Last Post of the Year!

Last day of 2019! Unbelievable!

Today I assembled all of the stitch meditations I've finished since July. when I learned about them through December, into a group, not necessarily in the order I did them and took a group photo. Each piece has its own post previously if you're interested. Just click on "stitch meditations" in the labels on the sidebar.

I haven't decided yet how I'm going to display them, but I'm leaning strongly toward a fabric book. We'll see.

Instead of stitching a piece a day for a timed period, I've been spending several short sessions on each one. They range, in size, between 2-5" and have different shapes, which accounts for the odd arrangement.

I have enjoyed doing these so much that I can't wait to do more in the new year. As I've said before, they are great stress relievers!

Stay tuned to see what I come up with in my creative journey! I would love it if you followed me either on the sidebar, by email, or Instagram, under rabbithop3432!

Thank you to those of you who have been following me all this time! I appreciate you! And thank you to all of you who just drop in to visit. I hope all of you enjoy my attempts at blogging! 😊

Last Two Paintings of the Year!

So today I finished both these 6" x 6" watercolors , adding some detail with white and black gel pens. They are more like small studies of landscapes that I painted from memory, inspired by our road trip back in September. I used Kuretake Sumi watercolors with a water brush pen on a Grumbacher 140 lb watercolor pad.

They are the last two paintings of the year, and since I've posted them, I see some things that could be added, but, for now, they are what they are. Studies from memory.

I enjoyed painting them in a relaxed and playful way. One of the most important things I've learned is that it doesn't have to be perfect for me to enjoy doing it and sharing it. Being afraid I couldn't do things perfectly kept me from even trying a lot of things. I now just relax and try not to worry about perfection and doing it "right", and it's much more fun and feeds my soul much better.

I try not to be just sloppy, but I just do it with abandon. The best times are when I can create without really thinking about it, and just zone out! If it turns out ok, great! If not, I learned from it and that's the important part. I enjoy the process and the doing, while creating, more than the outcome, which probably accounts, in part, for all the works in progress I have laying around! 😏

Looking forward to seeing what I can create in the new year!

I Finally Got A VW Bug!

I have always wanted a VW bug and Santa Hubby brought me one this Christmas! It may be a toy, but still...😀

I love it!

21st Stitch Meditation

Hope you all had a wonderful and safe Christmas! We had a good one at our niece's home, with our brother-in-law, our niece and nephew and their families! Santa was very good to us, but the most important thing was that we were all well, nobody was sick (well, I had a slight cold) or in the hospital or funeral home, and we were all together, except for one great-nephew and a couple of the girlfriends, so we were blessed to have another Christmas together. Thankful!

So this is #21, and it was done in several sessions the week before Christmas, plus one session yesterday when I added the yellow stitches and called it done. Lots of stitches! Can we say stressed?

It was longer on one side when I started stitching, so I trimmed it. Unfortunately, I didn't use a ruler and trimmed it too much, making it more triangle, which I couldn't cope with, so I added the strips of white satin to the top and bottom to square it up, while giving the textures some contrast. It seems to work? It's approximately five inches square.

I recycled a piece of orange batik from a fat quarter for the base, a wide piece of pale blue-gray lace from a gown, snippets of white satin from my cousin's wedding dress that her granny made, floral cotton from an old blouse, and red crochet cotton and yellow DMC embroidery threads from mine and my mom's stash, with lots of mindful stitches and thoughts on this piece. Not one of my favorites from the pieces I've done, but it has meaning for me!

These little meditations are great ways to relieve stress and get out frustrations!

This may, or may not, be the last stitched piece of the year. We will see. I still have a few end of the year things that I want to finish before New Year's, so that I can include them in my blog book for this year!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas! 

Wishing you all a very safe and happy holiday week of making memories with family and friends!

Kibbles Portrait Work

Last post draft that was waiting to be finished as soon as I finished this painting of our beloved little fur baby, Kibbles Marie, who was a gift from a friend, and was the closest thing we ever had to a child. She was with us almost sixteen years, before having to be euthanized in 1997 due to severe health problems. I still have not gotten over having to make that decision, all these years later, and miss her every single day.

