Face It

I was asked once how long it takes me on the average to do an ATC, I said 3-4 hours........I LIED! It takes me a bit longer. The booger I worked on tonight took me forever for one reason - I don't paint faces...people faces. I was in a swap where your partner chooses a favorite artist, mine chose Renoir, I gave her a hard time about putting the pressure on and she ended up giving me a couple alternates but this particular group I'm in is really for getting you to step out of your comfort zone and trying new things so I figured in all fairness I should send her what she really wanted, so after checking out a gazillion (yah, gazillion - the same amount as the national debt) I found one I thought I could do. I picked his portrait of actress Jeanne Samary circa 1877.
Edited to add: This is my finished product:

On an entirely different note, my mom came up for her annual come-to-the-tundra-for-fun trip. We had a blast as always. We had plenty of snow, as a matter of fact it snowed every day she was here practically so here's what we did on a couple days we were somewhat active:

This is where we ended up after running up and down the hill with our sleds...ON the snow flat on our backs - as I posted these pictures I realized my husband is right, I am my mother's "mini me", we are scooting down the hill below in the same fashion : }
 

Then in honor of the 2010 Olympics we went to the front yard for some fun:

Our downhill skier - of course took the gold

 

And we had the Roaming Shores Bobsled team also taking top honors:

The front yard now looks like a pitiful Olympian graveyard (or morgue) due to the sun this past weekend...we won't even go into the snow we have gotten since, we cannot even leave the house through the front door, the drifts are too high! So now we have a snow covered headless skier and shrunken bobsled team.

Thanks mom - winter would never be the same without you XOX.  Missing my mom...........................................at the Shores

Setting the Place

So, I've got the house cleaned and the spare bedroom all made up for my mom who is on her way to visit from Georgia. She was supposed to come up yesterday but thought better of it once we had a look at the weather going up I-77, lots of snow and wind. I can't wait till she gets here, we are so much alike (my husband always says "Great, now I'll have 2 of you around here, you're just like you mother", I honestly don't think he means this in a bad way!), we'll spend the week sledding, making a snowman, crafting and doing absolutely nothing - maybe even stay in our jammies all day....so there! 

I've finished a different sort of project, I made some placemats. They were done using canvas and fabric then coated so as to just wipe them off if they get dirty, so much nicer than having to launder them in my opinion, they're kinda G R O O V Y fun bright colors. If I can get quicker at making them I thought they'd be a fun addition to my etsy shop? Have a look:

I think they're pretty, all 4 are different but use the very same fabrics on each one.

I am in desperate need of a camera (as you can tell from all the posts here where I couldn't use my scanner)..wonder what the chances are of getting that Canon I've had my beady lil eyes on for months for my birthday this year....time to start posting my hints around the house - wait, better yet - I just need to take him to the store, point it out and say please : )

I think I'll go make some nice soup for when mom gets here. Cookin'.............at the Shores

Joining the Ranks

I've been recovering from a blow to our little family - BOTH my husband and I were laid off from our jobs at the end of January the same day (we worked together). We've joined the ranks of hundreds of thousands of others sadly unemployed in this beautiful country we call home. I can only pray the economy picks up - and soon! This also means we need to put our house selling efforts into overdrive, we thought we could take our time fixing up the old house before putting it on the market but I'm thinking it needs to go sooner than later before the taxes on both bury us!
Now for better news, I've got tons of time on my hands for my art, and have been working like mad to get some paintings done and perhaps some notecards printed from some of my favorites so I can open up an etsy shop to sell my work...paintings...notecards..I've also been playing around with some floorcloths but they are very time consuming especially since they have to be durable enough to take the wear of walking on them.
I cut a rather elaborate stencil the other night, actually the subject is on the odd side but it came out pretty good I think:

BREATHE

It was done with my new stencil and spraypaint, acrylics were used for the background and the flowers are decoupaged on with painted stems - it's about 6x8...weird?? LOL most would probably think so!

Next I was in a swap for an ATC where "Color" was the theme. One of the most colorful places I've ever been was Venice, Italy - the island of Burano...crazy beautiful colors there: 

WHERE CRAYOLA & BURANO COLLIDE

And lastly, I was on Facebook when a friend (the same friend I painted the "When a Tree Grows in Brooklyn" book jacket for in a previous post) changed her profile picture - just as soon as I saw it I knew it would make a neat photo transfer and this is how it came out:

SUSAN

It's a packing tape transfer, some papers and embellishments, I don't do a whole lot of collage work but probably should as much fun as this was to make. I ended up sending it to her as a surprise! BUT the surprise was on me - I just got the most awesome piece of art lovin' from her made with a gorgeous wooden cigar box from Columbia: 

Susan's Box of Dreams

Gorgeous! And a ton of fun to go through, how lucky I am to be the recipient of this : )

Ok, this is what happens when I don't blog enough - I ramble on for much too long, we'll see if I might just be a bit more faithful to my blogging. It's noon and I'm still in my jammies drinking coffee  ............................at the Shores