Derwent Art Lessons

Derwent Academy has a series of

art lessons on-line. (click on the top Tool Bar

on the Derwent site to create an account)

 This is Lesson 4, Color and Tone-

Blending Colored Pencil.

Some friends recommended the class

because when you've completed the

six lessons, Derwent will send you a

 small set of their colored pencils!

Since I don't have any of the 

Derwent colored pencils, I used

Crayola brand colored pencils, and 

various brands that have accumulated 

over the years. They are not as 

intense in color, and the scan is a bit light.

Quote from this lesson:

"It's all about describing what's in

front of you by using different marks."

--Dee Cowell, Derwent Academy instructor

I was rather pleased with the outcome

of the sketch of the cockerel,

considering the image on the computer

screen was a bit difficult to see.

The border around the video obscured

the feet so I just had to 'wing-it!'

And the instructor shows how to 

layer color over each other for

more depth and variation. (not sure

if you can tell, but there are blue and

purple beneath the black)

A fun exercise!

ArT Journal Pages on T Tuesday

Week 30 of The Documented Life Project:

Make your page 'Smash Book style.'

I added bits and pieces of my week

into the collage, and scraps

of painted papers.

What do you do for fun?

I draw, paint, cut and paste in my journals!

I find it Therapeutic...

Joining Elizabeth of Altered Book Lover blog

for her T Tuesday link party.  Above, a detail

of a larger collage that incorporates  a green

tea package and a little sketch of a tea bag.

What do you do for summer fun?

•  ♦  •

Documenting Life with Art

Week 29 of the 

Documented Life Project:

Make a wish list. Draw or use

magazine cut-outs.

This tip-in page was a piece of

scrapbook paper in a bright yellow, 

and I decided to leave it 'as-is.'

I added magazine words, fabric,

Washi tape, assorted papers, 

doodling, and the quote

from a magazine...

It's not really a 'list' but that

may still happen on the spread

beneath the tip-in.  It's been

a busy week, so I kept the

page relatively simple.

Messy paint might happen later!

Linking up with Elizabeth

for the T Tuesday link party...

and sharing 'coffee art'

instead of 'tea art!'

I do enjoy a nice cup of tea,

but coffee is my daily 

Wake-Up beverage. This page

was completed at a Starbucks,

Barnes & Noble bookstore,

Mansfield, Ohio.

Yellow lily, Wauseon, Ohio.

The coffee travel mug and the lily

are all in a black hardbound journal 

with 8 1/2" x 11" pages.

Notes, drawings, collages, and

whatever else I can think of

may go into it. 

What do you put in your journal?

•  ♦  •

Re-Posting a Favorite: T is for Tuesday, Q is for Quilt

Elizabeth invited us to look for 'buried treasure'
within our T Tuesday posts of the past, so I
am sharing an old favorite about the quilt I
made for my daughter and son-in-law.

I began working on this quilt in the summer of 2012...

A gift for the newlyweds, which they'll be lucky to receive

by their first anniversary in 2013!  (They did)

When I'm working on a quilt, I am careful to keep my

coffee cup (or any beverage) far away from the quilt!

The pattern is called Merry-Go-Round,

which I completely hand-pieced, and
 also hand-quilted..

It has bright happy colors, and includes many fabrics 

from the bride's past:  vintage fabrics from the bride's

great-grandmothers' stashes, fabrics from clothes 

that I sewed for her when she was little, and many

fabrics from the numerous baby quilts I've made.

I set the quilting frame up in my parents' home, as 

they have a bit more room, and it gave me an excuse

to go visit them and quilt!

My quilting stitches aren't exactly perfect,
or even tiny, but I tell myself that it's
 part of the 'charm of hand-made.'

I do attempt to keep them uniform in size.

In the block above, the red gingham was a dress that

I made for my daughter when she was in grade school.

A couple of the fabrics are from my maternal grandmother's

scraps, and one is even from a guitar case that I 

made in high school.  Yes, a quilted fabric guitar case.

Weird, I know. But I liked it much better than the

black 'cardboard' ones that you buy.  (I used

pre-quilted fabric on part of that guitar case, wasn't up to

hand-quilting in high school! and no, I don't

 really play guitar any more)

The cable quilting designs are marked in pencil and

then stitched.  The triangle and rectangle shapes are

just 'eyeballed.'  So they aren't always perfect...

It's challenging to get your shoulders, arms and hands

to 'turn' in the right direction to follow the quilting design.

I find I have to pace myself so as not to get sore muscles.

Many quilters have their quilt tops machine-quilted these

days, but I really enjoy hand quilting.  I don't exactly know

how many hours I have in this quilt. At least 500 hours, 

at a guess.  If I kept an accurate track of how long it takes,

I might never make another!

Here's how I have my morning 'mocha' coffee...

to your coffee cup add 1 heaping teaspoon of cocoa powder,

a pinch of salt, a teaspoon of vanilla, sweetener to taste,

(I use any Stevia sweetener)

and a splash of fat-free milk.  Yum!

Visit Bluebeard and Elizabeth at

Altered Book Lover

to see what others are doing on Tuesday!

Perhaps they are having Tea on Tuesday,

instead of coffee, like me...

•  ♦  •

Art Journal Pages: Turtle on T Tuesday

We had lunch at a Mexican restaurant on the 

Fourth of July.  I brought along my art journal

to sketch while we waited for our food.  In 

theory, drawing would keep me from eating

 too many tortilla chips while we waited!  

Our food came so quickly, however,

that I had to finish my pen sketch after we finished

our meal, and my hubby had to wait on me.

When I started sketching the planter, I didn't

realize it was a Turtle, until we were leaving, and

I walked over to see the other side.  The people

at the nearest table thought I was crazy, I think...

The sombrero was black velvet decorated with

silver and white sequins.  I added the

drawing of the turtle's head from memory when 

I got home, as well as the Watercolors. 

So my Turtle is the T for T Tuesday this week...

We also went to a concert in a local park,

presented by our community band.  The musical

selections were all patriotic and we quite enjoyed

it!  It is almost as much fun watching the people

as it is enjoying the music...I think the attendance

of my nephews brought down the median age

of the audience ~ most of us were seniors!

After doing a web search, I believe the 
distinctive bark on the tree I drew is
a Shagbark Hickory tree.  There were a
few hickory nuts being blown down by the
wind that evening, but there were no
casualties, that I know of...

Above, this week's Documented Life Project

challenge #27: add a Crossword, Sudoku,  

or Word-Find puzzle to your page. Another

opportunity to go with a black and white 

composition that I enjoy! Collage includes

scrapbook papers (music & crossword)

magazine clippings, and my own drawings.

In keeping with T Tuesday, I should include

a photo or drawing of my beverage of choice,

even if it isn't tea.  Joining Elizabeth for

T Tuesday, and sharing a drawing of

my pink travel mug, in progress...

not sure what else to include on the page.

Something will come to me...

Patriotic Index Cards~ A Reprise

 Wishing everyone in the U. S.

a safe and happy Independence Day!

Reprise of Index Card art from previous years...