Etsy love

Detail from 'Zebra River', painting by LeiLiLaLoo

I recently purchased some items from the Etsy shop 'LeiLiLaLoo'. I have been following the blog 'LeiLiLaLoo' for some time now and I adore the creations of the blog/shop owner Dana. I purchased the painting 'Zebra River' and the pillow 'Tiara, girl who does the fire dance'..The items arrived a few days ago and I am so happy to have them! The items are of such fabulous quality, Dana really is such a talented artist/maker. The shop 'LeiLiLaLoo' is now stocked with new works and worth a peek. I can't wait until I can purchase my next painting, I have my eye on this lovely painting.

September news

This past week I have been super lucky to have been mentioned on the beautiful design and lifestyle blog by British blogger Kerry called 'The seventy tree',  thanks so much Kerry!

I am also participating in an art swap with the talented artist Vesna of 'My cherry tree' she is having my 'listen to the birds' print and I am receiving  one of her beautiful bird broaches.. I'm so excited! I love doing art swaps! If anyone else out there fancies doing an art swap then you can email me via my website contact page.

So I am smiling from ear to ear at the moment, although I am exhausted from my new job, getting by on caffeine only tonight! It's a beautiful autumn day here in Bristol, and today I have been admiring all the colours of nature. I am so fortunate that even though I live right in the city I work in a rural location and get to spend time in beautiful gardens and even on a farm (I dug up carrots in the vegetable field today with the children)! I plan to take some photographs of the sights at my place of work and I will share them with you when I do. I am so inspired by the colour combinations that I see in nature, today one of my favorite combination's was a gray blue sky and deep red leaves..

I hope all is well out there, have a good evening all, I'm off to make an apple cake, YUM!

Sew far sew good

Please excuse the terrible heading I just couldn't help myself! So today I finally got the sewing machine out, set it up on the dining room table and got to work trying to remember how to thread it....It wasn't happening so I searched you YouTube for some helpful videos and I found this video helpful. Sewing machine threaded I got to work trying to sew a straight line, the first few attempts were pretty shocking but after a few attempts I got an okay (ish) straight line. I have a lot to learn though, it's going to be my winter project I think, to get to grips with my sewing machine!! Any hints, tips, or advice are very welcome! I'd love to incorporate some sewing into my artwork. I love the aesthetic of paper with stitching combined with other medias. Has anyone else out there got this sewing machine? I don't have a manual for it which is a shame, and have no idea about tensions/stitch lengths and things like that. So any info would be much appreciated. Okay well good evening all, I will leave you will some photographs taken today..

First attempt!!!

After a few more goes it was looking much better..! I'm thinking I might make some bunting for my first sewing project, must be pretty simple right?! Watch this space!

Inspiration - Walk in the woods

I went for a walk in one of our local woodlands and took my boyfriends new camera to play with. I'd forgotten how much fun it is to walk with a camera, you see everything differently with a camera in hand. It was a sunny day and the sunlight was streaming through gaps between leaves and branches, looking up there really were some beautiful sights. So many shades of green and so many different shapes. I spent most of the time on the walk looking up at the trees and narrowly avoiding mountain bikers, lots of fun though!

These images would be a great starting point for patterns..I am particularly fond of the 2nd image, it feels softer than the rest and I love the mint green colour that has come from the sunlight behind the leaves.

I hope everyone's having a fun weekend, I have day of art and experimenting with my sewing machine ahead of me..perfect!

Some more Etsy treasury love

I have been spoilt rotten lately, I have been included in three fabulous treasury's, the third of which I want to tell you about now. This treasury is titled birds of a feather and was created by the brilliant Tera of olive hue designs. Tera has a great blog titled olive hue designs and three Etsy shops. Olive hue designs which stocks art,digital prints and designs, and Olive hue 2 which stocks jewelery, a more recent venture is an Etsy shop called Alice's secrets where she sells blog/web banners and other art work. One of my favourite creations of Tera's is this Bunny hugs banner and avatar that is for sale in her Secret Alice shop..So go and view her blog and these great shops!

