It CAN Be All Unicorns & Rainbows!

Who says life can't be all unicorns and rainbows? Certainly not me! In fact, I love to perpetuate the idea of beautiful natural occurrences and mythical creatures... especially in a whimsical painting. For sure!

This piece actually started as a background created with watercolor crayons and pencils... making fun marks and scribbles in a free-form manner. A little bit of drawing and it looks like this. A little bit of water and it turns into that.

A little bit of paint and that turned into this... and then this turned into that...and then that turned into a unicorn. Wheeeeee!

I thought I'd give this piece a nice pastel theme and play up the rainbow and the Unicorn Girl. Can you tell I was channeling My Little Pony?

And although it seems simple in subject, it was the tiny little tweaks here and there that set my brain on fire. I absolutely loved going back in to add little details to create interest. I kept adding, changing and tweaking it until I was satisfied with the finished piece. The most exciting part is that now I know how to fix what I'm not liking... and I'm less afraid of messing up my painting. So, see.... miracles do happen!

Thoughtful Thursdays: Sometimes It's Years!

Inspiration doesn't always hit right away... that's for sure. But sometimes you see something and you just have to have it... even though you're not sure what the heck you're going to do with it!

Well that's exactly what happened when I picked up these cute little houses from Maya Road. They sat and sat and sat and sat in my stash of stuff for several years.

At one point, I'm sure I attempted to make something of them, but was overthinking it too much... so I put them back. And then, just a few weeks ago... I had an idea!

I'd make them into little beach cabana-style tents... and use them as beach badge holders! I painted them with summery shades of pastel and made cute little striped roofs. I decorated each one with a coordinating window and door.

And added dimensional metal numbers to them using extra-long brads.

I even added funky fuzzy ribbon around the bottoms to give the illusion of sand. Now they're all ready for summer. It only took 3 years!