Paintings in My Studio...

I want to thank everyone who wrote to me after my last post.
My daughter is still in the hospital, but she really is getting a ton of great help and things are looking brighter and I cant wait to have our little girl back again.

One of the questions I got was about a painting that hangs on the wall behind the easel that holds my new painting that's being worked on right now.  It's an acrylic painting I did of the many lovely long sand beaches that we have gone too here in Ontario, and I tried to capture the look of the wet sand as the water drew back after each wave came through.  Needless to say the title of my painting ended with "Wet Sand" 

And then it comes to another painting (on the opposite side of the work space), I call it my gallery wall and the place I can store larger canvases, my inspiration board, I like to change things around all the time and this wall is perfect for that.

Any how, on that wall I have one smaller canvas, a landscape painting from a canoe trip we did in Algonquin Provincial Park.  I really hate being in stormy weather, and thunderstorms scare the living crap out of me.

A few years ago we were in one Mother of all storms and ever since then, you could say I have turned in to a big chicken...  But I still like to capture pictures of the heavy majestic clouds, paint them and look at them.

(Just don't ask me to sit through them when they go right over)

Okay, so here is my problem with this painting, I cant for the life of me remember if I did it in oils or acrylics.

Sure, I could always check and not sure why I haven't done it yet...  Maybe, just maybe I'm a bit worried to find out and then start fiddling about with it and screw it all up.  

I'm not sure how to fix the water, any ideas?

I leave you again with more pictures I took from my morning walk two days ago.

Lovely frost had settled above everything, all was covered in a sweet sugar dusting, dew drops frozen in to beads.  I just love this time of the year where even the smallest detail is dreamy.

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Still here!!...

I know it has been a while since I posted last, over a month now. But I'm here!!!!  I'm around and about and today has been my first time to start painting again in a long while.  And to tell you the truth it hasn't been easy going, some of you might know that my daughter has severe autism and since February 2012 she developed head aches and it has been going on ever since and it has only become worse.

Journal page I did one night after one very frustrating day

So it has been a huge struggle for us and mostly for her as she can only say few words, but cant articulate where or how it hurts.  We know her and we all know that she's in pain and not doing well, but how do you explain that to Dr's and others who don't know her.  So during this whole time we have been fighting with the medical system, hospitals and specialists and all we got was not much at all, and due to this nothing was done and she only got worse.  Because of her autism and not being able to communicate verbally, her behaviours got worse and worse...   Everything around here has been put on hold, I haven't been able to work or paint, life just took a place on top of the highest shelf possible and everything has been to care for her and trying to find help for her.  Then finally two weeks ago, we finally found that one person who would hear us out and agree something has to be done.  Finally my little girl is getting the help she needs.  Now she's under medical care, some tests have been done and now we're waiting to hear.  We're no longer beating our heads against walls, our pleads for help have been heard and now the path looks like its going in the direction for the light.

So between visiting our girl in the hospital, meetings with Dr's and others, medical tests, never ending phone calls and emails, we have finally been able to catch up to much needed sleep, recovered energy and even been able to get a few things done around here.  One of the things was my workroom and studio space, the insulation work got done so Mr B bought me furniture and few things for my space {thank you baby} and although it has taken me over a month to get everything back in, I at last moved in again and even started to paint again.  So here it is, my new space {mind you, its still messy and will take time to get all that stuff I pushed under things to get sorted through} so I snapped a few pictures...

Canvas on the easel is getting ready for a painting I'm doing for an auction I'm donating it too 

{More details coming soon}

So today I added more to my canvas {details} and I cant tell you how fantastic it felt to 

be right in here, paint, feel the brush and just for a while my mind was only about the moment.

I feel hope and I really think we're now doing what should get done.

I cant believe it has been over a month since I posted here, and fall came and its almost over

or at least the beautiful colours have almost all fallen and faded away.

I have been able to get out for a few walks and of course my camera had to come along too.  

Board walk down by the bog

fall harvest

Sweet Cotton Grass

Here's to hope, to my little girl

And to everyone with no voices to be able to be heard!

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Its coming along...

FINALLY!!!!  The floor has been re-insulated and same goes for the attic.

It was pretty funny when the contractors took up the floor, not only have I had a whole zoo living under there

but squirrels have also kept the space as a chestnut bank and they had made a ton of deposits.

