GAAAAAAH! I Hate change!!!

Ok, i'm gonna try really really really hard NOT to say bad words!

And i've been known to use bad words in clusters...

sorry, well, not really, It can all be quite poetic, sortof..

 But, i hate change, i hate change, i hate change!!! 

Whhhhhyyyy do they, whoever THEY are, 

( and it's usually someone you can not reach in any way at all ever)

  always change something that works perfectly fine exactly the way it is!  

Change is not always good... ok.  So never say change is good.  Just never say that...  

Now i have to get used to something else new with the new blogger look.  

And it's announced so happily as,

"The new blogger interface".  

I should never have to read the words "New Interface" again in my life.  

Or Portal... God, it's sooooooo annoying...  

(said in a very very whiney voice, with my forhead on the counter now...)

Mr. Fractured hears me bitching at my computer, and is asking what's wrong, and i'm just whinning and fussing, so he went and put on his headphones to 'listen to some music'... 

Aaaaannnnywwaaay...  

Here is a new painting i am working on...

It is NOT finished,

but i thought i'd show you the progression

 you know i want to put pink on this painting

but i'm debating on making the roses white...

 we'll see what i end up with

I guess this is my first test using the new

BLOGGER INTERFREAKINFACE

ok, get over it girl, stop your whining 

Below is the start... above is a week later after i let the first layer of dark background dry, and darkened it even more, that was the only change in the above photo

pretty amazing how much the contrast changes it... 

As soon as i'm finished i'll post the final painting... 
i'm a little nervous about what i will end up with when i start adding color... 

Ok, so my friend Karan, the one i always talk about with the amazing shop "Fetch"

saw some cows, and goats and donkeys on a country road when she was driving home

and she pulled over, and took photos for me for painting...

now That's a good friend.

She met the farmer who owned these animals, and he took her on his go cart for a close up

there were some goats, 

and they came running up to her bleating and stuff, and scared the crap out of her, so funny

anyway, check out this adorable creature

what is not to love about this face!?

and how many people would brave a farmer with a go cart, and really huge cows, and crazy goats, and funny donkeys, just to get a photo for their friend to paint... so freakin cool

...the end...

Definition of MÉLANGE : a mixture often of incongruous elements

Ok, here goes... just a melange of randomness... 

a pretty scarf i couldn't resist

isn't this the most yummy color, and it has these sweet teeny little wooden beads at the tips...

a  pile of freshwater pearls, from a broken bracelet and a thrift shop cuff

 thrift shop pearls, and broach, mixed together to make a funky necklace....

I love finding jewelry for a couple of bucks, and mixing it all up to make something new... 

i wasn't sure if i hated this pin or liked it, but something in me told me it had potential... so i grabbed it just in case

fabulous fall pears, with brown spots

just like my face before makeup goes on - sigh...

 

anyway, i think the freckles on the pears are so adorable and fallish  and that they're loaded with personality 

this bench is from my friends shop "Fetch"

A pile of pillows, one a vintage coral thrift shop pillow, that i just love.  

The old worn velvet has the best patina...

 

...and the fringe is so gloriously tattered... 

 

 an old cross i found at the thrift shop and updated with some good ole Annie Sloan  paint...

this was such a bad color, but i thought... this could be really pretty painted white...!

I've moved it all over the house, 

finally it ended up laying on the living room coffee table... 

i kinda like seeing it just sitting there 

completely unplanned

fall hydrangeas blooming... love these...

 they start getting a blush of pink at the tips.. i can't think of the name of them right now...

dream catcher in an empty frame...

 

 you are banned from noticing the picture wire behind the dream catcher... !

Yummy nail polish color i found on Pinterest, but couldn't track back to anywhere to find out the color name!

do ya'll know???

I want my hands to be all creamy white and pretty like that!

 

  

and finally, an insanely fabulous architectural piece i got from my friends shop 

Fetch

 at a great price... 

traded for a painting!!! 

almost free!  

 i do the blog for her insanely fabulous shop if the voice there sounds a little familiar to you... smile

anyway,  she really liked my little atmospheric beach paintings from the last post, and grabbed the smaller one for herself...

