Some new watercolor

So today in the Beyond Traditional Watercolor class we practiced a very traditional method: glazing. Laying down a wash, letting it dry, then painting another wash over to achieve darker tones. I used a photo of canna leaves that I took several years ago, when I moved to Ukiah. The canna plants have long since disappeared...wait, maybe these were at that vineyard I used to visit to paint plein air...no matter, it's a great photo, the sun shining through some of the leaves, creating shadows and complex patterns. The painting exercise ended up not looking very much like the photo, but I enjoyed the process, watching the colors change and deepen. And I learned some things, too. And even though it doesn't look like the photo, it pleases me on several levels. So there you are. It's about 8 x 10 inches.

More Fabric Fun

Part 2 of yesterday's fun in fabric class. This piece, also about 13 x 15 inches, was done with clear water-based resist. After that dried, I painted on different colors of fiber-reactive dye. It "batched" (rested, folded up in plastic) overnight, and was washed out and ironed this afternoon. I'm not thrilled with the colors, but it was the process that was intriguing. More to come, I'm sure. It's the painting part of fabric surface design that I enjoy.

Fun with fabric

My friend Teri keeps after me. She says I never post any of my fabric fun on my flickr. She's absolutely correct. Most of my fabric things won't fit in my scanner, and I just get lazy, too lazy to photograph them and post them. But here, for your viewing pleasure, is the first step on what might turn out to be a "project" for the Fabric Printing and Dyeing class that I'm taking. The blue outline is a water based colored gutta resist. The colors are fabric paints, applied with a brush after the gutta dried and was heat-set with an iron. I'm rather pleased with this piece, which might find its way into a sort of wall-hanging. Other people in the class expressed admiration also. I blush. And enjoy the praise.

Please be patient....

I just let my life get soooooo complicated, taking a few too many units at the local community college, but what can I drop? Modern Dance? NOOOOOOO way. Feldenkrais..."Lie down on the floor and feel how your body connects to the surface beneath it. Think about how you move." Can't drop that one: it's only one hour a week!
Then there is Beyond Traditional Watercolor. That's just plain fun. And Textile History is so interesting; 3 hours of slides of historical textiles, after the watercolor class. Makes for a full Friday. Then there is all day Saturday Fabric Printing and Dyeing. I guess I'll just have to work through it.
But I'm tired this week, after spending most of the weekend in the SF Bay Area, visiting family.

This afternoon on the way to my car after class, I caught some gorgeous sky photos. I'll paint these clouds one day soon.

I'm never blue when the sky is...

...and lately we have had clear blue skies, cold, crisp mornings and sunny days. We desperately need rain, and we all will welcome it when it comes, but I can't help loving these gorgeous days. It's the truth: when the sky is this bright clear blue, I am NOT depressed. I spent enough years living in Coastal Northern California with high grey overcast that deadened all shadows, feeling tired and sad and defeated. Since moving to Ukiah, where the sun shines almost every day, my emotional life has improved immeasurably. And not too long ago, I got back in touch with the dancer within me, who had been hiding, dormant, waiting to emerge, and what I feel now is JOY. The phrase "jump for joy" makes sense to me now.

Something New

Something is better than nothing, right? Well, here's something. My sweetie gave me this tiny rose in a little tin "pail" and I decided before it dies (I do not have a naturally green thumb) I should preserve it somehow. Here's how I did it...in my larger Moleskine sketchbook, with Pentel brush pen and watercolor crayon applied with a waterbrush. Personally, I don't think it is a great drawing, so many things are "wrong"--the perspective and the colors, to name a couple--but it speaks to me, and will always remind me of a loving gesture. For me, that's more important than being correct. And it makes me smile.

Ouch!

I guess I should have waited until I was feeling better to start this blog. Although the URL for this blog is http://itsonlynowthatmatters.blogspot.com I seem to have misnamed it when I set it up. How could that have happened? It's only now at matters. I guess I'll leave it as a reminder that perfection is not my goal. But as I promised, I've included some eye candy, a photo of a fabric postcard which I made, and sent through the mail to someone special.