Tera included my Yellow Bird print in this treasury, you can still buy this print from my Etsy shop, click here to view.

I must say that I am in love with the majority of the items in this treasury. Which probably comes as no surprise to those of you who read this blog regularly! I particularly like the clay birds by redhotpottery, very nice!

An explanation

Hey all!  Right, I feel I  owe you all an explanation as to where my daily drawings have gone, the thing is that the past few weeks life has been hectic (and it looks to carry on this way), and try as I might I just can't keep up the daily drawings, at least not  at a standard that I feel happy with. I've posted a few daily drawings that I felt unhappy with and well I just don't want do that. So for the time being I won't be posting the daily drawings, I shall return to just posting art work as and when.. I feel better now for explaining myself to you all!

Something I have been doing recently is painting, I have started my first painting in a few years and am really enjoying the process of working with paint on canvas. I'm also enjoying being able to work on it each day, building the image up slowly. It's so much fun!
For now here's a snippet from my art space, I will be posting images of new work soon. I hope you are all well out there, have a good week :-)

Inspiration post - Charlotte Hardy

I have been thinking about writing some inspiration posts for quite some time now. I often come across artists or take photographs that I would love to share with you. So today I would like to share with you an artist/illustrator that I have recently come across called Charlotte Hardy. I first spotted this image on a card, I was drawn to the colour palette as turquoise and neon pink are faves of mine, also I have a bit of a thing for chairs at the moment.

Bedroom Chair

So I purchased the card and came home to do some research. Charlotte Hardy is a British artist who works with silkscreen printing, acrylic, inks, oils and mixed media. She has a beautiful website which you can view here.

Cherry Blossom

Chandelier

Midwinter Coffee pot

Etsy treasury love!

I am so in love with Etsy treasury's! Its so exciting to see the collections that people have put together..Not to mention a great way to find new shops to adore! As I've said on here before there is just so much talent out there, it's unbelievable really, all those people working there 9-5's then getting home and crafting until the late hours. I am very happy to find out that I have been included in another treasury! This treasury was created by Penelope Reichley of il gatto selvatico, whose shop I happen to be amazed by, check out this embroidered necklace, how cool is this? She has also created one in the shape of the United Kingdom which I have to mention, it would be rude not to really! Penelope also creates earrings, bags and scarfs..all worth a view.

Here is the Treasury that she has created featuring my singer sewing machine print:

You can view my singer sewing machine print in my Etsy shop, or click here.

Day 31

Another quick sketch with pencils and water colour pencils. These passion fruit flowers were growing in my front garden and I picked a few to sketch today. I remember the first time I saw these flowers, I was walking home from school in wales and saw them in someones garden. I thought they were so amazingly beautiful! I went home and tried to describe them to my mum...I was too scared to pick one (as that would of been a naughty thing to do)!

Day 30

Day 30..... During a walk near a stream in an apple orchard (with sheep, how idyllic)!? I came upon some oak trees and stole some leaves to sketch. Here are two quick sketches with colour done with watercolour pencils.

A very late day 29! OOOPS!

Hey all! Well it has been a whole 10 day since my last post which also means I'm 10 days behind on my daily drawings...A big oops there then! I intend to catch up, life has been very busy! I've been spending a lot of time back 'home' in Devon visiting friends and family. I also started a new job at Steiner Waldorf school, and I can happily say that this seems to be the first job I've had since University that I am really enjoying..I love the school, the staff, the pupils and the environment. Also having only experienced mainstream schools before I am really impressed and very interested in Steiner education and looking forward to learning more. So happy happy me!
I have also been to a wedding and some birthday parties in the last week, mix all this up and I haven't had time to draw! I have however collected some things to draw in the past week, the first image being of a pebble with a hole in it, collected on Branscombe Beach in Devon.

Hmmm sort of looks like a gray doughnut?! I hope everyone is well, even though I've been quiet over here I have still had time to read your blogs over coffee in the early morning. I love you creative bloggers, it's always inspiring to see what you've been up to!

Bye for now!