What is my workstation like?

I've been seeing some interesting work spaces lately and want to add mine to the collection - along with my general environment.

Noodlerabbit88 - Work space

I work very small so realistically I use very little space. In this picture you can see my usual layout for painting ATC's - this bat is day 14 on Drawlloween - one of my more simpler designs. Anyhow I have my computer right in front of me because I can't tear myself away from my emails and Facebook!

Lego Minifigure and art collection - Katie Hone

Boxes of stuff - organised heaven!

Workspace and inspiration

These pictures are what surrounds me, mostly envies, Moos and inchies - inspiring and a great collection of Lego Mini - Figures (which by the way I love)!

Finally I wanted to share these awesome pictures that TF Balding has got on her Facebook page called Southern Sweet Tea Studio - She is an exceptional artist and here she's done a time lapse of her latest piece which will be a giveaway to a random lucky winner. Check out her Etsy shop too.

TF Balding 2015 Southern Sweet Tea Studio

I would love to see your workspace too, how organised are you?

Check out how much my art and working has changed. 

A Canvas Work in Progress

Way back in 2012 I used to paint canvas, bigger, more space needed. I'm quite glad I work small with my little set up!

Art Topic List For Halloween, oh and Cookies!!

Hello everybody! I hope everyone is doing good.

Monday

I had a rather epic day with a new friend from work, she is all artsy and we had grand plans to do some interesting stuff. I was going to introduce her to Art Trading Cards, make origami things, this strange plastic bead you can melt down and mold which then hardens. Followed by an interesting dinner and cookies (we figured that would appease the Georgie girl).

How did we do?

We made dinner and cookies - hah!!!

Jody and I spent the whole day chatting and I showed my enormous collection of Art Trading Cards I have collected in two years. Georgie wanted plenty of attention and wouldn't go down for her much needed nap.

Georgie mashes up the mix

Georgie beats the dough into submission

Drawlloween Challenge

My topic list for Drawlloween

Oh this is such fun - for every day in October this year is a topic, we post everyday with our creations and with any luck I will complete all 31 and get a cute little pixel challenge trophy! Don't we just love pixel trophies!

Here is a sneak peak at a few completed ones:

Drawlloween - Ghosts - Eyeballs - Skull - Dragon - Devil --- Katie Hone

Someone you must go and look at

Clicking a few links and looking around the internet I happened to bump into a very good friend of mine on her blog! And it's rich with posts and ideas which, when I have a bit more time I will start reading through. Her name is Amy Weaver - you can find her blog at TheWeaversHand. She has traded some awesome pictures of my daughter, I'm not usually a great fan of collage but the way she uses mixed media is just incredible. Seriously check her out!

Moos made by Amy Weaver - Georgie Atkin 

Minion Mashup

One of the swaps on ATCs for All that I've joined is Minion Mash Up which was to find a famous painting and put minions in them. Now I am an enormous fan of minions and I am thrilled to bits that they get a whole movie to themselves next year!!! Here are a few that I've done so far. I was tempted to stick to my ultra vibrant colors but rather experimented with trying to get the colors close to the original painting as possible. A very fun endeavor.

So here we have “Minion’s Mother” – inspired by “Whistler’s Mother”

 

2.5" x 3.5" ACEO - Minion's Mother

"Whistler's Mother"

A Salvidor Dali inspired mashed up painting inspired by “Sleep” 

2.5" x 3.5" ACEO - "Sleepy Minion"

"Sleep" - Salvidor Dali

My last one is for sale in my Etsy shop – inspired by “The Metamorphosis of Narcissus”. I absolutely love Dali and will probably keep using him.

"2.5 x 3.5" ACEO - "Metamorphosis of Minion"

 

"Metamorphosis of Narcissus" - Salvidor Dali

I've also been experimenting with different pen thicknesses with some great results. It helps that I've also acquired a tiny thin brush to do all the fiddly detailed bits!

Journal Pages full of Flowers

My first journal for me to fill has arrived.

All the way from Russia from Irina.

 

Firstly a thank you for the little bag of shells - yay.