So now, frosty, squirrels, mice and chestnuts alike have been booted out and now hopefully 

it should make it much easier for me to stay in there and paint while the winter months rolls by.

Been doing very little sketching during this time.

I cant believe we are already in mid September and fall is here for sure, leaves have started to change

and almost all flowers have turned in to beautiful and interesting seed pods.

A few things are still in bloom.

I found this drawing among my many paper stacks

Now wanting to do something with it so I can finish it, just trying to figure out how.

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Studio changes on the way...

  

So I'm in the works of clearing out my studio space, and as exciting things are to come.  

This part however is something I would rather be without.  

Oh how I hate packing things up and moving everything!!

  

I remember as it was yesterday when I finally got my last box out from my space, and it really was not that long ago, we have after all only been in this house for just a bit over a year.

But here they are again, the blasted boxes

{needed a few to protect some of my things}

And I have been measuring everything more than twice, or make it hundred's of times

Trying to work out how I want the space to be and look after all the work gets done.

In a week the insulation company will come in and rip out the floor, re-insulate under it and winterize it and then they will do the same with the ceiling, then put everything back together again.

After that I have to do insulation work around all baseboards, windows and walls, then paint and then all the fun stuff will start, get it all put back in again. 

I just cant wait to get back in there to paint again {on canvas and paper}.

Today I took a break from the boxes and moving stuff, went for a nice walk in the woods.

Its very lovely out, still summer but there is small signs of that autumn is not far away now.

Tomorrow the same story again, lots of moving stuff and furniture.

Between it all I have to cut matting for a picture I'm entering in to a juried art show.

Now, time to relax and watch a bit of tv with my dearest, maybe do some sketching.

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Art in the Park...

Yesterday was the...

Could not have asked for better day for this, beautiful late summers day.

Sunny, not too hot and a light breeze.  Eight of us artists outside and it was a great mix of work.

And the crowd was good and steady stopping by

During a break I walked around the farmers market park, of course camera in hand
I love the different stands, all the colours and signs.

Bought some vegetables, fruit and fresh bread to take home. 

Love beets and peppers, and I just had to get a few of these purple peppers.

The colours were amazing, will be fun to see tonight what they taste like.

Sunday has been spent with some cleaning, and especially the garage as I have to start

to get my work room ready {emptied} for some renovations to be done.  I'm finally getting the floors and roof done so this should make it so much easier to work in here when winter comes.

Cant wait to get all this done, so I can start getting everything back in again and then start painting.

But now cleaning, sorting and moving stuff and while I'm doing that my daughter is 

sitting here in the middle of the mess creating some cool art.  Making her own stamps and cards.

Love seeing her being able to enjoy some art time again!

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Painting and more supplies and more....

Here's a better picture of the painting again.

And below is some of the pictures I wanted to have in my post about where I work for the Where Bloggers Create, but I had those issues that didn't let me upload them...  And now, after my dearest husband gave my computer a good talk, slap on the backside and almost tossed it out the window, it started to work

Holy macaroons, is this ever exciting!!!

{but now I'm afraid to close my computer, maybe it only works right now because he's home...}

Any hoooo, this is the pictures of how or where I store my supplies

and display others

I love old vintage or antique suitcases 

and not that I'm either vintage or antique {yet} but the wicker case you see on the left hand side is from when I went to art school, love it but it was the worst thing ever to carry art supplies in during my travels between home and down town.

See I lived in the country south of Stockholm {were the school was}, so first I had to walk for 45 min to the train station, then the train ride took close to an hour, then I had to fight through crowds in the Central station to catch the subway to get to the other end of the city and then again walk about 25 min.

I don't mind to travel or walk {if anything I love it}, but this poor wicker suitcase sure took a beating after just 3 weeks of being not only stuffed silly with every drawing and painting tools thinkable and being squashed between other commuters...  So now it holds some of my older work.

  

Supplies, if I only worked in one or two kinds of mediums, I guess my work space would be less packed full

But I paint {acrylics, water colours, oils and ink}

I also do drawing, illustrating, sew, make my own stamps and I do crafts with my daughter.

On top of it I like to do photography, mail art and just try out new things.

I love different textures, fabrics, glass, paper, natural things like bark, rocks, wood and the list goes on.

I also love to collect antique and vintage books and fabric, plus I really like washi tape {Japanese paper tape}...  Well any how, this is how I store and display some of those things.

