forgot one!

this is a journal page I did 10/26/2011 and forgot to post

paint & gesso on Venus

a little old tissue paper from Starbucks

splatters of pearlescent inks

line drawing & coloring

poured out feelings written on top of each other

and more gesso to hide them further

what I've been doing

busy, busy, busy
we are all so busy
when I looked at the blog last week I was shocked to see I hadn't been here since Thanksgiving
but as I thought about it I understood

you see I was working on a piece of art that really really stretched me.
why was I stretching?
mainly cuz it's YELLOW!!!
I know, I'm a little weird but yellow is just not a color I'm comfortable with - it's hard to keep it clean and, well, yellow, when doing as much layering as I do.

the other stretcher was that I actually wanted to paint an image that looked like its counterpart in the real world and I haven't tried to paint realistically in years

all-in-all, I'm very happy with the results

I struggled with a beeswax collage I was working with. I must have scraped this one down five different times. I really like the way it looks now except it's missing something. Any ideas?

I also went shopping with a new friend and she suggested I could do a line of pieces for some local stores and etsy that was a little less involved and less expensive.  I loved that idea and wondered

why didn't I think of that before?

and my brain was off and running.  I came up with a whole series of 6x6 whimsical collages which I finally finished today.

I desperately wanted to have these two pieces and the new series done and on here and on the website and on Etsy and everything linked to everything and and and . . .  
You know how it goes, the more you need to do, the more things go wrong as you try to do them all!  When my camera battery said "ENOUGH" today, I realized I needed to say it too and just post what I have so you all don't think I moved to Mars or something.  Afterall, tomorrow I start tax season and the odds of me popping in regularly are pretty slim.

Thanks for sticking with me.  Maybe I'll get that new series posted before the overtime crunch starts but maybe not.  LOL  In the meantime, I'll be stopping by your blogs and Facebook pages to see what you're doing amidst the crazy busy-ness of your world.

Feel free to visit/like my FB page as it's so much easier to post artsy tidbits and images there than here.
TTYL

what I'm thankful for

I’m thankful for forgiveness, grace and mercy becuz I am in dire need of them all.

I pray that I will practice forgiveness, grace and mercy with others.

I'm thankful for my mistakes as they've made me who I am and I like who I am now.

I pray that others will learn to forgive themselves, live without regret, and, most of all, like themselves!

I’m thankful that I live in this time, in this country where women have the same freedoms as men to vote, to speak, to pursue their dreams.

I pray that this will continue here and that all people everywhere will be free from oppression & repression.

I’m thankful for the constitution that guarantees my right to practice my religion.  Or not.   Where I am guaranteed the right to speak my mind, to protest my government, to assemble.

I pray that we will remember the price paid for those freedoms and value them accordingly, that all people everywhere will have these same freedoms.

I’m thankful for my parents, Uni & Bill Ball, who not only taught me the rules but taught me to love without condition, to think for myself, to value the thoughts of others, to have compassion for those less fortunate, to appreciate the differences – not to mock them.

I pray that I might be a loving parent, spouse and friend as modeled by them; that I will value what makes people different from me and not try to force them into a mold.

I’m thankful for my husband, Patrick Schoenfeldt, who loves me, not inspite of all my weirdness but becuz of it, who tells me I’m beautiful so often that I believe him, who knows my dreams and works toward them with me, who inspires me to be loving, who understands that domesticity is not as important as passion.  (If you want to know more you can read the blog posts about how he saved our marriage here)

I pray that I will love him as well as he loves me and that he will always be here with me.

I’m thankful for my children, Nathan Opdyke and Dani Turner, who give me so much joy, who actually like to spend time with me, who are affectionate and smart and kind and good friends to their friends; that I can see myself in them yet see how different they are from me and from each other (tho this took me some time to see).

I pray that they can learn from my mistakes, that they will know the love I’ve known, that they will have all they need and then some, that they KNOW they are loved beyond measure.

I’m thankful for my home that is a haven from the craziness of the world, that’s cooler than the summers and warmer than the winters, that is often filled with family & friends, fun & laughter.

