time flies!!

it has been ages since i have written on my blog, i can't say it's because i haven't had the time :) and it's not because i haven't got anything to say or to show... just call me lazy lol!!!



seriously, i've just been taking a break, two sunshine filled weeks in Spain with my friend Sue and her husband Colin, and adventure at times! starting with Sue having a flat tyre on the way to the airport to pick me up! luckily i had a friendly man sitting next to me on the plane, we had been chatting the whole flight, he heard about me having to wait a few hours so he suggested i hitch a ride with him and his two teenagers :)) lucky me! Sue got home hours!!!! later.



then i did my back in! totally! just by leaning over the bathtub to rince my hair, omg!!! i thought i would have to call the inssurance to let me go home! but it subsided a little, enough to still enjoy my holiday, on crutch most of the time but hey!?



We visited Valencia, i loved that! i'll show some pics in my next post, i have my foot up at the moment and don't want to get up to get the SD card from my camera :))



oh and of course i had a few paints and brushes with me so i made a little painting for Sue, pic is still on my camera so that's for the next post

some pics i do have:

this is the angel i painted for Diane Radichat in Seattle

(we were at Ranger together)

Tanya & Sue having cocktails :)

my gekko tatoo

me getting the tatoo!!! painful??? well no!!! i was faking! it's only henna lol!

i'm kind of tired!! went to a park concert last night, always fun because most of my friends are there too and in the Summer there is a concert every Thursday! so next week i'm taking the kiddies, there is so much for them to do there, it'll be fun!

today i picked the kiddies up from their two week stay at their dad, so glad to have them home again :))

tomorrow we are going to ROCK HERK, a rock festival not too far from here, loads of my friends are going too so it'll be great!!

Wednesday i'm off to my friend Esther's birthday BBQ

lol no wonder i'm tired huh?? but Summer is good for meeting up with friends and having loads of fun i think! pain or no pain :)) no use lying around all the time huh!

i have a few commisioned paintings to start but for now i'm going to just keep my feet up and have a rest with a good book

till next time :)

love & peace

tanya xx

where does time go??

it might be just me but i feel like this year is moving on at high speed, some how it is almost half of April without me realizing...

due to the hernia, which is causing me more pain and grief than i care to talk about, i haven't been up to much, i did work on this painting though, a work that took about two weeks for me to finish, i had to learn to paint at my easle sitting down, not the easiest thing with this 54X107 cm painting!!

Absolem Butterfly Girl paintingthis beautiful butterfly that a friend gave me after the Alice in Wonderland film, was my inspiration

it was quite a journey, a new adventure actually! first i painted my girl on wood as i usually do, this time i painted a bit smaller than i am used too and that proved a bit tricky for me to do details but it didn't matter reaaly, i painted on 15X30 and then i had it scanned at the photographer, Paul Croes in Hasselt, he printed it on to canvas with the Epson fine art printer. a really nice starting point for me to finish off my art on this huge size!

the nice thing is that i had the finished piece photographed in the studio so now i can sell prints on canvas that i can further embellish if i please, this way i can make more people happy withmy painting at a lower cost. the original is no longer available.

i have already had the draft version printed again, flipped horizontally so she is now facing the opposite direction, this one i will be painting in very different colours, a totally different butterfly girl! i wil show once finished.

ok that is enoigh blogging for me, my back is aching like razy so i better take the lie-down

hope you are all enjoying Spring! here in the countryside the first blossoms are starting to show, hopefully the weather will stay nice and then we will have the full white burst of the apple, pear and cherry trees! it is a wonderful sight!! tourist come from all over to visit our area then.

talk to you again soon!

love & peace
tanya

beautiful times

isn't it just wonderful when Spring makes it's enterance? not that i ever complained about Winter, not like 99% of the people i know lol, i don't mind Winter, i love snow, ok, driving in snow and on icey roads not so much but it's part of it and can't be changed ... so why complain?

anyway, Winter seems to behind us and Spring has made it's enterance, i see purple sticking up out of the soil, the goldfish in the pond are pretty active and before long there will be thousands of tadpoles appearing.

Even my doggy knows it's Spring, he ran away last week, off to find himself a woman jack russell lol! he had no luck!!!! i found him first and my neighbour found the new tiny gap he managed to find to escape the garden ... it's fixed!

My last two orchids are in bloom again, last year i must have brought home an orchid with a desease, (white sticky fluffy bugs!!!) i did all i could to save my 18 orchids but sadly i only managed to save two and yes!!!! they are blooming, i am over the moon! like a proud mommy :)

i've been painting:

this one is on canvas, i hardly ever work on canvas because i need to work gentle and i'm not such a gentle worker :) i love to rub, scratch, scrub,... not so gentle!

This one is called Alice's Angel and was inspired by what other that Alice in Wonderland! i went to see the film in 3D, i hate those stupid little glasses over my own glasses, they just don't fit!!

but the film i liked very much! i loved this version, Tim Burton doesn't usually appeal to me that much but Alice was great!

