Where does your inspiration come from?

This was the last piece of work I did before having my baby. I wanted to make sure I had something during all those early weeks (when there was no time to create) to remind me of what inspires me. It was sitting on my studio work table when I returned from the hospital. All I had left to do was to place the letters on it. It now sits next to my work table...a beautiful collage of hot pinks and turquoise!

I have a huge binder filled with images I have cut out of magazines throughout the years. I page through the binder whenever I'm in a creative rut, but I thought it might be great to showcase some of the pictures where I could always see them. I cut out all of my very favorite ones to use in this piece. After gluing them all down on a piece of flat plywood, I added fabric swatches and some other little bits of this and that which I've been saving for just that "perfect" piece. No time like the present!

"The artist is a receptacle for emotions that come from all over the place: from the sky, from the earth, from a scrap of paper, from a passing shape, from a spider's web." -Picasso

What inspires you? What colors are you always drawn to? What makes your heart go pitter- patter? What will put a smile on your face this week? What will be the catalyst for your next creative masterpiece? Go forth and create.....

Little Angel

Back in June, I took a Whimsical Collage class at Paper Tales (THE best scrapbook store in San Diego!) taught by the talented and sweet Lilia Meredith. I just love her style, especially with all her layers of paint and sanding and stenciling and oil pastels....it always forces me out of my "neat" zone to get a little messy with my art! The task of the class was to bring a blown up photo of a family member and incorporate it into a large collage. Of course, I had to use Liam as the subject and here's how it turned out...

I hung it in his room...my sweet little angel! Too cute!!

Playin' With Paint

I've really been into the spray mists and ink splatters lately!! I'm taking a one week online class hosted by the amazing Debee Campos. I just love all her work and her blog is always full of really bright cheery pictures. Have I mentioned that it is my new favorite blog this summer?!

Anyway, she is teaching us her paint splatter technique which she incorporates into all of her work, and I have just been dying to find out how artists get such great splatters...kinda Jackson Pollick-y. So here is my first attempt. There are more elements that are to be added to this cover but in between cleaning up the house which seems a 5 times daily occurence and doing laundry and nursing, this is all I had time for!

Here is a quick journal page I snuck in last night at 9:30 when I was supposed to be getting ready for bed!! It's just a short little journal book filled with pictures I've cut out of magazines of things that inspire me. I loved this vignette in last month's Real Simple issue.
And lastly...but certainly NOT least....an updated pic of baby Liam at 13 weeks!! He only makes me smile about half a million times a day!!!