I'll Keep Going If You'll Come WIth Me (work in progress)

Here's one of the things I'm working on today.

When I start a piece, I usually jot down a few words or a phrase on the canvas/paper, before I ever do anything else. These words usually get completely covered up by paper and paint, but I write it down on masking tape and attach it to the piece, so I'll remember later. Often it becomes the title of the piece, and sometimes it influences what I paint. I feel like it's a secret message from me to...whoever enjoys the art.

It's cloudy and cool here today, which is unusual for this time of year. Usually by now we've seen the last of the year's rain, but it poured last night. I love it. I've always been a cloudy day kind of girl, I think. When I was little I loved to run around in the rain, or hide out in the jungle-y forest behind our house, sitting up in an old apple tree, mostly protected from the rain...

I've been thinking about adding more texture to the backgrounds of my paintings, not just with torn paper and text, but also with molding paste, or plaster, or doodles (much like zentangles?) Below is an example that I did the other night on a 3" by 5" piece of watercolor paper.

I've used Spackle on pieces before for texture, but it doesn't adhere as well to paper when the paper gets bent, and many of my 'experimenting' happens on watercolor paper...

I also am going to spend my evenings sketching animals, as I want to include some of my favorites in my paintings. The first animal I drew when I was little was giraffes--my mom used to find little pieces of paper EVERYWHERE with giraffes on them. Then there was a looooong horse phase... But I had a little stuffed elephant, and a stuffed monkey named Andy (who lives on the bookcase here in the studio)--and of course, don't forget jackrabbits--My guess is I'll be doing LOTS of drawing before I start getting any animals that look the way I want them to!

Here's a quick pic of Andy--he says "Have a great Tuesday!"