My Art Nest in Progress

Well, here she sits in my yard., all 8x8' of her.  At last!  I have been waiting for this for two months now, and finally this is mine!  You might be able to tell from the pictures that she is facing the back of my yard.  This was just by happenstance.  The person who moved my art nest went in behind it to pick it up, so she was put in my yard backward.  It is a lucky accident though, because this allows the door of my building to be in the shade most of the day.  This means less heat will build up inside.  I do have a window a/c unit in case the temperature climbs anyway.  Please forgive the quality of some of these pictures, they were taken mainly with my smart phone.

This is what you see from the side of my house, and I think this will be perfect to plant shrubs around and easy to make pretty.  Hubs and our friend/cousin David put some shutters up for me.  They also jacked the building up and straightened and leveled it.

Just peeking inside it really doesn't look like much.  But this gal has been making art and jewelry on her dining room table and storing art supplies in the laundry room under piles of clothes.  So this is a beautiful site to me.

Here she is all bare and beautiful.  I had to take these two built in tables out, and I decided to paint the inside white.  Check this post out to see my inspiration.  I don't have a sprayer and a large roller won't work, so I have been painting this with a small roller and a wide brush.

Here's the progress after a few hours.  I love how bright the white makes the room look.  

Oh that pesky ceiling!!!!!!

And here is one corner with two coats of paint covering it.  Lovely!!!!!  I can't wait to get all this done, get my floor painted, and move my furniture in!!!!   BTW, I also have a light and 16 (wow!) outlets in this building, so I should be good to go with my equipment.  Nice to know I won't have to move everything around to plug stuff in.  

On My Table

This is how my work table looked last night.  I ordered some lovely things from Amazon and received part of my order yesterday, so they are on my desk along with my current WIP.

Here's a breakdown for you:

1.  Gouache - Savoir Faire French School Opaque Watercolor Gouache 

My first gouache set.  I haven't had enough time with these yet, but I do love them so far.  I wish I had the 20 color set.  

2.  Sweet tea.  Always by my side.  

3.  Messy water cup.  I like using glass jars for my water; they look so pretty and messy with streaks of color running down the side.

4.  An upcycle project for my daughter's room.  She is such a princess.  The bright beautiful colors are Dye-Na-Flow colors (yes they are made for fabric, but work well on many surfaces). 

5.  Palette - Master's Touch Plastic Folding Palette.  Filled with Koi watercolors.

6.  Brush - Master's Touch 20/0 Liner from the 5 piece white taklon set.  One day I might invest in some higher quality brushes, like maybe when I learn not to leave them soaking in water all night long.

7.  Remote control for the TV/cable.  Tuesday night is Face Off night, and I own the remote at 8 PM!!!

8.  My sorry excuse for a phone.  One day I might get a better one.  I dropped the two decent ones I had and ruined the speakers on both.  

9.  My new Koi Tube Watercolors.  I got the 18 tube set.  I am in love with these and I just got them yesterday.  I had the 24 pan field sketch box, but found it frustrating to activate the colors in those little pans.  And since I never go out to sketch I gave those to my daughter and ordered the tubes.

10.  Stephanie Corfee's Creative Doodling & Beyond.  I ordered this with my Koi watercolors.  If you like to doodle and seek inspiration, I would definitely recommend this book.  I love Stephanie's art (see more if it here) so I had to get a copy of this.  I got it last night and after about 10 flip-throughs and reading 1/3 of this I can see already that I will really enjoy the projects in this book and will keep it around for inspiration for years to come.  I love it!!!

Chalkboard Desk

I've had this really great desk for a while now.  Hubby got it for me at a local thrift store, and I adore it.  It have lots of work area and storage.  We just redid our floors in my craft room and our kitchen, so I decided this ol' girl needed a paint job.  I knew I wanted to use black paint, and I thought a chalkboard top would be great for me and my little girl.  I made my own chalkboard paint using this tutorial from Emma and Elsie at A Beautiful Mess.  It's super easy, just add 2 tablespoons unsanded grout to 1 cup of paint.  I used latex paint, but you can also use craft paints.  

Here's a before picture of my desk...

And here it is after painting...

I made the curtain from an old bed skirt.  As you can see in the next picture, Lula approves of the updates.  She has drawn on it for the last two days.  And if Lula is happy, then Mommy is happy.  

I'm also working on a mural in my art room, and I plan on posting some pictures of it soon.