jimmy and digging worms

this is a picture of jimmy, jerry's middle grandson, from our father's day fishing experience of 2006. jimmy was scooping worms up and dumping them out as fast the rest of us could find/dig/pickup the worms, so he wasn't mr. popular for that! other related drawings posted from that day are girls can fish, too and father's day -- 2006 -- fishing.

when jerry was in the hospital recently for knee replacement surgery, i needed something to do and only had this old picture to work from -- so this is what i drew. i had never done hatching in my artwork before, and it was amazingly stress-relieving to sit and do crosshatching to pass the time. plus, it gave me something else to focus on other than listening to jerry breathe and "jumping to attention" every time he wiggled or made a noise.

this picture was done w/ a black prang colored pencil on white 70# paper in a 9 x 12 sketch book. the finished picture was sprayed w/ matte sealant to prevent smudging.

tiger lily - ATC for DT2

my latest serious art creation (or attempt at one!) is this tiger lily ATC for the DT2 exchange. i was going for an artistic impression of a realistic picture -- more adept than a typical coloring book picture, but not real enough looking that someone might mistake it for a photo. it almost seems to me to have a stained-glass quality, and i like that.

overall, i'm very happy with the creation and really sad to part w/ it. every time i work on a project like this, jerry always watches w/ interest. he never asks for a picture for himself, but then he makes comments later like "i wish you weren't getting rid of that one" or "that would look good on my desk".

i think if it were up to him, he would have all of my artwork framed and hanging all over the house. i'd feel like i lived in "the shrine of jill"! since much of it is artwork of our family, it would probably be ok, though.

this ATC was done on white Bristol Vellum paper with prismacolor colored pencils and sprayed w/ krylon workable fixatif to protect the colors from smearing. Being an ATC, this piece measures 2.5" x 3.5".

copper "family" tip-in ab page

the double page spread was done in response to the color "copper" for a tip-in swap. i used the theme of family, as family is extremely important to me. the outer edges of the paper have been stamped w/ ink and then sprinkled w/ embossing powder, which melts when heated w/ a heat gun.

the tag on the upper right says "family" w/ the letters stamped on little copper "coins" and is sewn together in layers. the lower left is just a brown block of paper to be used as a mat for a family photo of the person who received my page in the swap.

on the right side, the quote says "the voice of parents is the voice of gods, for to their children they are heaven's lietenants" taken from shakespeare's work. on the lower right, i punched the year 2005 into a sheet of copper and glued on to the page.

when this person received the pages, then all he or she would have to do is glue on a picture of the family and have a completed and personal page. i was happy w/ it and intended to make one for my family, but just didn't get around to duplicating the page for myself.

emerald city pop-up ab page

this altered book page was done in a children's story book round robin and the technique this month was pop-ups. i couldn't imagine what more exciting to see pop in front of me as a child than the emerald city, so that's how i chose my page topic. well, that and i was born/raised in or near kansas -- so wizard of oz has always been a part of my life.

the background is just covered in green grass scrapbook paper. i had a calendar w/ beautiful pictures of poppies on one page, so i scanned that page in and printed out more poppies and cut out to glue on to the page. the yellow brick road is just made from yellow scrapbook paper and shaped to look like it is receding toward the city.

the pop-up part was the hardest, though, as i didn't have a pattern and just had to figure the folds out by myself. i knew i wanted it to be of the emerald city, but had to play around a little to figure out what size it could be and still fit in the book and still pop up when the pages opened. after a couple of tries, i had the right fit and a working design -- so i glued it in and was done.

sealant nightmares

i've had a few incidences lately where the sealant that i've been using has created a problem for my artwork. in fact, it has been such a problem that i have quit using it and purchased something else. i have used this several times before and on many projects and haven't had a problem that i could specifically trace to it, but now i have had a few very specific problems.

the first example, who is watching journal, was covered in full, vibrant colored pencil on top of acrylic paint. the silver/purple of the dragonflies and the various bright colors of the water's edge just disappeared when i sprayed the page w/ the krylon matte finish. once the spray hit the page, the vibrant colors just melted away. i thought they would return after the sealant dried -- but no such luck. i even tried to pencil them back in after the sealant had dried, but the colors will just not adhere and/or show up on these pages now. the dull colors are the best i can get to "stick" to the pages.

an even worse situation happened on pow-wow dancer, and i was so disappointed that i was almost sick. i had worked several hours on drawing, coloring, shading, blending, adding in last minute details and more. this was the first ATC i had ever made and i didn't want my trade partner to be disappointed in the ATC he received. i stayed up late to finish the picture so i could spray it w/ sealant before going to bed.

in the morning when i went out to check the ATC, i found that it looked like i had sprayed it w/ silver spray paint instead of sealant. i checked the bottle to see if i had grabbed the wrong can or something, but basically my beautiful (in my eyes, anyway!) ATC looked ruined, w/ "blobs" of silver covering the picture. the blobs of silver wouldn't scrape off w/o pulling off bits of the paper behind it, so i just decided to work on top of the problem.

i started coloring the picture again, and after about 5 hours or reworking the details and losing some other details -- i was able to save the piece. imagine my disappointment, though, to see what had happened to my picture and the time/work/effort i had put into it.

after these events, i was afraid to use the same stuff on my tiger lily picture that i had just finished. i really liked the picture and hated to invest the time/effort into a picture that would/could be ruined as soon as i sprayed it w/ sealant. i went to the art supply store and talked w/ the owner about what to do. she said she had had some of the same problems using the matte sealant, especially when she worked on a dark background.

she suggested that i use the krylon "workable fixatif" and that she had been very happy with her projects and successes with that product. it doesn't have the same finish as the matte sealant, but i didn't really want or need that finish. plus, it doesn't seem to have a problem w/ leaving residue or silver specks on my artwork -- and i really like that! what i need is protection from smearing and smudging, so it looks like i'm sold on "workable fixatif"!

so, if you're looking for something to protect your work, consider the "workable fixatif" rather than the sealant. from the name of the product, it's obvious that even though it has been sprayed, it's still a workable surface, so you can work/spray/work/spray, etc. sometimes i need that protection in one area of my work to continue on in other areas of my work w/o smudging one area to another.

any other ideas, suggestions, or stories of similar incidences and what you did to solve them would be welcomed here. after all, the comparison of products helps us all out in the end!