Butterfly And African Violets Painting Inspirations

Just yesterday I finished my Butterfly & African Violets painting. This piece was painted with acrylic paint on an ornate vintage ceiling tin.

Lots of my favorite color in this one......PURPLE!

The inspiration for this acrylic painting came from the 4 lovely African Violets I purchased a couple of weeks ago at one of my favorite nurseries. They always have a beautiful selection there, not just African Violets but just about everything. I'll be purchasing the Geraniums for my garden from them later this month and lots of Impatiens from them in the month of May.

Some of the inspirational African Violets in their new home by my Orchids and Maidenhair Fern.

My only delemma was which color plant to use in my ceiling tin painting. I finally settled on the purple and white ones though.......

This piece will be coming to my website and ETSY site www.artfulcreations.etsy.com soon. Enjoy the spring weather and try to look around for something that can inspire you everyday.

A Hydrangea Wreath In The Making - Part II

I've made quite a bit of progress on my Hydrangea wreath painting since I showed photos of it the last time. When I left off with my progress, the above was the last thing we saw.

I've made a lot more color decisions since then, including the colors of the Hydrangeas themselves. First though I had a lot of fun playing in some very wet paint, swirling and twirling colors all around, to create the multi-colored green background above. I love working with very wet paint and although it takes some time to dry, I like the results I get.

I also decided to use the blue shades I'm working with to fill in the spaces between the grapevine wreath. At this point though I've lost some of the wreath as it got painted over and also, I had wanted to define it and make it more bold.....which leads us onto the next photo to see some of the results........

Here I've reworked the grapevine wreath to make it pop out from the canvas. To do this I used a couple of different browns.

Here I've painted in a few of the leaves...again working with the paint very wet as I was enjoying the results. I've also decided on the color for my largest Hydrangea. It will be a beautiful blue, fully opened bloom. Here I've done some of the basecoating to lay the ground work for the rest of the bloom. My Hydrangeas are a bit time consuming to paint and I use quite a few colors on each one but again, I seem to like this process and most of all, the end result.

This shows the finished bloom...fully painted and detailed. Months ago as I was painting some Hydrangeas, I develped the method I like to use for them and realized it was a bit complicated for me to remember so I wrote everything that I did down, the colors, when I use them, where I use them etc... Now every time I want to paint Hydrangeas, no matter the colors, I always look at my notebook . I find keeping a notebook full of colors, ideas and techniques that I had a good experience with, really works well for me. Sometimes when you have a result that you are happy with you think you will remember how to do it the next time....this just isn't so, not for me anyway, that is why I've started writing things down.

I'm trying to be very diligent about taking photos of this paintings' progress so I'll be posting more as I go along.

Artful Pendants

I've started a new creative adventure that I'm having a tremendous amount of fun with, I'm creating glass art pendants from my paintings and photographs. I've also launched a new ETSY shop, Artful Pendants!

I have to say that making each pendant by hand is very therapeutic and relaxing. I'll be adding more and more pendants to my shop over time but for now, I feel I'm off to a good start.

All the pendants, whether they are photographs or paintings, are inspired by nature and therefore, I felt I had to do something quite special and "natural" when photographing them. I have to say, taking photos of them is almost as much fun as creating them.

Pendants are $7.50 a piece and I will always be running a buy 2 get one free offer. I hope you will visit my new ETSY shop and enjoy these new nature inspired pieces. http://www.artfulpendants.etsy.com/ .

Treetop Chickadee Vintage Ceiling Tin, Note Cards & A Blog Break

I finished my latest vintage Ceiling tin , Treetop Chickadee, it measures 12" x 12" and comes ready to hang on your wall with a hook on the back. When I first saw this antique tin, I really fell in love with it because it was so intricate in design and well, just plain different from anything I had purchased before, I knew I had to have it.

With the embossed design covering the whole of the tin, it was quite challenging to decide what exactly I should paint on this one that would compliment the tin design.

I mulled over several design choices in my head for a few days, really unsure what to do. If I decided on a complicated and intricate design, I ran the risk of making this tin look like a crowded expressway at rush hour. : )

More so then any other tin I've painted so far, my design had to be something that complimented and flowed with the lovely pattern already on the tin. As I sat and studied the tin, it occured to me that the tin pattern kind of reminded me of a treetop somewhere high in the sky, lots of vines and branches twisting around. Maybe this treetop was so high up that you couldn't see it, you could only imagine what it really looked like.

