Getting Crafty

I was waiting for a verdict on the Red postbox scene on Friday. See above.
So......an idea has been brewing in my head for some time now...... I have long been inspired by the wonderful 'Geninnes art blog' and the stamping that she does.  I have been busy accumulating the various bits and pieces required to do some stamp creation. I can tell you it's taken some doing!! I've had to send for bits and pieces from all over the country!! We used to have a wonderful art shop in the town where I live, I know for a fact they would have had all these things, but in these times of recession, it closed. It was awful when it did, I knew I would struggle to find things, and they always had some new projects going off in the shop, with little workshops etc, sadly no more :(
I now have to find things on the Internet, and carefully plan any project, trying to suss out the right colours from charts etc, not so easy!  So now I've had my little rant, (I know the Internet is wonderful) I will show you my little assembly of exciting stamping bits and bobs.

I have had an idea, to make some Christmas cards, I was inspired by this book cover,(up on the right) a year ago! I love the colours here, and the snowflakes against the dark blue. So my idea was to use these colours and my red feature would be a robin, (replacing the lady). I wanted to create the distressed feel of the snowflakes, so I sent for some chalk effect ink pads, I'm looking forward to how that may look. So, I started by drawing my robin, I wanted a stylised little bird. I have some envelopes, so I knew what size to work to, then to get an idea of the size of the snowflakes, I stamped some at the side. When I was happy with my sketch, I drew it on some tracing paper...Hmmmm.....think, think, which way round do I draw this, so that when it stamps down on the paper, it's the right way round, nearly got that wrong! Then before I set about with my lino cutting tools on the lovely 'Pink Stuff' (ooh trepidation). I went to look at Geninnes little tutorial on how to do stamps, she creates a beautiful feather stamp.
Filled full of confidence, (I can do that), I set to work. I cut a piece of the pink soft stuff, just big enough, didn't want to waste any! rubbed my image down and carefully, with the No1 cutter, started cutting away. It was easy to cut through, I just wasn't sure how deep to go, I had given myself some tricky thin lines to do! Just typical of me. But I persevered, and it looked OK.
I worked away, until it all seemed OK to go ahead and STAMP, wheeey.....this was the best bit! Only trouble was, I wanted the bird to be red, and I only had a little red ink pad, so I had to dab it on all over, wondering what the outcome would be.... well, here's my first attempt.

I made a little tiny stamp for the pattern too, that was quite successful, though a little fiddly! I'm pleased with my little bird on the whole. I managed to get a bigger red ink pad yesterday, for only 98p, so I think it will print somewhat stronger now. Just need to stamp these onto my watercolour paper cards, do the lovely blue background,( like the book cover), and then stamp my snowflakes, in all their chalky loveliness, all over the dark blue etc. I think they will turn out OK? I also managed to get a stamp of some Snowy wording (you might just see it on the first photo) I'm going to use that on the blue background too!
It's been quite a lovely experiment, I am sure I will be doing some more ideas, once I've finished this one. I will come back and show you my progress along the way. Hope you like my first foray into stamping, I thoroughly enjoyed it. Sorry if I've rambled on a bit. :)

Last of the eskimos

Just a quick little update folks, I finished the last 2 of the scandi eskimo characters this last week. They have all been so nice to work on, I'm looking forward to seeing them as cards. I'm on with doing some trad Christmas now. A red postbox and pencil village scene.

This weekend was also the 33rd Annual world sketchcrawl event. I went to the one near me, it was at the newly opened Hepworth Gallery. I forgot to take my camera with me, I was rushing to get there, because I had other things on this Saturday. I only made the last hour. Managed 2 sketches. We now have a facebook page for this group of sketchcrawlers, Sketchcrawl north I think is the name of the group. The gallery was so lovely inside, I'm not a fan of the outside I'm afraid to say, I will try and post some photos of it. Everyone on the sketchcrawl was so nice, we meet up at the end and pass sketchbooks round, it's all good fun. Hope you like my sketches. Speak to you all again soon!

On a roll....Eskimo roll

Hello blog friends. I was supposed to be updating on the progress of the honeysuckle, but, I've been so very busy with some new additions/ commissions. I've been creating lots of these little characters, which are sort of like Eskimos, but actually were based on the Sami people. I started out doing just one sketch, and this led to another and another, until there are now half a dozen! Like a little family.
I am thrilled that the people I've done these for love them so much and kept on asking for more, it has been a pleasure to do the work and I'm quite pleased with how they've turned out. Done in pastel again, I'm loving the pastels :D

So it's been a busy couple of weeks, I'm still finishing the last 2. The honeysuckle is on hold for now.

My walks with the pooch this past week have seen me swooshing through the autumn leaves, they look so beautiful all the wonderful colours there are, so I had to pick some up and have taken a snippet of some of them to show you. It's amazing the detail you see when you stop and take a good look. They have lost a bit of their vibrancy because I had to keep them pressed under books until I had time to write this blog. Hope you like them though.
Well, time to get the ironing done now, before a nice walk in my favourite woods again. Bye for now folks.

Sweet Honeysuckle.