Anyway, I started this large painting of her in the winter of the year she died (1997) in oils on a gallery wrapped canvas. I've worked on it some a couple of times over the years, but it has remained at this stage for several years now. It hangs in our dining room, and everybody thinks it is finished, but the eyes and muzzle, in particular need quite a bit more work.

I started this post early this year, with this picture of the wip painting, because I had full intentions of finishing it, but then I tore my work space/dining room apart to clean under and around everything and get stuff organized. I got under and around things cleaned, but the stuff I moved and put into boxes to be organized unfortunately is still sitting stacked up in the floor waiting, so I  have not been able to locate my oil paints.

 I painted pretty much exclusively in oils when I started this painting. I have since switched to open acrylics, but I need oils to finish her. Can use oils over acrylics, but can't use acrylics over oils!

So, for the time being, it stays like it is, and I will live with it. Maybe I will get her finished before I die! 😊

Mama 2017

These are some of the last pictures taken of mama. I took them with my Kindle in the spring of 2017. She was sitting in her favorite chair at our house, where she spent part of the day every day with us, just visiting. She and Jim were discussing something, and I just happened to be fooling with my Kindle at the time.

She had fallen just before Christmas and hurt herself pretty bad. She was still having some problems from it, but she hobbled the short distance over to our house every morning for a long visit. The visits were getting shorter as the Spring turned into summer though, and her health was deteriorating.

The week of her 85th birthday she couldn't breathe and had to go to the ER at the hospital the next town over, who sent her on to a bigger hospital a couple of hours away. She spent part of the week there and was released on Thursday, on her birthday. She wanted to go home, but for the next three days it was a struggle for her. I did what I could, but, again, she had to go to the ER and back to the larger hospital. The Dr. admitted that he shouldn't have let her go home. Things went from bad to worse, as she had breathing problems and kidney problems, which led to her not being able to stand up or walk, but they put her in rehab on another floor.

In rehab, which was pure torture for her, they discovered that she had liver cancer, which had already spread to her kidney, lymph nodes, lower spine, etc., and she was very confused and couldn't understand what was going on. We were there for almost six weeks, before they transferred her to a local rehab/nursing home, where she was for five nights and four days before passing away June 6, 2017.

Eight months later we went through pretty much the same thing with my 94 year old father-in-law, who passed away in February 2018. It was a very hard time, and the grief continues to evolve. They are both missed so much, as well as our other two parents, who we lost six months apart in 2004.

These pictures are very painful to look at, and I only figured out how to get them transferred from my Kindle to my laptop back in the spring of this year, two years after they were taken, but I'm glad I have them, especially the top two, because that's how I want to remember her. She loved to talk!

There's no way to even imagine how painful and scary losing a parent is before it happens. We were both blessed to have good ones. My husband and I, as well as others who loved them, are changed forever...

Mama's Vintage Pillow Case Box

Remember when pillowcases came in beautiful boxes? Well, most of you can't, but they did!

I am an only child, so I inherited everything from my parents when my mom passed in 2017. I have yet to go through many of their things, because it's very painful, but in going through mama's linens last year, I found this box with the pillowcases still packaged inside, exactly as they were, I'm sure, when given to her at her bridal shower in 1949.

The box inside was not in good shape, and the pillowcases needed washing badly (age spots, yellowed, cellophane torn and brittle) and gently. They were white cases with hot pink, elegantly monogrammed, embroidery, "Mr. and Mrs.", on them.

I wish I had made a picture of them before taking them out of the box and washing them, but I didn't.  I LOVE the soft pink and green colors on this box lid! So dainty and delicate! I love vintage things, and they don't make things pretty like this anymore.

There was also another box, same age, but just plain, and dilapidated, with white pillowcases monogrammed "His and Hers" in royal blue. I didn't make a picture of those either, but they are beautiful too, despite the yellowing and age spots that wouldn't come out.

Both boxes, as well as some other items, must have been very special to her, to have kept them as they were all those years. People don't keep stuff like that anymore either. I'm also sentimental about things and have kept a lot over the years. I have no children to leave it to, so when I'm gone, it will mean nothing to whoever comes after me, and will more than likely be trashed. Sad. Our memories mean nothing to anybody else. They have their own.

