Rocking Christmas,

 After months of not painting rocks, I finally picked up my paint pens and got busy. After all, I had no excuses. My office/studio was completed so all I had to do was push myself to get started. I turned on a tv series I hadn't watched in a long time, sat down in front of my paint pens and got to it.

My best friend requested some gingerbread girls for a party she was having for her granddaughters and nieces, so I started with those. I went through my rock stash and picked out 5 similar sized rocks. Then I made a template of the shape I wanted and traced it onto each rock. 

I filled in all the colors.

Then started adding details. 

After they were done, I added a little glitter to the heart, bow and skirt. So cute!

After that, I started doing some trees. I have done these stylized "wonky trees" before. They're fun to create because there's no rules, plus the shapes of the rocks made it work. 

And some more...

And then I did some assorted holiday designs. 

I did most of these on Black Friday and the few days following. These will be my gifts
to people instead of anything purchased. 

Oh and here's a photo of me using my magnifier to add those tiny little details.

If you  have any artistic, crafting, cooking or gardening talent, please consider giving your creations as gifts instead of overspending this year. Things are so tight and they're going to get worse with health insurance, food and energy costs rising at ridiculous rates. I would love it if someone gave me a homemade loaf of bread, homegrown canned veggies or jellies, a handmade ornament or a matted photo someone took of a sunset. Give from the heart and the hand instead of the big box store. 

Have a great holiday everyone! 

🎄

More Garden Markers.

 

In my previous post, I showed ten of my painted rocks made to be used as garden markers for the raised bed garden at the senior center. I did ten more and presented the whole set to the garden club this week. They loved them!

The director took this photo of me with all twenty.

Here is the whole collection.

We went outside the place all of them and they looked great among the plants. 

This was a fun project and I hope my rocks get to be enjoyed by everyone that visits the garden.

Garden Markers.

 

Are you starting your seeds for this summer's garden yet? While you're waiting for your seedlings to grow, why not think about making garden markers? There are so many fun, creative ways to make identification markers and rock painting is just one of them. I was actually tasked by my local senior center with making painted rock garden markers for the raised beds that the senior garden club planted a few weeks ago. Here is the garden.

There are quite a variety of herbs and veggies in there. They gave me a list of about 20 of them and so far I have painted 10 rocks.

I first started off putting primer on the rocks to get good paint adhesion. I use wedge makeup sponges to make the job go faster. Then I apply a basecoat of acrylic paint in multiple layers, combining colors until I get the shade I want. You can also use outdoor craft paint. 

I google clip art images of what I need to paint and get inspiration from a variety of designs. I sort of borrow ideas from a few different images. These were all done freehand with Posca paint markers.

Here are the first 10 of the collection. After this photo was taken, they got two layers of clear coat spray to protect them from the elements. The clear coat is glossy and makes photographing them difficult, so I always get a shot of my rocks before they get sprayed. 

You may notice #prbl on various rocks. That is something I add to my photos so that they are more difficult to use by nefarious people who steal and post photos without giving credit to the artist. This happened to me last year and ever since I make sure to add hidden marks to my photos. 

We are expecting rain this weekend, so I will be home working on the second batch, so check back! 

Let the Good Times Roll!

 

It's Mardi Gras season here in the south, so after I finished up with the heart rocks for Valentine's Day, I shifted into purple, green and gold designs for the current celebration. Last night was the first parade in town, but I didn't go because it was way too cold to stand outside.

I painted 35 rocks total and plan to give this assortment out to the ladies in my Thursday Mardi Gras class at the senior center. 

Here is a special crab I did. 

And a couple more with lots of glitter.

Next up will be some Easter rocks. 

I'm keeping very busy these days with rock painting, working on puzzles, volunteering at the senior center and subbing in the school cafeteria. The Beautification Committee I'm on also visited an assisted living home and we gave out bags of candy and socks for Valentine's Day to the residents and staff. Soon we'll be doing more outside work like weeding and planting at The Wetlands area that they take care of all spring and summer. 

We are in another cold snap right now, but warmer temperatures are on the horizon!

Stay safe and warm everyone and thanks for visiting my blog. 

Hearts, Buttons and Rocks!

 

Greetings from the frigid south! Yes, we are in below freezing temps here and it's no fun. Schools were closed for a day with delayed starts the day after. That left me lots of free time. I saw a FB post that instantly inspired me to get out my craft supplies. I still had a stash of miscellaneous things, plus a lot of buttons that I had purchased from estate sales because, why not?

This was the post I saw that inspired me.

I immediately rushed off to the craft store and bought some wooden cutout hearts. Then I got out all my supplies and spread them out on my craft table.

Two days later, I had made all these....

I put magnets on the back and I plan to send them to friends and family for Valentine's Day.

For another Valentine surprise, I worked on something for Manny's Pet Pal class. Remember I made bookmarks a while back for the kiddos? Well, I decided to have Manny tell them about his "mommy" who is a rock painter. I have a package all made up for them with a book about rock painting and a gift for each student. I painted these little Manny rocks.

I'm really happy with both projects. They've been fun to do as well as calming and therapeutic during these cold days. I can't wait for spring!

In other news, I had a little bit of a kerfuffle happen last weekend. A local business posted a Mardi Gras rock painting event that was to take place at their restaurant. They went to google to look for a photo to use and they pulled mine. They probably had no idea that I would see it, but I did. I commented on the post that it was my photo and that those were my painted rocks. Before I knew it, my friends chimed in and gave the person some grief. She refused to properly attribute the photo to me, nor did she take it down. Instead she did this....