I pray that people everywhere will have a safe haven, a place to weather storms; that they can too be surrounded by those they love.

I’m thankful for art – both in the big sense of the word and that I am pulled to do it; that I now have time & space to do it; that it’s brought me in contact with other creative people who contribute so much to my life on so many levels.

I pray that I will never cease to have new creative ideas and the time to try them.  And that people will “get” it and be willing to pay for it.  J

I’m thankful for work for both Patrick and myself; that Patrick loves architecture & gets to practice it at a firm that actually has work; that I’m good at accounting & that in these tough times I am able to pick-n-choose between assignments; that I don’t have to do it 60 hours a week any more (see the previous section).

I pray that we will always be able to do what we love and know that that is more valuable than money.

I’m thankful for friends, the ones in-person and the ones on-line who I’ve never met up close; for all they contribute to my life and my art; for the support they’ve given me and the times they’ve set me straight.

I pray that I will be a good friend, honest, loyal and giving.

I’m thankful for Facebook & Blogger where I’ve reconnected with old friends, met new art friends and been able to get to know two younger cousins.  I’m also thankful that I can hide, unfriend, block or ‘mark as spam’ those who only contribute negativity.

I pray that I will be a positive contribution to the online world and appreciate the differences in our great, vast world.

I’m thankful for my mind.

I pray that I use it well and it lasts as long as my body – or longer.

I’m thankful for Diet Coke™, margaritas and dark chocolate (tho not margaritas with dark chocolate).

I pray that I can learn to exercise moderation.

I’m thankful for high heels.

nuff said  J

I hope you have a wonderful day with family, friends and food

filled with laughter and memories

and that your grattitude is known by all

Happy Halloween

I can't believe it's been over a month since I was here ~

I'll blame it on work tho I haven't done any since the filing deadline on 10/17!

I've been teaching some beeswax classes yet
struggling with the pieces I've been working on.

Don't you just hate it when your great idea just won't become a great piece of art?

So I put the art aside and started playing with a few Halloween projects ~

I started this tag book 2 years ago (yes, I'm slow at doing a lot of things)

and I made a couple of charm bracelets ~

one for me and one to put on Etsy

and the last project I've been working on is altering this fabulous book
(you really have to check out this line of books ~ they're full of vintage images

and stories and are perfect for to use in lieu of scrapbooking.
I've used the Christmas one & the Love one.  I have the boy & girl ones
for that day when I figure out how to quit being so slow at everything.  LOL)

Have a happy Halloween
or a scary one ~ whichever you prefer

What was I thinking?

I'm not sure what I was thinking when I decided to start another blog and start teaching beeswax workshops. I was constantly behind before that! And now that the extended tax deadline is a month away, I find myself unable to breathe!!! 

Apparently my life motto is
"to catch up on one thing you have to be willing to fall behind on another"

But no matter what I was thinking, I have discovered that I absolutely LOVE teaching.

I need to find somewhere to teach in Tulsa and Dallas becuz I can NOT get enough of it.  I love the interaction with other creative types as well as all the things I get to learn from them.  But mostly I love seeing someone's eyes light up as they discover that they're ARTISTS not "just" crafters, stampers, scrapbookers ("just" being an adjective they use about themselves).

Eventually, when I'm caught up, I'll have a workshop page on my website.  In the meantime, if you're interested in learning more about the classes, click here.

Well, writing this has caused me to fall behind on something else so I better get going. LOL

Repose

Some of you might remember that in a post titled Risqué or Okay? I stressed about posting art online that contained nudity - not a problem with nudity in art but with putting it online.  And how I got over it when I posted the piece Fire a few months ago. 

Also in that first post I had some close-up shots of a piece that I was calling Oklhoma Hills at the time.  I was never quite satisfied with that piece so it moved out of sight for awhile.  When I pulled it out again, I realized the hills/sky were just too juvenile and the body was underemphasized so I scraped and collaged and colored and beeswaxed, and here we are.

She is not nearly as subtle as Fire, is she?  I'd love to know your thoughts.

Repose is available on my website.