 

Now the theme set for this journal is flowers, awesome and quite an easy theme which works well for me.

 

So I have recently got myself a large amount of stamps and as I've been sorting them to find foreign and British stamps I noticed a lot of bird stamps... Which gave me an idea for my first double page spread.

All of those birds and houses are tiny cut outs from stamps - I wanted to add a lot more things but I always worry that I'd over do it. So I left it at that. This was my painted page.

 

So next I had a stab at some more collage and mixed media. I decided to go with my original theme for my journal and let Georgie the Sunflower say hello to Irina!

 

 

I am really pleased with how this came out, with collage I never have a plan, I just start in one corner and slowly fill the page out. The border was cut from a napkin I received many months ago. I'm glad I could finally use it. I really enjoyed doing this first step of the long journey. I have 3 more journals to see and decorate and look forward to seeing mine come back safe and sound.

My Art Journal reaches Russia!

I have pictures back from Russia to see what Georgie has been getting up to!

 

Here she has discovered Russian Ballet!!!

And here she's discovered Russia is a good deal colder than the UK!!!

These are so sweet - all of them from the lovely Victoria - you can find her blog here.

 

Thank you so much - now it needs to go to two more people and then back to me - yippee! I suspect I may have to do another Georgie journal!

To view Margaret's 4 pages - here.

To view my 4 pages - here.

And we're off - First Stop Poland

My journal has reached it's first destination - Poland. I wasn't too sure if I'd get pictures back so soon - was indeed expecting to only see it when it finally worked its way back round here.

 

When I opened the photos it made me realise just how happy and glad I've made it Georgie themed!

 

Here is Margaret's first double page:

Doesn't Georgie look sweet in a flower!!!

 

And her second double page:

 

Haha this one made me smile!!

 

 

I am in love and I've decided that once this one comes back if we do more I'll always make them Georgie themed - with the photos of her getting older and older - traveling around the world.

 

I'm so thrilled and its made my day!

 

 

To go back to the original post when this all started check out:

Georgie's Book of Culture

and:

My Journal is Ready

Georgie's Goodie Bag

Georgie got a goodie bag from an art friend of mine!

 

First of all this started out as a standard 2-2 trade.

 

I made these two for her:

Orange Butterfly - 2.5 x 3.5 Original ATC

Blue Butterflies - 2.5 x 3.5 Original ATC

In return I received these two cards:

 

Particularly love that Georgie card! I also received an extra card - yay!!!

And then as if that wasn't enough I also got 4 children's books, 2 US stamps (for me to use in further swaps), a gorgeous 6-9 month Bunny onesie - and a snuggle bunny!!!!

And here is Georgie having a good snuggle!!

Such a kind gesture - Georgie has received many a gift from my art friends - I can't thank you enough!!

My Journal is Ready

I have refined the Georgie book...

 

Here I have done my two double page spreads.

 

This first one is Georgie sitting on top of Harlech Castle (of course)...

This second one is all about her up and coming journey.

There are four others in this journal swap - each of them will have two double page spreads to do what they'd like with. I have printed out four large pictures of Georgie (one for each) and I'll print out four small pictures. I want to give everybody the opportunity to do something similar to me, however they don't have to be limited. They can do anything - have Georgie go visit animals or discover an inspirational quote. There really is no limit. I can't wait to see this book completed, it will be several months before I get this back but I hope to see some fun results!

This has been fun and really enjoyed creating the two pages, I may do another one of these all by myself.

Georgie's Book of Culture

I've started a new project alongside Victoria and three others. We're going to do a journal pages swap. Now I'm not very confident with this idea since I'm not used to working on pages and using mixed media. There was no theme so I decided to make a theme so that I could have a goal in mind while making it. So first of all I made the pages - had to watch a video on how to bind it together and I don't think I did it very successfully. I suspect I used a thread too thin so it isn't very tight.

 

I also made a cover - I won't need to send this in the mail but the pages are pretty secure in it, shouldn't cost very much more to send the cover too, so I'll decide later.