 

and really, she was just being very sweet and let me have it because she knew i loved it

and when i get some extra $$$$'s, guess what i am going to put behind the panes?

a mirror!  won't that be pretty!

not my magic "mirror mirror on the wall" mirror that's behind the window now,

 it will have to find a new place in my house because i kind of love it too

 i will have the whole back side of the piece mirrored

Now that was alot of stuff!  Sorry,

and i'm pretty sure i said "thrift shop" like 32 times in this post

anyway are hereby warned!

...If you ever hear me say random melange of stuff again...

you'll know what's coming

reminds me of another quote found on pinterest

i liked this quote, it made a mess of chaos sound almost wonderful instead of disturbing

 

and i think melange is my new favorite word

...the end...

 

 

Inspired By Friends...

I was inspired by three of my favorite blogging friends who are also artists, to paint something soft and and somewhat impressionistic...

Michele at "Hello Lovely"
with her beautiful beachy grays

 Kerrie at "Sea Cottage"
with her soulful renderings of the sea
and as always she has her seahorses and sanddollars and more...

and i'm always inspired by
Erin at "Erin's Art and Gardens"

  who's beautiful ethereal paintings just blow me away

So with this inspiration I faced my canvas today with just a concept, of softness, and ease, and spirit
and decided to let the canvas tell me what it wanted to be...

I only knew i wanted to use a very soft toned down blue,

and maybe some contrasting dark colors

and here is what i ended up with...

i put a dark frame around it in Picassa because the darker color makes it stand out...

here it is without the frame...

let's imagine it on a white wall now

as you can see, everything is simple, blended in some places, and not blended in others, 

all of it is about not trying too hard...

i had the bottom part on this one very dark brown, but the painting told me to go lighter

so i did
i just wiped out some of the raw umber, 
(one of the reasons i love oil paint, it dries slow, it's quite forgiving) 
and then added in some of the blue mixture from the sky color...
instant grayish softening effect

Since my paints were all spread out, and still wet, i decided to do another

sometimes you just get on a roll like that...

without frame

on a white wall color

Wanna see a mess!?

my brushes

four of those are dollar store brushes

and here is the famous dollar store brush, my favorite,
 the one that costs $1.00 and i always tell you to grab when you're there, i buy em by the handful!

This is the kind of painting i thought i could do a tutorial on 

so you guys would try to paint

I practiced recording myself with my iphone propped up on a tall  chair with about 10 plates stacked up and my iphone teetering up on top of it all...
 it was still too low, and recorded me up under my chin
never a good look

and then i looked at the recording

OMG

holy crap, I look and sound like that!!!?
and what started out as... 

i want to help my sweet friends paint a painting and discover their inner artist.

became

i need botox, and juvederm, and my hair is too long, and my lipstick is on crooked, and i sound stupid

uhhh, ... cindy... what ever happened to your paintings from the spirit 
 and being yourself and being natural, and having fun talking to your blogging friends on video about painting???

the hell with that!
i need an emergency dermatology appt. and about $10,000.00!
or i can never be seen in public again!

anyway, i am working on it still
getting old sucks

you can see that on a  blue wall, the painting is not too interesting, ho hum... yawn, boring...

but put it on a gray , or a darker wall, or even a white wall... and then you have something that would look nice, soft and pretty on a white wall, and it would pop like a gorgeous translucent blue marble on a dark wall!

the paintings above are simple, they're not clutch your chest, pay thousands of dollars for, make you famous paintings

but they're fun, and you can do this!

you don't have to do anything fancy - simple is wonderful!

they're pretty colors,and pleasing to the eye

and they would look good on alot of wall colors
basically i brush in my most intense color up top, then get lighter as i go down,
that's where the dollar store brushes come in

also note the blue is very light, in some places almost no color at all

 notice that some of the sky color is also brushed into the ground color... 
there is a pretty good amount of blue in that brownish looking ground !

another thing to think about is that if you get too bluey, and bright, it can be cartoonish looking, even though you will be tempted to use intense bright colors... because they're pretty... don't!

i even add brown to my blues and white to tone it down

colors used:

ultramarine blue

thalo blue

sap green

raw umber

yellow ochre

titanium white

here is my palette with these colors

all great colors i use over and over for lots of different things!

anyway... i want to end with this amazing photo i found on pinterest
isn't this just so touching, and so so beautiful

(and it has the same colors i used in the above palette, just concentrating more on grays)

click photo to go to source

 

...the end...