A Birthday Gift

I wanted to show you a piece of jewelry I made a few months back for my friend's 40th birthday.
She is an old friend I have known since we arrived in Brisbane, our kids grew up together and we were pregnant at the same time with our second one's.
I wanted to give her something special that I had hand made especially for her.
I saw this U-tube video on how to make 'The Tree of life' and loved it straight away, it didn't take long to make and I thought that the name was appropiate for a birthday present.
On her card I wrote something about being 40 and just starting life as it were.

All wrapped up in tissue paper and silver sparkly thread!

"The Tree of Life"

She LOVED it! :)

This has been one of the first presents I have ever made for friends, and it felt so good to give something made by hand. Don't get me wrong I have made things for family all the time, especially mum, we're always swaping stuff we have made, sometimes I need to steal stuff back as she always takes my earings! Giggle - giggle!!!

Do you make things to give as gifts?
I love receiving hand made things people have made, there is something so loving and warm about the gift, it comes from their heart. I have kept every drawing and hand made thing the kids have made, which is a lot! :0

Which brings me to another question, Valentine's Day, is coming soon. I have been thinking about making cards for friends to send in the mail! Is anyone else making things for Valentine's Day?

Happy creating for the weekend, Angie ox.

P.S. I just want to thank you all for making me feel so very welcome and part of this wonderful family we have created. (((((Hugs!))))

First Year of School/ Back to work for me!

Wow, so much has happened in the last couple of weeks!
The holidays are over, and my youngest has started her first year of school. Look at her, she looks all grown up. It is an end of an era for me, no more stay at home mum, now I go back to work.
I have mixed feelings about it all. But most of all I am excited about all the new changes coming up, a little anxious too, but mainly excited about what work will bring to all of us.
Firstly more money, less pressure for my husband to be the only bread winner, more independence for me, meet new people make new friends, and earn more money so I can buy more art supplies! (Last year I really had to watch what I spent my money on, most of it went into the art class.) So many positive things will come from it!

In the last few weeks I was also thinking about no longer writing my blog, giving up art, because I was feeling the pressure to conform, just concentrate on work and the family. But the weirdest thing kept happening, I kept hearing this voice saying "Keep the dream alive". So after more thinking, and hearing this voice in my head, I thought, no, NO. I will not give it up, I will not leave it till later, I will not forget about my dream, my spirit, I will not shelve it away till it gets all dusty and worn. Even though I haven't kept up with my blogging as I would have liked it too, some nights I am just too tired, blogging and its community has come to mean so much to me, I would miss catching up with all of you, I would miss seeing everyone growing and changing, also I would miss sharing my art with you, unfortunately in my circle of friends i have very few people who get what I do, who understand why it has become so important to me. So I am keeping the dream alive and as Oprah says, live my best life! ;)

So whilst going through all the turmoil of feeling a little down and blue, I made a journal page titled "What makes a house a home?" I felt that after so many years as a stay at home mum I felt very privileged to have had that opportunity, to make a home with my husband and children. And some of the words which came to me were; love, laughter, sharing a meal, cubby houses out of blankets, artworks displayed, music, tea breaks, acceptance, hugs, sanctuary.

I found this wonderful artist "Mystele" who paints lovely pictures in mixed media and she is doing a 2 week course which I have joined, very excited about starting it 1st of February, go have a look at her website and if you are interested in her class, I think she has a great presence.

This year for me I don't have a resolution as such but more a promise I have made to my self, to make art which resonates with me, more authentic, even if at first i may stumble and make ugly art! (quite a scary concept for me), but I just want to let go of my inhibitions and open my heart.
One type of painting or drawing I have been interested in is intuitive art/painting, where the artist allows the art to come from another place, inside of themselves.
Let's see where all this will take me!

Thank you all for coming on this journey with me, my blogger friends old and new, it has meant so much to me. Angie ox

The new year.....

Happy New Year to everyone :)

Better late than never!!!

I have been busy so far with relatives visiting, friends popping in and keeping the young ones entertained. We have three weeks to go of our holidays and the kids are getting restless, so we go out a lot. Tommorow skating, we swim every day, and go for walks at our parks close by.

I must admit I have started a lot of projects, and I am grateful for having found the time to do them in little stolen moments, but most of the art pieces are unfinished. Hopefully as things slow down back to our 'normal' routine I can finish them.

I would like to thank firstly HybridJ for sending me her gorgeous work of art "The Christmas Sky", beautifully hand drawn by her as a give away for Christmas. I was so happy when it arrived. It is displayed on the kitchen bench side next to my other art pieces that I admire daily. I will cherish it always :) Thank You HybridJ, such a lovely gift!

This week I will also start with the "Creative Everyday" prompt for January, THE BODY.
I made a "Soulful Diva" art doll as displayed in the magazine Get Creative, the artist who makes this is a lovely lady called Sarah Lawrence and from this article I was then inspired to make one of my own,( I may make more to dispaly as a group) and I have also bought a book by her titled 20 To Make Art Dolls.
This Soulful Diva is not yet finished, she will be stuffed with filling and other little trinkets (like a little paint brush) and special words/poems to give it special meaning for me.

Hope you like the "Soulful Diva" she gives out an energy of calmness, of knowingness, she seems wise beyond her years, and so very grounded. She is like a good friend always there when you need her, even if it is to just sit quietly and contemplate life with.....

I hope you have all had a lovely break and have started the new year with lots of creating.

