INSPIRATIONAL TEA CUP QUOTE

Tonight I worked on a tea cup painting ordered for a person who just received her PhD.  What a huge accomplishment, and a fun project to work on!

All wrapped up and ready to go!

If you have a favorite quote and a favorite tea cup, let me paint a personalized gift for YOU!

My teacup quote paintings can be found in my Etsy shop here.

Thanks for looking!

Nan

HE LOVES ME, HE LOVES ME NOT

The Sun Cherry Zinnia.  

A real stunner in the world of zinnias.  Brilliant color with long-ish petals that stand up well while allowing a few to gracefully "droop" to add artistic flair to this flower in a bouquet. 

This one, with its two drooping petals, reminds me of the whimsical children's game, "He loves me, he loves me not", as illustrated in this old engraving:

"The Decision of the Flower" (1820) 

by Henry Moses

I'm loving the process of working on pen, ink, and watercolor illustrations.  From the outlining of each petal -

  

to the finished drawing -

 . . . to the process of adding color.  It's picky, time-consuming, and detailed drawing, but I love seeing it all come together!

These 8 x 10 inch original watercolor is available in my Etsy shop.  (fits perfectly in an 11 x 14 inch frame) It will arrive safely on your doorstep matted, backed, creatively packaged, and ready for framing in no time!

Other pen/ink/watercolor flowers in my shop:

Or, purchase a commission of your own favorite below:

Thanks for looking!

-Nan

THE BIRDS - NEW NOTECARDS IN GILLYFLOWER COTTAGE

New notecards are in!  The first set has been listed, with several more to come.  Check them out here.

The Birds!  

This set includes 4 - (blank inside) notecards that are professionally printed by Vistaprint and suitable for framing.  More will be listed soon.

 "THE BIRDS" note cards measure 5.5 x 4 inches.  

Along with making great stationary, they are also suitable for framing.  Visit my Etsy shop, 

Gillyflower Cottage, 

to check them out! 

HOME PORTRAIT

Working on this home portrait was SO MUCH FUN, and today it is on its way to Ontario!  What a treat, to be asked to do this!

She wanted to be sure I would include blue sky and their Canadian flag, front and center.

Putting special touches on the packaging is almost as fun as doing the painting itself.  I want any paintings or other artwork that goes out of Gillyflower Cottage to be fun to open along with reflecting something about myself.  On this package I did a little watercolor portrait of one of my favorite Native Wisconsin Wildflowers - the Coneflower.

Do YOU know someone who would like a portrait done of their home?  It makes a great housewarming, birthday, or anniversary gift.  Check it out here.  All it takes is a couple great shots from your iPhone - no fancy photography needed.  All the instructions are right on the listing.

Saw this on Facebook this morning and it says it all!

Thanks for looking!

-Nan

J IS FOR JACK, K IS FOR KITCHEN, AND NOW IT'S ALL ON ETSY!

I've had a lot of inquiries . . . "Where can I get this book?"

So, you can now pre-order on ETSY with 2 opportunities to personalize the LITTLE PERSON'S ABCs for your own child or grandchild - delivery estimated by mid-late November.  More on that at the end of the post.  

Here is J, which stands for Jack, of course.  The Etsy copy will have a different word in the place of Jack.  (I know not everyone has a son/grandson named Jack!)  That "J" page is coming soon.

And, K, for the KITCHEN!  (The "K page" in the Etsy book will not have Jack's name on the refrigerator drawings.)

A LITTLE PERSON'S ABCs offers lots of great opportunities for growing your child's vocabulary.  As they become readers themselves, the rhymes offer creative practice for oral reading fluency.  Check out the A LITTLE PERSON'S ABCs in my Etsy shop,

Gillyflower Cottage.

BIRDS AND THE BEES . . . AND A FEW SHEEP

If you have a "make it" blog, or even if you just like to make things, then you understand how I'm feeling.  I kind of feel like this every day, actually, but sometimes you get specific creative urges.

You just want to use your hands to make something.

Sometimes you have the urge to sew.

Sometimes you feel prompted to paint - and that's the way I feel.  It's windy, sunny, and pretty chilly today.  A good day to stay inside, light a couple great smelling candles, make a fresh pot of coffee, and use that bright sunshine coming in the window to work on a painting project.  

I have a couple of great photos of some sheep that I've been saving for a day like today . . .

Aren't they awesome?

So it's time to get out my supplies!

Also, for the "birds and the bees" part - I have a few new paintings in my Etsy shop to share today.  

A Green Honey Creeper

 A couple bees . . .

 . . . and a Nuthatch.  They were part of a little painting challenge I took part in a while ago.

Thanks for stopping!

LLOYD II & GETTING READY TO PAINT

Guess who's going to Boston?  Lloyd II will be leaving my Etsy shop and heading out tomorrow morning.  He is a little apprehensive and it shows, but he'll be fine.  So I spent part of the day getting him ready to go. 

Au revoir, Lloyd! 

Then I picked up a couple new canvases and got ready to paint by taking some photos of flowers from my garden.  Even more than the flowers, I'm looking forward to the challenge of painting the jar of water.  These are in an empty mayonnaise jar.  I love the distortion of the stems underwater, and the little changes in color from above, to surface, to under the water.  We'll see how that goes . . .

 A photo taken from above allows you to see so much more of the water and an interesting view of the stems.  That, along with the sparkle of the glass and the ridges around the rim should be pretty challenging!

 There are lots of different blues, grays, and greens in that water. 

 And so much beautiful detail in these flowers!

I like to crop out individual flowers in different positions and stages of opening so I can get a close-up view of all the colors and shadows.  The photo below really shows good detail of the dark green, overlapping bracts zinnias have, under the flower head.

Zinnias have little "disk" flowers in the center, and "ray" petals around the outside.  To make it realistic it all has to be there.

My canvas for this is large - 24" x 30" - so the flowers are going to be WAY bigger than life!

And just one photo of a large part of my garden.

Just because.

 So, tomorrow will be a painting day.

All.

Day.

Long.

Can't wait!