 

 

 

So the theme I've chosen is culture and secondly I'm going to make this book for Georgie for when she's old enough NOT to tear it apart! Originally it was so you could showcase your own culture but I've decided not to limit it, since I received some Chinese lettering I'm going to use that on my front cover. I have loads of international stamps and some paper notes I can stick in too...

 

I may give each person a questionnaire they can choose to fill out or not...

 

Not sure, has anyone done this before, I'm finding it hard to mix paintings with collage - what do I put in this???

 

Anyway - its an early start for me because my wisdom tooth is pushing my other teeth and my jaw throbs... hopefully getting them removed in a few months but that's a long time to wait.

Mondrian with a Twist

Not one to pass up another great swap - I got invited to Mondrian with a Twist. I suppose you already know that the twist is Giraffe and Elephant! Of course - because they like to explore the Art world!

Mondrian with a Twist - ATC

 

Here are the first four Mondrian's I did - after this they suddenly got popular.

 

 

I ended up agreeing to a few personal trades and then did these.

 

After that I decided on a new technique with the shading, by doing this it made them look richer with detail.

 

Here I have one up for sale!

 

And last night I did a Mondrian altered envie! Oh wow I've fallen in love with it and of course I want to give it to the person intended but I will miss it!

 

Anyone know if an altered envie might sell? I wonder... Would you buy one and what price?

Georgie's ACEO Baby Shower

A few months ago I joined a Facebook group - the ebay ACEO. It's a great group and things are always happening, lots of conversation and new pictures posted all the time. A really active and thriving community. While I was very close to giving birth I gave everybody a daily update as to how things were going. I think everybody got pretty eager to see me finally pop the Georgie out. It was quite good having a lot of US people in the group who would be up when I was, at 3am with some form of pain or ailment.

When I eventually went into hospital I believe I made the time to write a quick desperate message - something to the effect of, I think it's starting! Then that was it, no word from me for a couple of days.

Imagine my excitement when I came back - 19 FB updates, 3 friend requests and 2 private messages (along with 36 emails)!

Anyway to get to the point, Leola and Cheryl who are the administrators or some form of leader of the group had organised a new photo challenge. Rather than providing a picture for everybody to interpret; people were asked to make a card in honour of baby Georgie, an ACEO Baby Shower if you will. Then send all the cards to me (I wasn't expecting that at all!)

Once I got my first card I decided to take pictures of Georgie posing with each card I got through the door.

So sit back and enjoy the photos. It has been an amazing thing and I am now hoping something else happens in the group that I can participate in and share the love :)

Beverley Goding
Victorian Baby Carriage

Penny Stewart
Don't Wake the Baby

Karen Brady
Georgie Girl's Fairy

 Linking this ACEO to Karen's Blog.

Sharlene McNeill
Georgie's Dragon

Linking this ACEO to Sharlene's Website and Blog.

Sue Perez
Katie's Little Darling

Barbara Donati
Sugar and Spice and Everything Nice

Sherry Goeben
Why Won't he Play With Me
Georgie's Mouse

 Linking these ACEOs to Sherry's Facebook Page.

Cheryl Buckman
Georgie's Giraffe
Georgie's Bear
Georgie

Linking these ACEOs to Cheryl's Blog.

Leola Walker
Fairy Baby

 Linking this ACEO to Leola's Facebook Page and her Blog.
 

Art from Russia

A couple of weeks ago I made an awesome trade with a new trading friend from Russia. This was back when trading was still relatively new to me. I gave away two custom paintings, one of some elephants because they’re pretty popular! And I also repainted Buckden Towers since my first one sold on eBay.

 

Russian post is apparently a little sluggish so I was worried when it took nearly a month for them to arrive, but it’s all ok and we’re both happy bunnies.

 

I am thoroughly pleased with the ATCs I received. Victoria does these amazing tree doodles with some awesome vibrant colours and face collage, such a unique way of throwing things together. Collage is something I’ve never been able to achieve well. We will probably do more trading in the future!

 

Check out her blog over at 365 day Zentangle Project

 

I also got an altered envie – which inspired me into doing my own. I really love the trading community!

 

 

Thanks for looking :)