Every kid wants a clubhouse. This kid built one...

How much fun was your Monday?  Since I'm going to be travelling the next two weeks, I did a long day with Artgirl, to make up for the missed classes.  We decided to build a clubhouse in her back yard, using salvaged stuff.  We used plywood and other lumber from an old bunk bed, two-by-sixes from friends who moved and passed them to me, the storm panel from an old door, cabinet hinges, and a canvas drop cloth.  I'll pop back to her place tomorrow to get her started on painting, which she can handle pretty much on her own.  We didn't do it quite like a real house, but it's sturdy, cute, and we did it in one day.  One long day.  Here's the progression...

All you need is  pile of junk, a good imagination, and a few tools.  Sunscreen and bug dope  aren't a bad idea either.

She measures and marks!

She runs in screws!

She saws!

She sands!

She goofs off a bit (who doesn't?)

She enjoys sitting on her new front porch.  She deserves the rest after this day!

One unusual feature is the canvas roof.  We'll give it a couple of coats of paint, and it will be pretty water proof for the rest of the summer, and maybe next.  This little toss-together won't last much more than that, but by then, she'll be too old for a club house, and she's hoping her folks will spring for a little art studio shed.  By then, she'll be strong enough to run the circular saw and build her own!

Hope your next two weeks are fabulous and fun.  My travel does include work, but I'm going to take a vacation from the computer, at least.  I'll post again sometime around the 4th of July.  Ta for now!

A little bit of Venice

Actually, a bunch of bits of Venice.  This scene doesn't really exist.  It's compiled from a handful of vacation photos belonging to the clients, which guarantees it's one of a kind, and super personal.  But boy, for a small mural, this one sure took some time!  It's all those windows and roof tiles, of which I would love to show you close-ups, but, um, I sort-of forgot to take them.  I finished at 10:45 tonight, so we can blame it on fatigue, and wanting to get done and out before my clients booted me out.  I'll get more photos of the finished room, once the tile backsplash is done, and I can catch close-ups then.  For now, proof that I do actually still paint walls:


Feature wall in kitchen.  Walls are hand painted marble.



and a little closer

Dusty, the supervisor on this project, liked my ladder.  If you look very close, you can see him in the painting, sitting outside the restaurant.

SLOW Artist at Work

I actually once had an orange road sign that said that, back in my sign painting days.  I crossed out "work" and inserted "play".  I used it when I was working on murals or things like window lettering.  I shoulda kept it.  I promised photos of Venice tonight, but in case anyone was holding their breath (you really don't know me, do you?), it will have to wait until late tomorrow night.  Those buildings have tons of windows and shutters and roof tiles and rain gutters and balconies and...well, you'll see tomorrow night. :)

Play Date with Sunshine

We finally got some sunshine in Minnesota, late this afternoon, just in time for Artgirl's Monday visit.  I promised her several months ago that she could sling paint in my back yard to her heart's content, as soon as the weather warmed up enough.  I was thinking late March, but Mother Nature had other ideas.  I think Faithie had fun...

The casual drop spatter



Changing trajectory changes the spatter pattern.  Professional artist or crime tech in the making?

 

Philosophical pondering?  No.  The paint soaked sponge just felt good in her hand.

She can even paint with her eyes closed.  Actually, I think this was to prevent the back-spatter from getting in her eyes.

Making a present for her brother.  If Noah isn't excited, she can turn it sideways for Zack.  Brilliant.

Samauri painter. 

N is for nifty.

Shooting Star

Hose time!

The past few weeks were beyond crazy busy, which you might have surmised from the missing and abbreviated blog posts.  365 Being Summer issue should be rolling off of the presses in the next day or so, and the mural of Venice that I'm working on looks like it will be finished in time for the Thursday night post, so I'm just about caught up.  I still don't have time for a day off, but playing assistant to the "Ar-teest" today was pretty refreshing.  If it's been a long time since you played with paint, may I suggest you let your hair down, kick off your shoes, and let 'er fly?!?  Happy summer!

Fried.

Parched.
  Drained.
   And...
     Done.

I poured it all into that crazy little bookazine thing.

My brain checked out an hour ago.  I can hear it snoring on the pillow from here.

Tomorrow is a fresh blank page...

Summer issue underway. Not so sure about summer...

