Sunday, March 27, 2011

Spring is in the air

Today was a beautiful day with lots of sun!! This afternoon we (Cor and I) went for a walk with the dog along a canal near my village and this is what we saw .....
..... a blue sky reflected in the canal (Noord-Willemskanaal) near Oudemolen;


we counted 11 Deer (actually fawn) enjoying the sun and eating some green grass; 

a buzzard sitting on a pole. These photos are taken with a 12x optical zoom but the buzzard was still very far away. 


And now I'm going to try and work on one of my creative projects. I have 3 projects that I'm working on at the moment.


1. Mermaid painting: 

2. Angel: 
Building up layers around the angel and dove.
I started this one a long time ago when I was in Suzi Blu's workshop Angels, but I never finished it. I decided last week to give it another try.


3. Drawing unicorns for Natalie's workshop Woman and their Unicorn:
Last week we learned how to make a frontal unicorn head and the one on the left is my first try. Haven't finished the shading yet!


PS Yesterday we went laser gaming with my son, 2 friends, Cor and I. It was still for my son's 17th birthday earlier this month. It was my first time ever and although I wasn't sure upfront of liking the game I thought it was lots of fun. The first game I even was the number one scorer!! And the second and last game I came in second. Today however I feel every muscle in my body aching and I also discovered lots of bruises on my arms and legs. But ... it was still fun!!

Tuesday, March 15, 2011

She now has a beard!

Today I received 2 packages from a Dutch online web-store with some books about unicorns. I love the book called The Unicornis Manuscripts written by Michael Green!!! 'This curious and fascinating work combines a mystical temperament of the late Middle Ages with a purely Renaissance spirit of scientific inquiry.' Now this singular manuscript, bearing the cipher of an obscure philosophical brotherhood from fifteenth-century Italy, reveals in convincing details the habits, characteristics and natural history - even the origin - of this rarest of creatures.


When I was watching all the beautiful drawings and paintings I noticed that all the unicorns were having beards and I decided my unicorn would also get a beard. So here she is with beard!



Monday, March 14, 2011

My first unicorn sketch

Last week I started with a new online workshop: Women and their Unicorn and today I drew my first unicorn!! She looks like a deer or fawn and has yin/yang beads in her hair. The yin/yang symbol suits her name and personality. The name of my unicorn is Pachamama Yemaya. 



Pachamama or Mamapacha (pronounced as Patsjamáma) is the name for a goddess from South America/Peru. She stands for Healing/Wholing/Holy. For the people from Peru and Bolivia from before the Inca's she was the earth, worshiped in many different ways. 
Pachamama opens her arms for you. It is time to give into her embracement. It is time to heal/become whole and to think about your own Holiness, to recognize yourself as a sacred being. Open yourself to Pachamama and you will be healed.
Yemaya (pronounced as ímazja) is an African-Caribbean Santeria-goddess of the sea. She stands for surrender. The people that come to Yemaya and surrender, will see their problems dissolve into the water of her embracement. 
Surrender to Yemaya doesn't mean give in! You ask for help so that you can do what you want to do. Your wholeness will nourish if you can see that you can only surmount some difficult situations if you surrender and open yourself for something bigger. 





This morning I went to see my family doctor to talk to her about how I feel lately. She knows I don't like to take pharmaceutical drugs so she suggested I go see the psychologist again, who helped me a couple of years back with the PTSS (post traumatic stress syndrome) I was suffering from. I'm going to make an appointment with her tomorrow. Maybe we have to do some EMDR again. We'll see!

Friday, March 11, 2011

New update!

I've had a bit of a rough week, feeling extremely tired with lots of muscle pain and feeling very down. I'm going to see my family doctor on Monday and talk to her about how I feel lately. I've already had my blood checked but there were no abnormalities, except that I'm low in vitamin D (21).


I didn't work much on the painting and I'm not satisfied with all that I've done but I show you a photo of it anyway.




In the end I think that the carriage will be painted in gold and that I will sand it so that some of the brown and more layers of paint, which I will be adding soon, will shine through.
Don't forget to click on the photo for a closer look!


I have also started a new online workshop about Unicorns this week and I think that I will change the white horses in my mermaid painting into 4 mystical unicorns!
If you want to join me in this class and your budget is low or you know someone else who would like to join this workshop, go check Natalie's blog. She's giving away one free membership to Woman and their Unicorn! Leave a message on her post before March 14th!!!

Friday, March 4, 2011

Last update for this week.

I have just had a little time for working on my painting. 




I used a paper stencil and a small sponge to add some green to the hill.



Here I added some text stamping on the second hill. You can hardly see it but if you click on the photo you might be able to see it.


Finally I added some creamy white to the castle and painted the hand of the prince. The one that holds the mermaid on the left.

It was a sunny day today and this afternoon I took a long walk nearby my house. I saw a large group of deer laying in a field and I took some photos of them using my telephoto lens.




Thursday, March 3, 2011

Update

Found some time to work on the mermaid painting! This is what I added:




More snippets of yellow and green handmade paper. 




A top made of fabric for the mermaid on the right and ...




... another top for the mermaid on the left.


That's all for today! I have been busy with preparations for my son's 17th birthday this Saturday and I also took a walk this afternoon when the sun was finally shining again. Even spotted 3 deer just outside the village!



Wednesday, March 2, 2011

Update on painting!

I finally had some time to work on my mermaid painting! I'm not completely satisfied with what I did today so don't be surprised if it looks totally different in a couple of days!


I first cut out some paper roofs for the castle.




Here I painted the sky, the trees, hills and hair. I also changed the color of one roof of the castle.




Added some nice light green handmade paper snippets in the background and some purple paint to one hill. I wasn't pleased with that and ....




... covered it with light blue handmade paper snippets. I also added light yellow handmade paper in the background.
I hope I will have some time tomorrow to continue working on my painting.