Between Shadow and Light Drawing Exercises Continued (4 Girls Bonus lesson)

This is the last of my post drafts from 2018 class works in progress, which I'm going ahead and posting, because I have no idea when I will get them finished. Life has a way of dictating when things get done.

This exercise is from Ivy Newport's 2018 class called, "Between Shadow and Light" (see sidebar for link) and, again, it's been so long since I've looked at it, that I don't remember what all is involved, but it involved sketching portraits on very large paper and trying different media, and the final exercise, I think, is a portrait on canvas. The exercises are all timed, so it all has to be done quickly, without too much time to think!

Again, I may, or may not, have followed her instructions exactly! I tend to do my own thing, once I get started!

For this exercise, I used an 18" x 24" mixed media paper, gesso, charcoal pencil, inktense pencils (could only use four colors), Lyra watersoluble pencils (same four colors), water, and a timer. I used an old photo of a beloved cousin for reference. Of course, these look nothing like her. She was beautiful, and I lost her four months before I lost my mom in 2017. I wasn't really trying for a likeness though.

Multiple faces using the same reference and the basic sketch was done in maybe ten minutes. The Girls were first done in charcoal pencil, then I used white gesso to paint and mix with the charcoal, which I forgot to take a picture of. I then put another layer of charcoal and inktense pencils with water and gesso over this layer (no picture), then added still another layer of Lyra watersoluble pencil, inktense pencils, white gesso, and water over that layer, trying to make it look better. I failed. (Well, I didn't really fail. I learned what doesn't work!)

I went over the whole thing again with my charcoal pencil and white gesso, losing all but a slight tint of color. I know, the faces are all wonky, but I was learning a process with layers here. You would never know they are all the same person, would you?! 

Then I went over them again with the charcoal and added color back in with inktense pencils and water, and this is where they've been for over a year. Not pretty! But it's a practice, so it doesn't have to be. Right?

Maybe, I will get back to it at some point, but if I don't, I learned from it, and that's the important part! Plus, it was fun! I just got involved in too many classes at once and life threw some curve balls at us, and these unfinished pieces and classes are patiently waiting for me to come back to them, when I'm ready.

I have been through a lot and learned a lot since I left all these works in progress, so when I do get back to them, it will be a different me than I was at that time, and I will bring a new perspective and new experiences with me to incorporate into the finished portraits. I just thought of that, but it's true! I'm not the same person I was a couple of years ago, and I see things in a different way now, partly because I'm older (just turned 70) and my circumstances have changed, so that will be reflected in any creative projects I do now, I'm sure.

That's ok! As long as I can keep trying, I'll be happy! Don't be afraid to try whatever you think you would enjoy doing. You don't have to do stuff perfectly to enjoy doing it! I know someone already said that, but it's true! 😀

Class 24 PYH&S 2018-Wild in Heart-Olga Furman

This is another draft post from 2018 with an unfinished class from the "Paint Your Heart and Soul 2018 course with Olga Furman (see link on sidebar). The classes don't have to be done in order, although I had been doing them as they came until this one, and I skipped several classes to do this one. It's from her Raw series and is called Wild in Heart, using loose fluid paint. She also had a reference picture that could be used, but I chose this old picture of my mama, as a teenager in the forties, because I love it, and when I started working on this I had just lost her the year before.

Again, I didn't always do what the teacher did. I used what I had handy, but I still tried to follow the technique, because I loved the way her painting looked, and I am trying to loosen up with all of my creative pursuits, especially my painting.

My beautiful teenage mama, who was married at sixteen and had me when she was seventeen. We made it together for over sixty-seven years though! Miss her and daddy so much!

Olga worked on cardboard, as a substrate, but I'm doing it in my mixed media sketchbook, about 9" x 12". I used a piece of vintage designer wrapping paper (I think his last name was Morris?) that I had gotten in a book of his paper, years ago and still have. It was glued to my page with
gel medium and let dry. Because the surface was glossy and shiny, I brushed a layer of clear gesso over it to dull the shine and give it a little texture.

