Happy New year

I send along to all the very best wishes for a new year filled with the wealth of the creative spirit that allows life to flow with beauty and peace.

May we howl at the moon and fly free. And may the Earth Mother be the better for our having walked her paths and rowed gently down her streams.

Painted Furniture: garden benches

Last Friday I went thrift shopping. Here are two of the three benches I found.

I brought them into the studio and began. They were scrubbed and prepared with three coats of white primer/sealer. Then I covered them with black latex and drew into the wet paint with a Pink Pearl eraser spontaneously letting design begin to form.

Next came a series of glazes using Golden Acrylics and Matte Medium. Again drawing into the wet paint with the eraser to bring up the form and a sense of movement.

Finally the details were applied making the 3 pieces part of my current 'Bird watching' series.

I kept them simple as I have a gallery that is waiting for them. The bases are left white and they are sealed with Minwax Polycrylic making them suited for indoors or out.

Hand Painted Furniture

I bought three benches at the thrift store last week and have been giving them a new life. I believe I'll have them ready to post, in their varying stages, within the next few days.

In the meantime I walked around the house and snapped a few of the pieces that I did when I owned my gallery. The 'Water table' is a farm auction find made of wide, mismatched planks. I cut the legs down to make it a coffee table height and have used it in that fashion ever since.

The bench is a theatre seat that folds flat for storage...a fabulous design and so incredibly comfortable one could even fall asleep during a boring performance. I had about 7 of them and painted and sold them all keeping this one, that I painted with my fingerprints, as part of my collection. I still have one more unpainted one in storage and one day...

The little hall table is one of many, and during the time I was doing these lizards and frogs just kept leaping onto the surface.

Play Ball

                    Play Ball, Drozda 2008

                                   8x8 inches

                                Acrylic on woodIt's been a week 'gone to the dogs' from meeting Minnie, the rescue Dane in the last post, to having a lot of ball time with my Jack Russell, Valentine. She got me inspired to create this little piece on an 8 inch square piece of wood that I found on a building site, along with many other planks and possibilities.

Speaking of wood...I stopped at the thrift store this week and found three benches that were just calling out to become part of my painted furniture inventory.

Over the years and particularly when I owned my gallery (a hundred years ago) I loved to find wonderful wood furniture cast off's and give them a new life.

So there's lots of fun in the studio and something wonderful will be emerging over the next while.

Today it's primer and base coat.

Meet Minnie

I couldn't resist sharing this good news from over at The Blooming Platter. Check in and get the whole story...a wonderful happy ending and beginning all in one for Miss Minnie.

Animoto.com

Holiday Fest

Wisdom Words continue with 'R e l a x'

Click on the video link to see more... happening in the Atrium at CACV this Sunday.