Art in your mailbox

I only have one lily like this so I wanted to enjoy and share it as much as I could while it lasted.

I started with a small pencil sketch in the corner of an envelope.

Project updates

It was nice to get the lily painting finished and hung. After that I relaxed a while and crocheted this hat which will be donated to a charity this week. The crochet group that I belong to sends things to different charities several times a year so I'm starting another hat that I hope to finish in time to go in this batch.

Once I get that started I'll get back to work on the pencil drawing that I started yesterday.

I'm SOOOO happy to have new pencils again!!!

Of course the projects that I work on this afternoon will depend on the mail. I always stop whatever I'm doing for that and it will often dictate the sort of projects I'll do for the rest of the day.

Scrap paper, magazine clippings and photo Greeting Cards

Here are a few cards I made while cleaning off the worktable today. 2 were from some magazine clippings that arrived in todays mail and the third is a photo of one of  the art projects that I did recently.

The other fun thing about this project is that it included some bits of  card stock that was given to me by another friend and they'll be mailed out in envelopes recievd in the mail from another friend.

When I write back to these gals they love to see what I've done with the things they've sent.

All of the colored cards are lined with white paper to write on.

Lots of projects, places and things

Besides the cats you saw on the mail this week I designed several more elaborate ones to go on products at Zazzle and spent a LOT of time designing things with them there.

Back at the worktable there is always mail and a lot of the drawings don't get scanned before I send them out. Letters went to Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa and Florida.

As I was finishing with the cats I grabbed a canvas panel and sketched out an arrangement of them much the way I've done with horses and butterflies in the past so that I can fill in each shape with things I like to paint and things I'm teaching myself to paint. I get a lot of practice with various brush strokes and designs and the paintings are always nice enough for gifts or sale. Yes, it's always a win, win situation no matter how they turn out.

This morning I'll start with Zazzle and hope that my sales improve there.

Design Practice with Watercolor Brush Markers

Watercolor note cards are a great way to get some practice, play a bit and share the fun with the people that you write to. Here's the card.

Here's the envelope. I always like to paint a little something in the lower left corner of the envelope to dress that up too and keep the mail interesting.

Learning Polish Folk Art from "junk" mail

I get a few cooking catalogs which as you can imagine is kind of funny considering the fact that I hate to cook and rarely venture into the kitchen (always with disastrous results, but that's another story). Anyway, as I was saying "I get a few cooking catalogs" and love to look at the pottery and china patterns so I began to clip them out and practice drawing and painting some of the patterns on some of my letters and pictures or wooden items I'd been working on.

Yes, I always recycle everything afterwards. The catalogs go in the recycle bin and the pictures I've clipped go into letters and my sketchbooks where they're enjoyed by a number of people in different ways and lead to other projects.

This is going to be fun!

I started trying a few of the designs in colored pencil and will be using this to write a letter on to share my little art project with an elderly aunt. I think you'll find that mail like this makes almost anyone happy and each time I do it I learn a bit more about the designs I'm using so it does us both good.

Everyone wins, one thing leads to another

I forgot that the white paper wouldn't show up on this background. As long as I'd scanned that catalog clipping to show you what I've got planned for the garden this year. I thought I'd put it in the corner of a page and make a couple of copies for letter paper to write to a couple of Aunts that like to hear about our garden. The fun will continue as I draw a a few strawberries around the page to make it a bit prettier. Doing drawings on 2 different pages will give me a bit of practice and a chance to try various pencils and pens because they love to see that too. Everyone wins, they get fun mail, I get practice drawing and you get to read about it.

If the drawings turn out well I can scan those and use them in other ways too. One thing really does lead to another.

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.

Carried away again

I had so much fun making that last card that I just kept making all sorts of other cards out of everything else I found but all I've got to show for it is a stack of outgoing mail. I'm not even quite sure how many letters I wrote but I've got to thank my friend Bernice for the fun package of rubber stamps, cards, envelopes and papers that she added to the mix today.

Yes, it's been hours and things are no better organized than when I started but I think a lot of us will enjoy my efforts anyway, don't you?

Recycling fun with and for my friends

Everyone knows how much I love my mail (both creating it and receiving it) so today's project will be something that we all enjoy.

Thank you's go out to Margaret for the great desk calendar. I was enjoying it so much that I just couldn't bear to toss the pages when I'd finished with them so I'm recycling them into note cards with the help of blank cards, card stock and envelopes given to me by Colleen and scrap booking paper scraps given to me by Mary and Sharon.

Thanks everyone! This will be a project that will make people happy at the mailbox all year long. With all the bad news we're getting these days it will be nice to have a little fun to go with it.

I plan to make some cute stickers with some of my drawings and paintings on them to make the envelopes bright and interesting too...or I may just grab my colored pencils (Thanks to Irene and Esther and Colleen) for some of those) and just draw directly on the envelopes. Either way they always make the mail carriers and the people getting the letters smile.

Surprise packages

Just as I was in the middle of making a batch of cards to answer my mail and get started on Christmas a package of my newest designs arrived from Zazzle. My work is improving and I've got plenty of things to send out for the season.

That being the case I may pack up the card making supplies and use that table to start on the slipcover I want to make for one of our kitchen chairs so that it can be used in the living room.

