catching up with AEDM day 10 and Sketchbook Challenge

It's a very special Remembrance Day today as here in the UK we remember those in our armed forces who give or have given their lives in the line of duty at 11am on the 11th day of the 11th month of 2011.

Yesterday and today finds me poorly at home with some kind of nasty cold that has settled on my chest.  Yesterday was ok, doing a bit of blog hopping in the morning, but then the internet went down and didn't come back on 'til about half an hour ago today when I finally phoned our provider (turns out we have a broken modem) and he sorted it out for me.

So without the internet I sat in bed doing some blind contour drawings.  For these you draw around the image without looking at the paper, only looking at the image, and use a single line.  I couldn't use a real life picture of a seahorse to draw from (how much do we rely on google images!!!) so used this one, which I just LoVe:

Unfortunately I'd printed it out for my ideas journal and not noted properly where I found it!  Sorry!

This idea is from Carla Sonheim's fantastic book 'Drawing Lab' which I find I go back to so much for ideas to get me drawing.  Part-way through drawing some smaller versions of the seahorse I realised I could google an image on my phone!!!  I also noticed how like dragons seahorses are, certainly around the head area anyway.  No wonder I like them, I love dragons!!!

I then chose an image I liked, copied it and started some mad doodling.  I'll add some colour at another time. All this was so taxing I then slept for 6 hours!!!  I'm desperate to have a go at free-machine embroidering a seahorse but need some painkillers first :(  I'll share day 11's AED a bit later!

ps Isn't YouTube fab sometimes?  I have absolutely no need for daytime tv when I'm poorly...

AEDM days 8 and 9 - a fantastic evening playing with clay ...

Yesterday was a bit manic (I spent the day teaching, went straight from school to another one to run a Numicon workshop and went straight from there to a two hour evening class) but culminated in leisure!  Our local grammar school runs adult classes every November and I signed up for the ceramics one.  It's just for three evenings in total.

After rolling out a piece of clay, we pressed lace, dried orange slices and other bits n pieces into the clay to create texture.  We then wrapped it around a tube and created a cylindrical pot.

I then had a bit of a play, layering snippets of clay, and created a book cover.  I'd like to incorporate my textile work into my clay pieces so made three buttons and saved the piece I cut these from to layer over a stitched and needle-felted piece.

AEDM day 9 started early as I woke in the night with chest pain (I've got a cold!...Again!!!)  I need some ideas for next week's clay class ... well, I need to refine my ideas as I only have two weeks to do the work!  After a bit of a hunt on the internet I found this fabulous work by Elizabeth Howe...

... GoRGeouS!  I also found a blog stocked full of great inspiration - I love so much of the artists' work that Sara features.  I now have plans for next week in my notebook :)

AEDM day 7 - an online colour tool

Jane LaFazio featured this on the Sketchbook Challenge blog and I just LoVe it!  It's slightly annoying in that it doesn't seem to be able to see yellows but I think it really has potential re looking at the colours you use in your work, and I also think that the swatches would make a great starting point for a second piece of work.

I did the circle painting first and was a bit disappointed by the results.  As you see, no yellow!  But my other image choices gave better results.

The program is called 'Colour Generator'.  You just upload a photo and it creates a number of swatches featuring the colours you've used.  Cool isn't it?!!

AEDM day 6 - an autumnal walk in the countryside

I am very lucky to live really close to the Cheshire countryside so this afternoon saw us taking a walk in Tatton Park.  As it's 'Art Every Day Month' I dutifully took my sketchbook and drew some of the things I saw and liked,  as directed by Carla Sonheim in her book 'Drawing Lab'.

It still needs the colour adding to it, but I'm happy to have done some drawing!

I chickened out of drawing the deer though and just took photographs instead ;)

AEDM day 5 - drawing with my sewing machine

... one of my favourite activites, which Kirstie Allsopp described as "the crack cocaine of the craft industry" on 'Kirstie's Handmade Britain' this week lol; not sure about that one but it is great fun :)

I used the designs I did in my sketchbook yesterday, stitching them onto patches of felt I had lying around near my sewing machine.

I had saved a funky label from a cardigan I'd bought from Fat Face this week and decided to add one of my pieces to this.

I 'drew' onto my fabric, then cut around the body of the flower before adding it to the tag and stitching a stem and adding a leaf.

Tonight we're off to a bonfire party :)  I love it all, the sights, the smells, the treacle toffee and melted marshmallows, but fireworks still frighten me from a safety point of view.  At least the dog is getting deaf as he gets older so the loud bangs don't bother him so much.

I'd just like to say that my heart goes out to those who've lost friends and family in the M5 Somerset crash last night.  Involved in a crash myself this time last year, similarly in the dark and wet, I still cannot begin to imagine how horrific this one was.  Surely they can't now raise the speed limit to 80mph on the motorways!

AEDM day 4 - a page in my work journal

An idea I'd like to have a go with at work (Bean and Brush Art Cafe) is scratching back paint to the bisque, or layer of paint below.  The photos on the left are of work I liked that I found on the internet.  The bottom picture made me think of the work of Miro.

I have a lovely little book entitled 'V&A Pattern    The Fifties' which, unsurprisingly, is full of wonderful mid-century patterns.  I copied out some of the patterns into my journal.

I just love anything designed by Lucienne Day!!!

Art Every Day - days 1-3

1st November '11

After teaching in school all day, I went into the Bean and Brush in the evening to write and decorate the boards for the new winter menu.  Not art exactly, but definitely creative!

2nd November '11

A sinus headache, and a busy day yesterday meant I had a sleep this morning rather than getting some art done.  I was in work at the Bean and Brush at 3pm and carried on painting 'Brian' the builder after Hannah had started him [he's in the children's corner and those are my paintings :) ]...

...before teaching an adult class...

...so looking forward to seeing these when they come out of the kiln as that brown glaze will be a gold layer over the green with bursts of silvery blue...

Again more creative than 'art'!

3rd November '11

Yay, finally got my art materials out tonight whilst watching 'Educating Essex'!

My new numerals stencil arrived this week so I had a good play.  The 'sum' is a '50s flashcard, and the black swirls are from a cupcake wrapper from Asda!