Have you ever seen birds on a wire?  There are always scores of them all lined up, and you wonder what they are waiting for.  They wait and sit, wait and sit.    It’s a great thought on life… not to just sit around waiting for things to happen, waiting for things to come to you…..“Don’t be like a bird on a wire waiting for the good things to come…instead FLY to see all there is to see and be……be the one to fly”…..

This winter is unrelenting here in upstate New York.  We’ve spent many a cozy day hunkered down as snow piles up outside.  I’ve been watercoloring in my journals with really bright colorful illustrations, just to keep myself out of the winter blahs funk.   “Love being home where it’s safe and cozy”….A crooked little house, unattended details, just some color love.  Spring will come.  It always does.

One of my absolute most favorite quotes by Rumi.  My friend Rena Askey gave me a beautiful card with this message.  This is another art journal piece.  I first loosely painted the outlines with black acrylic ink and then filled in with watercolor.  I’m having a great time experimenting and painting with some new color palettes.

 Really like how this came out! I am such a dinosaur.  My kids know so much more about computer graphics than i do!  My art training consisted of extensive drawing and painting, as that’s where my specialty was.  I’m an artist, an illustrator.  I never learned much on the computer, as i was always working by hand with pens and brushes, paints and inks.  Sad to admit that i am so illiterate about much of the Photoshop possibilities.  My goal is to keep the hand drawn feel of my work, while bringing it into a new dimension.  I love to play and learn, and my skills are coming along.

 It is amazing to me how artwork can be manipulated into so many things.  That’s cool.

I just love how the spread came out.  Very bold and colorful, not for the “pastel” of heart!  Arranging the original flowers into my journal makes for a happy “rework of art”!

 It’s Valentine’s Day and hearts are everywhere!  It inspired me to gather together a collection of my artsy hearts.  I love hearts and put them in a lot (most!) of my work.  I love the shape, the symbolism, the emotion it generates.  So here’s a collection of some of my illustrations, doodles, journal pages, paintings, collage and more.  All for the “heart of it”.  

 This winter is awwwwwwwful!  I think we have had three days of sunshine in Rochester in the past 3 months!!!  Arggghh!  It’s hard to be bright and cheery, when you are buried under snow and peering only into cloudy, overcast skies.  I need sunshine bad!  But luckily i can play with my paints and brighten my world as bright as i want.  So here are some new color palette that i am exploring.

 It’s the back page of my “Joy Journal”.  Acrylic paints with my signature white paint pen.  Happy!!

Here’s a “Go Red” girl for Women’s Heart Month.  It’s a journal illustration i did while vacationing in Cedar Key, Florida in Valentine’s Day 2010.  It was freezing when we were there, so there was lots of time to be inside journaling and creating.  I drew the outlines with a Copic multiliner and colored it in with my sketch markers.

Alright, let’s just do WILD debut peek at all of my new rubber stamps for Art Gone WIld.  I created these 21 sample cards that will be on display at the CHA show this weekend, woo hoo!!


The line is called “Artful Cardmakers”, specifically designed for coloring.  Love love love and love to color!  And it’s so good for you. (relaxing, meditative, calming, ahhhhh…..)

The “Artful Cardmakers” set includes FOUR stamps.  The central image is a red rubber cling stamp and the coordinating words and sentiments are in clear (so you can position easily).  Each image has a blank box so you can pick and choose the sentiments for several occasions!  Isn’t that fun?!!

These were made with the “Getting Punchy” sets.  The set comes with FOUR 3″ stamps, the images designed for the Marvy PURPLE PUNCHES (available at Michaels Stores).  But of course you can stamp you own repeating patterns as they stand along well. (*i posted all the PUNCHES sets in my January 21 blog post)