Being a cheapskate is not good this WOYWW

I have all sorts of goodies spread around

 my desks this week.  

I have something rare first

I tidied the inking station,

well not all of it but hey,

that's a lot for me.

Stop looking at the mess in the background,

you were lucky to see the front bit tidy.

You'd better look now as it won't last long!

Here's the main desk

 Back to the normal mess

but wait, there's something

Doctor Who added there!

Yes I know I'm sad but I couldn't resist

the sonic screwdriver pen and journal

and yes, that's a Tardis cup.

I added some water ripples to Mr P 

but being the cheapskate I am

I used up all of the mixed glaze rather than waste it

and now he's been over rippled.

I'll have to glaze over some of that white (sigh).

Being a cheapskate is really not good

when you need to do sketches.

I have three sets of glasses.

One for seeing, sunglasses and reading glasses.

In this country it is actually cheaper than getting 

graduated, self tanning (or as the boring people say,

light sensitive) glasses.

This seemed okay until I started to sketch

things a little further than my reading glasses could see.

Now I have to do this just to sketch

Of course I look like this, you don't think I would forget to put all the wrinkles in, do you?

and I have to tell you it ain't easy 

to balance all that lot

on your snoz.

I have to lift my head up and down 

to get the right lenses for which bit 

I want to see and it gets really confusing.

Plus my parrot doesn't like

me looking stranger than normal

and jumps up and tries to pull

the glasses off my nose,

that leads to putting the wrong glasses 

back on and I get really into a mess.

 

Now why don't I just get graduated glasses

for sketching, I hear you ask.

Well, that is my plan but you only get

one set of cheap glasses a year and

I've already had one this year,

so in my normal cheapskate way,

I've got to wait until next year to get them.

Until then it's double vision all the way.

 

Kinda gives a whole new meaning 

to four eyes, doesn't it?

Watch this space for some updates

(well I hope)

on my plan to take over the living room.

(mwa ha ha).

 

Now you've seen mine,

hop on over to 

Julia's Stamping Ground

and have a look at the other

desks around the world

this What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday.

 

  

 

Too much poo cack is not a good thing.

I had a very rare whole day to paint today

and paint I did.

I bought my two inked paintings

home to work on

and decided to play with 

Mr P.

This is how he was when I brought him home

I roughed in his beak

gave him a bit of an eye

and a bit of shape to his beak.

I still have to refine it all 

but it's coming along nicely.

Except for his poo cack feathers.

Now my teacher is a

poo cack connoisseur,

she just loves that poo cack.

I, on the other hand resist it at every 

chance possible.

Yes De, I can hear you saying

you have to have poo cack to bring

out the bright colours.

But poo cack on his cute little feathers,

just can't stand it!!

Sorry De, I know you said NO

but I just had to do it.

Sorry about the toes, I inked some water and can't stand it upright yet.

Poo Cack GONE!!

Mwa ha ha, ooh the power,

I can sense the steam coming from 

my teachers ears,

ha ha ha ha ha......

See, even Mr P is smiling now!!!

Much as I hate to admit it,

a little poo cack is needed

just not on Mr P's feathers.

Happy painting everyone.

Linking up to PPF

Eye to brain to hand, no can do for WOYWW

I wish I could say that I've cleaned up

my desks, I did do it in my mind

but the hands weren't willing.

It's really neat if you look past all the junk

There are four desks in my room,

if you look hard enough.

To the right is my big 'L' shaped desk,

at the back is my inking desk,

in the middle is my mobile desk

and to the left is my credenza/desk.

Actually I have an extra one,

on the floor is my tub full of desky things.

This is what I take to class and it's full of all sorts

of painty things like paint (duh), brushes, glazes,

pots etc.

Here is my inking station, wow, that sounds very official

it's really just a space to put all my inks and bits.

As you can see, all very well organised

(cough, cough).

Despite this mess and my teacher

trying to give me heart attacks,

 I've nearly finished three paintings.

Love the colours but have to paint in his face yet.

Boat colours are roughed in and needs to be finished.

Needs a little bit more colour in a few spots.

If you're wondering what the title is all about,

I have joined a sketch book class 

and was trying to practise before it begins.

One exercise is to look at a cup and draw it

without looking, sounds easy and probably should be,

as long as you are not me.

I had an almighty row going on in my brain when I tried this.

You see, your eyes are supposed

 to tell your brain what they see

and then the brain is supposed to tell the hand

what to draw but in my case

my hand is very strong willed and it was yelling at my eyes

saying it's always done the drawing and

back off eyes or else.

You can imagine how noisy it was getting 

in my little brain with the tooing and froing

between my eyes and hand. 

Needless to say, the hand won this round,

(the drawing was terrible)

my brain has no right or left side

just a muddle in the middle

and my eyes don't want to play any more.

This is going to be a long and 

very noisy (in my brain) 

sketch book course,

just hope I survive.

Wonder if the eyes will 

eventually win the war.

While my hands and eyes are still working,

on the keyboard at least,

I'll end off

but first why not hop over to

Julia's Stamping Ground

and see the the more normal people

are doing on this

work desk wednesday.

