A Study in Patience

Posted on April 17, 2018 by Mama Cormier

…..Day 77

I’ve included this knitting project has one of my art pieces for my 365 Days of Art. It took me hours if not days to complete this shawl. I had never done a lacy pattern before but I think it was the 361 stitches on the needle that caused me the most grief. If I dropped one stitch or miscounted the whole piece was off and trying to fix a mistake when you’ve completed a row was close to impossible to fix. I ripped out the stitches four times and one of those times I was already finished with the lacy section when I realized that I had misread the last row of the pattern and had 70 stitches too many on my needle. Arghhh!

The fifth try was the charm. By this time I truly understood how the pattern worked and the number of stitches remained constant until it was time to decrease. I have to admit that after the third failure I was ready to give up. After all, it was taking away from my time at my art table but I decided that this project was a form of art so I persisted. I made a couple of trips back to the yarn store, Spin Me a Yarn, where I was given the encouragement I needed and some helpful tips for this project.

If you’re interested this pattern is called Mesquite Shawl from Zen Yarn Garden.

365 Days of Art – Adding Colour to One-liners

Posted on April 16, 2018 by Mama Cormier

…..Judith over at Curious to the Max suggested I try adding colour to my one-liners

So for day 76 I took another page of birds created with one continuous line and added colour with markers and then added more line detail.

365 Days of Art – Enhancing My One-liners

Posted on April 15, 2018 by Mama Cormier

…..day 75

Back in January, Carla Sonheim gave us an assignment to create multiple one-liners of birds, cats, flowers, houses or anything that tickled our fancy. I started them in a brand new sketch book and I’ve done some things since that I’m quite proud of. The one-liners, however, didn’t thrill me. On the first page I had drawn five different birds and every time I open the book that is the first thing I see. Today I decided to enhance or edit those birds. I should have taken a photo of the whole page before I made the changes but I didn’t. Going back through my photographs I did find one of the birds from a similar page. Here it is:

I’m much happier with my new rendition.

Cee’s Black and White Photo Challenge – People or Objects Over 50

Posted on April 15, 2018 by Mama Cormier

…..thanks to Cee for hosting the Black and White Photo Challenge

Sunday Trees – 335

Posted on April 15, 2018 by Mama Cormier

….thanks to Becca Givens for hosting Sunday Trees

If you know the weather we’re experiencing right now you know this photo wasn’t taken this week. Hard to believe that the weather was nicer in March than it is now in April.

Silent Sunday – April 15, 2018

Posted on April 15, 2018 by Mama Cormier

In living colour…….freezing rain and ice pellets

Awakening the Plants

Posted on April 14, 2018 by Mama Cormier

….thanks to WordPress for this week’s WPC ‘awakening’

Here in the northern hemisphere spring arrived a couple of weeks ago but the awakening of new growth has been slow due to the unusually cold weather. Today in Hamilton my granddaughter and I played in the backyard and even though the sun wasn’t out it was mild enough to be outside without hats, scarves and mittens. Miss Winnie loved playing with the puddles of water and digging in the mud and checking out the plants to see if any flowers were forthcoming.

Of course there are a few patches of green sprouts emerging in parts of the garden and if I got close enough I was able to see the beginnings of buds on some of the shrubs. On our walk we also came across a small flock of pigeons in a bird bath…..something they haven’t been able to do in awhile.

Art With a Toddler – Day 74

Posted on April 14, 2018 by Mama Cormier

….365 Days of Art

Today I travelled to Hamilton to spend a few hours with my granddaughter and her mom and dad. I packed up a box of circles from my collection, some stamps, Washi tape, a glue stick and clear ‘cow’ tape. I also brought along a small book with blank sheets inside so that Winnie could have her own sketch book.

We sat together at the kitchen island and I opened my sketch book and we worked side by side so that I could demonstrate how to make a simple collage using bits of paper and tape. She need a bit of help with cutting the tape and using the letter stamps was a bit of a challenge but she got right into it and she added some detail to my example as well.

Here is my piece: