A Gift for my Daughter

Once my eldest daughter caught wind that I was painting, she asked if I would paint something special for her. I agreed, thinking that I would paint something from a picture one of her cousins took. A landscape from Colorado that had some gorgeous colours. She seemed content to let me chose, but after a few days, changed her mind. She sent me a picture and instantly I knew why she wanted that as a painting.

This picture is one that my daughter took on a trip with her boyfriend, to Banff, Alberta. It was part of our pic-a-day event. This event we started specifically for this daughter, as a way to help her deal with her anxiety, loneliness and depression. This trip was a wonderful, special time for her and she was very proud of herself for going to a new place, with new people and experiencing these things. 

So I started my next project for her.

It won't be exact, but it will be full of love.

New Project

The next project I decided to attempt in painting was based on several things. I was really enjoying my photography, especially since my kids and I are engaged in an ongoing Picture-a-day event of our own making. I was taking some pictures that, while I didn't use for the pic-a-day, I still wanted to memorialize and thought that it might be nice to paint them.

As we were walking around a local park, I was sharing with my children how my grandmother used to take us there. Most especially, she would take my brother fishing there. And while I have no memory of participating in this, I could nevertheless picture it in my mind. I took several shots of the area, as well as having some of my daughters pose at the bridge in the park, so that I had an idea of how to manage this. I'm not thrilled with the end result and have decided to keep it for now.

This is the initial picture that inspired my memories of my grandmother.

I decided that this was sort of the perspective of the bridge that I wanted to paint from.

As usual, I started with the sky and then began painting in the far landscape. I sketched in a rough bridge and some figures so that I knew where to paint around. I used mainly acrylics, but used some pastels for the tiny work and the fishing rod. My brother laughed when he saw it, because he remembered having a blue and white striped shirt when he was that young, but not red shorts or a baseball cap. I guess I got something right.

And this is the finished product. As I said, not my best. Not the worst, but perspective and angles are something that I can do a lot of work on!

Falling By The Wayside

So it seems as if knitting has kind of fallen by the wayside these past few years. Instead, my children and I have discovered a new passion.

Painting!

We have been having so much fun with it that I thought I'd post a few pictures of what I've done so far...

This was the first painting that I attempted. I watched a YouTube series of painting lessons by Allison Prior from Eastern Canada and was fairly pleased with my initial attempt. I gifted this one to my mother for Mother's Day. She says that it reminds her of a place her father took her to fish. 

This little one I painted simply to play around with brush strokes. It is extremely simplistic, and best viewed from a distance.

Since I had found some photographs that friends had taken, to be breathtaking, I decided that I might start branching out.

K2 Blanket

Oh man. I have had to restart this blanket so many times. And then they discontinued one of the colours that we finally decided on. I was ready to cry, but the teen just shrugged. A new shade of pink doesn't matter to her. As she decided, it will make a good story to tell people when she displays the blanket. And even after all this, it's still only up to my thigh. ~sigh~

Superhero Cape

Oh, saw the neatest, simplest thing for kids. They usually borrow my dish towels to tie around their necks, or the old baby blankets, when they want a cape. It's usually a superhero game or whatnot. The idea I saw was to simply take large t-shirts that had outlived their shirt life and cut away the front and arms. Basically leaving the neck hole and the back part of the fabric. And best of all, I'd still be able to hang them up in the closet at the end of the day, so that they aren't scattered all over the house. I'll probably give this a try the next time I go through hubby's old clothes.

New Craft Idea

So I was going to try my hand at knitting shawls for my younger two for Christmas. But honestly, that's going to take too long with the projects that I already have going. So I changed directions for that. Instead, I'm thinking of getting some lightweight fleece and some heavier cotton poly blend, for the different seasons. Then it's a simple pattern to create a fabric shawl. I can add some fringes at the bottom. And I think I will add in a button and buttonhole so that they can keep them on when their hands and arms get to flying around as little children are wont to do.

I'm excited to start this project. But first I need the money to go get the fabric and some corresponding yarn or thread. Buttons as well. They'd have to be fairly big buttons. And choosing the fabric and colors will be important. I know K3 likes green, but I want to incorporate some other colors in there. Until about six months ago, her favorite color was blue. Now it's green. So a little variety won't hurt.

Daughter 2 Sweater Progress

Wow, come a long way on the sweater since the last post. I have the front, back and one sleeve done for the sweater. So it's moving along well. But more importantly than that, I've finally converted said daughter to the use of circular knitting needles. She absolutely loves them now and has even started a blanket project of her own. It's mostly to give her something to do once the extracurricular school stuff starts up. They spend a lot of time on those buses.

I also just today, found an antique dragon motif pattern for crochet or knitting that will work perfectly for another blanket that I am making as a graduation gift. Now I just need to decide the colors on it. The blanket colors are lime green and black. But I was thinking of putting the dragons in gold to help them stand out a little. If not, I might keep the dragons green, but shade the area around them with purple, which is another favored color of the intended recipient. I'll have to do some experimenting with the colors and see what will work. But that, added to the Chinese characters will make it quite the unique blanket. Much like the child himself.

The other exciting thing that I managed to do this summer was learn the Continental style of knitting. That in itself was easy enough. But trying to master the purling took me several days. So quick and easy, that I can't imagine going back to the English style. I tried to convince my daughter, but she wants to master what she knows before she starts learning another style. And I suppose that's fair enough.