I finished my Sailboat picture the other day.

 

 

Evil teachers and snot for WOYWW

I was missing last week

I had a date with a few boxes of tissues.

It was one almighty snot fest,

you know the kind,

where the only way to sit upright is if you

stuff a tissue up each nostril and

just let them soak up the snot.

If you sit up without the tissues, the snot just comes

streaming out and floods everything in it's path,

even computer keyboards are in the firing line. 

Plus once the snot hits the cotton wool

inside my head it gets really heavy and I can't 

hold it up, hence, staying away from the computer

and just laying on the couch for quite a few days.

Today is the first day back into my art room since my last post

and of course nothing has changed desk wise

but I did go to class this week and did quite a bit.

 Remember this fellow, well I decided I didn't like it now

so we decided to take off a lot of the dark ink on the colourful water.

He's looking better now but my teacher had

 that evil glint in her eye.

That look of I'm gonna scare the pants off you now and

she made me mix up two pots of ink, one with turquoise and

sepia and one with purple and sepia.  

Now those of you who know me well, know that I hate the colour brown

and the thought of putting that poopy colour on

 made me go green.

I put in just one or two drops of sepia

 and then miss meanie

smiled and poured that stuff in like crazy. 

 I think they heard my protests in the next county!!

Trust me she said, with that evil grin and so it began, a dribble of this and a dribble

of that and ....

okay I told you that it needed the sepia in there

to bring out the colours (cough, cough).  

It still needs to dry and the colours will still move,

plus there is a lot of work to do on the pelican itself

but I have to admit that I really like it now.

Just wish we could get this result without 

 giving me a heart attack every time.

Just to prove it wasn't a fluke

I also inked the boat with the leftover inks

 

This was really fresh when I took the photo 

so it will move more but I like it.

I'm going to paint the boat properly, I think, 

may change my mind yet.

Now don't get me wrong, my teacher is fabulous 

at teaching us and I love her to bits

 but when she gets that evil glint in her eye,

 my heart starts to race

and that feeling of dread comes over me,

cos I know she is going to make me put 

poo cack all over my canvas!

Should have gone to class last week

and let the snot run free!!

Well that's my almost kinda desk 

for this week

so why not hop on over to 

Julia's Stamping Ground

and see the other desks around the world

this, now snot free, Wednesday.

 

Creative Blog Hop

I've been asked to join in the

Creative Blog Hop

by Shoshi.

I met Shoshi (Sue) through

WOYWW which is

What's On Your Workdesk Wednesday.

Shoshi does unusual things with

teabags and makes all sorts of 

lovely crafty things in her huge craft room

(yes, I'm just a little jealous of her space).

The blog hop involves making a post on a monday

answering a few questions and then

nominating three other blogs to share the love.

Here are the questions and my answers:

1. What am I working on?

I'm currently experimenting with a more loose style of painting

using acrylics, inks and anything else I can play with.

I currently have seven canvasses on the go, all at

different stages of completion. 

I'm in an ocean mood at the moment and playing with 

sailboats and pelicans.

That's after my parrot mood where I painted

bright Lorikeets.

2.  How does my work differ from others in my genre?

I guess really in my work there is that element of 

blonde nutter in each piece.

Most of the work is crazy and bright with loosness

but I always like to add a little bit of

uptight and get it just right me,

somewhere in the piece.

3.  Why do I write/create? 

I've always loved to draw but had to

 work for a living, which was no fun.

I started painting when my last child was young

 and haven't wanted to do anything else since.

Painting keeps me sane, although many would say

I'm totally insane but hey, just imagine 

what I'd be like if I didn't have painting!

4.  How does my writing/creative process work?

I can get ideas from anywhere and then I try to find  photos

of that subject and from there it's to photoshop to get what

I think will work, draw it up onto a prepped canvas

and just let the imagination go.

Sometimes I will just paint and glaze a painting

and then on another I might put tons of gloop on,

then ink it and paint over that.

All of my paintings just seem to evolve rather than be

meticulously planned.  

I find it works better that way, 

plus I don't have the patience to plan.

I have two people who I would like to nominate 

for the next blog hop. 

They are both arty farty types like me.

1. Neesie.  I've known Neesie for quite some time now.

We met online when she was living in Melbourne

and still keep in touch now that she has moved

to Bonnie Old Scotland.

Neesie is a fabulous artist, photographer and cook.

 Her work is gorgeous

and her posts extremely funny.

I would urge you to visit her blog for

some highland hijinx. 

2. Sandra Busby.  I met Sandra online a long time ago too,

it was her fabulous paintings of glass

 that led me to her blog.

 Sandra is an incredible artist who works in oils. 

 Her glass paintings are second to none

 and she does the most adorable teddy bears. 

Sandra also has a news letter 

which is very informative and she often shares

how her work is done with a series of photos.

I've learned quite a few things from her blog.

Now I've given them a little introduction

and if you're still awake after my waffling,

maybe you could go and visit their blogs.