Still going on the fish painting (darn it) for WOYWW

I'm sorry to say

the fish painting is still going.

We had a good look at it in class today 

and decided it needed more 

glazing to get the look of water right.

The glaze is still a little wet and I hope it will

calm down a bit more.

It's so scary when you put it on as it's really white

and I was sure I'd messed it up.

This was taken a bit earlier and

you can see how white it looked.

 

I still have to tone down the eyes,

they look like cartoons at the moment

and I will add more white in some areas to

make the ripples stand out more.

My desk this week was outside

and this is why

 

Apart from the fact that it's been

30 plus degrees this week,

Don't you just love the bird poop on the chair, that's my magpie friend!

I had to prepare a new canvas for class.

You can see my fan brushes with pots of

very watered down paint.

I use these to spatter the canvas

and boy did I make a mess, it went everywhere.

Yes, my glasses got the treatment as well.

Puts a whole new meaning to spots before your eyes!

Of course you can see exactly what 

the painting is going to be,

what, you can't see it??

Well you're just not using your imagination,

there are two Lorikeets (small parrots),

one is flying off and the other is about to.

Now do you see it?  I thought not.

You'll just have to wait until next week.

I drew the birds on in class and then really spattered

it but couldn't bring it home as it was too wet.

So, it's just going to have to be a Picasso 

until next week!

That's all for me,

the little bird from last week

still looks exactly the same,

school holidays are a bummer.

Why not hop over to Julia's 

Stamping Ground

and see what is on work desks

 around the world,

this glorious wednesday,

have fun.

 

 

Trevor the farting turtle leads to undersea bubbles for WOYWW.

If you saw my post last week,

I introduced you to Trevor Turtle

my farting pool cleaner

(if you missed it you can have a look here).

I've been getting great entertainment

(yes, I know, simple mind)

watching Trevor's antics around my pool

and the other day I was watching him do a 

particularly huge fart under water

(wish I'd got a photo)

and then it came to me

"light bulb moment" .

I could do an ink canvas with bubbles coming

from the deep depths of the ocean

and so I did.

After a lot of playing and just as much swearing

I made a cute little canvas which 

I'm calling "Undersea Eruption".

As usual my camera skills suck and 

I couldn't get a good picture of it,

so you will have to use your imagination quite a lot.

I has layers of deep blue and turquoise in real life

but it's quite shiny and hard to get a good shot.

 It has a lot of depth but you can't see it 

in the photo, pity cos I actually like this.

I still have to ink the bottom edge.

To my desk this fine sunny hot spring day

 There is the same old junk to the left,

of course my Dalek pens aren't junk, 

they're real!!

Since spring has sprung magnificently

in this part of the world, I thought

I would do a springy type watercolour.

Dummy here, did it on a thin flat paper

instead of proper water colour paper

so it didn't blend and went blobby

and now I'm really busy, so I don't know 

when I'll finish it, typical me!!

I can't show you the next stage of my fish pond

painting this week as it is still at the studio drying

but I hope to show you the finished,

 yes that's FINISHED

painting next week!  

This week I have to start on a new painting

and I don't even know what it will be yet.

That's my little desk and natter for the week,

why not hop on over to Julia's

Stamping Ground and see what

everyone else has on their desks

around the world on this wonderful

Workdesk Wednesday.

Ahh, you gotta love spring :)

 

 

Same painting but a new friend for WOYWW

My desk is quite boring lately

just the same old fishy painting

and still not much to show.

This week in class I started to refine my painting

and my poor teacher must be pulling her hair out with me.

I'm getting so frustrated with myself 

because I want to finish each piece off 

and that's not how it's done.

My mind is sort of willing but my hands say no.

Hence, I didn't get much done today.

 

I'm a little dib, little dab kind of person and I'm

trying to learn to be a bold, put it on there kind of person.

So far, not so good but I'm determined to keep trying.

My teacher got me to put those really bold white strokes

on the tails and I have to tell you, I was having heart

 palpitations and my hand kept saying no, 

but looking at the photo now they actually look okay.

