Crows 'n Roses Spring Swap

I belong to an eBay goup of fabulous creative women,a nd every season we swap with each other!

This spring I received the most beautiful basket of fabric roses complete with a fabric postcard sent to my by the lovely Charlotte! Charlotte is a very talented lady who makes beautifully stitched fabric items! Not only that but Charlotte has her own website - The Homespun Loft - where she sells what se makes alongside primitive giftware and the most beautiful homespun fabrics!

These roses are so beautiful and they also smell like real roses and I am so pleased to have such a lovely gift! Imagine how thrilling it was to open the box and find these roses inside. Charlotte knows how much I love roses and this is a very thoughtful and heartfelt gift!

Thank you so much Charlotte!

Tea Room sign

I have been working on signs lately for an exhibition in May and this is another one for it painted on a shutter type door. I wanted to get in all the things I love to paint - teacups, cakes, chocolates, roses and distressed finishes.

I plan on doing another shutter as maybe a bakery shop with more cakes and such and maybe with lilacs hanging over the same sort of twig frame. I haven't fully decided but I wanted to keep them related somehow. Tomorrow I will work on a series of 6 smaller signs on wood with distressed finishes - all again with a garden theme and next week I want to work on cakes.

This is the plan anyhow - the reality is yet to come and that will determine how much I actually get done. I haven't much time now but I will do what I can in the time I have.

It has been a beautiful and sunny day today - I love the fact that Spring is here and Summer is on the way!

Just For You Designs by Lisa

Here is another wonderful blog from the very talented Lisa, who lives in Wales and designs and makes a beautiful range of lovelies which she sells through various shops in England and Wales. Lisa is also the brainstorm behind Crows 'n Roses, an ebay sellers groups full of lovely ladies - all who craft, and all who have become good friends together!

Have a look at her blog and see what I mean! Lisa works full time, and has a family and home to run and she still manages to make so many beautiful items! Her latest treasures are gorgeous chickadees!! I know you will love her special designs!

The Junk Art Queen Extraordinaire

I have just added a link to the blog of Susan Wymola for you to have a look at! Susan is a decorative painter who specialises in transforming trash to treasure in the most innovative and inspiring ways!

Susan loves to paint roosters, chickens and flowers and calls herself Suzie Cackleblossums! She has also formed a Yahoo group called Chic Chicks which is a fun and friendly group. Susan is now teaching on-line and she designs painting patterns available through her Etsy shop!

Not only talented, Susan is also friendly and sharing and a great gal too! I am lucky enough to have swapped with her in a Chic Chicks gift exchange event and now have several of her pieces of art in my own home! Have a peek at the photos! The Rosy Bugs plaque is made from an old cd, and Suzie has used buttons beads and hearts to make a Rosy Bug plaque complete with roses! Rosybugs is my Etsy Seller name and this is a unique and very special gift! Thank you Suzie!

The chickie is adorable and has slogans which can be changed to represent my moods! Other gifts included native Texan bluebonnets painted on broken tile, a jam jar painted with adorable cherries filled with sweets and another CD painted with Suzies lovely roses! She also sent me some of her fabulous painting patterns which are full of pictures and demos and are well written and easy to follow.

Have a peek through Suzies blog and her links and I guarantee you will have a fun time!

Roses

Here is a little sneak peek at one of my signs for the art trail. I love to paint roses and have been painting them now for several years in various styles. I have had a lot of help from Connie Parkinson who always gives me great advice and guidance!

I have since wired this sign for hanging, but I wanted to get picture when the light outside was bright, and that was when the paint was still fresh! I have two new cameras (long story) and they do not work anywhere near as well as my old Kodak, so I am a slave to bright outdoor light!

Painting Signs

I have been so busy lately with painting signs for clients and shops that I have not had a lot of time to just post blogs, so I am going to catch up today with a few new posts before I secret myself away in my studio to work on creating new signs and paintings for the Westcliff art trail. This is an art exhibition for artists in the town I live in, and it is where artists exhibit their work for sale in local shops and businesses. I have never participated in anything like this before and so it is a new venture for me.

This wisteria sign was made for a client for her cottage home. I have never painted wisteria before and so getting commissions for flowers outside of my comfort zone is a great thing for me - as it means I add something new to the flowers I paint. My style of painting is loose and can probably termed more impressionistic than realistic, and is of course based on strokework derived from traditional folk and decorative art. I am a decorative artist as I paint art to decorate interiors, and I work primarily on wood which is often in the form of signs, furniture and interior accessories, but I also paint on canvases too. I think all art is decorative to be honest - as it ultimately decorates walls and interior and exterior spaces.

Spring Violets!

I think wild violets are the sweetest little flower and I love how they grow anywhere! This little clump found a home in a hole in the pavement and I could not resist taking a photo of them! Some of their friends found a home in a wall nestled amongst the bricks/stones using the smallest amount of soil to feed and provide a display. I call it wall art!

Pretty in Pink

I love flowers - and I love vintage china and if it is old china and has flowers on it - I am happy, happy, happy! I couln't help photographing the blossom on the plate! Ok - I know the blossom is a spring thing, and the roses are a summer flower, but I still couldn't resist the combination!

Spring Blossom

As a painter, I am always looking at flowers closely to see how they are made (basically!). These blossoms I collected in 2006 to observe and I photographed them to add to my inventory of inspiration. As of yet, I stil have not painted blossom,- perhaps now is the time to think about that!

Happy Easter!

Here it is - already Easter Monday and soon the holiday will be over!

I love the spring in England - the flowers are so fresh and the birdsong is all over the place as robins and blackbirds fly about gathering bits of straw and such for nests. When the blossom is on the trees I think of ladies in frilly ballgowns and I wish I had room in my own small garden for one of those ornamental cherry trees smothered with the overblown blousy pink blooms. A whiff of wind and they decorate the grass below! A rug of pink petals - wouldn't that be something!