It seems to have finally decided to warm up, here in Minnesota, but it's still mostly cloudy and rainy.  I might whine louder but I can't go out and play, anyway.  Not until the summer issue of 365 Being is in the hands of the printers.  Here's a few tidbits of the schmorgasbord it's turning into...

We share some of our favorite books, and our featured BEing, Maureen Carlson shares her picks, too...

 We couldn't feature books and not talk about libraries.  We have some really big ones...

 ...and some really tiny ones...

 And speaking of tiny ones... 

They're never too little to learn to color on the walls DM style! I do love my job.  More of this mural, along with oodles of other stuff coming soon in the summer issue of 365 Being.

Free sample of 365 Being!

Hi-ho, Dawn-Marie and Cathy here!

Actually, that's Cat on the left, and DM on the right.

...and we have...

If you haven't read 365 Being yet, here's your chance to do so for FREE, and please would you be so kind as to facebook share this post, or email a link to this blog to everyone you think might like this free issue of 365 Being, or everyone who knows someone else who might like it (which is just about everyone you know)?

Who wouldn't want to receive a free, fun, no-ads magazine?

Okay, so here's the deal...

About this time last year, we got this crazy idea to create a bookazine (an advertising-free magazine on book quality paper, meant to be kept or shared), and by autumn, we were in print (and PDF). We're celebrating our year of insanity with a fabulous freebie:

Our Sampler Issue

in PDF format

is now completely FREE!

It's a smaller issue than our usual, but it's filled with the same full color ideas (and we do mean FULL color) for living a hands-on, heart felt, perfectly imperfect life. Also, like all of our issues, it's free of annoying advertising! All content, all real, all fun! And it's all yours!

You can download it for yourself, send it to friends, zap it off to pen-pals...

click: 365being.com

Give us a try, and if you enjoy it, we would love to have you as a subscriber! You can subscribe in PDF, but print subscribers get a gorgeous coffee table book (so dubbed by several of our readers) and fun little freebies tucked in with every issue. Readers who have seen and loved it first in PDF, and then in print, say it's so surprisingly, deliciously more amazing in print. Okay, that's not the exact thing they said, but all combined, that's the gist of it. Oh, and every issue has a different look than the one before.

We choose a loose theme for each issue, and for our Summer issue (coming out in June), the theme is "For the Love of Books". Polymer clay artist, and author of oodles of books on fun with clay, Maureen Carlson, is our featured artist. (She's shown above, dressed in her story telling garb, holding our Sampler Issue.) Our Artgirl, Faith, tested a project from one of Maureen's books, and we'll show you how to make it, too. You can also read about big, old, beautiful libraries, and the new tiny libraries popping up in front yards across the country. Need to feed the book club (which we might inspire you to start with Barb Gates Schaben's story)? How about a recipe for potato salad with no mayo?

Friends taste-tested this recently, and the ooh's and yum's assured us it was a print-worthy dish. It tastes as fresh as it looks, thanks to lots of veggies, including avocados, and fresh tarragon! We have created several more recipes that feature the fresh herbs of summer, along with a few gardening tips, book reviews and recommendations, and oh, there's so much more in the summer issue, but you get the idea:

It's a whole buncha fresh, fabulous stuff in a beautiful book, for you to enjoy on your porch swing, hammock, patio or poolside.

Subscribe now, so you don't miss it!

(or just download the free sample issue, to see if we're your cup of tea)

click here: 365being.com

Be sure you don't miss a single issue! You can subscribe in PDF, but again, print subscribers not only get a beautiful book to keep or share, they get extra little goodies tucked into each issue... Greeting cards, book marks, paper dolls, art supplies...whatever we think might catch your fancy! We're that kind of fun.

The winter issue had a love dove for subscribers to cut out and color, or to use as a pattern to make a whole flock from all kinds of papers.

So, here's to a great summer, and if our style meshes with yours, we hope you will include 365 Being on your summer reading list. And again, being a small, no-ads publication, we don't have a mega-corporation's advertising budget, so we would really truly and deeply appreciate it if you would share this link through email or facebook (just click the icon under this post!) with anyone and everyone who would not be bothered by receiving it. You just never know who would be delighted by a free sample of our colorfully quirky and charming version of a lifestyle magazine.

