Here is Orange Cat In Tree, painted in acrylics on stretched canvas. The finished piece is 36″ x 36″  Original photo inspiration is from the photographer Yeray Banot and it is called “The Look”. This will welcome feline friends to WNC Veterinary Hospital’s waiting room. Please, feedback is always welcomed.

I LOVE all farm animals! I originally set out to paint this piece to sell, but soon fell in love with the painting and could not give it up.  It now adorns my livingroom and I could not be happier.  My colors are off in the photograph which makes me mad! Her name is Maple as she has beautiful shades of maple syrup through out.

This piece was a commissioned piece. Rio had recently passed over the rainbow bridge and it was a remembrance gift of this wonderful friend.

Comments from the family; ” My family loved the painting, it resulted in many many tears, both happy and sad.  We are grateful to have such a life-like painting to hang up.”

This beautiful kitty is playing peekaboo with you!  This OOAK piece is done in acrylic paints on a cotton stretched canvas.  The edges are painted, so if you choose it can be hung without a frame.  I have protected this piece with a matt finish coat for years of care free enjoyment.  The piece measures 24 x 36, with a price of $350.00 + S&H in the US.  Please contact me if you are interested in purchasing Peekaboo Kitty.

Peekaboo Kitty

This is Shep the sheep. Acrylic painting on a stretched canvas.  20″ X 20″

JACK

This little tree hugger was recreated from a great photo found on Pinterest.  I just love the feeling of mischievousness from this little rascal.  I wanted to use the vision to create  a sign to use at my work.  We have some incredible animal paintings in the lobby with vibrant background colors, so I was trying to keep that vibrancy going with using a complimentary color of both orange and red that are in the other paintings.  I started with a cobalt blue, but it had no relation to the orange cat, so I switched it up and went with shades of green and using a fresh touch of sky blue in the lettering.

This is my newest commissioned piece called “Teddy”.  This portrait really combines all my loves, quilting, designing and painting.  It ends up being around 12″ x 14 ” and it captures the client’s business color scheme.  This is one of her pups.  To show you how I work, I will show you the original photo, then my mock up for the client’s approval, as well as the finished piece.  let’s get started.

Here is the original photo cropped to a more manageable size for this project.

The second photo is the color selection and what I plan to recreate with the edited photo. It gives the client an idea of what colors I hope to include.  I do use pattern fabrics but they are very subtle.  This client had a few revisions so the size is different from what is written on the mock up sheet.  The fabric colors noted may be used or not, it all depends on how the project progresses.  I developed my style after frustration, as it was.  When I was making smaller portraits, the tinier pieces of fabric frayed too easily when sewing and were very frustrating to work with.  How I dealt with this was to seal the edges after sewing, and painted in the finer details. If you have any questions as to my methods please email me, I am always happy to share.

Here is the completed piece, I am very pleased with the end results.

Cardinal Table Topper was a gift made for my mother inlaw’s table as the Christmas holiday was just around the corner.  It was all done free hand.  I wanted a quick sew and this certainly ended up being just that.  This is how you too can accomplish this table topper.

I found a great picture of a cardinal that was easy to interpret into a three layered design.  I drew a branch on a piece of freezer paper (mat side) that I duplicated several times to make a the circular design.  The freezer paper is great for this purpose, as you can use the iron to adhere the design for marking and cutting. (shiny side to face the fabric) I took the bird picture and traced it onto the freezer paper (x3) and cut it into shapes to give the three individual layers.  I was now ready to move on to the next step.

Prepping the fabric with the iron on adhesive backing on the wrong side of all the fabrics to be used, was the next step.  Iron the freezer paper shapes to corresponding colors on the right side of the fabric, then cut them out.

Place the pieces in the desired design and then carefully iron the adhesive side facing down, to adhere into place. remove all freezer paper before next step.

Finished cardinal

Quilting

On to the free motion quilting.  Have fun with this, it DOES NOT have to be perfect.  I tend to follow the outline and just add in detail lines .  You can either do this with the feed dogs up or down, depending how free you want to be with the quilting.  I lowered the feed dogs for more free movement when doing the inner portion but kept them up when doing the birds and creating the grid in the very middle.

After you are done with the quilting, cut stips of fabric on the bias for the binding. sew together.

This is simplified version of the process, but I hope it can get you started.  Please feel free to contact me to ask any questions about this piece or any of my work.

Thank you

I am like the wind, I never stay still and blow in many directions.  This girl is always exploring new ways to be creative.

I am currently on a kick, using the barn wood from my shed tear down to make lots of projects at the homestead.  This weekend I wanted to make a bed for my extra room, it currently had a bedframe and mattress only.  I was not looking for a fancy design, just a simple rustic one would do just fine.  I measured the bed and remembered to add a few extra inches for wiggle room.  I cut the pieces to size and started my sanding.  As I wanted this rustic I did not plane the boards, just made sure they fit closely without too much gap.  I sanded and sanded till there was no splinters waiting for someone to come along.  As you know the more you sand, the smoother it gets and loses it’s great charm, so I set out to add that charm back in.

I did it with this lovely tool, this tool is NOT for the faint of heart, it will take your hand off if you are not careful.  Twisted wire cup brush.   Gnarly!

After distressing it sufficiently with the twisted wire brush, I re-sanded to take the high edges off and then assembled.  Now I will be honest I wanted this to be a lot lighter but I had not received in my Briwax light pine color in yet, grrrrr, and I wanted this project done this weekend.  So I changed my plans and went with what I had.  I am NOT a patient crafter!

After adding several coats of wax, I buffed and buffed for an understated sheen. Looked pretty good but needed to stand back and really take it in.  Much darker than I planned but it really worked well with the flooring.  It grounded the bed.

I really had in mind using rope to add interest not sure how I wanted to do it, just that I wanted to do it.  I drilled holes evenly on both sides and weaved the rope through the holes and anchored them on the back side.  I really liked it but felt it needed something.  Something in the middle.  I thought I could add a dark wax/stain design, which would work great as I would not have to sand what I had already done.

I am a huge fan of primitive country style so I was on the hunt for a design that would work.  The jumping rabbit caught my eye immediately on Pinterest.  I copied the design, taped off the area and stained.

Here are the results of the finished headboard.

Picture to follow of the bed dressed as soon as I have time to sew the pillows and add the frame around the mattress.  It is going to be great!