Angie oxoxox

Micro- movements, stillness and inspiration

In the past few weeks I have made more progress in my art than I have the whole year. Instead of sitting for big chunks of time, I have been taking snippets of it and quickly working away, stealing five minutes here and there depending on what is happening.
Moving slowly on each project, then working some more as time allows.
I always thought that doing it this way would lack passion or focus, but I have surprised myself that it actually makes more fun, and less pressure. I have made lots of journal backgrounds, with left over paints, fibre, materials what ever I had at hand. Soon I will fill these pages with collage, words, journaling, doodling and more paint! Fun-fun-fun!
Which brings me to my new years resolution! Fun being the operative word. When I did the art course I had to learn so much in such a short period, and a lot of focus on skill and technique, and for me it took away the fun of art and the spontaneity it can have when you are excited and exploring new mediums or projects. If I can find a different art course which encourages these values and beliefs I will enroll straight away!

This is a drawing of a girl from my imagination, (I have been enjoying drawing and sketching faces) I will transfer her image on to a painted canvas and then I will doodle some shapes around her. This idea was taken from Milliande's Channel on You Tube called "Mixed Media Painting Canvas - Combining Art" Lots of exploring and playing, so much fun!

A few weeks ago I met with Crissy at the Northey Street Markets, she is a wonderful inspiring artist who is involved in community and environmental art work. I went with my girls to one of her workshops, we made planter pots and covered it with recycled materials, Chrissy then gave us sunflower seeds to grow in our pots. The seedlings are growing beautifully, when they flower I will post a picture, we are all very excited to see them. Maybe I will be inspired to sketch them!

The new year will bring with it many exciting challenges. I will be starting work, after 7 years of being a stay at home mum (ohh my!). In late January I will be teaching as a Relief for the first few years as I am new to Queensland Education, I am originally from Darwin Northern Territory. So I need to make up points till I become permanent and then I can find work at a school, this is where I have come up with my wonderful idea, to make an Art Club in school time and do some sort of journal art, or canvas painting with kids that are interested in creative arts. Another idea I have been thinking of strongly is about doing more studies in Art Therapy, as you can see from most of my posts I believe art can heal us and bring peace and joy to our lives by allowing us to free our worries or burdens through expressing ourselves. But we will see what the year brings.

I wanted to thank you all for supporting and sharing your art and your hearts with me throughout the year, this journey has given me so much, a real belief that life can give you what you need at the right time. It has helped me grow and realise that we truly all are wonderful special human creative beings.

Merry Christmas to you all, love Angie. :D

Owl Mania

The school holidays have started and the kids are home for the next 6 weeks. I have been looking forward to this for a while, no more school pick up or drop off. Phew!! But it will mean that I have to get 'crafty' (giggle) about managing my time to do some art. So far so good, have been squeezing in time to doodle and play around with drawing cartoon owls. I don't know why or what has possessed me to draw owls but I love them, they are wise and spiritual animals and they like to read! Some of the owl drawings I googled, some are from a cartoon my kids like to watch and others are from the imagination. Hope you like them.

This is a new journal entry (apologies for the fuzzyness of picture). Again very play related, do you remember making butterfly prints at school by sqeezing paint inthe middle of the page and then squishing it all up, to then open it and each time the butterfly would be different. After the paint dried I doodled around the butterfly.

Do you let yourself play some times? Give it a go, it's so much fun, maybe you can squish some paint and make butterflies!

Oil Painting

The first image above is of my first ever oil painting, taken from a photo from our recent holidays in Byron Bay, this is one of the gorgeous views which we enjoyed daily on our stay there.

The painting isn't finished yet, so far this is my second coat, few more to go till I am happy with it, needs more detail and 3 dimensional effect on the front in particular. I really enjoyed painting with oils wet on wet, particularly when I make a mistake I can easily wipe it off! The paints are bright and strong too.

This is our last art piece of the art course which finished last week, and sadly I couldn't go to all my classes, so now will try to finish this at home in time for the Exhibition in February. We can enter any piece and I will enter the oil painting.

Promise to show the other paintings in the following week.

I have been U tubing (is that even a word?) and finding lots of fun arty painting activities to do at home, loving Miliande a lot and have started to do a piece from her in acrylics and mixed media. I really enjoy doing experimental pieces where there are no rules as such and just let the play come into it, where my art classes felt very different very structured and informative. Don't get me wrong I enjoyed my art classes but at times I did question whether this is where I wanted to go with my art, but Kim, the teacher, said you need to know the theory of each medium and explore them, and you need to be able to know what each medium can do.

What I was also wondering was whether art could have another vocation, to use a word. What I am getting at is can art also be used to free your spirit more, heal and find those parts of us we feel are lost sometimes? Mmmm, something to contemplate....

Hope your art whether you paint or write or sing fills those places for you and brings you joy!

Angie x

On Leave...

Hello everyone,
I really wanted to catch up with all, just really busy painting! (I am so happy creating and learning lots), I have been involved in my art classes, which I have been attending these last few months, we are approaching the last three weeks till the "Art Exhibition"! I am sooo excited and a little nervous, my first ever exhibition, and the other students have all been so wonderful and supportive we have really bonded over the weeks as the pressure is on to finish our pieces. I am at the moment doing two lessons per week and with school run and house stuff , doing x-mas shopping/organising, I am feeling a little inundated with errands and finishing work off, so I will be absent for a few more weeks, but will return hopefully with lots of pictures of work to share...Also I would like to keep in touch and see what everyone else have been up to!
Hope your days are also filled with creative endeavours...see you all soon Angie ox