A quick post today folks. I have had a little idea brewing for a while, to paint some Honeysuckle.  I love this plant, it smells divine, when you catch a whiff of it while walking in woods, where it grows wild. I think there are many cultivated varieties, and I have the awfully naughty habit of, if I see one I like trailing over someones fence, breaking off a small piece and trying to get it to grow. I have had 4 successes with this now, all coming on nicely in my garden!  I took some photos of some growing outside the lovely Hobbs cafe at the top of Monsal head. Then a couple of days ago, I started to sketch up an idea. I'm only at the beginning with this, starting with a very sketchy sketch and then refining it as I go along. It's quite a complicated flower, when you look at it, and I know I won't be totally accurate, but hopefully it will be a nice impression of this sweet smelling flower. It has such wonderful bright berries too, like little gems. I'm just showing the sketches as this is as far as I got. I'm working to the size of a card I did a while back now, Alliums, see the artwork for this also. I worked quite big, it felt essential to do this as there was a lot of detail I wanted to get in. Hope you like them. I shall post further progress as I get there!  X

Artists Ramblings

Hello Blog friends. The Autumn is approaching now, but there have been one or two lovely last flings of Summer sun just lately. Nature is so amazing, and although I am apprehensive about another bad winter, I must admit to liking the changing of the seasons. Last Thursday whilst walking the dog,( it was such a lovely day, made you feel good to be alive), I saw one of my favourite little birds. It came creeping round a tree close by and low down, so it caught my eye. It was a Nuthatch, and I remembered some Illustrations I did earlier this year around May, when I had some experimenting time. I came home and took a photo of the artwork, I also did a Bullfinch, as I was wonderfully surprised in the spring, when I opened the curtains, a male Bullfinch in the garden, so so splendid and bright!! I worked in a loose watercolour style for these, wet in wet, it's a lovely way to work. I was hoping to add to this collection, as I love the birds, but I've been really busy with commissions, so not had chance to get back to them. I have also been following an Illustrators blog,' Geninnes art blog' which is just so inspiring and full of the most wonderful Birdy Illustrations, I may have to buy something of hers, she has a very popular blog, check it out if you get chance, it's amazing!

I took a couple of photos of the flowers that day too, they may not last much longer. The Hollyhocks I grew from seed have at last flowered, I seemed  be waiting forever for them, I'm hoping they will keep coming back every year! The Fuchsia which I bought for a pound has been totally splendid all year, what a bargain! I loved the fact that lots of insects have been busy in my garden all year too, I try and plant things that will help them.

Today we walked in the woods and it had more of an Autumn feel. There were so many funghi, especially those wonderful (possibly very poisonous) fly algaric, ( I think that's what they're called?) which just look like they are waiting for some magical fairy type character to come out of the undergrowth and sit down on one??? My imagination hey?? Weird. I have never seen so many of these particular funghi though, the weather must have suited them this year.
It's late now, so I'll leave off. Out there in the woods, those fairies and elves will be partying around the magic mushrooms I am sure of it :D See you soon.

Fairies have flown

Hi there everyone. I was working on some new Christmas fairies last week. I love working on these, and I'm pleased with them. It always seems to flow so well when you're enjoying the work, and now they've flown away.... If you're wondering why I take the photos in this spot, it's because sometimes I need to put them away from me at a distance, then you can see if they are looking ok? It's best to leave them there and keep passing them to see if anything is amiss?..... Hope you like them anyway?

Onto my adventure this last weekend!

I went on a 'Sketchcrawl' at the Yorkshire sculpture park on Saturday, we were very lucky with the weather. It was so warm, if a little blustery in places...I came about this from following the WONDERFUL blog of Lynne Chapman 'An Illustrators life for me' she posted on her blog about this one and I went along, there were about 20 people there, a good turnout. All very nice people, it was a pleasure to meet. I did feel quite nervous though, being on my own, but Lynne and the staff at the Yorkshire Sculpture park were very good at accommodating us all. I will put a couple of my sketches on and corresponding photos, so you can see what I was sketching. Some of the exhibits are wonderful, particularly those of Jaume Plensa, which is a new exhibition this year. We had about an hour sketching at 4 different locations in the park, and then got together at the end to share our sketchbooks. There were some really good pieces. The people who incorporated some colour in their work stood out for me, it's amazing what a little colour zing can do for a sketch? I had a very good day in a beautiful setting. Cheers Lynne!!

Woodland friends project

Hello again blog friends, welcome today. I hope you enjoy meeting the new friends I have been working on this past week. I am going to post some of the process of creating this work. It all started by a client liking some of my previous work.(see first photo).

I had a brief set, this is for a greeting card, with a front page design and 2 inside pages. I worked up a sketch initially and after this was approved, went on to start the background artwork. You can see my sketch above the drawing board. (photo 2)
It is all a steady build up when working with pastels, but the nice thing is that they do allow you to change colours to some extent. As long as you really don't overwork, it will cover over. The last 2 photos show pages 1 and 2 being finished, then everything finalised.

 I am quite pleased with how they have turned out. I would really love to do some children's book Illustration and in some ways this has that feel about it?? Do you think so? I don't know if  I will ever get to do any as it seems so difficult to get any interest going? But I will keep trying. Whilst doing these, my mind was thinking up some ideas. I would like to use these pastel techniques, and the softness they evoke, to create a bedtime story for little ones. It was one of my favourite things to do, reading stories to my son at bedtime.( I have an idea brewing on this).
Well I hope you like them?  I am now going back off to fairyland again, as I've been asked to create some new ideas. This is the part I love, sitting sketching and letting my mind drift and think up new ideas.
See you all again soon. X