ETSY Shop Update and Month Long SALE!

The holidays are approaching quickly! I've started Christmas way earlier than I ever have in the past, I love Thanksgiving so I don't like "skipping it" to start decorating for Christmas. But this is the first year that Reed and I will be "home" for the Holidays! I've also been asked to participate in some bloggy Christmas events so I'm kinda excited :)



So in honor of getting ready for Christmas but not skipping over Thanksgiving and the importance of acknowledging our blessings I'm having a thankful sale on my ETSY shop!!

From now until the 28th I will be offering free shipping across the shop, and I will be having a 40% off sale in honor of Black Friday. I've never been someone to wake up early and hit the stores so my Black Friday event will last from Midnight until Noon! So put it on your calendars and get over to the shop to get your custom gifts and goodies!! 

Here are a few goodies I have in the shop that have proven to be pretty popular :) 

Want a puppy portrait to add to your family room, office, or mudroom?? Well This 8x10 portrait is only $25 and is the perfect size to make a statement about your loved one without giving off a "crazy dog" owner look. Even though lets be honest, we all are crazy dog owners at heart right :) 

I have various other size pet portraits ranging from $25- $40 so be sure to check them all out! 

This customized tray has been SUPER popular lately! This $30 solid pine tray is a great gift to give for a wedding present, anniversary, or just because. I've done a few different designs for this changing around the wording, and even replacing the place with a bundle of grapes. If any of you have custom designs floating around just let me know and we can work together on achieving it!! 

This is one of my favorites :) These scarves are hand painted with a floral design and beautiful vibrant colors. Along with this one I have done loads of other designs varying from College teams to monograms! If you don't see your team or monogram listed message me and we can get it done asap! And even have a few in a little boutique!! Woot woot!! 

GIVEAWAY HAS ENDED! 

And don't forget about the Giveaway I have going on with Rachel over at Like A Saturday! You have just a few days left so be sure to enter enter enter!  

Painting with out BLACK

A few weeks ago I shared how to use the  language of color (if you missed it check it out here) I talked about all kinds of terms and how the color wheel is set up. Now I didn't get a chance to go to deep in to color theory and I don't really think I'm qualified to go much deeper. BUT I did think I should share how all of those terms can be used in an actual painting. 

So today I decided to do a little pet portrait of a precious pup and show you how the knowledge of color can help create a really unique painting. 

Quickly I'll just share with you how I started. You can see that the board I was using had a painting on it before. So I just used some gesso (basically primer) to cover it up and start a quick drawing. I am so not good at sketching so I usually just do a real generic sketch (this one was based off of a photo) and then fill in the details with the paint. 

I then started with my high lights. Based from the image I took the lightest parts of the fur, where the light was reflecting, and chose my light colors. I didn't want to do a super realistic painting so I decided to go with yellow and a bright orange. And I left them straight out of the tube, no mixing. 

This puppy is a dark black with khaki/cream spots on his face, ears and paws. But like I said earlier, to avoid a flat and realistic style painting I decided not use black or white at all. I decided to use nothing but color to create this painting. So by using the knowledge that contrasting colors often create a muddy brown/black when mixed I started at it.  You can tell that there are lots of blues purples yellows and pinks. What you probably can't pick out are the greens. Green and red are one of the best combinations for getting a dark color with out using black. So the dark spots are mostly a forest green mixed with a red. You can see how different areas are shaded with different colors I used that to create the volume of the body and show how the light can cause different temperatures of color just by how it hits the object. 

Painting with out black and white is hard. But often creates a much better painting. By using other colors to create your darks you are actually painting much more realistically than if you only use black as your darkening agent. Just look at an object and really study it. You can see that the shadows are different shades or tones of a color like red, green blue, ect. It takes a minute to notice but once you see it its like light goes off and you will never see white as just white or black as just black again! 

I enjoyed this fun little painting. I wish I had paid more attention to my photography so I could have actually shared the process with you instead of just talking. But I just got caught up in my TV show and painting. Too many things I love happening at once for me to stop and photograph the process :) Sorry 

So this wasn't nearly as informative as the earlier post about color (here) but I hope it helps you get creative with the next little craft or painting you decide to make. Seeing that you can get real lights and real darks with out using black and white will make any project more interesting and dynamic!! 

*I have started some advertising with Passion Fruit Ads and need some lovely blogs to grace my side bar :) Please check out my advertising page and let me know if you are interested!! HERE