I like to rotate things from time to time, but I cant stand it when I have too much around and showing.  

But I'm by no definition {or that I see my self as} a tidy or well organized person.

I make really big mess when I work and I love it!

Huge thank you again for all the wonderful visitors and comments you have left.

I'm back on line again and lets hope this time it actually will work.    

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Where Bloggers Create 2013 & This is where I create

Hello, Hej Welcome to my space!!!

Before I take you through everything, I want to apologize for the messy look to this post.

Its all due to that I cant post on my own computer {something seriously wrong with it} and thankfully my husband let me use his computer for this {thank you baby} and the pictures I had ready for this event

Where Bloggers Create 2013 by Karen Valentine of My Desert Cottage

are stuck on my computer and I was only able to use very few of them here.

I was so looking forward to this event, have been part of it the past three years and I really enjoyed it each past year, love seeing all the other bloggers spaces and how and where they work.

Okay, so here we go...  the picture above is the view you see when you 

enter in to my space from the back yard of our house

Then you turn left and you will bump in two of my work tables, the one in the left corner is where I cut matting, paint and do more messy stuff...  Oh heck who am I kidding, all the surfaces get messy when I get going : )  It just looks clean right now for this event.  

My son noticed it, he pointed out that I have wood table tops, who knew.

Second table {with white legs} I use for drawing, cutting fabric and for photography.

Go around the tables and you end up in the middle of the space, to the left again you can see the old wood stove {from a tugboat}.  That one cant be used and next year we're putting and new and smaller wood stove and it will be more back to the corner so it wont take as much space as this one.  But for now its serving as a stand for my brushes and paints {acrylic and oils} and next to it is one of easels.

The bench is new in there, I put it in so my daughter can rest there when she's not feeling well.  She loves being in there, but due to a headache condition she has, she gets tired fast and needs to rest a lot.

Under the bench is storage cases that hold my own made stamps and supplies and other stuff.

Not sure if you were here visiting last year, but I has just moved in to this space and house.  And then this my very favorite piece of furniture was still in its original colour {I bought it from a store I worked in before it closed down}.  I painted the whole thing cream white and added all my old storage cases, baskets and boxes to hold more stuff.  So here I have books, mags, extra paper and fabrics.  And my collections of antique and vintage books, washi tape and other little bits and bobs.

   

Back to my tables and this where you can see water colours, inks and lots of other drawing supplies.

Above it I have my small yet growing ruler collection, the older and worn the better and this is where my dads old rules he used while building also hangs.  I love looking at it from time to time, I look at all the marks he had put on it through out the years and it makes me feel closer to him.  Sure miss him a lot and especially the times when he and I were building things together.

Different view again of the space, and there is of course my trusted secretary Charlie.  He likes to snooze while I'm working away and when he wants my attention he either lets out a loud bark or brings all his toys and drops them around my feet until I will notice.

{The large windows face west and the two small once face out north, ton of great light in there}

The dresser on the right hand side is where I also paint with acrylics or oils, and it stores a lot of supplies and other junk.  My daughter also likes to paint here.  Behind it {seen more in the second picture from top} I have three old closet doors standing up, behind them I store most of my canvases, portfolios and some tools.

  

This is my small work desk and this is where I blog {when it works} and do all that fun paper work that comes with having an arts business, having kids, a household and...

In short, this is the place where I write, work on my photography and designs, pull my hair {I'm not good with numbers or with computers}, search, look for and dream about {very long wish list}.

And back to my work table again, this is where I store fabrics and all my paper for drawing and painting.

Some paint & drawing stuff

I totally love my work space and its double in size from what I had before in the old house, and I have windows, a lot of windows something I really missed before.

But this space is far from finished, little did we know when we did move in last year {during a heatwave} that this place would get cold.  And I mean very, very cold, so cold that everything will freeze solid.

I was not able to spend much time in there during the winter months.

So this fall, everything in there has to be moved out and up comes the floor, then it will all be sprayed and insulated really well, same goes for the attic. And then new floors will be put back on top.

Down the road for work to be done, is the new wood stove, new heating system, lighting, new windows 

{I really hope my husband is not reading this or he'll get hart palpitations}, sure he knows all about it but seeing the list with everything that I have added to it, like laundry tub or a sink, painting all walls, new/better bench, fabric for cushions and curtains...  Well, lets just keep that part out for now.

