Phew

Well - its basically done. I still have to stick down N and X Y Z, but I can do that on Sunday. There are still lots of things to do to get it finished properly photograph each one, fix the sides and do the reference for who took the photographs.I have made contact with most of the photographers that want payment. That will all happen after I come back from my trip to USA which starts on Tuesday. This is the trip to see my family in North Carolina and do the Byron Katie workshop. I can't do the info with the pictures so have to do it here at the top.

Have told you about the aardvark and cat in earlier posts
The elephant comes from http://www.wildlife-pictures-online.com/200602.html
No permission for Nyala yet. The picutre comes from www.zooborns.com and the Nyala its self comes from Houston Zoo http://www.houstonzoo.org/en/photos/search.asp?albumid=135
Thanks to http://www.gustafsonphotosafari.net/ for Quetzal
PPF Sheri for the unicorn
No allowed to show the whale
Yaminon by Dave Watts
Have asked for permission for the zebra
Still trying to get a response from cat, squirrel and Xola people.

The others are all free and when I have more time I will acknowledge each and every one of them.
The colours in real life are much more dynamic.

I love you should have just the way you are

This will be my last post for sometime. I am away for three weeks and when I come back I am going to have to focus on some money creation. I hope to do some non dominant hand drawing and painting and if I do I will post some of them up. I will try and have a look now and again and comment where and when I can. I suspect I will miss PPF way too much to not stay involved, but we are coming into summer and it's never as productive for me. Much love to you all.

Something nothing and not much of that!

I have been beavering away this week, cutting and pasting. I hope the ABC will be finished next week. I will show and tell it then.

On Monday night my friend Lorraine and I got together, as we do most Monday nights recently, to finish up doing Julia Cameron's Vein Of Gold ( The Artists Way on steroids!) We started in a couple of years ago and then the group disbanded and it never got finished - till now. So long preamble to the two pictures I am showing today. The exercise was to do something that has been done before and do it in a repetitious manner. So here you have flowers and hearts. I did them with my newish water soluble wax pastels. I really like them. And I LOVED doing something that wasn't FOR anything it was just done to do. I will do more. I have been so focused for so long, it was just lovely to muck around!

I have a really busy weekend but will do my best to get round to all the Paint Party Friday entries

Slow progress

There has been a lot of behind the scenes work over the last couple of weeks. Sourcing photos and trying to find the photographer and get permission to use the picture. Creating lists of where the picture comes from and who has and hasn't given permission. Sticking the pretty paper to the often three coated backing card. And cutting out the words. My friend Kim (who is also a member of the 'business' accountability group I set up last year, a pre school teacher AND most importantly is the person who suggested an affirmation ABC) phoned on Tuesday to say she was concerned that because I am using a higgildy piggildy font IE home made and  I have made the affirmation words curve around the animal,  kids, especially dyslexic ones, would find them too hard to read. A sleepless night ensued. Creatively I want them to curve they look 100% better. But I didn't want to make it hard for kids to read. Then I figured that in my mind I am making this a book for parents to read to kids, I am basically pitching it at 3 year olds. Anyway, in the end I have kept going with my creative vision. If anyone wants to publish it and thinks the words must be straight then I figure I can make it again. It would be a lot quicker the second time around.

I am still have difficulty with eager like an elephant, my two playing elephant babies look like something else to some people! I have looked at sooooo many pictures of elephants. They are not really eager animals! And a unicorn was proving to be a problem till I had a brainwave and got in touch with Sheri Cook from Paint Party Friday She has given me a picture of Lippizzaner she drew with pastels.  He still needs his golden horn! Lets hear it for PPF networking!

These are some of the others I have done. You have already seen the cat but it's sneaked in cos I changed it from clever to curious.

The colour is a bit dodgy cos the curtain is closed to stop them curling up in the sunlight. I particularly like the Iguana! My goal for next week is to have it all done. That might be a bit of a push as I have started a from home selling job which is now taking up some time. If not by the end of next week then for sure the week after.  Looking forward to catching up after a week away.
And today is my niece's LAST CHEMO YEAH.

On we plod

This is the second go at writing this post. The other one kept on snarling up Firefox and I have restarted the computer a number of frustrating times.

Not much art done this week. So much for being ahead last week! I have had the pages out on the floor most of the week and have been fiddling around with different colours and position of the animals etc. Also spent a lot of time looking for free pictures of animals.

I am liking them more and more! Hopefully next week I will have a whole lot more letters cut out and can show you more pages like this.

Oh - and yes, Aardvark needs a double A. It has it now. You might notice that I have changed the lettering a bit in that it's got movement around the animals. And I love the clever cat! Trying to get in touch with the photographer who is, I believe, called Claudia Romero and you can see more of her work here. Details about Beverly Joubert (Aardvark photo)  in post below

N is difficult, I've given up on newt and night owl and am trying a Nyala right now. It's a Southern African antelope. I tried to put up a picture of one up before and I think that's what mucked up the blog so here, instead, is a link to a photo of one This is the most adorable site of new born zoo animals. So what goes with a Nyala? Nice, nifty, noticeable or .... any ideas very welcome.

Have fun on Paint Party Friday I hope to have a bit more new next week.