This is when I was able to finalize the design and settled on a little chickadee perched high up in a treetop. I created some flowers, leaves and vines to coordinate with the design already on the tin. I painted in some of the embossed areas of the tin, with light blue and light green, to give it a very whimsical and natural feel. This little guy is now available on my ETSY site and my website as well.

I've also started to create a line of note cards from my vintage tin images, the first two designs can be seen on my ETSY site @ http://www.artfulcreations.etsy.com/ . They are a set of 10 blank note cards, with 10 envelopes in each package.

Last but not least, I'm taking a blogging break for just a little while to embark on quite a big adventure.... I will be going with my friend and her family to visit the Grand Canyon and some lovely parks out west. I'm leaving this week and will return the week of Oct 9th, no doubt with tons of pictures to show you from my grand adventure. I will be away from my computer for the week but Chris will be here caring for the 3 Tzus while I'm gone and he will keep me posted on what is happening in the land of the internet . Until next time....

A Little Autumn Whimsy......

My latest vintage ceiling tin was created by request, for a very special reason but more on that in the month of Oct.

I was asked to create a piece that not only said "autumn" but had a touch of Halloween to it as well. I had a couple of ideas in mind for this piece but quickly narrowed it down once I knew the feeling the tin needed to convey. I really wanted this piece to be all about whimsy, hence the name "Autumn Whimsy" Anyway, with that in mind, I knew I had to use my little Chickadee friend and this time, I decided that he should be perched on a lovely orange pumpkin. For a pinch of whimsy, I added a little witch's hat to his head.

For the background I wanted to create almost a grainy effect if I possibly could so I tried out a few different techniques to see if I could achieve that idea.

The leaves I wanted to make almost foil like in appearance, almost as if they are made of delicate colored foil that could crumble in your hand if you are not careful.

The autumn twigs were painted in on one of the very last steps and I think, connect the dots of this theme very well.

This piece and some home decor products made from the image, will soon be listed on my ETSY site.... http://www.artfulcreations.etsy.com/ .

Tea & Roses Gothic Vintage Ceiling Tin

I just finished a new ceiling tin the other day, "Tea & Roses" done on a beautiful old gothic ceiling tin. I have found a few of these beauties and I snatched them right up when I saw them. I'm always keeping my eye out for new tins that will be a beautiful canvas to a new painting. This particular tin is 13 3/4" x 9 1/2".

The tin itself was in beautiful condition and all I had to do before I started painting, was apply a layer of acrylic gesso.

This one called out to me to have a teacup design painted on it so that is exactly what I went for. Each ceiling tin I come across is so different in style, design and architectual interest that no matter what I think I plan on doing, I do let the tin design dictate to me how I should proceed.

Sometimes I change my plans before I even start to paint, as I sit and think about the tin more and more. Other times I change directions while I'm painting or atleast, keep my options open to add something later if I need too. The cup is rimmed in gold and I decided I wanted some sweet little washy roses on the the cup along with some gold accent dots, to create a nice elegant teacup. Underneath the cup, resting on the table, is a piece of vintage lace.

I really wanted a butterfly to rest on the rim of the cup also....maybe the tea drinker is outside, having a tea party and this little butterfly happened to come along....who knows.

Of course framing the piece and adding to what makes this tin special, are the cascading roses, leaves and vines coming from the top and the sides.

In the end, I hope it is a piece that a tea lover as well as a lover of roses will appreciate. I will soon be listing this piece to my ETSY shop and also my website: http://www.artfulcreations.etsy.com/ .

Chickadee & Petunias Vintage Ceiling Tin

My latest vintage tin painting is one of my favorites, it was done on a gorgeous, ornate piece of tin that really caught my eye. The minute I saw it, I had to have it. In fact, I liked it so much that I bought another piece of it last week. The detail on the tin itself is quite incredible and I knew it was full of design possibilities.

I was very inspired by all the lovely flowers I had seen on my Mononk trip and these beautiful pink Petunias were really among my favorites. I showed them a few entries down in my "Inspirational Flowers" post.

I loved the blooms so much that I decided to use them on this tin. I've also been on quite a bird kick these days and have decided to paint lots of them in the future....all different kinds. I've done some Bluebirds over the last weeks/months and decided my next paintings should have Chickadees. This is how I ended up with "Chickadee & Petunias" for the design on this tin.

I hope you will enjoy the detail of the beautiful tin and also, the detail in the painting itself.

This piece is now on my website and ready to go.