Where Olga actually sketched the portrait off, I printed a copy of the photo off on my printer, then covered the back with charcoal, then lay it on the page charcoal side down, and traced over the head with an old pen to transfer it. Some of it had to be gone over with charcoal, because it transferred off light, or not at all in some places. Then I had to spray the image with fixative to keep the charcoal from smearing everywhere. I should have used a carbon pencil, or sketched it freehand, like the teacher did. Oh, well! I learned some stuff!

I scumbled over the background with ultramarine blue acrylics left over from working on a previous class, and laid in the darkest areas with paynes grey and burnt umber. NOT pretty! The background pattern is supposed to show through, but it's very hard to let it when the colors are so light. Another lesson learned!

As you can see, after a couple more layers of acrylic paint, I have completely lost the background pattern and everything is off. This is where the painting has waited for over a year now, as is. I will have to go back over the instructions again before finishing her, and I do plan on finishing her at some point.

Finishing the post drafts for these works in progress has reminded me of how much I was enjoying the classes before life intervened and I got sidetracked. I want so badly to get my work space/dining room back in order, so that I can resume work and get these classes finished, as well as, many others. Maybe the time and energy will present itself to me for Christmas this year and I will get it done!

I wish I enjoyed finishing projects as much as I enjoy starting them! 😐

Class 11 PYH&S 2018 -Self Portrait As Child

This class is a practice in using different media on different surfaces for different effects, with Roslyn Pratt, and is class eleven in the Paint Your Heart and Soul 2018 course hosted by Olga Furman (see sidebar for link).

I started this painting, and this post, in 2018, and I only put the progress pictures and class name, because I was planning to finish both while the class was still fresh. Things didn't work out that way though, and here I am trying to finish the draft without finishing the painting first. Truth is, I don't know when I will get back to to it, but hopefully, I will at some point.

Anyway, the lessons are all done in a mixed media sketchbook, and the final step is in about a 9" x 12" book. Also, I don't always follow the teacher's exact instructions, so these may, or may not, reflect what she instructed. I often read, or watch, the material, and then do the project without referring back to the material, so at the end I often find that I skipped a step or missed something, but that's ok, as long as I learned something!

Sketching little faces and trying different colors on with watercolors...

The photo of me at three years old that I used for reference, and no, I didn't cut my own bangs!

A not so good pencil sketch for practice...

Practice with two colors of watercolors, no likeness at all, but that's ok, I learned some stuff...

I toned the paper for the final portrait, I think, in burnt sienna and yellow ochre acrylics. I don't know why. It just seemed like a good idea at the time. I used to hate acrylics, until I discovered the open media acrylics by Golden, which don't dry as fast. Now I love acrylics and they are what I use most of the time for everything.

The first undercoat was too bright, so I toned it down with some blue, then sketched in the figure, which I'm not too good at, in white.

This is where it's been for over a year after a couple or three of layers of paint. No likeness at all, but it's just barely started, and still has quite a ways to go. There will be much adjusting when I do resume work on her, and that is why I took the course, to get better at portraits.

I am learning a lot from many teachers, about many different things! It's a great adventure, full of highs and lows, this creative thing!

Class 10 PYH&S 2018 - Two Sides of Me- Double Portrait

Unfortunately, I, like many of you, tend to start classes that I don't get finished too.  No matter how fun they are, or how much I'm learning in one teacher's classes, I get sidetracked onto another and have several going at once. Inevitably, one gets pushed to the side for another, until I can get back to them, which rarely happens. I have actually finished a few, but have more that are still in progress.

The next three posts are from the classes with various teachers in Paint Your Heart and Soul 2018 with Olga Furman (see link on sidebar), which is wonderful and is new every year. I had so many online classes in progress in 2018, none of which I have finished yet, that I have refused to let myself sign up for any the whole year of 2019, no matter how tempted I was. There are so many awesome teachers and classes out there, and a couple of them I might have given in to, but they were out of my price range.

