Thaqnksgiving

 Thanksgiving at my niece, Lauren's, again after missing it last year. As always her table was exquisite with all fresh flowers and some wooden accents. She never repeats from year to year. Dinner was delish as usual and she had a signature drink, Pumpkin Spice martinis with gingerbread man peeps.

All the ladies enjoying their drinks. They were sooooo good. 

My Christmas trees are going up tomorrow so I had to make a tree for my little squares. I could be finished with this project with just one more square, BUT my good friend , Paula, gifted me with a wonderful book of Japanese designs by Dover. There are so many that are circular and very adaptable for my squares. I will have to do one more vertical row and that means 13 more. I'm pretty sure that is what I will do. I'll post some next week.

I'm linking up with Off the Wall Friday.

Weekly Stitching

 I know that it's been awhile since I posted. Firstly I spent two weeks in Florida and only got a little bit done. Secondly My iPad, where I take my photos, was not transferring them to Photos on my laptop. After about two hours online with an Apple tech it is still not right. I had to send myself the photos and drag them onto my desktop to use them here.

Only four finished. I am busy doing other things, which I will show you later.

One last Sunday Morning sun

I've long had an affinity for Ginkgoes and have used them in several of my art quilts so I had to do one on a square.

I thought it would take a nice design if I had four leaves facing out. I like the single leaf better.

                                                              Yet I did it again.

Weekly Stitching and Sunday Morning Suns

 While making ALL these circle designs on 4 inch squares, I don't know why I didn't think of the designs I made for CBS Sunday Morning. Two of the stencils had what looked like rays around the circle, so I made squares with different variations of a sun.

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Favorite of the week, not sure why. Maybe it's because he looks so happy.

Then I made anther negative space circle with variegated Rose' to Merlot thread. I left a quarter inch border to allow for the seaming.

Linking up with Off the Wall Friday.

Weekly Stitching

 Just four this week because one if them took forever.

This is the one that I got extra credit for. I know it's not a circle, but my challenge, my rules to be broken. I just couldn't resist doing a heart.

One of those cute stencils and how I adapted it for stitching.

I did not want to go all around those big ovals with a stem stitch, so I made a big lazy daisy stitch and then a smaller one inside. I turned the inner design into straight lines and French Knots.

That's it for this week. Maybe, MAYBE, I'll be more productive next week.

Weekly Stitching and Watercolor Cards

 Six little squares this week, all using those fabulous stencils.

I concentrated on small watercolors this week, 4" x 6", the perfect size for mounting onto a card front. I found some terrific blank greeting cards in Michaels, sets of all different colors.

I enjoyed making these. A pen and ink drawing of leaves, then added watercolor squares and splatters. I  think they are also good for masculine cards. You don't always want flowers.

This is a mini version of a CeeCee design I did last week. I am going to try to duplicate it, but that doesn't always work.

These last two are my own designs, but using the CeeCee techniques. Again I'm not showing you the flops or the ones I threw away. I am putting away my paints for awhile for various reasons. I will explain that in another post.

Linking up with Off the Wall Friday. In addition to seeing some great art, Nina Marie always has some interesting posts. This week she is talking about how fabrics are printed. Something of which I never gave much thought.

Weekly Stitching and Watercolors

 I really got my mileage out of this stencil The first pix shows it using the stencil just the way it is and the next five are either additions or subtractions or both. I  had fun with this one. But then I aways have fun.

This is my favorite of the week, but it is my second attempt.   The first one was very muddy. So much to learn. This is 6" x 9".

It took four attempts to get this little guy right. It is 4.5" x 6" and the perfect size for a card. I am sending it to a dear friend who is suffering from dementia, early stages, and loves to get cards in the mail. I send her about one a month (all handmade) and her hubby says she loves them.

This also 4.5 x 6 and will also go on a card. 

So onward and upward, I hope. I will try to get some more painting done this weekend. And always, always stitching.

Linking up with Nina Marie's Off the Wall Friday.

Weekly Stitching and Watercolors

 Six squares done this week in spite of spending way too much time on my new addiction, watercolor. More about that later. Again, I relied on my great stencil set, doing variations of each.

                 I like the scallops on this one and I know I will be using it again in different ways next week.

                               Least favorite of the week. Hard to get those straight lines straight.

Now on to WATERCOLORS.  I have often admired watercolors, but for some reason I was never interested to try it until last week when I saw some on Lee Ann Paylor's blog and saw her Painterly Friday and a fabulous video on Watercolor Doodles. OMG I thought,  this looks like so much fun. So I ordered a nice Kuretake set of paints which I really like for the large removable paint pans and its 36 colors. I  also ordered a couple of good brushes and bought a book of watercolor paper at Michaels' and I was off and running. There are so many videos on YouTube and I mainly concentrated on Watercolor Doodles, combining painting with fine point pen and ink doodles. I just used a black Sharpie Pen (not to be confused with Sharpie Ultrafine marker).

For the most part I followed the videos and will branch out with my own designs as I get more confidence. Right now I am learning techniques and practicing.

This was my very first attempt. I was rather pleased with myself and it spurred me on to the next ones.

These first three were all  by the same artist, Nia. She has many videos on Youtube. These three were done on 140 weight wc paper in 9" x 12" size. On these you paint first, then doodle.

These next three, by the same artist were just 4" x 6", just the perfect size to mount on greeting cards. On these you doodled (or drew) the leaves first and then added the watercolor circles. I want to do more of these with my own leaf designs.

And this last one, inspired by another artist CeeCee,  uses a very loose style. I really loved doing this. I have done a few more in different colors and sizes, also good to mount on a card.

I'm not showing you the ones I discarded or cut up to use on the other side for practice. I had my share of flops, but I am hooked for now. As I said before there are numerous videos out there, but perhaps I will take some online lessons in the future. The might be a good project for Florida, since my sister and my friend Claire (my FL housemates) are also interested. And Claire is a former art teacher so we should have a great time.

I am linking up with Off the Wall Friday.