I still have a long way to go, just hope 

the old ticker can hold out!!

Last week, just when everything was going crazy

(isn't that always the way), our automatic pool cleaner

decided to give up the ghost.

After a lot of very strong words, I gave in and went 

to the pool shop.

Our pool cleaners never last long and I was shown

 the latest toy  robotic cleaner.

Now I'm a sucker for anything cute and different,

 so $1100 later we have a new pet, 

Trevor the Turtle cleaner.

 How gorgeous is this little fellow.  He swims and turns 

and scrubs his way around the pool and in three hours,

the pool is sparkling.  Not only that but he is very entertaining.

You can't see it in these pictures but he has a fan where his bottom would be and if he gets too much air in him he farts and swims down!!! 

Sorry, but who doesn't laugh at a good fart.

Okay, I'll lift the tone of the post now.

I received a beautiful gift from Margaret 

of Glitter n Glue.

It's a Christmas cracker and so intricate.

The card is beautiful and Margaret sent it to me

 in a container that is just perfect.

I will keep the cracker in this and bring it out every Christmas.

Thanks so much Margaret, I will treasure it.

Well, I've waffled on again, sorry Julia.

Now you've seen mine, why not hop 

on over to Julia's Stamping Ground

and see what's on desks from around the world,

this glorious springtime wednesday.

 

 

My painting's coming together and spring has sprung early. Life is good!Follow my blog with Bloglovin

You can't see it but there is a huge grin 

on my face. Spring has come early,

it's 28 deg and I have bare arms!!!

Ooh, I'm loving lettin the skin hang out,

not in a rude way but a kinda lettin it breathe 

sorta way.

I've been playing on a few desks this week.

This is my dining table where I drew up 

a backdrop for my Little Misses' class speech today.

They had to write a story about the Aussie Outback

and this is of a naughty emu who stole someones Akubra hat.

 

It's yellow because I took the photo last night and forgot

to turn on the flash.  It's not finished in this photo

but Little Miss took it this morning and I forgot to take another photo first (oops). The other picture I drew was of a dunny (outdoor loo for those who don't know) and yes, I forgot to take a photo of that too.

This is the mess I'm making on one of my other desks.

You can see my bottle of clear gel medium, that's what I mix 

with the paint to form the glaze that I used in class today.

I'm winning the war with my painting, so what more

 could I ask for.  I wasn't happy with the fish painting last

 week.  I did my homework yesterday, that involved

 spattering over the rocks.  It's easy to spatter in a large

 classroom but you try in a small little room filled with

 junk and  other paintings. I covered the floor with

 plastic and  half the things around it, loaded up

 my fan brush with  sloshy paint and had to be

 careful not to just  swoosh it like in class but

 be more dainty (ha that's a joke for me)

 and just lightly shake. Obviously that was just too

 much for my little blonde brain to comprehend as

 when I gently shook the brush the paint went upwards 

all over me instead of downwards onto the canvas. 

Just proves that gently is not my style.

After a lot of swearing and getting splattered

(a piece of advice, keep your mouth closed when doing

 this as it don't taste nice!!!), I got some on the canvas.

Here is where I left my canvas before class this morning.

Still a bit blah!

But then my teacher showed me how to glaze

and this is the under glazing so far.

 It is really starting to look like they are under the water.

 Here you can see the swirls in the actual glaze.

You paint the glaze on and then use a plastic comb

 to give  the direction wanted. In this case the

 swirling water. The light is shining on this 

picture so it looks more white than it is.

There's no class next week, so I might

 get some more of my inking done.

That's my fun for the week, sorry it's so long Julia, 

please don't yell at me :)

How about you go to Julia's Stamping Ground

and see what everyone has on their desks

this beautiful, sunny, warm wednesday.

Thanks for all the birthday wishes last week.

Ouch, another year older on WOYWW

I'm late posting today

that's because I'm another year older today

and I'm getting slower in my old age.

Today I'm forty-twelve, 

I can't bring myself to say the other 'F' word

cos I'm sure I couldn't be that old.