Anyway, this lesson is in painting with oils with cold wax with Lucy Chen, which I got almost completed in my large mixed media sketchbook. There are about 24 classes in the course, and I worked on one while another was drying. The subject for this class with Lucy is the two sides of myself, one happy, confident, etc., and the other the opposite of that. The don't necessarily have to  look like me, and they don't, just kind of the gist of me.

Pencil sketches looking for ideas in a different sketch book...

Still searching for an idea that clicks...

Found one, sketched it onto the mixed media paper and started laying on layers of oil mixed with cold wax and adding textures. I have to say that the smell of the oil and wax did not do my allergies any good, but I kept going, glad that this is a small painting!

I only lack the finishing touches and a few details here, and this is where it has been for over a year now. I love the effect of the oil and cold wax, and it's fun to paint with, and I like this painting, so I do plan to go back and finish it, as soon as I uncover the supplies I need from the chaos of my studio/dining room, and with better ventilation (maybe even outside) next time.

I don't take classes to copy the instructor's style or technique, but to learn new ways of doing things that I can work into my own style of painting and creating. Besides, I couldn't copy them, even if I wanted to. I learn by trying it, then using what I can remember and need to do my own thing. I love the doing of it!

Do a little bit of something you love every day. You'll be better for it! 😊

Quirky Doodle Vase w Flowers

Another catch-up post draft of a quirky doodle sketch pulled from all the random marks on the page, done in my mixed media journal back in June, which I have yet to paint.

Stabilo pencil doodle sketch w some shading...

Water brush pen added for kind of a monochromatic effect. I do plan to add a watercolor wash over at least parts of it at some point though.

Sacred Landscape w Ivy Newport-Project 3

This is a post draft that I started sometime in 2018 while I was doing the third project in Ivy Newport's "Sacred Landscape" classes (see link on sidebar). I believe it's on a 6" x 6" gallery wrapped canvas, and I used Golden acrylics. This is as far as I've gotten on it, because I got sidetracked, as I often do.

I used an old favorite black and white photo of my maternal grandmother as inspiration. It's been a while, with many other things going on, since I worked on the classes, so I can't remember exactly what I did in each phase, or what this lesson actually was, but I know that I really enjoyed the class and the other projects, which are shared in older posts.

I was enjoying this one too. I just haven't taken the time to finish it, plus my work space/dining room has been in such chaos for almost a year now, but I'm going to go ahead and share the WIP now, and I will share the finished canvas as soon as it's completed.

I love red ochre, so I used it and ivory black, plus maybe some white to block in the base, after lightly sketching the main parts off in, I think, charcoal.

Here I applied some modeling clay with a painting knife to the foreground for texture for rocks and let dry, before adding a second layer of paint and some pencil marks, trying to find m.y way.

I added another layer of paint over everything, covering up part of the pencil marks and getting other marks way off direction. Didn't like how it was going.

After more paint layers, trying different things, this is where it's at right now. It's supposed to be more abstract than this, with the figure not necessarily recognizable. More of an abstract landscape with a figure in it kind of project. I took the class to help me try to loosen up more in my painting. I think it helped some.

Posting this makes me want to get her out and finish her right now, but it's less than two weeks until Christmas, and I have not gotten the first gift or fixed up the first card to send, so I guess she'll have to wait a few more weeks, along with the other paintings and projects that just lack finishing up.

I think that if I never started another new project, I could spend what's left of my life just finishing up the ones I already have going. Sound familiar, anyone? 😊

20th Stitch Meditation-Hat With Flowers

When I clean out closets and drawers, I often tear pieces of fabric from the patterns and colors I like, along with buttons and trim, which I recycle into various creative projects. Right now, I'm into small stitch meditations and watercolor paintings, both tremendously satisfying!

I finished this piece this week, using mostly cotton scraps from daddy's pjs, my old Richard Simmons exercise shirt, my linen like jacket, fat quarter orange, mama's varigated yellow/orange crochet thread, and my blue embroidery thread (all 6 strands) to make this little fabric collage up, with a lot of happy stitching!

I've had several comments on other social media about this piece reminding them of Van Gogh, which is really a compliment, however, I didn't intentionally try to make it look like that. I see it now though!

