Miles to Go

12" x 12" Mixed Media on Wood 

"The woods are lovely, dark and deep,

But I have promises to keep,

And miles to go before I sleep,

And miles to go before I sleep."

  -- Robert Frost

Soul Searching

This is a mixed media piece I did a while back when I first started experimenting with beeswax. It was before I had any of my encaustic equipment. I thought the art papers had a nice aged look and just begged for some wax! I loved the little goddess and had to use her in this piece. The text at the bottom is from an old dictionary and the reference is the soul.

I want to thank you all for your awesome comments and wonderful emails! I truly appreciate it and love hearing from you. I'm sorry I haven't been online as much these past few weeks. I'm trying to get back to a normal schedule. I promise to visit everyone in the next couple of weeks! I've got family visiting this weekend and am stressing about that. I'll be glad when that's over and then I can get back to a normal life, I hope.  ;-)

This song has been playing a lot on my play list, soothing my nerves. I hope you enjoy it too. A BIG hug to you all!!

The Walk

The Cold Hill Side

As months and years accumulate,

I miss you more and more.

Forgetting where I put the key,

I sometimes find a door

and other times feel stunned and lost,

though living in my own

body and life, presumably,

bewildered and alone

as the knight, kidnapped and released

to a dim world, who said

And I awoke and found me here

on the cold hill side.

--    Rachel Hadas

I loved that poem when I read it. I keep a box of poems that I come across and from time to time I go through it for inspiration. This one begged for a painting. And I found a new medium to play with: plaster! All sorts of fun to be had there. A new book called Plaster Studio caught my eye:  

Who knew you could do so much with plaster? My painting is done on a base of cotton. Then blocks of plaster gauze are cut and adhered to the cotton. After that dries you paint! Easy peasy and so fun. There are more plaster products I want to experiment with. This was my first try since it seemed the easiest place to start.

This is also my entry for Paint Party Friday. I haven't painted any new work for awhile. It felt good being back in the studio making a mess!  :)   Stop by the party and check out what everyone else has been up to. You won't be disappointed.

Wild Thing

This week for the Summer of Color challenge we were supposed to work with the color green. Ugh! I had the hardest time with this one. I realized I hardly EVER work with green. I was so tempted to skip this week. But I signed up for this because I wanted to try and work outside of my comfort zone. This is what I came up with. I know, not my normal thing. Ha! At least I did something. I can now move on to next week.

One fun thing: I was able to play with Tyvek! Yay! The crocodile is Tyvek painted black, ironed and then painted again. That's where all of that cool texture came from. So if nothing else I was able to come up with some textures for another piece later on :)

I've been having some computer problems off and on, but all fixed now. For Paint Party Friday people, sorry I wasn't able to get to you before now. I promise to visit your blogs starting today!  :)

Tangled Heart

This is my new encaustic mixed media piece: Tangled Heart. I didn't originally start out to do just one color with the encaustic. But after I laid down a couple layers of the titanium white and then the red, I didn't want to add any more color. I liked the bold splash of blood-red on the white.

When I started to fuse the red layer it was really cool how the bottom left splash ended up looking somewhat like a heart that was breaking up and melting. I didn't want to touch it anymore after I fused this layer so I decided to work on the next part: the resin heart.

This wood board had a 4 inch square cut in it already so I decided to add a heart there. I used some copper wire in different gauges in zig zag patterns behind the hole and backed that with copper mesh. Then I added a heart covered in paper and resin. Here's a closeup of that part:

I put this piece in our great room and I really like how it blends in with the other pieces I've done. This one measures 12" x 12" x 1 1/2". I have really missed working with the encaustics. It's been so hot already this summer and the studio upstairs is just unbearable to work in if I have to close off the air conditioning vents. In order to paint with the encaustics I have to plug in the heating element, open both windows, use the exhaust fan, etc. and it's just too hot in the room. But this week we had a little reprieve and it was in the mid 70's all week. What a treat to play with them again!

Other things happening: Kelly Rae Roberts' course ended this week and that was sad. It's been fun checking in with her and reading the posts and comments from the group. But the Facebook group will continue and that's been a great help. There are so many energetic, fun, talented women in that group! I love reading those posts and looking through the blogs.

My sister is coming to visit for a few days! Yay! Hopefully it will be in the next week or so. We always have a great time when she comes so I'm looking forward to that. And I'm putting finishing touches on the two faces I'm painting in Sharon Tomlinson's Technicolor Faces course. This one is very challenging but I'm giving it my best shot. I'll post those when they are finished if they don't turn out too alien-looking. :(

Have a safe holiday weekend everybody! We will be staying home working on different projects around here. One of mine will be getting the spare room ready for sis. And playing more with the drill in the work room. I'm still not ready to show that project yet. But it's coming along! More to come on that later...