Ultimate Valentine

Ultimate Valentine

by julia_art

Well, here it is again. Each day I add a few more products to it and am amazed at how well this image works on any size and shape.

I did this oil painting over 20 years ago and it's brought a lot of pleasure to people in the last couple of decades.

Art can add a lot to your life in unexpected ways.

When I was a little girl all I wanted to be was a Dixie cup and Kleenex box. To brighten up life a bit and come in handy whenever needed. I never appeared on those products but I'm on thousands of other products that do the same thing.

Your dreams can come true in unexpected ways. Almost anyone can do this, it's always worth a try. You may be surprised at the results.

Iris Garden Electronics Accesories

Iris Garden Gel Mouse Pad

by julia_art

You may remember  this design from a painting I did quite a few years ago. It's been fun to use this detail view of it in so many ways. I'd worked on that painting in my garden off and on for fifteen years. Now I get the chance to take it to the next level and see just how far I can push the image.

Iris Garden Power Bank

by julia_art

I've used it here as a repeat pattern.

Iris Garden USB Charging Station
by julia_art

Iris Garden Power Bank
by julia_art

Iris Garden Mouse Pad
by julia_art
I think this will brighten up any office, don't you?

Iris Garden Wireless Mouse
by julia_art

Designing with the Iris Painting

This time I've got to say that I can't decide which was more fun. Painting the picture or seeing what I can do with it afterward.

I started by making stickers to keep my letter writing interesting and entertain myself and my friends.

Next I discovered that you can make anything into an all over print on a bag on Zazzle so I had to give that a try and I've got to say that I was really impressed with the quality and the value on that.

I'm headed back there now to see how some of my other paintings look on them.

Yes, the possibilities really are endless!

Design update

I've been going through my stores on Zazzle and eliminating hundreds of products trying to make things easier to find and quicker to sort through.
The new products that excite me right now are scarves and lunchboxes. It will be interesting to see how some of my drawings and paintings look on them.
I'm eliminating a lot of my old images and getting lots of ideas for new ones.
I'm so excited about today's projects that I've got to stop writing about them and get back to doing them.
Stop by soon and take a look  Zazzle  .

Everyone brought cheese and repaired the faucet at the Halloween Tea

Sometimes you just have to laugh at life and all of the plans we make. My company arrived just as I was getting the food laid out on the table and they dropped a hostess gift, a computer project,4 kinds of cheese, muffins and yogurt in the middle of it which of course changed things a lot. I never got the chance to set the salad out and in the middle of the mayhem (three different deliveries and a phone call) and I discovered that the shrimp ring hadn't been thawed.
Ordinarily this would not be a problem, you can thaw it in minutes under running water but there hasn't been any running water in the kitchen for over a week while we were waiting for parts to repair the faucet unless you count the 2 inches of water shooting EVERYWHERE  and rolling down the basement stairs when the shut off valve under the sink gave out. (more about that on Doug's blog). The good news is the parts arrived, the bad news is that he installed them DURING THE PARTY.
Anyway, there were suddenly 5 kinds of cheese and a computer project(which of course is another story) in the middle of the table for the salami taste test. (same brand but one package of lite and one reduced sodium) It was interesting to compare the numbers and most preferred the lite and there was also the question of  whether or not to cancel our pie taste test ( one regular and one diabetic friendly version) after the muffins and having spent our morning baking.
The crackers (for those of us who still eat them) were a number of different choices and I was surprised to find that my favorite was Blue Diamond Natural Almond Nut Thins which are a nut and rice cracker snack.
the calorie count per serving was the same as Back to Nature Spinach and Roasted Garlic Crackers but you only get 6 of the wheat crackers per serving as opposed to 16 of the rice ones. I don't know about you but if I'm trying to diet a larger portion is going to help me feel like I'm eating more and being deprived less so I was excited about that as well as the fact that they are gluten free which is important to a lot of people these days too.
What does any of this have to do with gardening or painting?... which of course are the main subjects of this blog. Actually a couple of things, if the weather had been better we'd have headed to the garden to pick rose hips to make tea with (you can use fresh ones, chopped and boiled) and now that the party is over I get my work table back and have and least 3 painting projects I'll be working on.
What's next? Follow the blog and find out. There's always something going on around here and generally lots of things at once. Thanks for stopping by to visit with me, come again soon.
The big excitement for me right now is that I just discovered that Zazzle is going to do wrapping paper and I can't wait to see some of my designs on it!!!

Playing with color

Here's where I started:

1. I got the card as a gift (part of a set of note cards)
2. I looked at the card and attempted to paint the design
3. I scanned the finished butterfly into the computer
4. I made as many different color variations as I could with the computer to try in the future when creating my own patterns.

More fun with art and computers

Encouraging news

I spent most of today crocheting an  granny square afghan for the veterans home and was thinking about all of the things I give away, the state of my finances and what I "ought" to be doing with my time when an e-mail popped in to let me know I sold some sheets of postage stamps with my daisy drawings on them. Finally, a bit of money coming in so I took a couple of hours to design some more and went back to my crocheting.
What is it about most creative people that makes the simple act of making some money to pay bills so difficult? Are our brains really wired all that differently from "normal" people with jobs? It's a question I'm giving a lot of thought these days. How about you?

