The Easel Project

This was a "project" because I fully intended to paint the easel that yellow. 

That yellow the I'm head over hills about.

That yellow right there in the floor cloth.

After the yellow on the door porch post fiasco, I got shy about it. 

And decided to keep this antique just as it is.

I just needed to repair the back where a screw was missing and the holes were wallowed out. 

Easy fix. 

The real project was designing a wire hanger for the easel. 

While I do plan to use the easel, I wanted to hang it as wall art in the meantime. 

Another sweet project checked off the list.

Another Cabinet Door

A Cabinet Door

This project started months ago when I collaged the book pages on this small cabinet door. 

I did it not knowing what I was going to paint but I will tell you, I never thought about painting flowers. 

Actually, I never thought it would be a Garden Palace project.

Each day when I go over the the Garden Palace, I take along my art-to-go-bag that I used when I was going to that dang-desk-in-town.

Now instead of paint brushes and art supplies, my bag carries things like small tools, plastic bags, paint rollers, batteries from my cordless tools, and whatever thing I might need for the work day.

Each day I plopped it on the floor while thinking I need a place to hang it. 

Finally, the day came when that was my mission.

I think that happened when I discovered the pretty little hooks I  purchased so long ago.

I found them when I emptied the big bookcase in the parlor. 

I'm always amazed when something slots right into place.

the cabinet door + the hook + inspiration to paint flowers + the perfect place to hang a hook

Oh, and if you want to know the gorgeous color is Derivan Matisse background Straw with a little bit of dark wax over it. 

Watch for more of it.

♥

I Need A Name For My Giant

There is a Giant in my studio....and a big mess too.  

I have not painted since the Christmas Eve Angel.  Oh my! Two months ago. 

In my past when in a funk, broken, tired, distracted with life or just uninspired, I turned to shopping. But I don't shop for clothes, shoes, or jewelry. My shopping therapy is for canvases. I place big orders with Blick just knowing as soon as I get some new canvases, I can/will paint. 

This time, I just happen to see this giant. Although, it didn't look like a giant in the picture. I knew since this grand piece of equipment has been on my wish list for ages, and since I could not justify more canvases, the universe was telling me, "today is the day. Go for it!"

I popped over to Google, found a great deal and the rest is history. 

I just wasn't expecting it to be such an overpowering giant. It has such a presence in my studio that I feel like it needs a name. Nothing is coming to me. What do you think? Maybe you have a name suggestion for my giant. 

Oh, and look, today I discovered she has one too. Do you have one?

I need a name for my giant. 
Sharon

Good Morning,
She is still on my easel. During this morning's art period, I was ready to start painting her face. I don't know why but I have been avoiding the face. She is still a work in progress but it does help to console me if I can bring her in picture form with me for the day to this desk in town.  Isn't is odd that one can see the little things that need changing when looking at the screen.

I wish I were at home with her and still painting.
♥

On my easel

On my easel

This is what is on my easel right now. And I don't care if the studio is a mess, I AM GOING TO PAINT THIS WEEKEND!!!

But what I want to talk about is blogging.

Have you noticed that I have changed my header?  Slowly but surely I am trying to get it looking a little nicer around here.  But that's not what I wanted to talk about either.

There are two things I want to talk about.

One is about comments. (I LOVE THEM!!)  About a year or so ago, I read a blog post about making it easy to leave comments.  I'm sorry I didn't bookmark it and it is not a blog that I read but was blog hopping and somehow ended up on this blog that had huge following like seven thousand or more.  Really. Anyway, it was a good post about spam and making it easy for your followers to leave comments.

I can say that Blogger is on top of the spam issue now.  I haven't had any of those nasty spam comments since they started their spam filter.  So, I took the advise from the blog post and went about making it easier to leave comments at my blog.

Here is what I did:  Go to your Blogger Dashboard, then to Settings, then to Comments.  Scroll down to "Show word verification for comment" and click the choice to NO.  For a while, I moderated comments older than 14 days because that seemed to be where the spam was landing but I don't do that anymore.  I made these changes more than a year ago so you want notice any difference.

Next,  did you notice that I added the Blog List that shows a little picture of your post along with the post title.   It is in my sidebar and I gave it a title of "My Wonderful World of Bloggers".  If you want to do this, go to Design, then to Add a Gadget, then select Blog List.  There are options and you want have any trouble with that.  I only wish I had realized that I could add several of the gadgets because I would have organized my list  into blog themes, like art, quilting, photo, etc etc.  I might get around to that some day.

But what I really want to say is I have reverted back to my original method of reading your blogs.  That is to say, I come to My Blog and scroll down and pop out to Your blog from my Blog List.  It is so nice that the new entries are at the top.  I still have you all in google reader but it is so cold over there. And there is so much clicking to do and the truth is, I don't leave as many comments when I have to click and click and click to get there.  And when I get behind and can't keep up, the number of unread drives me crazy with pressure.  I know, I am crazy.

But here is the best part,  I enjoy seeing your beautiful blog with your beautiful header and all your sidebar thises and thats.  And I am likely to leave a comment unless I am sneaking over for a quick peak when I should be accounting or selling insurance at this desk in town.  It just feels like a real visit when I pop in and see your personality showing through in you blog design. Actually I find it inspirational. You all look the same in Google Reader. And if I get a post or two behind, I don't feel any pressure because when I pop over and scroll down, I know immediately if I have read everything or not.

I didn't mean for this to be so long but ....well it is.   Now, I have a favor to ask , I don't have all of your blogs in my list yet.  I am slowly but surely getting there but if you notice that you are not in my list and you want to be.......well just tell me in a comment and I will put you there.
Thanks, watch for me.
Sharon