to Casey

to Casey
Originally uploaded by Ashleigh713.

Happy Birthday, Casey. Hope it is or was a wonderful one!

~Ashleigh

mermaid

mermaid
Originally uploaded by Ashleigh713.

Again for sentimental reasons, it's one of those brazen ysst mermaids from the prefects bathroom

rainbow dragon baby

rainbow dragon baby
Originally uploaded by Ashleigh713.

Because it's the end of an era, sort of, a dragon for Hagrid

tea with sponge

tea with sponge
Originally uploaded by Ashleigh713.

A hunk of sea sponge that's been used for a bunch of projects, sitting on top of a big can of istant iced tea fom Aldi. It's good to have for emergencies

watercolor crayon on small Moleskeine WC notebook

tents

tents
Originally uploaded by Ashleigh713.

I was looking at tents in google images for one to put in a painting. I wound up liking this more. I am so weird.

done with a calligraphy pen I grabbed from the desk, on lain old cpy paper, W&N watercolor added later

tidepool

tidepool 2
Originally uploaded by Ashleigh713.

under the sea, under the sea

well, slightly

blue crab

blue crab
Originally uploaded by Ashleigh713.

I've left the birds and returned to my natural habitat things related to sea and shore.

EDM 125

EDM 125
Originally uploaded by Ashleigh713.

The challenge was to draw a bird. It's abundantly clear that I cannot really draw anything that looks like a real bird, so I did some birds I like.

The firstbird at the top, of course is a peacock. Certainly not the nicest bird in the world,and there's the thing about their feathers bringing bad luck. I've been around a lot of them though and they are beautiful, and probably have a lot to do with my loving blue..

Then there's an eastern bluebird, a pretty little thing. Beside her is a little owl that I wil say is Pigwidgeon, the little owl Sirius gave Ron in POA. My favorite HP book, ever..

The last one is a mountain bluebird,, someplace in the western part of the country.

revamping paintboxes

There have been a few things that I feel better about, as far as the quality of my painting. While this was the year I got determined to spend enough time on something I love to see results, and I know skill and practice are huge, materials are too. Discovering the Moleskine watercolor notebooks was one thing. The paper isn't the best quality, and I prefer Canson Monteval, there's something about a Moleskine that makes me want to paint and to be more free to create.
Switching from Cottman to artist quality paints has been another thing. I've currently limited myself to twelve pans, instead of the multitude of Cottman tubes I have. This has forced me to become more adept at mixing. Besides, I love playing with color.

Finally, after using the top of an old metal paintbox from years ago, it seems there reallly is a difference between metal and plastic for color mixing. Maybe it's my imagination, but the blend seems smoother. I looked at some empty metal paintboxes at various online dealers, but they were usually 23 half pan size. So, I made my own. The large metal one is a Cretacolor opaque box, I just pried the paint out and added my own from tubes. I LOVE it! I know it looks sort of messy, but it works!

The other box I found in a retro candy display at Michael's. The pans are ones from a Cottman pocket set. I had changed the paint in it to artist quality. It's a little deep, but I also have room in the box for water, in a plastic bottle that once held diabetic test strips. very tight fitting top. Also my small travel brush and a paper towel for etc. All of this fits in a small cosmetic case, along with a pocket Moleskine watercolor notebook, a #2b pencil , kneaded eraser and Pitt Artist's pen.

I'm pretty happy with this basic set up, and feel good about using what I had. The Cretacolor box is very sturdy and heavier but not terribly so, than plastic ones. I also have a nice set of opague paint to use with my niece who's 2 and my nephew, who's seven. Katie walked in this morning and immediately demanded to paint. She was slow talking, but what a change, even knows a lot of colors. O'nge is a favorite, so is pupoople.

The little one makes me grin, just to look at it. Fun stuff!