Painting Elephants

Last week I attended a two hour acrylic painting class at Pinot's Pallete in St. Matthews with my friend Brooke and her sister-in-law.  They do classes almost every night and have a bar where you can buy beer, wine or mixed cocktails to sip on while you paint.

We painted an elephant and it was a lot of fun!  I went in there anticipating a canvas with an outline of the elephant already there, but much to our surprise, we all sat down to a blank, white canvas.  At first we were extremely intimidated, but our instructor was awesome and did a great job of showing us how to do the outline of the elephant ourselves. We started with a grid on the canvas and she instructed us where on the grid to place dots of paint and then which dots to connect until we had our basic outline.

Once we had the basic outline, we filled in the grey for the elephant, which looked like this:

After that we filled in the background before adding detail to the elephant:

After adding details step by step to the background and the elephant, we ended up with a final painting!  They all looked a bit different, but yet very similar.  Here was my end result:

And here is a group shot from the whole class:

It was a lot of fun and I definitely want to do it again soon!

Re-Painting Garden Frog Statues

My mom has two cute frog garden statues that have seen better days.  They are structurally sound and aren't chipped or cracked, but the orginal paint colors had faded to white and grey.  Who wants grey garden frogs?  So I brought them home and spiffied them up with a new coat of paint and weather sealed them so they should keep their vibrant colors year round now.

Frogs & Butterfly Before:



Frogs & Butterfly After:


Frogs & Butterfly After:




Swinging Frog Before:




Swinging Frog After:

Work in Progress

This is a swinging frog statue that hangs from a tree with rope ( rope is removed for painting ) that I am repainting for my parents.  These little guys tend to fade over time and I like to repaint and seal them so they are weather proofed as well as bright, shiny and like new!  I always forget how horrible they look after just the first coat of dull paint, before any touchups or detailing is done.  Should have an after photo of this guy soon along with another one!  ( I promise it will look much better in the end - here is the before and after of the bear I repainted. )

Welcome Bear - 23/365

This  is a bear statue I picked up at one of our local Goodwill stores for $4.  When I purchased it, it was in all shades of gray and pretty chipped up, at that.  I took it home, repainted it, sealed it and now this guy lives on my back deck.  I'm always on the look out for fix 'r up statues like this to put around the porches and in the yard.  :)

Here is a bad before photo:

Painting Lattice is Not on My Favorite Things To Do List

Last year we extended our back deck and to keep in sync with the rest of the porch we continued with the lattice for the sides.  It looks good, but boy is  it a pain to paint!  And we haven't even gotten around to doing the outside yet.  We can't really spray it since we are staining the floor boards and don't want the overspray dotting up the deck boards.  Summer project, for sure!

The Hens Got Their Coop Sign Hung Today

This is a craft grade bread board I bought from Michael's crafts. I painted a chicken on the front, eggs in the grass on the top with acrylic paints and used my Cuttlebug to cut out the letters and decoupaged them onto the board.  After a coat of exterior sealant made for wood, it was good to go!  So now the girls have their own sign above the egg hatch door of the chicken coop.

Da Bear

I bought this bear statue at Goodwill for $4 all chipped and mostly one color. I repainted him using acrylic paints and sealed with an exterior sealant. Now he's good as new and he will live on the back porch. (This picture is before he was sealed - he is now nice and shiny!)

My Fur Kids - 22/52

Our friend Jenn of The Artist's Eyes is a fantastic artist. We asked her to paint portraits of all of our pups, past and present, and she did a fantastic job!  She perfectly captured each dog's personality! She had painted Rudy's portrait for us last year and completed the rest of the crew for us recently. Jenn makes all of her art ECO friendly (environmentally friendly), which is always a plus!  Check out her site and portfolios - she does more than just painting!

I framed all of the portraits in matching frames and hung them on the large wall so that they are the focal point when entering the house (or sitting anywhere in the living room, dining room and kitchen for that matter).

Here is a picture of the portraits after they were hung.  They are hung in order of when we got each dog.  Hardy and Rudy, the first two, are no longer with us.  I am hanging their tags on the corner of those portraits with ribbon in honor of them. I have Hardy's tag up there now, but have not yet located Rudy's tag since we moved, but I will!  Blue, Lois Lane and Buddy (aka Giant Dawg) are the others three pups.

Rudy - A Pet Portrait

Project 365: 92/365

This is my beloved Rudy who passed away a few years ago of canine lymphoma.  He was the best dog!  He was almost  a year old when we adopted him from the Animal Care Society,  a local no-kill shelter, and we think he was likely a lab/chow mix.  We adopted him so Hardy would have a buddy to play with while we were gone at work. They were like two peas in a pod and got along great.  Rudy would follow Hardy anywhere and Hardy quickly taught him the ropes.  The biggest problem we had with Rudy at first was his separation anxiety.  He generally was crated when we were away as he became quite destructive if left to roam the house.  We once came back from Thanksgiving dinner to find the innards of our couch all over the living room.  He did that to two couches, actually.  But we still loved him anyway.  :*)

Here is the original photo:

Jenn of The Artist's Eyes creates these awesome ECO friendly pet portraits and they are, obviously, stunning!  Check her out!