I still feel like I'm in my thirties.

I had a great day, art class this morning

and my lovely friend Lea

took me out to lunch.

Thanks again for that Lea.

Here is my desk today

How cute is this fella.

My wonderful hubby gave me this teapot for my birthday.

I just love quirky things.

Oooh I can feel a watercolour painting coming on!!!

Earlier in the week I decided to do an ink canvas

and boy was that a mess

It started out okay, this is the gloopy stuff.

 

Then trouble, dummy here forgot to put a high bit of

 something in the centre of the painting and all the ink flowed

 to the low point.

I had to hold it perfectly flat and get little miss to put some 

bits and pieces under it to flatten it out a bit.

 

The ink has dried a lot here, I was too busy with the wet puddly ink to take a photo.

 

You have to hit the ink hard with water spray and that

 makes a huge mess so I had to cover the floor and

 cupboards with plastic,but then I oopsed.

Have you ever wondered what happens if you shake

a full bottle of white ink and forget to put the lid on??

Yep, it was everywhere, all over the cupboard, the floor, me

and it hit the old computer on the floor.

 

 

I wiped all the floor and cupboards quickly before it dried

 but this sorta got missed, ewww. 

 Lucky I don't need the screen anymore!

 

Here is my fish painting from class today.

I think it's hideous but the teacher assured me it is

just as it should be.

 

 

Just looks like a mess to me but I'm determined

to do it the proper way and hope for the best.

 

Here is the ink canvas as it is now.

I still have a lot of work to do on it

but it's getting there.

Well that's my fun for the week.

I'm off to start dinner,

so hop on over to Julia's

Stamping Ground

and see the other desks

around the world

this wednesday.

 

 

Best laid plans, seem to go astray. WOYWW

I was quite excited about this week

as it is a public holiday in Brisbane

and I don't have an art class this week

which meant I could start an ink canvas.

Well in typical style, that didn't happen

as my last Gift Certificate for a Pet Portrait came in.

Of course I had to give that priority.

To be honest I'm not really happy with it.

The colour is too pale but it just doesn't want to darken.

The doggy photo I was given was taken at night 
which really messes with the colours

so I was guessing quite a bit and I prefer to just do the face

as a character portrait but they insisted that
 they wanted a full body.

I think that's what threw me.

I just hope they like it as they paid $50 for the gift certificate.

I've decided not to do any more gift certificates as 
I get quite stressed if the painting isn't working perfectly 
and you can't time when they come in for painting.

Since I didn't get to show all brightly coloured ink splodges,

I thought I would show you my splodgy room instead.

Here's my desk with the painting nearly done.

 This is to the left, oh yes not too bad you say.

Now it's starting to get there, you might be able to see
 the white sheet behind my easel, 
that is hiding a heap of half done canvasses

up against the wall, yeh, I'll get to them one day.

To the left of picture is my pile of junk that I have to squish
 each time I need to get into the cupboard, yeh,
 I'm gonna clean it up one day.

This is the one area I'm reasonably happy with
 as it is sort of tidy.

Well, that's if you don't look on the floor and oops,

 I didn't get that in the shot :)

This is the painful spot, I can't move for mess

and it's even up the wall and I have to dump all

of the papers on the printer on to the floor

each time I want to scan something.

Yeh, yeh, I'll clean it up one day.

So there you have the mess in the surround.

I often wonder how I manage to get anything done at all. 

Speaking of which, I may not get much done

from the middle of September as my girlfriend in Essex

has sold her house and is emigrating to Aus.

My girlfriend will be staying with us until she buys a house.

It will be shopping, coffee and cakes all the way for a while,

mwa ha ha.

Hey, maybe she will tidy up the art room (he he).

Nah, cake sounds better.

That's my desk this week and Julia hasn't posted
for this week yet, so I might get to play
with my inky mess yet.

Well you've seen mine, why not hop on over to Julia's,
I'm sure she will have WOYWW 
on her Stamping Ground by now
and you can see all the other desks 
around the world.