Running with scissors, inspiration is EVERYWHERE

I tried to get some photos of the squirrels chasing each other around the front yard and the few birds that were at the feeders outside my window this morning but I didn't have any luck so I returned to the worktable where I "found" scissors, tape and a couple of photos of different crazy quilt Christmas stockings that I had made years ago. I know you can make a collage on the computer but it was a lot more fun to cut them up and combine them into one image by hand.

I'm listening to a bit of music and deciding where to start next. Living in such a small space means that EVERYTHING is handy and inspiration is EVERYWHERE which as you can imagine is both good and bad but always fun.

More sorting, rearranging and card making

 Still sorting things out and getting ready to do a bit of ironing as well. It's hard to imagine that there's actually a dining room under all of this and that I'm hoping to find it before I have company coming in on Saturday.

 I rearranged some scrapbooks and trimmed up a lot of things to be put away.

 I wasn't sure what to do with this photo so I decided to make a card out of it. Look how much difference it makes whether or not I draw a border around it.

I'll probably us this to answer some of tomorrow's mail.

Staying Cool

I've been staying indoors where it's cool during the recent hot weather and was really excited to see the blossoms open on the little orange tree in my dining room. It seems that even when I'm not out in the garden I've always got something to do with plants and flowers.
Being indoors gave me a bit of time to scrapbook about the drawing that I did on Tuesday and all of the things I've been making with it since then.
I'm feeling like painting and have a few ideas in mind so there should be new work and photos soon. There seems to be a bit of time and process involved between the idea in my head, the feeling in my heart and the way it shoots out of my fingers. I wish I could share a real sense of the experience for you. It's a very special place in space and time that consumes everything else. When people say I get carried away-they're right.

Scan, Scan,Scan

After that last lovely day outside I got busy indoors and rounded up 22 scrapbooks of my work and have spent most of the last few days at the scanner getting everything into the computer. As you can imagine I'm rally looking forward to sitting down with my watercolors tomorrow. It will be nice to be painting again. Looking over so much of my old work has given my a few ideas for subjects I want to pursue in the future.

Sunflower Blue

I love the idea of this card but am not real happy with my pencil drawing on the border. The colors were right for the photo but the drawing needs to be more of an extension of the image on the photo. Still, I think it was a great project and a lot of fun to put together. I hope it inspires you to pick up a pencil too.

The Last Cards of the Year

Time was getting away from me so instead of painting each and every one of my cards, I printed photos of my card designs and made cards out of those then added pencil drawings to the corners of the envelopes to make them a bit more special.

Asiatic Lilies in pencil, pen and ink

While sorting through things I came across this in a scrapbook from a few years ago. I started with the pen and ink drawing and then drew the same flowers in colored pencil to frame it on the page. It was so much fun that I made a second page for the next drawing and a photo of the project. It never occurred to me at the time that I may want those drawings for something someday. They're firmly glued in with other work stuck to the back sides of them. Oh well, If I want drawings of Asiatic lilies I guess I'd better go, buy some and find out if I can still draw...keep checking here and I'll post it if I do any.