More beeswax workshops coming in September

I've added two classes to the schedule at My Heart's Fancy in September:
 
the first on 9/10 is a repeat of
  EXPERIMENTS IN BEESWAX COLLAGE
 
the second on 9/24 is a follow-up to the first
  MORE FUN WITH BEESWAX
  (if you'll click on the titles, you'll go to actual event pages).

class samples for More Fun with Beeswax workshop

made by Maura W. in Experiments in Beeswax Collage workshop

You can click here to check out some reviews.

Unfortunately, the retreat I was going to teach at in Texas has been cancelled due to health issues with one of the other teachers.  So, if you know of a place in DFW that would like to host a few workshops, please let me know.  I would love to go back to my old stomping grounds to meet up with friends, shop and share the wonders of Beeswax.

knowing when your art is done

Rhythm (finished)

Awhile ago I posted some pictures of pieces I'd been working on asking how do you know when your work is done?  At the time I was sure that the piece below wasn't finished but I had no idea what was needed. I finished it last week by making round impressions and coloring them with brown. It made such a huge difference.

before - not quite there

In that same post, I was sure that the other piece was finished. But I pulled it out last week and attacked it with the scraper and torch and ended up with this.

SST (finished)

These changes are much more subtle ~ so subtle, I have a hard time noticing them myself. Yet the refinements are just what was needed.

before - not quite there (tho I thought it was)


These pieces were relatively new so they might not really qualify as "re-dos" or "do-overs".

But I have some older pieces that I just don't like. Some because my style has just evolved. Some because the composition was always off.

A few of these are hanging on the walls but most have been added back to the substrate pile to become the base of some future piece. Some even have gone in the trash.

It's the ones on the walls that I just am not sure about. Should I rework them, adding more layers but allowing the original to show through? Or should they be relegated to the substrate pile or trash?  Or should I keep them to remind me where I came from artistically (I do keep the photos)?

What do you do with the art you've made but no longer like?

SST is available for purchase on my website.

and the winner is . . .

Maura W!!!

She totally dominated the competition by entering three different ways!

Thanks for entering and

congratulations!

Storming (a new encaustic piece)

encaustic, charcoal and hand-made paper (just barely peeking thru)

I started this piece in June at the encaustic workshop I took and just felt it needed a little more.  I did some scraping to even out a few lines then added more charcoal around the edges.  Then I hit it with my crème brûlée torch (again, buying tools and not using them as intended) to smooth out the marks from scraping and blend in the charcoal.

Now that I look at it, the differences are minute.  But important.  At least to me.  ;-p


same piece before I finished it today - can you see any difference?

 

I feel a contest comin' on . . .

I have been working feverishly on adding new pages to my website. Which for me means it makes me get a fever, not that I'm working super hard. HTML and CSS are still a stretch for me after all this time.

Anyway, I've added pages for selling the art that's available, for selling cards and, TA-DA, the newest page, selling double matted prints.

So to keep you interested despite my lack of art to share, I decided to have a little contest to
win an 8x10 print of your choice
(even if it's not on the print page yet - I'm sure I've forgotten something)
along with a small token of my affection.

There are several ways to enter:

• comment here
• tweet about it
• share it on facebook mentioning
• comment on the post on my facebook page
Be sure you use the @ to mention me on facebook & twitter so I can find your entries.

Deadline is Saturday, July 30th at midnight (CST) and I'll post the winner next Monday.
Thanks for playing.  Hopefully now that I've finished these pages I can actually finish some art.  Tho I do want to do a calendar page and one about my workshops so . . .

it sure is quiet here

I've been a little quiet online for a few days.  I'm trying to add some pages to the website and html is NOT my cup of tea!  Thank goodness I'm not redoing the entire site again!  That wore me out.

But I am finally adding a page of available art with links to individual pages for each piece that's for sale.  Yikes!! 

I also want to add a workshop page because I have discovered that

TEACHING IS SO MUCH FUN!!!

I know I'm not the first person to find that out but why didn't anyone ever tell me?  I have such a great time learning  with everybody!  Click here if you'd like to see some pictures from the workshops.