As Promised...

I have a bunch of photos to share. First I will start with my new bag because I am seriously in love with it. Check out how much I have in it now, and I still can put a bunch more in. I love that I have a place for my pencil box, papers, inks, pens, and more!

Next up is a quick picture of the tags I made in Donna Downey's class last night. I got to take my new bag for a trial run. We were supposed to make a canvas too, but we ran out of time which was a bummer as I was excited about that. Of course, Donna encouraged us to put our new techniques to use and try our hand at something on our canvas once we were home. Hopefully I will actually take her advice!

And here is what I spent my day working on:

This project is going to be a "Simply Amazing Journal" for 2010. I have four focus areas for myself, Health, Heart, Home, Hobbies. My goal is to record my wishes, objectives, hopes, fears, goals, and then really keep track of my successes. I have included monthly calendars, some pockets, and some journal pages. I will keep updates on how this works for me here on the blog.

And finally! Pictures of my online class with Misty Mawn. First up is my sphere drawing. I am trying out some charcoal pencils and I really like them so far.

And here is my first attempt at a realistic portrait. I am not sure why I picked this photo of all that Misty offered us, but I was trying to go with my gut and this one seemed to be interesting to me when I started...

So, I just started doing some shading on this and then I stopped myself as I realized that getting a before and after shot would probably be good for me. I am at a place right now where I feel very uncomfortable. It is not looking "right" or "good" and so I am urging myself to work through and just keep layering and going. Hopefully I will have my after picture soon!

If you got this far into this post, you are quite a trooper! Thanks for looking and sticking with me!

Lorrie

blowing off the dust...

from the ol' blog that is. Sorry it has been awhile. I just have not done much crafting lately and so didn't have much to say. But I am feeling better and have a few big things underway so I figured I would warm up and say "hi" to anyone still reading this. I will have some pictures soon. I am taking an online class from Misty Mawn and have started a sketch that is different than my other portraits. I will give everyone a peek tomorrow at the "before" and "after". I am a bit stuck and figured it would be a good time to take a picture and then we can see where I get to next with it.

Tonight I am taking this class with Donna Downey. She is in town for CHA in Anaheim, not too far from me. It was fun packing up some paints, stamps and inks. I have not been to a class since Inspired which was last May. I am sure this will be fun, and just what I need after a long long time away from my craft space.

Ok, off I go to class! (first online, then in person) I will post again tomorrow with some pictures of everything!

Thanks for sticking with me and wishing me well...this is certainly the biggest perk of cyberspace. (do people still call it that?)

Something New

So, I have not been up to much by way of painting lately. But I did happen to find a beautiful print by an artist named Yellena James. There were many to pick from, in the end I just enny-meeny-miney-mowed it. ;) I wished I could buy originals, but I will say that this print is quite stunning. I loved it online and I love it even more in person. I might even have to go back for a second one very soon.

Just Play

Hi all! I had an art coaching session with Mystele last week. I said that I get "stuck" easily and she told me to "just play". So, I did. She gave me a bit of homework. Pick three things and play with them. I picked acrylic paint, pencils, embellishments. And if you wonder why my girls always have weird hair, I wonder this too. They just do. ;)

This is another "pulled" piece. This time I could only see the outline of her face and her hair so I added the rest. It was very fun play time. And I feel like I made a bit of my own emotions work for me on this. I hear that artists say this a lot and I am hoping to get that more as I move along in this hobby.
This little project still needs it's birthday wishes written in the circle. It is a little bday card for my mother-in-law. I was trying out some color blocking which was something I often did when scrapbooking. I got this entire idea from Mati Rose.

Check this out...

Look at Paulette Insall's recent blog post showing her newest painting and newest style:

I love this!

Hmmm? Do you think it is that pink hair? Something about hair that is not in the "normal" color range seems to attract me and pink is my very very favorite! I really could stare at Paulette's painting all day!

I am learning in my class with Mystele that I can and do have my own voice. But sometimes when I see paintings like this I think I would rather have THAT voice. There is a list (much is found right here to the right) of voices that I think I want to have and would rather have than my own. It is hard for me to see that some day I am going to love my voice as much as theirs. But that is my goal. I said it at the start of this blog and I will keep right on saying it until I feel I am there!

The 350 event!!

Today was the 350 art show that I have talked about here. The art was displayed for a few days and today at 3:50 the purchasing began. We walked in at about 4:00 and most of my things were already purchased. How weird. Really, really, really. Weird. So, I had hoped to show some pictures of my things, but I didn't even take pictures before I gave them to the event! You can see a couple several posts back, but I had several others too. Oh well. I am sure they are happy with their new owners! And this was fun to participate in, especially as it was for a good cause. If you happened to be in New York at Time's Square, you might have even got to see some of the pictures of the event on the BIG screen! Also, stories about the event have been on the news all day. Very cool. Here's a picture and also a letter written by the organizer of this global event. You can click on the links to see more of the event that took place from Africa to Barcelona, to Mexico, and of course, to Pasadena! (Don't know why everything here is underlined, must have clicked something...???? Whatever, sorry it is annoying!)

Dear Friends,

Today in New York was one of the most amazing experiences of my life.

As I stood in Times Square and watched images flood in from every corner of the world on the big screens, I finally saw what a climate movement looked like -- and it looked diverse and creative and beautiful.

Please head to www.350.org and spend a few minutes watching the pictures. We need you to feel the strength of this movement, and to see how creative and committed this movement is, all across the planet.

It was so sweet to watch the day move around the globe, with thousands upon thousands of pictures appearing, sometimes a dozen a minute! There were photos of climbers high on the glaciers of Switzerland holding 350 banners, of bicycle parades from Copenhagen to San Francisco, of organizers in Papua New Guinea beating their church gong 350 times while churches in Barcelona rang their bells 350 times. Photos of activists protesting coal plants and celebrating wind farms, of students in 350 shirts repairing their flooded homes in Manila, and of thousands of people marching in the streets of Bogota and Kathmandu. Photos of people from different races and classes, religions and nationalities, coming together around a simple and powerful number to save our planet. Thousands took to the streets in Addis Ababa and Mexico City; we had huge parades in places like Togo and Seattle.

You were by far the biggest news story on Google, on CNN, on the front pages of newspapers around the planet. And these pictures were seen around the world, in newspapers from Beijing to Boston, on TV stations from New Delhi to New York, and on blogs, social networks, and websites across the internet.

Together, we've shown the world that a global climate movement is possible and set a bold new agenda for the upcoming United Nations Climate Meetings in Copenhagen this December. The 350 target is the new bottom line for climate action and world leaders must now meet that target.

We thought we would be tired after many sleepless nights planning this day, but in fact we're more energized than ever. We're preparing to deliver the photos and messages from your events to every national delegation to the United Nations on Monday, and planning to hand the photos to high-level ministers at upcoming climate negotiations in Barcelona and Copenhagen. So if you haven't uploaded your best pictures from the event yet, please do so right away by sending us an e-mail to photos@350.org with your photos attached, with your City, Country as the subject and the body as the action description.

Thank you more than we can possibly say. We'll (of course) be asking you to do lots more in the weeks ahead -- but today, lean back, relax, look through pictures at 350.org, and savor your accomplishment. You were part of what many journalists called "the most widespread day of political action the world has ever seen."

Together with millions around the world, you made a real difference already -- get ready to make much more in the days, weeks and months to come.

With hope,

Bill McKibben and the whole 350.org Team