Iris Horse

I continue to experiment with what is or isn't a traditional Dala Horse. This is my third attempt to design something interesting with Iris.  Each time I try different combinations of background colors and sizes or placement of the flowers.

What I love about the new design

The first horse went so well and I was having so much fun with the idea that I thought I'd try another one with fewer, larger eggs to see how many other designs I could come up with.

Catalog clippings inspire Dala horse designs

These clippings were designs on dishes in a cooking catalog. Pasting them up like this helps me keep track of the sorts of designs I hope to pursue in the future and shows me what I was planning to do with them.

When I've got time I'll begin by tracing the shape of the horse on to another sheet of paper and beginning to draw or paint some of the designs from the clippings in the actual shapes, sizes and locations that I would want them to be when painted on the wooden horses.

In the meantime I'll pack them away and move back to the other projects in progress here.

Pushing the design into another project

The Easter design on this painting worked out so well I couldn't resist trying it in other ways and different surfaces.

Those of you that follow this blog won't be surprised to find me trying this on a dala horse. The shape always appeals to me and I can't resist trying different designs to see what will and won't work on them. This time I'm starting with a dark background like I used on the football design. It always looks great peeking through the grass at the end of the project.

Setting Goals for spring designs

I had started a background for a landscape sometime last year and thought it might be a good start for my Easter egg hunt painting.

I'm a bit rusty with my sky and cloud technique but can rework areas of that later if it needs it.  I doubt people will notice it much after I get the wild designs and florals painted on the eggs anyway.

The basic goals of this painting are:
1. increase my sales on Zazzle
2. use this canvas panel in a good way
3. practice painting flowers and other designs
4. hang the painting at the senior center as part of the march decorations
5. sell the painting when everyone is finished with it
6. use the cash to buy art supplies for a "real" painting (the things I love to do but don't sell)

Blue Horse in progress

Carving and sanding

Yes, I'm back to work on the dala horses. Up until now I'd been hand sanding everything but I'm having more and more trouble with my hands these days so I invested a few dollars in a rotary sander. It will save some wear and tear on my hands and the sale of just a couple of horses will pay for it.

Well, I'd better get back to work and I should have posts of some of the designs I'm painting on them soon.

My projects have projects

After I finished with the mail yesterday I finished crocheting the scarf I was working on and started another one, packed those up for crochet group and then I started a crochet hat and packed that up too. My favorite hat pattern only requires counting for the first 4 rows so I find it easier to do that part at home so that I don't make mistakes or get distracted while talking to everyone  at group.

A friend sent me more card making supplies today and I spent a couple of hours on those and now I'm headed to Zazzle for finish designing a few products I've got in progress there.

After that I'm putting together information for a freelance writing job at a local newspaper.

Between all of this my husband and I scanned photos for a local group and put the actual photos in an album before moving on to making a computer CD. We may even take it a step further and make a collage and video so that they can access their event in any way that they want to in the future.

As I always say "my projects have projects" and that's just the way I like it.

Design Day

Zazzle is running a sale on iphone cases today so I'm off to design some of those before heading to the worktable and lots of other projects.

Timeshare, multi-purpose rooms

I was ready to settle in at the worktable and get back to work on those horses but my husband is working on one of the computers and needed the space to spread everything out while he made the repairs and replaced the light for the screen.

While that's going on I threw a load of laundry in the washing machine and headed back to work at the computer in the living room/office.

The lemon tree next to my desk is pretty sad, there are only three leaves left on it so I'll try to find a sunnier window for it and hope it survives until I can put it on the front step this summer. That always seems to help and I someday if I'm lucky I'll actually have fresh lemons growing here. I think it would really cheer the place up a lot.

In the meantime I'll head back to work designing those ipad covers and will post again, later.

Between Projects

The time/space between projects is interesting because aside from the boring things like cleaning up, assessing damage and deciding where to start next, there are plans, dreams and ideas that propel you into the next project.

I was a bit disappointed with this years effort at a new valentine design so I reworked a few areas, forgave myself and moved on.

The knitting themed horse was fun and easy. The reason that both sides are so completely different was that I couldn't decide whether to show the yarn loose or wound into a tight ball. Now that I've completed it and set it aside I've decided that the best design will be somewhere in between so I'm sanding another horse and may try again with a different assortment of colors.

I managed to get the dishes done and can see my kitchen counter again, laundry was boring but is all caught up and as I continue to clean house I'm trying to decide which of the 4 or 5 projects on my worktable to do next.

In between all of that I came up with a few exciting ideas on Zazzle. I'm the only person I know of who's stores are full of things I've actually made myself:

1.paintings
2.drawings
3.patchwork
4.quilting
5.embroidery
6.photography
7.crochet
8.mixed media

What excites me now is the idea that I can take all of these things and make them into lots of other kinds of things.

The creativity just keeps coming and the work seems to have a life of it's own that will go on long after I'm gone. It just doesn't get better than that.

Still Snowing

I moved the rest of the baby items out of our main store and into the new Mom and baby store http://www.zazzle.com/baby_art*     so I was ready to take a break and thought I'd shoot pictures of how much more snow we've gotten while I was working.

Time for lunch and a bit of housework before I start clearing the worktable so that I can get some painting done. I'll start on that sewing themed dala horse first.