I'm reading The Daring Female's Guide to Ecstatic Living. There's an entry in there about spending 10 minutes each day doing something you feel estatic about. So this was my 10 minutes for yesterday (which of course turned into more than 10 minutes!)

I painted this yesterday during a painting session with Sophie - it's leaf rubbings (2 oak leaves and an ivy leaf from our yard), crayon, children's Crayola pan watercolors, on regular Staples copy paper. The wax in the crayon resists the watercolor, so it takes a little planning, but it's fun. No pencils, no erasing, no drawing, just lots of paint.

Then, to make it more interesting, I threw on some salt, and then squirted it with Windex. The salt and ammonia leach the color out of the paper in splatters that I think help make it look more organic. Not sure what would happen if I did this with good watercolors and real watercolor paper, but that's next on my list of experiments. :)

(I should note that while I was doing this, across the table, Sophie was busy painting her entire arm and part of her face black. She had already done 5 paintings and decided it was time to move on to something else. Yes, I took pictures.)

I would love to write about being a mom and drawing with kids, but right now, frankly, it's hard to draw. Because of our family's work schedules, the kids are solely mine from lunch until 10:30 at night. I used to have helpers 5 evenings a week, now I only have one, one night a week. So at the end of a typical day with two teething twins, a precocious three year old, lots of whining (from them), cajoling (from me - they are still not potty trained and our oldest is fighting it with a vengeance), general willfullness, dinner, cleanup, a walk, board games, three bedtime stories later (not to mention prayers, brushing of teeth, etc.) - when all this is done and Paul is still teaching, I grab the kids' monitors and head for my sanctuary. My studio. The Tower.

It's a finshed attic, with slanted ceilings from being right under the roof, lumpy brown carpeting, and a tiny nook with a futon and little TV in it. Empty tea mugs gather around on the floor like a small crowd waiting expectantly for something to happen, for some great masterpiece to take place. I feel a tremendous sense of expectation - from nobody other than myself, mind you - to create something fabulous.

I let it go.

Creativity comes in waves for me. I have to accept that there are nights - and sometimes it may be for a whole week - that I am not going to paint, because I'm just too darn tired. I try to keep other projects on hand for times like this. I knit. I crochet. I doodle. I make lists - all pressure-free, creative things. I (gasp!) sometimes even throw in the towel and go to bed early for some much-needed rest so that I'll have an extra reserve for tomorrow's adventures.

Nobody ever promised motherhood would be easy. All I know is that I need to create to live, and that if I skimp on art, I am a cranky mama. If I am cranky with the kids, I don't feel like making art. An artist's date every week doesn't hurt either. It's a daily balancing act I've learned to live with and embrace - I can't imagine a fuller, richer life than the one I'm living now. I'll catch up on sleep next year.

My extremely talented brother-in-law is making a children's album, and had me sing backup on one of the songs.

I used to record on a regular basis, but it's been years, and after singing with a group, I was also not used to being the only person in front of the microphone. There's also a world of difference between singing weekly in church, and belting out a funky dance number in a recroding studio. So after I got over the stressing out, the perfectionism (mine!) and remembered that, hello, I can make mistakes, we'll just record over them - then I loosened up and had fun. I got to make up all the harmonies, and threw in extra bits in the middle - when I came out with, "Go boogie, dancing grandma", we both almost started snorting. :) If you can't be silly on a kid's album, where can you do it?

"If Jesus is your co-pilot, you should trade seats."

(great line I just overheard on new TV show, Studio 60)

(Me, in the green hat, directing chalkers in the park)

This afternoon, watching some children's television (I love PBS!) I saw a feature on a pavement artist. Coming from a bit of a chalking background myself, I started tearing up listening to him explain the joy he feels when he finishes a painting, how he loves to mix the colors with his fingers and feel the sidewalk beneath him. It made me so eager to chalk up a storm - with the kids, natch - that way I can teach them how it's done!

Some eye-popping work to explore and inspire:

Kurt Wenner
Julian Beever
The Chalk Chics

What does a potato have to do with change? Lots.

Genetically modified foods are everywhere - you've probably eaten them without knowing it. Big food companies fight to keep any information about GMOs off of labels, and also fight for other companies that have no GMOs to not be able to advertise that either. All because they (rightly) think that the general public would rather eat a real potato than one that's had its genes spliced, or crops that do nothing but make money for big businesses and rip off farmers (not to mention what they do to the environment.) Scary, huh? This is not the way food was meant to be.

Sorry, this is something I feel quite strongly about - I think most of this country has no idea what they put in their mouths. And big business likes it that way.

{Note, I am not even talking about organic food, factory farming, cruelty to animals, irradiated meat, or many other subjects I could go on about at great length. Check out some of the links below for information you won't be able to put down.}

Highly recommended reading:

Food Revolution by John Robbins - truly a life-changing book for me
All Over Creation by Ruth Ozeki
And this link tells you what the stickers on your fruit mean so you know what to avoid

I was asked recently what kind of supplies I use, and so I thought I'd dig around for the labels on the backs of some of my favorite things.

Watercolour sketchpad. My sketchpad of choice lately has been the Canson All-Media Book. It's acid-free, 90 lb. cold press paper that seems to take everything I throw at it: watercolour, ink, colored pencil, pastel, you name it. Mine's 9" x 12" and has 100 pages. This book is portable and lets me feel a lot freer to be experimental since I don't feel like I'm wasting a big sheet. I actually wish these did come in a bigger size. Which leads me to...

Watercolour pocket box. This is a wonderful travel box of watercolours that you can fit in your pocket. It's the Winsor & Newton Cotman Water Colour Sketcher's Pocket Box. (phew!) It has 12 half pans of paint and comes with a tiny brush. When we went to Italy, I brought these and painted all my pictures with these tiny paints. They're really marvelous.