That is not a proper photo attribute. Just because an image appears on google search, it does not mean anyone is free to use it, especially if it is artwork. A search will clearly show where the original photo came from and proper attributes should be given. After a few more comments from friends, the image was replaced. I'm sure others have lifted my photos, but goodness only knows where they might be. I just happened to see this one because it was posted for a local event. So now I have to make sure I put my name across every photo of my work.

Now, if you've read this far, you're probably wondering how my dog  Zoey is doing. She has finished all her meds and the issue she was having seems to have gone away. She is on prescription food and she loves it so much that she runs to the kitchen all the time for more. She has put on some weight too. So hopefully we are out of the woods with that. I will just have to keep working to pay for the very expensive new diet. Thanks for all the caring comments and emails regarding her health scare. You all are the best! 

💟

Sweet Charity.

 
As I continue to rock my retirement, lol, new challenges seem to drop upon me from unexpected places. For the last few years, I have been painting rocks for two local events to help with fundraising. One of them is the Color Fairhope With Pride event in June, which this year was very successful despite local protests from some ultra conservative peeps. At the end of the day I raised $500 with my painted domino magnets and for the first time I finally felt seen as an artist and contributor. 

The second event is the Out of the Darkness Walk in October that raises money for the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention. I really struggled this year coming up with a theme and the organizer of the event had ideas that I just could not translate into designs. Most of her ideas involved words or phrases and I'm not good with lettering, but I tried my best. Then I got inspired to do a few retro phones to promote the 988 Suicide and Crisis Lifeline number. I thought the idea was creative. I also made some pink sparkly sneakers like the one above with a semi colon that I thought were cute, especially after the popularity of the Barbie movie. 

But the big challenge came when I was asked to make something for a charity event for a gala to be held in September. There's going to be a silent auction with proceeds benefitting a community service called CASA, which stands for Court Appointed Special Advocates. They help and support abused and neglected children who need to appear in court. So, how could I say no? The theme of the gala is "Night at the Museum." I immediately had the idea of trying to replicate a famous painting and Van Gogh's "Starry Night" fit the bill. It's colorful and has lots of movement and seemed like something I could achieve. Well, it was more challenging than I expected and I have a whole new respect for this work.

I started out with an outline and then made dashes in the direction of the 
paint strokes in the painting. 

I just kept working on the strokes with my paint pens, layering the different 
shades of blue and adding white and yellow to make the glowy moon and stars.

The town was the most challenging part, but I got to a point where I felt
I had achieved the overall look and recognizability of the original painting. 

My version of Van Gogh's Starry Night painted
on a 6" x 4" Santorini stone. 

I'm hoping it fetches at least $100 at the silent auction. 
This was actually quite fun and different. I'm thinking I may go this route for future events. Just doing one or two large pieces instead of 50 small ones. Yesterday I packaged all the rocks I did for the Out of the Darkness Walk and called it done. I decided this is the last year I'm doing these events as I feel I'm out of fresh ideas.

So, that's a wrap on that and I'm happy to be finished as I was really struggling 
with trying to come up with new designs. 

********************

I've also been turning my attention to another charitable cause. We have many "Blessing Boxes" around the county. They are similar to Little Free Libraries, except they are for food. I started buying extra items on grocery trips to add to the boxes and now I'm keeping an eye out for good sales. There is a box at the church where hubby works and we've sort of adopted that one and try and add to it a couple times a week. We try and look for items that are ready to eat because there are a lot of homeless people in the area who may not have a way to cook something like pasta. 

The Blessing Box we contribute to.

Publix is a big contributor to these boxes. There are volunteers who are able to pick up day old bread and bakery products from the stores and they fill the boxes with those items too. It's quite an undertaking, especially with the heat and also the cost of gas. My only disappointment was finding out that someone at the church office saw one person come and completely empty the box, which is perfectly fine if they in fact really needed all that food, but not fine if they were just taking all of it for the sake of getting something/anything for free. Either way, we hope to continue our effort as long as we can afford to do so. There's a little voice inside me telling me to do this, so I have to listen. It's never wrong. 

Thank you for visiting my blog!

💗

The Ides of March are Behind Us.

 

All three pets in one room. A rare occurrence! 

I'm always always aware of The Ides of March for some strange reason. Not sure if it's my Italian roots, or what, but I've always been superstitious of things like that and full moon fever type stuff. Regardless, the ides have passed and all is well, so feeling very thankful! 

A lot of events were happening over the weekend in these parts, but the sudden cold weather put a bit of a damper on them, at least for us. The famous Arts and Crafts Festival in Fairhope started on Friday, but had to close early that day because of storms passing through. We didn't end up going on Saturday or Sunday because it was just too cold and windy. Last year it was blazing hot. The semi annual yard sale in my neighborhood complex also took place over the weekend with about 40 homes participating. Hubby and I got out early and hit probably 95% of them, but we didn't buy anything except this oil painting of a pelican.

24" x 36" oil painting. $5.00 at yard sale!

Sunday was the day of the year I look forward to the most. It was Festa Italiana at the catholic church in town. Every year (except during Covid year) they have it as a fundraiser. There are trash to treasure tables, spaghetti dinners for sale and tons of Italian pastries including homemade cannolis,

We had a feast yesterday of all things I'm not supposed to eat but since I planned my blood test ahead of time, I was going to enjoy this day to the fullest! Everything was delicious!!!

The only treasure I found was a sterling silver ring. It was really tarnished, but I polished it up with some toothpaste and got it nice and clean. It was only one dollar!!

In the rock painting department, I worked all last week and over the weekend on Easter eggs. These will be sent to my great nieces/nephews and given to my sweet coworkers that have young children.
Any spots you see on them is glitter that doesn't photograph well. 

Have a great week!