Just added these two small sketches I made...  Just having fun stuff, and the best part is that I think I'm starting to get over the drawing block bug I was hit with.  Things are coming back!!!

And talking about coming back, I'm sure these guys will be back in no time and the battle of dust bunnies will continue, maybe they are the reason why my computer is sick.

I want to thank you for stopping by and sorry again for a wonky post, all in all I'm just happy I found a way to be able to get this posted and actually be able to take part in the Where Bloggers Create event.  

Huge thank you to Karen for running the event again this year.

When I can, I will post the pictures I had made for this, fingers crossed all will be fixed sooner than later.

Happy creation everyone and now I'm of to check out all the other bloggers posts about their space.

And thank you again for visiting!!

Mari

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Testing colours & moving things around...

We went from winter to full summer with in a week, didn't have much of spring at all. 8 days ago I was in Toronto and it was cold and when I got home our chestnut tree had only big buds on it. And today the buds are wide open with flowers and the leaves are close to 8 inches long. So summer came with a boom and it has been insanely hot for this time of the year. 

Small acrylic painting

Between working on a few commission pieces and for the upcoming show,

I'm doing some small paintings for the heck of it, testing colours really.

 And I also have been reading posts of blogs I'm following and many artist bloggers are talking about their travel art kits right now, not only do I find this fascinating but also fun as I get to see what and how they are able to cram all that stuff in to their bags. 

Made me think about what I had in Toronto last time.   

I brought both my watercolour cases, but ended up with the small one in my bag as the other one is far to heavy (which sucks as they are my favourite).  But this is what I had last time, and the sketch in the book is of old houses in the Queen St West neighbourhood... 

I love old houses and the turquoise one of course stood out to me.

 

And I have been having to move things around in my studio again and add a bench in there, its for my daughter and when she's not feeling well.  She loves to hang in there with me and when she cant paint then she likes to lie down and sleep, sadly it has been a lot of that again for her.  But I'm just glad I have been able to make the room for her to be comfortable in there.

And its kind of neat place to sit down and read, sip tea and or blogging.

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Clean work space & work shop...

I did it!!!  My work space is way cleaner, trolls and dust balls kicked out (and successfully too, no one has returned yet) and a lot of stuff went out as well.

The old wood stove is now serving as a stand for my water colours and brushes (the stove cant be used for burning).  A old kitchen island is a work and storage space for acrylics and smaller work.

My desk is for paper work, sketching and sewing, and the table leg you see on the top left picture is my cutting table.  Still lots to do in there, but its now cleaner and workable.  Ahhhhh!

 

I also took part in a mixed media and picture transfer work-shop, I know most of this stuff already but it was great to go and hang with other artists and just have fun.  I made three and half pieces (the half one you see below here in green...  have no idea what to do with it next), the top one here is about my mums side family history. 

 

And here is a bit of a mix from that day.

And spring has finally arrived with nice warm air, tree buds are opening, birds everywhere singing and busy building their nests.  I have even seen some plants sticking out of the ground.  I know I have mentioned about spring being here in few past posts, but it snowed last Saturday so it has been very frustrating and super slow going with the "finally here", so I hope this is it

No wait, this better be it!!!

 

During a walk in to woods today, I saw this little pretty bird.

Do you know what kids of bird this is?

 



So yet again, happy spring everyone and thank you for your comments to my last posts.

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To Conquer the Mess of all Times...

I think I said in my last post that I'm going to clean up in my studio (?)...  Well, if I did, lets just say I didn't get as far as I had hoped, instead I ended up with a small cold {maybe it was allergies to all the dust bunnies, yeah that sounds more likely} so I was out of energy for a few days and instead did a bit sketching.  However, with the little clean up that I did get done, and mind you this was just with me stepping inside the studio and looked through two boxes
and I found a pen that I totally forgot I even had, China marker {its more like a wax pencil}.

So while fighting the sniffle I found a new series on the telie {well its new to me} Downton Abbey, and I just love how the story what the time period it all takes place in.  I like the hair styles, the fashion and designs of it, so of course I had to sketch while watching it.

And I was going to take a full picture of my studio space, but I don't wish any of you to fall ill and feel the need to gag, so to spare you the horror here is only a few snippets of the

'Not So Impressive Space' but the rather 'Crappiest Space'... 

Holy crap its awful and its time to roll up my sleeves and get down to it.

Time to face the bad and the ugly!! 

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