The Tears of a Clown

I don't have a card today, my darling hubby has been home a lot and I just don't seem to get time in my craft room; I'm not complaining we do really nice "stuff' when he's not working, like walks along the river and breakfast at the beach...(it's winter here, perfect for breakfast at the beach!)
So, in lieu of a card, I thought I'd show you a painting I actually did a few years ago, simply because I liked it.  The colours suited our lounge room at that time, then we promptly changed our colour scheme, and my husband said (when I was going to move the picture out of the room) that it was one of my paintings he liked the best, so I changed the mat colour from fuscia to brown and it fits in beautifully... adding a splash of colour to a now very grown up "muted" palette (my DIL is an interior designer; muted = fashionable!)

There is something of a blue cast over this picture, I can't correct it but the close up picture is more accurate.  

I used a pattern from Donna Gilbertson, fellow Aussie who's painting style I really admire.  This is one of about ten paintings I've done using her patterns, my mum absolutely loves the style too and has done four or five of her own; in fact she's working on a couple of mini canvases at the moment (my Mum is the last one standing from my Wednesday art classes, she was one of my first pupils too - ten years, that's stamina!)
Not much more to say about my wistful little clown, he's painted using Jo Sonja acrylics, on a 34cm (13.5") canvas in a 50cm (20") frame.  
Craft Your Days Away is a multi craft challenge blog (there are so few challenges around that aren't exclusively for papercraft, unfortunately this is their last ever challenge, it has an Anything Goes theme.  The Allsorts Challenge is also a "multi challenge" blog, their theme is It's a Gift... this painting was a gift to my hubby, so I'm entering there as well. Divas by Design tell me that you don't have to stamp at all, so I'm taking that as my opportunity to enter their Anything Goes challenge too.
That's it for today, I'll be back in a day or so - hopefully with a card, or maybe with one of my fabergé eggs... I don't want to lose Craft Your Days Away without sharing some of my non-papercraft creations, lol.
Until then, Happy Crafting, Donna

I'd like to be...under the sea

As promised; "Now for something completely different"

Crafty Cardmakers Challenge this fortnight is "Altered Food Containers".  While some may not consider a wine bottle a "food container" some - like me - do, lol.
I can't remember the name of the wine, it was something like Glass Mountain, and suffice to say, I have painted many of these bottles over the years...I only bought it for the bottle (yeah, right!) the same company bought out a red and gold coloured bottle, but I don't have so many of those gathering dust in the shed!!
I used Jo Sonja paints and Glass and Tile Medium, the bottle wasn't too slick to start with so I didn't have much trouble getting the paint to stick.  I saw the pattern used on a plate and added some details and adapted it to the bottle.
My husband had some family over from England recently, I painted the bottle for the parents, a photo frame for the little girl (Grace) and the trinket box with the crab on for Dan the Man!!  I used patterns from Susan Pirone's fabulous book Splash! for the frame and box.
My husband's niece went swimming with dolphins for her birthday while she was here; in fact the entire time they were here the whole family were in the water, so the gift seemed appropriate - they seemed to like it, anyway.  I had a cute photo of the little ones at the beach, so I gave them that for in the frame.
Anyway, that's about it; just thought I'd "share", and when I saw this challenge theme, and that it didn't have to be papercraft I thought I'd enter.
Fab'n'Funky Challenges has Summer Loving as its challenge theme - and it as it can be any craft project, I'm entering there too.
Until next time, Happy Crafting, Dee

 

Something other than cards

I've been doing some "housekeeping" in my Decorative Art folder and thought I'd share some photos of some of the art I've done over the years.  Firstly there are some photos of "Bug Boxes" I have done, the inspiration for these projects have come from Folk Art Magazines and other publications....believe me, if they are original ideas I'll claim 'em!!

                                                                                                                                                                                                  These papier maché boxes are painted from a pattern in "Fantasy Garden Vol II".  Using the lovely jewel colours from the painting, I made some matching jewellery , I think they make great looking gifts, but maybe I'm biased

Another Bug Box I painted was from another book by the same artist, "Faerie Garden Book 3".  It was a good gift for a boy, not toddlerish and yet not too grown up.  It was fun to paint too!