It's so fun at the end of a session to see what has evolved while I was focusing on the stitching, and not perfection! I love the wonkiness of it! 😊

I love how the towel I had on the chair arm matches the piece before cropping too!

I'm still going to catch up old drafts before the end of the year, but they will be interspersed with any new posts of pieces completed between now and then, as I have time. I currently have two small watercolor landscapes almost done, and am about to start stitching a new meditation!

No way have I even started preparing for Christmas! Cards, gifts, decorating. Nada! Yikes! Gotta get that ball rolling too! Too much to try to keep up with anymore at my age and want to, but I will give it what I have! 😁

Thankful it's Jesus' birthday, and I look forward to seeing family that we don't see often though. You never know when it will be the last time you get to spend Christmas with them, so enjoy them while you can!

I am on Instagram as rabbithop3432 if you would like to follow me there!

Repairing My Vintage Charm Bracelet

This post was actually started in 2016, after I took an online jewelry making class on Jeanne Oliver's site. I actually wanted to learn how to make beaded bookmarks, journal jewelry, etc. more than actual jewelry to wear, although I did make some earrings, just to see if I could! Also, I wanted to repair my old charm bracelet!

This is the charm bracelet that I wore as a teenager in the sixties and loved very much. The sterling silver charms cost a dollar each, and I spent hours in the local 5 and 10 store (Skinners) picking out just the right ones. The bracelet cost maybe two or three dollars. It was the early sixties. I was maybe twelve and got a small weekly allowance. One of my favorite cousins gave me the baby shoe for Christmas one year, the 67 is for the year I graduated high school, the heart because who doesn't love hearts?, Kennedy was president when I was a freshman in high school, Tennessee is where I've lived my whole life, the horse because my best friend and I loved horses and planned to have a horse ranch when we got out of school (didn't happen), the little double hearts were first love, the jukebox, because I've always loved music, the clam shell for the beach that I got to visit with my cousin and her family the summer between my junior and senior years of high school, and the seahorse, just because I love them.

As I got older, life happened and I gained weight until it no longer fit my arm, plus I broke the little rings that it fastens with, so it lay in my jewelry box all these years until I got nostalgic and wanted to wear it again, thus prompting me to take this class.

I ordered a chain extension and a new fastener online and bought a jewelry making tool set at Walmart and set to work. It was tedious, as I have large hands and fingers, but I did it! So proud of myself for making it wearable again!

Now it is a little large, but not enough to be a problem! I still love it!

The reason I hadn't finished this draft before is because I saw online where people were finding vintage charm bracelets and adding charms, medals, pictures, etc. to them, making them kind of chunky and updated. I found many addable "charms" in mine, and my mom's (which I inherited) things, and have added a couple to the bracelet. I don't have a picture yet, because I got distracted, as I am prone to do, and it's still a work in progress. I will post pictures when it's done, which may, or may not, be soon!

Anyway, it's wearable again, which makes me very happy! 😊

Studio/Dining Room Table

I know I said that the next few posts would be catching up my drafts, but I just thought I'd share the reason I can't use my workspace/dining room table right now, and am having to do whatever creative stuff I do in my lap in my recliner. The floor is also full of boxes of stuff. It was in bad shape before, but I pulled everything out to clean under and around last spring, and to re-organize. Believe it, or not, I've cleared this table at least twice, maybe three times, but it gets covered back up when I'm looking for something. Very frustrating, but apparently not enough to do anything about it. I am not lazy. I'd just rather be stitching, painting, or writing!

Maybe I'll finish the job in the spring if I'm still able! I'll be sure to post a photo when it's cleared off! 😊

Catching Up and Clearing Out Post Drafts!

Hope you all had a lovely Thanksgiving weekend! We did. Some scary stuff, but still a lot to be thankful for when we look back over the past year!

Some of the drafts in my post list go back three years. There are ten of them, and since the three weeks until Christmas will be very busy, my work room is still a mess where I can't find anything, and I probably won't get any of these projects finished soon, I'm going to go ahead and post them as the works in progress that they are, to clear out my old drafts and to include them in my end of year printed blog book.

