I finally planted around my bird bath and love these flowers I never had before.

The milkweed plant with yellow florets have attracted Monarch butterflies. The name of it is Asclepias curassavica – silky gold annual butterfly weed

The pretty flower that looks like a rose is so different than I’ve ever had. The name of this flower is Lisianthus – blue rim

another picture of Lisianthus – blue rim

These daisies and sunflowers are in my front side garden

I spotted a hummingbird this morning, oh it made my day! I’ve also been enjoying the yellowest most beautiful male canary I have ever seen in my gardens. Yesterday, I saw the female. One day I ran to get my camera to take a picture of the male but it flew away and didn’t wait for me to take his picture!  Maybe one day I’ll be able to take a picture of both of them.

Happy Gardening!

I bought this delphinium to plant in my garden. The top stem was bumped and broken off, so I decided to press the florets.  I space them apart on the pages of old books. I also make sure there are several pages between them, as they are thick.  I had to put rubber bands around the books because the flowers were so thick. They will be ready to use for designs in six weeks! Hope you too can enjoy preserving your flowers.

One Fall October day in 2015 I gathered my paints, watercolor pencils, paper, masking tape (to mask my drawing of the birch), opened my front door and painted our birch bark tree. It was shocking to me that it actually looked like our tree when I was done painting! I had never painted before. I was hooked – watercolor is so relaxing and  enjoyable.

Front Yard Birch

Tom, my husband, framed it for me and I have it in my art studio where I press flowers and make pressed floral designs. My studio is in our basement where Tom carved out rooms for us. He does our matting and framing in the room next to mine.

I go up two flights of stairs to one of our bedrooms when I do my paintings. I call that room my craft /gift room. I love it there also, as it is quiet and I have ample space to arrange all my materials to paint.

I also like the idea of separating the two rooms, as I am getting wonderful and much needed exercise. I love being active.

“Front Yard Birch” is available in  5 x 7 printed Watercolor Greeting cards.

Happy 4th of July Everyone!

173 Tribute to America

This is a design I made last year.  Tom gave me this floral arrangement in this fun floral pot & paper last year.  We always combine 4h of July celebration and our Wedding Anniversary somehow.  We were married July 6th – 32 years ago!!  Where did the time go – so many happy memories!

Have fun celebrating the 4th!

This design is available as art (view our watercolor page ) or a 5 x 7 card. Our reproductions of original watercolor 5 x 7 cards are $4.00 each, 3 for $11.00, 10 for $20.00 or 2 or more 10 packs for $18.00. We have 5 x 7 cards available for all the designs in our Watercolor Gallery.

Hi Friends!

I wanted to share some pictures of flowers in my garden that have brought me joy. I also included a few other pictures of a beautiful begonia my granddaughter gave me for Mother’s Day and my cards I received. Our church also celebrated a 25th Anniversary, so we brought flowers and placed them on the tables for our potluck. Hope you are all enjoying the beauty all around and are having happy days.

Be looking for those original small frames very soon on our Artistic Accessories page.

Ground cover in our garden.

Begonia my granddaughter gave me for Mother’s Day

A few fern and hosta in our garden.

Poppies in our garden.

Yellow rose in our garden.

Gathering roses and greater cranesbill to place in a vase for our church’s 25th anniversary.

Roses taken to church from our garden for our church’s 25th Anniversary.

Sorry this picture is late in posting, but I wanted to share my happy memories from Mother’s Day with you all. My children always give me such wonderful cards. The one card on the right was one I painted, “Basket of Flowers” and was given to me by my daughter. The basket on my hutch I used to paint a still life, “Basket of Fruit”.

Hi Friends! I’m so excited. This is my very first blog post. I had always thought that when I start my blog, website, FaceBook, or YouTube channel, I would start where I am now in my art journey. Everyday, I work on different products,  lately many days I create watercolor designs. Today I am working on our 2 x 3 pressed floral designs. I paint right on the flower to preserve the color.  For my bigger pressed floral designs, Tom, my husband prints them to preserve their color and they are available in limited edition prints. I do not paint by bigger designs.

The materials I used to create these eight simple designs were:

Some materials pictured here – Derwent watercolor pencils, fabric glue, pro white watercolour paint, watercolor brush – Mimik #2 Round

• My flowers that were pressing in old books
• Aleene’s flexible stretchable fabric glue
• Paper – you can use any
  

  dianthus removed from books after pressing

  

  baby’s breath & hydrangea were removed from books after pressing

  kind of heavy paper with a little bit of “tooth” – not too smooth – so that the glue will hold, but not too rough so that the flowers lay flat; if you want your designs to last a long time without the paper turning yellow or producing acid – which may affect the flowers – use an archival paper such as cotton or paper marked “acid free.”  I am using a single ply rag mat board from Crescent. Hot press watercolor paper would also work well.

• Approximately ¾ x 2” strips of heavy paper such as card stock paper to apply a little glue under the flowers
• Water  & rag – to wipe your hands when you get too much glue on them
• Derwent watercolor pencils # 15, 17, 20, 22, 25
• Reeves  watercolor paint – sap green, lemon yellow, burnt umber, burnt sienna, ultramarine, crimson, yellow ochre (I have had these paints for years, so I want to use them up. When I started painting in watercolor to create big designs,  I had purchased the M. Graham paints in tubes and absolutely love them).
• Diamond Glaze by Judy Kins ( I am going to try glycerin next time. I think it would work like the diamond glaze – diamond glaze is costly)
• Pro white by Daler Rowney – an opaque watercolour I use when I want to add white.
• Watercolor brush – Mimik – #2 Round
• 2 x 3 frames

I press flowers in books from my garden – usually for at least 6 weeks. First I emptied books of my pressed flowers. I like to put the flowers on 8 1/2 x 11 paper & stack them while I’m using them. Then at the end of the day, I just put a book on the stack which keeps the flowers pressing.  Next I created my designs. I want to make at least eighteen of these as I am restocking our inventory. I had created twenty of them last year, all of them sold and at the end of our Art Fair days last Summer I made up about six more just in case someone wanted one, I am adding to that today.

use strips of paper to apply glue to underside of flower

Next, I glue the design with Aleene’s fabric glue. I then wait until the next day to let the glue dry before painting them with my watercolor paints & diamond glaze by Judy Kins. The diamond glaze helps the watercolor paints to adhere to the flowers. I simply dip my brush in the paints already with water, then dip my brush in the diamond glaze I have put on my pallet & mix it with the paint. I just use a little diamond glaze.  It is important to paint the flowers exactly the same color of the flower. (The hot pink flower is one I didn’t have to paint to preserve the color, when I received it in an arrangement of flowers many were dyed).  If I use the Derwent watercolor pencils I put a little water on my brush then touch the tips of the pencil to get color & then add the diamond glaze. Remember to wipe away the diamond glaze off your palette when you are done painting, as it will harden. If you prefer put the diamond glaze on a piece of aluminum foil instead of your palette while using it.

After I am satisfied with the look of the flowers I let them dry. If any flower petals appear raised up due to the painting, I glue the petals down. I then decide if I want to add any watercolor to the entire design, like watercolor splatters, etc.

finished 2×3″ framed originals

I then sign my name to each picture and put them in a pretty 2 x 3 frame. They look great on shelves, desks, dressers, also makes a great gift. I wanted to try the red roses again, but I didn’t think they did well when painted, it’s very puzzling to me why they don’t turn out.  I think the other flowers did so well and look so pretty in the frame.

I will make more and you will be able to see them on my website under Artistic Accessories.

Hello nature lovers, we are in the process of updating our web site.  Please pardon our dust as we continue construction.  Thanks for looking.