Heartfelt hugs and Smiles,
Dawn-Marie and Cathy
365 Being

btw:  Perfect Parfait recipe is in the Spring issue.



Peace, love and paint...and dance. Definitely dance.

This week's project was a fun little bedroom mural, for a seven year old sweetie, named Charlie.  She had a hard time deciding between a peace room and a dance room, so designer Codie Donahue (that's a clickable link) asked if I could do a bit of both.  I think it worked out well...


Twirling in and leaping out, the dancers continue around the room.



Details and...




more details.

 

First, I drew it in with chalk.



Next, my young assistant donned a paint shirt and helped me do a blocking coat of white acrylic.  This keeps the foggy blue wall color from showing through and dulling our bright paint colors.



In another setting, and with a few details tweaked, this could have just been left white.



Then we added color.  Charlie got her mama to paint a few shapes for us.

Here are all the dancers, in order of appearance...

So, last week I wood grained doors, this week I painted technicolor peace dancers, next week I finish the art and design for the summer issue of 365 Being, and the week after, it's a mural of either Venice or the Italian countryside (kinda hoping they pick Venice, since I haven't painted that yet).  If variety is the spice of life, my life is truly well seasoned!  Hope yours is just as much fun!

Messing with perfectly nice paint...

...because that's what I do!

Flat 50's goes rustic, with a bit of elbow grease and some glaze.

My client Alison loves the hand painted furniture of Henredon, and through vigilant craigslist shopping, she's collected some nice pieces.  Her home is traditional, leaning toward French Country, though a bit more streamlined than a lot of my French Country loving clients.  The fact that she's a professional organizer probably explains that, or maybe she's always been this tidy, which is why she's an organizer...hmm, well, suffice it to say, this was not a job where I had to trip over backpacks or step on legos.  Big plus!

First sand...

Another great thing about this project?  Alison wanted more than fit in her budget, so she agreed to help me with all the prep.  This doesn't always go very well, as some clients mean well, but they spend much of the day answering their cell phones, and stopping to run errands, and I still do most of the work at a discount price.  Grrrr.  Not Alison!  She's used to hard work and she keeps her word, so I got out of a whole day of prep and sanding, and most especially, CLEAN UP!  Mega bonus for me!

...then glaze

Alison's house was built in 1958, in a very nice neighborhood.  It's a split level, with the traditional styling of that era, which means it was well built, but nearly devoid of personality.  Over the years, she and her husband have added charm, and recently, they took on the kitchen, replacing the appliances, sink and counters.  Now, Alison doesn't buy cheap crap, and she doesn't waste money, so it didn't make sense to her to replace the sturdy but plain cabinets.  She knew who to call for those.

A bit of extra umber will help hide the fact that the new hinges are just a breath smaller than the old ones.

After a short conversation, we agreed to create a finish similar to one of her rustic painted pieces.  Because we wanted to just sand back the existing finish and add a glaze, I chose to use Benjamin Moore's acrylic D.T.M.  The ultra base, usually used for mixing dark colors, works great as a glaze, and it bonds well to most acrylic paints.  When putting new paint over old without a bonding primer, always do a test first.  Give things a week or two to cure, and try scratching it.  You shouldn't be able to separate the new from the existing.

Silly Robin built her nest in the window box right outside from the kitchen sink.

Alison hit the cabinet cases with the sander to show me how much distressing she wanted, and then I took over and did the doors, while she wiped them clean.  The next day, I mixed a yellowish tan to simulate the yellowing of old oil paint, and an umber to mimic tanin bleed, then alternated brushing and wiping until it looked right.  While I finished the last of the doors, her husband was installing the first ones, and Alison was practically crowing with delight.  Exactly the look she wanted at a fraction of the cost of new.

Hopefully her four eggs will still hatch, since she flies away almost everytime anyone uses the sink.  She was braver on the colder days, and stayed put, so maybe it will be okay.

It's not the right look for everyone, but Alison has been collecting this style of painted furniture for longer than I've known her, which is something like eleven years, so there's not much chance she'll get tired of the cabinet finish anytime soon. 

Painting your cabinets is a great way to get more from your kitchen remodeling budget, as long as the cabinets are well positioned and well built.  You can see examples of other styles of cabinet paint finishes on my website, theartofthehome.com.