I'm eagerly awaiting my copy of The Watercolor Bible to be amazon-ing its way to me for even more watercolor fun.

I also draw with mechanical pencils, gummy erasers, and paint with whatever brushes are on sale and come in a pack.

What are your faves?

I made Paul's birthday card a homage to his favorite Schoolhouse Rock song.


It also came with these additional interchangeable balloons (below) to demonstrate the subject of the song, so that he could replace the long balloon with the shorter "Happy Birthday to You!" Get it?

More Rufus Xavier Sarsparilla goodness; this made me laugh out loud. I would love to see Schoolhouse Rock performed live! (Heck, I would love to be in Schoolhouse Rock Live.)

And though I will always have a warm spot in my heart for Rufus, my personal favorite can always be recalled with the lyrics: "He was a hairy bear/He was a scary bear/We beat a hasty retreat from his lair/and described him with adjectives."

Watercolours, trying to use as much mud (sludge colors from the mixing colors in the middle of my palette) as possible - and no pencils or undos.

More work on the posters ... you can see how they go together both facing and back to back. Please excuse the paintbrush holding the corner down and my fuzzy camera skills.

[Update - more pics here.]

This is a sketch for a set of posters I'm working on for the NZUSA - they have a great campaign called "Thursdays In Black". Originally, it was just going to be one poster, but they liked the sketch so much, they decided they wanted one with a man in it to match!

The interesting thing was that I had always thought of these pieces as facing each other, but I think I like them even more if you put the two trees together - like they're sitting under the same tree! I didn't draw them that way, but as I was moving them around to paint them, I saw the connection between the two. So I made sure the trees matched as well as the ground - so they can match them up both ways, if the two are ever hanging next to each other. They're painted in watercolour and acrylic. Each poster will be A2-sized, which means I get to break out the big brushes!

Scroll down to see work in progress....

Friday sharing time! This animation is made by my brother, who some of you know online as the mastermind behind Egotistical Productions. I remember this when he was animating it frame by frame and filming it with a hand held camera. He wrote it, does all the voices, sings, and oh yes, animates the whole thing. (Did I mention he is also a super-genius? But I digress.)

You can leave him a comment here.

This morning I did something that I find a little scary.

In an effort to cross something off my new, unbroadcast-as-yet Big 35 List, I made up a sheet for prospective galleries who might be interested in my paintings. I haven't had any art hanging up anywhere other than my house (okay, and my mom's) since college. I figure, what can I lose? So three copies went out to the art association, in an envelope with a Muppet stamp on it for good luck. And of course, these are just three of all the other bits of art I have floating around here. Stands to reason someone, somewhere, might want to show one of them?

Anyone who's interested in a PDF, click here to download.

Hands down, this is my favorite clip from Sesame Street ever. Imagine on, baby!

Happy 9th anniversary, dearest one.

I heart Ebay! We found the set of Childcraft encylopedias I grew up with from 1974; these two volumes above fed my need for artistic knowledge with tons of information that made me think. If you have kids in your life, I highly recommend trying to snatch these two volumes up. They ROCK, and you can get them for a song.

Volume 13 - Look Again - (top) Shows many representations of various works of art with discussion questions. A great intro to art for kids. The Magritte (and more fantastic works along this line) made a great impression on me.

Volume 12 - Look and Learn - (bottom) Discusses symbolism, the history of typography, advertising and trademarks, color theory. I swear I knew things in college the rest of my art class didn't, because of this book.

Now get this: my library was getting rid of their set from the early 90's. I grabbed them up with glee (and $5) and found out when I got home that surprise! my two favorite volumes were gone. Art replaced by (gulp) "Mathemagics." And since then I've been on a mission to find those lost volumes. I now have two complete sets, which are known as "the ones you can read anytime" and "the ones you have to ask Mama to read with you." And we sit down together, share art, ask questions, discuss. They are only 2 and 3 years old, and they get it.

If you're looking for the whole set (they're great!) search for: Childcraft: The How and Why Library 1974. The 1975 and 1976 editions have the same covers and issue titles, and may be the same. We wanted the whole set, but you can purchase individual volumes for $.99 in some cases. Of course, the volumes on science are quite out of date, but the ones on literature, animals, and plants are virtually the same.

Or would you rather be a pig?

(Detail: click for full image)

Something new! Every Friday, I'm going to post something that inspires me, makes me happy, or is just plain silly. I was going to post only movie links but may branch out to websites and books if I feel like it. Basically, I love this (whatever I'm going to share) and I think you will too.

For my first share: a scene from my favorite Beatles movie, Help!

You've Got to Hide Your Love Away and The Amazing Adventures of Paul on the Floor.



A fan has sent Ringo a sacrificial ring from her temple. According to temple law, the wearer must be painted red and sacrificed. There's only one way to take the ring off, and Ringo doesn't know what it is. (I hope that I usually won't need to set up the videos, but honestly, you're not going to have a clue what's going on if you haven't seen it.) Go watch!

One of my two year old twins, Angela, has gotten interested in drawing. Not her drawing, but sitting on my lap and making me draw on command. It's fun though, and gives you a lot of insight into what's going on in her little head.

This doodle started out with "I want some ducks, walking up a hill." That led me to ask what was at the top of the hill, and we branched out from there. Of course, we had to have a pony, and the myriad of other animals that inhabit her dream world. My main contribution was adding Angela (and her Purple Pony) dreaming away. I also like how all the animals I drew for her on the back of the paper showed through on the scanner... we can say it adds to the dream-like quality, okay?

The point is that inspiration can come from the smallest of sources, and that sharing your art with others - and occasionally allowing for a pint-sized art director - is great for keeping your drawing muscles loose and limber.