The saying on it i already used before but i like it and i like opening doors and windows...

now i am working on a really small piece 6X12inch and there are plans to make her big!!! i will show and tell once it is done.

my foot is bad! terrible even, i wish wish wish i could say otherwise! i dream of the day i can tell you all my foot is healed and i can jump and dance like the crazy lunatic i am ...

but due to the beautiful L4 L5 hernia i have the nerves to my left leg and foot are even worse off than they already were, i mean come onnnnnn!!!! f*!!!!

i hope the epidural treatment next week helps some.

my left foot is now starting to turn inwards, the muscles aren't getting the correct information and are giving up on me :(( no matter how hard i try my foot will not stay flat, doc says if it gets any worse i will have to wear a brace to correct my foot position, this really made me want to cry...

but!!!! life is beautiful, there is more to it than my stupid foot!!!

i am enjoying all that can and have loads to be grateful for.

on the bright side: due to the pain i haven't been able to eat well so i am losing weight!

hey!!! losing weight is a good thing :))

see always a silver lining!!! always!!!!!

have a great day! i' m off to paint and sing, i can't dance but i can softly headbang to Metallica wohaha!!! Spring is in the air!!!

all my doors are open!!

xxx

love & peace

still no tag 11 & 12

i know i promised the last two tags, truth is: i am shattered, i feel every single little muscle in my body, think i am getting ill.

i did work on the tiny art pieces for the 5 goodiebags, no they have not yet left the building but thet will by the end of the week for sure! even tiny tag artwork takes time! here's a sneak peek, not yet finished but you get the idea

my five blue hair angels, backgrounds are bare but as i said, unfinished.

i had already told you all that i had a friend here for the weekend, she wanted to help make some things to remember her father by.

as soon as we were going through the photo's i picked these two out, her father with herself as a baby and with her daughter as a baby, they are almost identical, the way he is looking, holding the baby, it just felt like the right match for this canvas.

her dad didn't like too many frills and things so i kept it simple,

painted the Prima paintable with distress inks.

stamped the letters on grungeboard (tim's stamps) cut out and embossed with distress powder to give them a rough look.

then i did a book, my friend helped with this, keeping in mind she is not a crafter lol! she did well on distressing the edges of the pages and the photo's.

again, i kept it simple, gessoed the cover and painted with cranberry dabber and dry brushed with pearl and gold, on top of eachother they give a more platinum look, i like that.

i glued pages together with CH matte medium because the pages were very thin, i stamped backgrounds with vintage photo and aged maghony, using lots of my Tim's stamps.

we added tags that she will write on at home.

it was an emotinal weekend for both of us, heavy to be honest

but i am glad i could help her and she is happy.

i am a little drained though, suppose it's normal.

on a lighter note (and i am getting tired of sitting up, really feeling ukky!)

here is the finished advents houses i made for Hobbyfarm.

the roofs can be taken of by undoing the ribbon.

i inked and stickled the roofs, they look so adorable in real life.

there you have it!

i'm shattered so end of blog post

i will not promise the tags for tomorrow, no idea how i will be feeling, but you never know, they might be here so come back and look just to make sure you don't miss them

have a good evening, mine will be a short one, off to bed early i think.

xxxx

no Tag 11 yet

hello hello, no! no tag today! owwwwww untthinkable nearly! but you know what? i had a bit of me-time in the city with a friend today, hanging out, drinking coffee, bit of shopping, lunch, you know just ahhhhhhhhh relaxing time. no time to make tags or anything else, didn't even cook!!! got pizza instead. so a lovely lazy day alllll day! so proud of myself.

i did finish an angel painting last night, the light was really bad today but i took a picture anyway, doesn't really show the true colours, the ochre in her face is really very very subtle in real life, strange how it is so hard in this pic, ah well here it is anyway.

she is an adorable red head angel, apparently i do a lot of red heads... now where does my inspiration for that come from i wonder... i had a nice time painting her, lovely new golden fluids mixed with my studio paints by Ranger of course and i have some wonderful Sterward Gill paints on their way from Scotland, can't wait to get them in !! they are sooooo beautiful, can't even describe them, you need to see them for yourself!

ah the flowers on the windowsill inside are dead! i know, i should throw them out huh!

but see how my geraniums are still flowering strong outside!!! December i might add! see this is where the ochre in her face is harsh but not in real life i promise you :)

the wings are very textured so i didn't beeswax them,

all the rest of this 60X30cm painting was waxed

bit too dark picture to see the lettering at the bottom! it says EMBRACE in nice bright red really ( i might have to take a better pic tomorrow of the weather decides i can)

she is telling me to embrace love,she is holding my heart, she is reminding me to embrace all the love around me, the love in my heart even if i don't realize it at times, there are so many things to love, it is not always about romance now is it? lol i am in love with my paints for example, i enjoy painting so much, it just feels right and makes me happy and carefree., i love my children of course, goes without saying that! i love my doggy, did you notice him in the background, too lazy to be bothered about me painting pretty angels.

ok tags, cos there is a fat chance you came to see my take on Tim's 11th Xmas tag!

Monday! i will post the last two tags on Monday, i am having a friend over this weekend and we will be working on a personal item for her to remember her father by, so no time for tags.

you understand.

hope you all have a great weekend, see you on Monday! xxx

still time to start following my blog!