Watercolour workshop - day 4

This time I've finished my lighthouse picture. It's my favourite but photos don't show all its beauty :/

I will scan it later on and we'll see what comes out of it. Although I'm pretty sure that the scanner will eat all those light colours...

 You may remember from the previous day that I've covered the sea with paper tape (so it wouldn't get dirty from the rocks). It appears that you can use that technique to make really nice walls or rocks ;)

 I've managed to rescue that part, however :D

 Everything all over the place got really dirty while making textures.

 We were playing cards and chess while waiting for the layers to dry :)

 And remember, never take off masking fluid before the paper dries completely - otherwise your lighthouse's window will get bigger than intended :/ Of course I knew about it - but my sister was too impatient to wait and scratched it off!

And that's the end of the workshop. There's also a day 5 - architecture, but I was at work during those classes..

A.

Watercolour workshop - day 3

Today I started with finishing previous day's trees.
New topic was a lighthouse which appeared to be very nice! I did not expect that :) I have not finished this painting unfortunately - waiting for the paint to dry before starting with next layers took too long (I've used way too much water in the first layer and then it only got worse with every next one :P).

I was trying very hard to make the paper not wave (because I hate it when it does so). As you can see - one of the paper's edges freed itself from the glue with which it was stack to the rest of the papers and waved anyway. Bad, bad paper!

 While waiting for the layers to dry a bit I was re-designing my Etsy shop's logo and everything connected to it (stickers, business cards, labels, banner, etc.). Hopefully I will get down to it this week and you will be able to see everything in action :D

 I have no idea what I'm doing...

 It starts to look well - but there's still plenty to do! 

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Watercolour workshop - day 1

I like painting with watercolours a lot. Like - A LOT! But there's always something new to learn about them. Especially if I always use them to paint the same thing - cute illustrations. That's why I've decided to give it a try and attend watercolour workshop held in my sister's drawing school. Those will be 5 days filled with watercolours that I don't yet know. Sounds interesting :)

Those are my clouds. On this photo they are not finished yet.

 My sister's warm up.

 And here' she works on her clouds.

 My youngest sister also came to disturb a bit ;)

Oh, and here's the first horse-chestnut of the season. I like to keep the first ones from each year ^^

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New kitty

My mum got herself a kitty :) It's half a maine coon and it's a cutie.

I'm not really sure if it's a SHE but since it was our first impression, right now she's called Tola. However, I wanted to call her Little My and my Love calls her Bobek (Stinky in a Polish version of 'The Moomins'). If she turns out to be a HE, I think the Bobek name will stay ;)

My cat, on the other hand, is not so happy with this new-cat situation. She stays under a coach most of the time. Wonder how much time will it take for her to get normal again... And I wonder if they will become friends.

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Yield - Illustration Friday + DS II 44

 She yielded to the temptation. Books can be so intriguing!

 ..and suddenly few moths have passed. *Oops!*

It is a birthday present I've made for my sister. This is she on the picture, being very elf-ish ;) Hope she'll like it!

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Christmas baby angels

This Christmas my family was a host, what happens quite rarely. I liked it a lot, it was so much more peaceful but it also didn't feel like true Christmas. I'm just used to going to Pulawy city where all my family was born and where the rest of our relatives live.

My mum was quite excited with all that Christmas preparations and she got crazy decorating house. For example, I with my youngest sister have to make napkin holders. I never thought that just laying the napkins next to plates is so yesterday ;)

Here are the holders:

We had to sew together those angels and straps (in shape of Christmas trees, of course!). It was my sister's first time of using needle so the first angel she made was a bit bloody ;P

And here are some more photos, my family really wanted to see those ^^ And you will also see a bit of my life.

 Those are my two sisters - Kate (bigger one) and Zuzia (smaller one). They both are younger :)

 Here are my grandparents (from mum's side of family). In the background you can see a fish tank on which my cat usually sleeps.

This is my dad and a fish plate I won last year through Design Files. My dad loves to eat fish so he decided to make a very fancy version of a pike perch with apples, cranberries and I-have-no-idea-what-more. It was yummy!

Mmmm... :3

I hope that we will be hosting Easter breakfast too!

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Pizza part 3

After another weekend at work in a cafe I was back to painting the walls. I had 3 days and a morning of the 4th to start and finish the last wall and add some small details to the previous ones. So it was a lot to do considering that previous walls took me 7 days to (almost) finish :P But! I took my Love with me again and when I was making the details he was, again, painting base colours and drawings straight lines and so on and so on. What a helpful creature :3

Here are the pictures:

 First sketch. The whole painting was supposed to be based on this picture. But there was no way of making it the same (and absolutely no fun!) so I've changed it. A lot ;)

 This wall colour suited the furniture so well.. But in the end both of them looked different than here.

 This time I took my music in a more convenient way than a huge laptop. And I could just concentrate on painting. I cannot imagine creating anything without any music in the background.

 My Love helping, drawing straight lines. What would I do without him? :)

 Five days left till the opening, 2 days left for me to paint. And I'm sitting and posing ;P

 Finally, got back to work. Comparing with previous weeks, when working with such a close deadline, I felt an urge to eat all the time. Chocolate mostly, Kinder Country, to be specific :3

 And sandwiches with cheese :) Made in a pizza oven. Pizza would be even better but there was no one to make it back then.

 A shelf with toys - everyone could suggest what toy should find its place there.

 This wall was more like a real painting for me, with more possibilities and giving me a lot of fun. When I painted the forest on the previous one I just used green. This green, that green, a bit of blue, a bit of brown, no invention - it was just a forest and it needed to look like 'just a forest' for normal people. But here I could change my idea every minute and it still was ok.

 Although I sometimes missed Ctrl + Z buttons ;P I always do when switching from digital to traditional painting.

 Finished furniture is more reddish than it was on the 2nd photo. The free space on my painting is where the flat screen will be.

 Shameless self promotion :)

 Finally open! Everyone loves the place!

Especially my pretty paintings :)

Those were busy 10 days of creating. I got really off my daily routine then and lost track of everything else but painting, but I liked it. I could do it more often, no problem :) Anyone wants a wall painted?

And this is a cone pizza. Will eat it every time I'm there :)

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Pizza part 2

 After a weekend at home (or at work actually) I came back to Pulawy to keep on creating my wall painting. You can see the previous bit of painting here.

 There were only 9 days left till the grand opening. And the 3rd wall wasn't even started (and won't be until next week!). I was changing pictures and making the count down every day :)

 I took more paints with me. Those layer and layers of the forest ate most of those huge green paints.

 I was working about 8 hours everyday. It doesn't sound harsh but with the possibility of not finishing on time hanging over my neck I felt very exhausted every evening.

 But still got power to dance :)

 This time my Love came with me to help. And helped a lot! He did the most nasty thing - he was putting the base colours on walls (giving me time to paint more creative things).

 Oh, and he was fixing my messy edges ;)

 But also got some free time for himself! Everyone needs a rest from time to time.

 But maybe he had too much free time if he got the possibility to cover paper tape with rabbits ;P 

 The bar was finished and it was time for the rest of the furniture to drive in. 

 And a bit of it you can see here. I liked the original colour of this wood, but it was not my task to decide about it. On this photo you can see the almost finished 1st and 2nd wall - I just needed to add few tiny details later.

 And this 'wooden' wall is ready to welcome some pictures hanging in fancy frames. Fancy WOODEN frames, of course :)

Hope you liked what you saw!

A.