I made three attempts at this one. Blimmin’ awful! We had to use magazine photos of faces and paint over them. The back grounds are paint, collage and gesso. I spattered and dripped, splodged and crayoned but I could not get them to look  how I saw them in my imagination. The premise of the exercise was ‘Life Connections’. Obvs I focused on my family and home. Why the little house on the right looks like it’s on fire, I have no idea! Anyway – crap!

Week 11 was a short bonus lesson based on ‘The Tree of Life’ Tam’s demonstration was a lovely whimsical girl on a swing and her ‘cohort’, Gracie, gave us a lovely video of a more abstract tree. I’m not  alover of drawing figures, so I sort of combined the two demos for the image on the left. The one on the right was just me playing with some ideas in my journal – nothing to do with Life Book.

You might notice I skipped a couple of weeks. That’s because the exercises for the missing weeks didn’t really appeal & I didn’t have the necessary materials for them. I can always go back to them if I feel the urge later on.

This was Week 14, a bonus lesson by Dyan Reavely. Much fun. Quick and easy. Dyan’s flowers were three dimensional but I made mine flat as I am working in a journal, rather than on loose sheets of paper. I cheated even more – the flowers, leaves and tree were created out of  four large sticky labels. I journaled on them – freewriting all sorts of crazy stuff. The flowers, etc., were doodled, painted (Tombow markers) and cut out. Of course, they simply stuck down without me having to bother with glue or gel medium. I like the effect so it’s a technique I will use again.

The background was created by spraying diluted Brusho (powder) watercolour paints. Sorry, Dyan, but I can’t afford Dylusions right now. Brushos work just the same, last for an eternity and you can do lots of different effects with them. There are several videos on YouTube which demonstrate how to use them.

Readers in the US can buy Brusho paints here.

Week 15 was so much fun. I loved making these Quirky Animals! This was a lesson presented by Tam… I dreaded trying to do these, but the way she explained and showed us made it super-simple. Again I used my trusty Brushos for the background, spraying them through stencils.

The creatures are made with simple shapes with added quirk. Some are painted with acrylics and some are watercolour and/or watercolour pencil.

I added white pen all around, and some gold dimensional paint on the background.

I’d love to do more of these and frame them for imminent grandbaby.

Week 16 was one I’ve been looking forward to. I’ve been a great fan of Traci Bautista for a few years now. I just which I could create art so… well, so artfully as she does. Her’s always seems unforced and easy, whereas when I try the same thing it looks like a dog’s breakfast! Think I’ll give this one another go,

Missed a couple more weeks – this is Week 19. Week 18 was an interview with Carla Sonheim.

This lesson was presented by Danielle Danielle. I quite enjoyed it, even if I can’t get the hang of crossed legs. Pretend she’s wearing great baggy yoga pants, please! The background was created with lots of collage, hence the very textured nature. There is a torn piece of collage that runs right though the girl’s face – argh!

Acrylics, gesso, collage, crayon & pen.

And I am all caught up – yay!