Of course there are so many projects going on here that it's anyone's guess which one will hit the table first.

The other wonderful package that arrived today was a box of wrapped Christmas presents from a friend. They're the only things under my tree this year so whatever they turn out to be they've already brightened the season and improved my mood.

I'm so grateful to everyone that's helped us through the years, the art couldn't happen without them.

Thanks again to all of my "art angels"

Real Life, Coupons and Song Lyrics

It's cold, wet and gray outdoors but sanding those wooden horses indoors wasn't much more cheerful until we had a few errands to run and were lucky enough to find 2 of the items we needed on sale and we had a coupon for 2.00 off on top of that.
We thought that was pretty nice but imagine our surprise when we opened on of the products and found even more coupons inside for products that we like to buy.
I'd have called it a good day at that point but then the mail came and a friend that knows my husband likes to bake pies sent a new recipe along with coupons for some of the ingredients needed.
People do amazing things everyday and I think that we can get so caught up with our own problems that we don't always notice or appreciate them the way that we should...Who knows? Maybe the radio is right and it really is "the most wonderful time of the year"

No photos but lots of interesting things

I'll bet you've been wondering what's going on around here the last few days. I'm at that interesting point between projects. The painted horses were well received and and I've been busy trying to teach myself how to teach bulldogs for a mailbox I'll be doing for a family member. Somehow in all of the decades I've been painting I've never really gotten around to doing animals so this will be quite a challenge. I'm starting with some internet research and looking at pictures so there's not anything on paper or canvas to show you yet.
There's also a lot of cleaning, sorting and rearranging going on around here to make way for this next project. There's one bag waiting to be donated to the thrift store this week and there will probably be more before I get back to drawing and painting.
Along with this as always I'm still designing a lot of products with previous artwork on them. My current favorite thing to do is make matching cards,postage stamps and stickers to allow everyone to send out great mail. I'm hoping to make the world happier a card at a time.
Yes, I realize how crazy that sounds but it's lots of fun and makes a lot of us smile through the hard times. That's enough to make me happy whether they sell or not.

Making something out of the mess

 This first design was made from bits of photos on my worktable along with some colored paper and marker. Yes, I plan to use it to write letters on but I'm sure there are lots of other possibilities as well.

This page was more fun. I cut up my colored pencil horse designs and added them to a picture of a chair I'd painted over a decade ago that also had horses on it. Of course at that point I couldn't resist adding more colored pencil to pull the whole thing together and finish it off with a bit or marker to outline some areas.

Step 4 on mailbox project

Step 4. Begin priming and base coating the shapes in your design.

IMPORTANT NOTE: Be sure you're using all EXTERIOR products on this, check labels to be sure the one's you've chosen are suitable for application to metal.

REASON FOR THIS: We want all of our hard work to last as long as possible. For many of us this will be as close as we get to exhibiting our art to the public so let's make the most of it.

Indoors and out

Well, I went as far as I could go with those bags and packed away the ones in progress when I ran out of straps and lining fabric. I'll pick up with them the next time I get supplies.

As you can see I've gone back to the portrait I've been painting and made myself another cotton pot holder.

It's been kind of a dull but peaceful week  I wish I had something a bit more interesting for you to be reading just now but on the other hand, perhaps the fact that things are quiet and peaceful here is just the thing to divert your attention from your busy day and have a bit of a vacation with me.

The warmer weather has had the birds back in the garden and a few have even seemed to take up residence in some of the brightly painted bird houses out on the arbor. Clearly, they think it's spring in spite of the date on my calendar.

There are lots of nice garden catalogs in my mailbox these days and I begin to dream about the new season.

Every Last Scrap

 If this looks familiar, that's because it is. It's part of a piece from the last salt technique watercolor paintings that I did. There's also a lot of merchandise based on it in my zazzle store  http://www.zazzle.com/julia_art*  

 This card is made of scraps from several watercolor paintings and card stock mounted on a blank card.

 I thought about developing this piece into bunches of grapes and vines but decided to keep "playing" with it instead.

 Here are the results: That card is the one on the left of this photo.

Today's Watercolors

Yes, they're on cards and envelopes. I just LOVE mail, don't you?

A bit of fun in the mail to brighten your day

This card contains bits of a card from a friend, a photo of flowers from my garden, a picture from some note paper and a bit of pen, ink and pencil. We find it kind of fun to write back and forth and keep adding things until the cards (or art, depending on how you look at things) get too thick and heavy to drop into envelopes to mail. This one is starting to get pretty interesting...and it's an idea that you and your friends might enjoy too.

Mail and other projects

It's funny but with all of the other fresh flowers I have to work with I just kept thinking how much I missed growing sunflowers this year. No matter what else I tried it all came back to sunflowers so I'm painting this and reminding myself to buy plenty of seed for a border of them next year. It's a lot more fun than a privacy fence and the birds love it.





Meanwhile as I looked over the flowers and the photos of them that I shot, I decided to share the garden with an Aunt and Uncle so the little pencil drawing was on the corner of the envelope that I sent the letter and photos in. I didn't draw anything on the letter itself because I had a cute little garden themed folder to fill and write on. Yes, mail is my very favorite thing!