Another "Candle"

In Progress 

This is supposed to end up as a GreenMan. These are the steps of development. After the first day's work, I saw the eyes were too low, so took them out and repositioned them. More to follow.

Creative Goings-on

Some homeschool friends of ours had been studying the Middle Ages and invited us to a medieval party they hosted.  It was a costume party, and probably the first time my kids have ever been to anything requiring costumes.  We spent a day in a frenzy of costume construction and as a result we had two honorable knights, Merlin (ah, a very young Merlin), a beautiful princess, and the court jester.  The party was great fun with food specific to the time (no forks!), archery, knife throwing, jousting, and general merriment.  

Right after that, I jumped into this project that had been awaiting my input--

My Mom and I planned this joint project as a 70th birthday gift for a special aunt in our family.  Mom did all the lovely painting, Dad made the rustic wood frame, and then they mailed it to me to add the lettering.  I had spacing problems, as usual (sigh), but it turned out pretty well.

I can't seem to find the photo of just the painting without the lettering, but here is a close-up of the lamp.

For "Card Making Day" on Saturday, my children made birthday cards for a friend.  (And I can't get the photos to be un-rotated no matter what I do!)  In the photo above, Andrew's is top, Evan's bottom.  I was struck by how carefully symmetrical Andrew made his.

 And I was amused when Evan drew a forklift on this inside of his.

Here is another case of photos annoying upside down and I cannot right them!  I wish Blogger would add an edit option for photos...  Anyway, these are two little mixed media pieces the boys did for the fair.  The background is a piece of canvas panel with tape resist paint, and then they glued corrugated cardboard and torn bits of crepe for trees.  

I, myself, have done very little art lately, but I do have a few little sketchbook things I can show in later post, as this one is getting long enough for today.  More later!

One Haiku and a Throwback Zentangle

Moving - Haiku

'Tween work and homework

We pack and shuffle our stuff

Over the river

We have been beyond busy this week, so I'm just giving you a short poem I made (see haiku above), and a throwback picture of a digital "zentangle" doodle I did at least a year ago on my phone, when I was first getting interested in the stuff. It's a totally random drawing -- I have no idea what that big swirly tentacle-like thing is in the top left corner. Haha!

I seriously need to find a way to squeeze in some chill time. I feel like I'm just constantly go, go, going, and it's really wearing on me. I'm actually surprised I haven't gotten sick already (maybe I will now that I said something, haha!), but then sometimes I'm surprised by how much I can take above what I thought I could handle... Doesn't help if I push myself too hard and over-estimate my abilities, though. I'm only human; humans need to rest once in a while.

ACTUALLY, I just remembered I read a book. A whole book. I shirked my to-do list for a few hours several days ago, and just sat there with a mug of tea and a book; and I finished the whole book. It was quite relaxing. I felt like a proper old maid, laughing over the pages with a cat sleeping on the couch nearby, haha.

Maybe I should make a haiku about reading, too. Or maybe YOU would like to give it a try? :D

Second "Candle"

Paper Clay

"Candle"

Seasonal Project 

This is in progress. They are practice pieces.

Make a Card, Send a Card

Remember 

National Card Day. We went to the annual craft expo in Zurich today. Fun. Lots of inspiration. I got a new stamp, you see.

Watercolor 90

Water

Watercolors 88 and 89

Landscape

Face

Notes

For Your Information

If anybody under 16 years old is interested, there is an international children's art contest every year sponsored by Pentel. Everybody gets at least a pen, and some get other Pentel products. It is worth checking out. Dead line for us was always end of October.

Also, I hear October 7 is International Card Making Day..... yes, really. Shall we all make a card? And send it to somebody.

No time for art today, but some thinking is happening.

Pastels and Perspectives

From Leah

So here's what I'm working on in Pastel class at school. It's very fun and messy! I have oil pastels that I've never used, but these are chalk and I was told there's quite a difference in them for sure. I want to be able to at least get a feel for pastels in particular, before I try my oil pastels. This is pretty fun and going pretty well though! Much work to be done on it yet and I can't wait to see my finished work!

From Sarah

I thought I'd share some of my photography homework with you today.

Last week's assignment was Forced Perspective. Making people look at my photographs twice because they are not always what they seem, and setting up nonsense that could be realistic at first glance was fun and kind of Alice-in-Wonderland-vibey, which was relaxing and slightly unsettling at the same time. I should remember to try this style/technique for taking pictures more often, as it causes me to look at things a little differently than I am used to and is both challenging and refreshing.

When you are trying to make something look bigger than it actually is,it is hard to get the focus to balance between the far and the near objects, and the lighting gets a little tricky.

This one was my favorite. I'm going to call it the Reading Corner haha!

This week's assignment is Leading Lines. Lines are really not so hard to find for use in compositions -- it's just a matter of seeing at what angle or perspective I should place myself in relation to the subject/mood of the photograph. This type of photography is also pretty relaxing to me; with crisp or soft horizontals or verticals it is like tidying up, and with S-curves or diagnals it is like adding a cherry to the top of a piece. Again, I think my photography and way of looking at things could benefit by not forgetting to think about lines in setting up my shots.

 

I don't much like taking photos when there are people around, though, so I don't think I could ever do it professionally, unless it was like nature or product photography -- I wouldn't be able to do occasions or portraits, because I tend to get nervous and hurry up with my work when there are others watching me snap a picture, haha!