birthday wishes 42

Hi there! Today I have a few projects to share. I'm joining along with this week's PTI Make It Monday challenge where Lexi is challenging us to create a project using pattern play with die cut silhouettes. I made two similar cards featuring the beautiful PTI Life is Beautiful butterfly die along with fun papers from the Twig Wreath paper collection. The first card up is for my dear DIL April who is celebrating her 28th birthday today:

The next one is for my dear sister Marlene:

For sketch inspiration, I'm joining along with this week's Sketch Saturday challenge:

I've also been practicing painting Gary Jenkins style roses. This is oil on an 8" x 8" canvas panel:

I'm linking my painting to Paint Party Friday and 30 in 30 day 30:

Thanks so much for stopping by!
Be Sweet ;)

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special friend blend 26

Hi there! I hope you are having a great weekend! I've had a creative kind of day. First up is a card that I made for my sweet sister Tina. We enjoy drinking Orange Spice ice tea together when she comes over to visit so I pulled out the PTI Tea for Two stamp set and created a card for her :)

I recently purchased a few PTI ink pads including Autumn Rose which I used to stamp the tea pot with and I'm really disappointed because the image is not real crisp. What's up with that?! I've contacted customer service and I'm hoping to get some sort of response. Tina will surely appreciate the card regardless ;)

For card sketch inspiration, I'm joining along with the current Freshly Made Sketches sketch challenge:

It's Day 9 of 30 in 30:

I was in the mood to paint roses so I pulled out one of Gary Jenkins The Beauty of Oil Painting books and followed along with the Tea Rose tutorial. Since I haven't practiced painting roses in awhile, I first painted on an 8" x 8" linen canvas board:

the roses seemed to grow as I painted and the canvas became very full in no time!

I was brave and gave it another try on a 16" x 20" linen canvas. NO two paintings are ever the same (at least not for me)! There are so many that I've done in the past that I'm going to revisit and repaint on a larger size canvas to hang in my home. 

I'm linking my paintings to this week's Paint Party Friday site:

Thanks so much for stopping by ~ I hope you enjoy the rest of your weekend!
Be Sweet ;)

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Barnyard wood and roses 20

Hi there! I hope you had a great weekend! I had fun hanging out with my dear husband and sweet sister :) Today I have a 12" x 12" painting to share inspired by Gary Jenkins The Beauty of Oil Painting Barnyard Roses video and book tutorial. To begin, I followed along with Gary's book instructions on how to paint a barnyard wood like background using acrylic paints:

After I applied several layers of paint and had achieved the look I was going for, I was able to move on and paint the roses and foliage:

I learned a lot along the way while painting this piece and can't wait to give it another try on a large 20" x 20" or 24" x 24" canvas to hang in my home:

I'm sharing this painting on the Paint Party Friday site:

Many thanks for stopping by ~ I hope you have a great day!
Be Sweet ;)

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an update, a blossom and bookpages 29

Hi there! First things first...Thank you all so very much for keeping my family in your thoughts and prayers. I feel so blessed to have an extended family here in blogosphere :)  My sister is the bravest women I know and has the most positive outlook on life at the moment. To bring you up to date, she is terminally ill with advanced stage metastatic breast cancer which has traveled to her brain. She has had brain surgery a few weeks ago to debulk one large tumor and the other is inoperable. To weeks post op, the MRI revealed that the cancer is continuing to grow. She has opted for 14 days of full brain radiation. I can't even put into words how heart wrenching it was to have a conversation with her regarding hospice and end of life decisions. She is quite the trooper and my shero :) My other sweet sister has been spending the last week with her, taking her to her daily radiation treatments. 

Today I have a mixed media painting to share! I was inspired to join along with the July  Creative Cart Blanche challenge where the theme is to combine blossoms and bookpages. This is my first time combining mixed media with oil paint and I am lovin' the results! I carefully tore out several pages from an old oversized dictionary that my sister gifted me that she purchased from a thrift store and proceeded to collage them on a 12" x 12" MDF board. After collaging them in place, I washed with gesso to create a surface for oil paints.

I only painted one LARGE poppy blossom as I followed along with one of my favorite artists - Gary Jenkins. I'm hoping the sweet ladies at Creative Cart Blanche won't mind that I bent the requirements... 

 You can still see the print from the bookpages peeking through the transparent layers:

I have to play around with the mixed media and oil paint technique. I'm not sure but I don't think the turpenoid likes the matte medium that I used to adhere the bookpages unless it's paper towel pillings that remained on the surface after wiping off the thin layer of linseed oil that was applied prior to painting the blossom. Trial and lots of errors will surely help me find what works and what doesn't ;) It's all a learning process and I'm loving the journey ;)

As I mentioned at the beginning of my post, I'm joining along with the July Creative Carte Blanche challenge, Blossoms and Bookpages

as well as linking up to the current Paint Party Friday post:

Thanks so much for visiting and don't forget to get your mammogram!
Be Sweet ;)

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Peach Parfait Roses 33

Hi! I hope you're having a great week so far! Today I switched paintbrush strokes and painted a few roses on an 11" x 14" canvas panel inspired by a lesson in The Beauty of Oil Painting book by Gary Jenkins. I'm not really thrilled with how the roses turned out but at some point, one must move on. Gary always reminds his students that one will probably have to paint at least 400 hundred roses to get the hang of the strokes! I'm two closer to my goal ;)

99.9 % of my paintings are "alla prima" style meaning (at first attempt) a wet on wet technique.

For color inspiration, I joined along with this week's ColourQ color challenge:

I'm joining along with this week's Paint Party Friday site:

Thanks so much stopping by!
Be Sweet ;)

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