I still don't have our road trip pictures labeled, and haven't taken the time to share any pictures yet, but I may yet get some shared by the end of the year. Who knows!

I feel badly for all of the unfinished projects and classes waiting patiently for me to return to them, but excited for all the new projects I'm starting and planning to start. When I die, I guess a lot of them will still be waiting, but that's ok. Maybe someone else will enjoy them in some way!

So the next few posts will be of projects that were started before this year, and which I will hopefully finish at some point!

My Hubby and Me (Thanksgiving)!

After about ten tries, I was finally able to get a half decent picture of hubby and me Thanksgiving Day! We were on our way to our nephew's home to spend time with his family. He wasn't too happy with me wanting to take the time to get a picture of us, but we hadn't had a picture of us, kind of fixed up, together in a while, and I was happy to get this one. I'm terrible at making selphies, but I kept trying until I got this one!

I also finally got one of myself that was ok while I was waiting for hubby the day after Thanksgiving!

We had a good time with our brother-in-law, niece and husband, nephew an wife, and all the grown up great nieces and nephews and spouses and girlfriends, and we also got to meet our first great-great-niece, who just turned six months old and is adorable! The food was delicious, but the company was better!

19th Stitch Meditation-Elephant and Moth

I finished this little 4 1/2" x 4 1/2" piece yesterday in one sitting of about an hour and a half, using scraps of fabric and lace with off white crochet thread and yellow variegated crochet thread. The outside white border is a paper towel that it was laying on.

The lace and the herbal tea dyed cotton with the stamped elephant came from a bed skirt found at Goodwill a while back. The little red strip is from one of my discarded blouses and the moth is a glass blob embellishment that just seemed to belong in that spot, so I captured him with thread! The threads are inherited from my mom's stash.

I was trying to learn the Pekingese (Chinese) stitch around the elephant, but I botched it at the beginning. I stayed with the rule of not taking out any stitches and kept going though. Not sure this is the way the stitches are "supposed" to look, but I like they way they turned out!

Anyway, it was a fun piece to do, and I'm happy with it, so into the stack it goes with the previous 18!

Happy Thanksgiving!

If anybody is still reading my blog, I just want to wish you and your family a blessed and happy Thanksgiving holiday with your friends and family, and if you are going somewhere to be with family, Safe Travels!

Thank you for taking the time to support my blog by looking at it, and I hope you enjoy the posts as much as I enjoy doing them!

Nobody's life is perfect, and the world is in a scary place right now, but there is still much to be grateful for. We just have to look around us, count our blessings, and be genuinely grateful for now, because life can turn upside down in the blink of an eye.

Church photo taken somewhere on our Sept. 2019 cross country road trip. Not sure where just now, but it was beautiful!

Watercolor Desert Scene From Memory

I painted another 6" x 6" watercolor, using my water brush pen, pan watercolors, black gel pen, and just a smudge of pencil, a few days ago. I did it from memory, and a bit of imagination, of some of the scenes we saw in the southwest on our September road trip, just a quick little study.

It was fun to do, and I think I like it! I am enjoying my creativity much much more since I learned to embrace the imperfections and I'm so grateful to Connie Hozvicka Solera for teaching me to paint fearless! She has online classes and she's amazing. https://www.facebook.com/ConnieSoleraStudio/

18th Stitch Meditation-Rose and Silver

This meditation was created from tea dyed cotton and a bit of lace from a thrift store bed skirt, rose linen like fabric from a discarded jacket, bought printed word cotton, peach crochet yarn, and silver warp (weaving) thread a couple of days ago.

I actually needed thinner thread or looser fabric, but I was just seeing what would happen. What happened was that my thumb and forefinger wound up being sore from trying to force the needle and yarn through the tight material, especially where there were three layers!

The silver thread was actually part of a three strand coarse yarn that I had bought to weave with, and just haven't gotten around to using yet. The other two strands are are sort of taupe colored, and very pretty, but no place for them here. I'm sure they'll show up somewhere down the road though!

Nothing too complicated here; just the sheer joy of following the needle around a few scraps of fabric!