I have been wanting to make more wings for use on cards and 3D mixed media creations, so out of the shelf came the lovely book Taking Flight that first taught me this technique, and after an hour or two of bending, cutting, glueing and painting, I had 8 brand new sets, wired and distressed and ready to use. I'll show a few pics of the easy and fun process, and some of the cards and gifts I decorated with them. I hope it will inspire you to make some of these versatile wings , and if you do please let me know about it!

I hand embossed the envelopes that came with little elephant cards that I bought in India on my first trip there in 2010. They still strongly smell of printing ink. Couldn't resist doing a white envelope too. Gotta love the frail lacyness of it!

In response to a challenge I saw on Instagram, I decided to give my own creative routine a boost by disciplining myself to a small daily creative effort. Although art is my bread and butter, one easily get very tied up with planning, admin, prep for classes and larger, more 'serious' work. It is true that every bit of creative work builds us up and boosts our day, and on a basic level, I need to get back to the simple joys of short, instinctive, free little sessions.  The artist is a child and mine needs more play!

I also do this in the hope that I will get to do more of the things I love, like graphic pattern making (I hear it called 'doodling', but the word does not sit comfortably with me...yet) and printmaking, and plan to have a stamp-a-day week after this!

The first drawing-a-day was early morning while sitting on the front porch, still in my night gown, and with my first cup of rooibos tea. The Australian trees are so fascinating! Branches twist and turn and leaves form cauliflower clumps at their ends, while strips of rough bark peels off finely-textured 'skin' below. Cockatoos and magpie larks and doves were grooming, eating, flying...so off I went! Day 1 was tree and bird studies. 
On day 2 I felt like giving my drawing hand more freedom, so I selected a mini measuring tape and small sewing scissors from my miniatures display and plunged into some blind contour drawings. Colour also made its entrance in the form of some line design-and-texta typography.
Day 3 saw some drawings of natural finds, in the form of a kangaroo vertebrae, such an exquisitely sculpted object!
Days 4-6 were a mix of pencil and pen drawings of an imaginary tree, some bell-like eucalyptus pods and a whimsical girl holding a heart in her hands. 
Day 7 was an exercise from the inspirational book Drawing Lab, so I drew silly cats for about half hour non-stop. Not the most realistic cats ever, but it helps develop a bit of personal cat-drawing-style, and will make me look much closer to the details of a cat when I see one again!

You may notice that I don't post every drawing. Doing that will make me draw differently, less freely, if I knew I had to post it here! That would be contradicting the freedom that is core of this exercise. I have done many detailed drawings (see photographs elsewhere on this site), but this is not the time for 3-hour drawings of Paris streets, it is meant to be instinctive and flowing, five-minute sessions of play and discovery. So please adjust your expectations accordingly!

Maybe if you see how simple it can be, you'll join me and try your own creative-play-a-day challenge...it may be writing, sewing, crafting of anything that makes your creative heart beat faster. Be free and be sure to let me know about it!

Our teenage son Juan just loves watermelon and started experimenting with ways of making the most of this fabulous summer fruit. This is the delicious result, a light and refreshing watermelon and mint smoothie

When my daughter's new digital piano was unpacket a week ago, the lovely boxes just begged to become something new. So a few ideas came up as they tend to do, and for a week my art table and most of the living room was posessed by pieces of cardboard in different stages of being cut, folded,  glued and painted.

 I just love the way you learn about a material by manipulating it, the different ways the box folds when it is single or double layers thick, the little surprises that just 'happens' like the shingles on the roof of the one fairy tower or the grass in the alcove. I just love the feeling when a corrugated piece of cardboard folds after being scored, and how well wood glue works on paper! Small joys...

The globe was made from cereal boxes and reflects a bit of my yearning for a real, grown-up old style globe on a swivel stand.  The world is such a vast place and the idea of reducing it to a cardboard miniature is rediculous I suppose, but making it became a study of the shapes and contours of faraway countries, islands and inland water bodies- an abstract form of travelling and discovery without spending a dollar!

A red London telephone booth was also born. What a pleasure to layer strips of cardboard to reconstruct the mouldings on the original, and I'm still thinking about what I will use to make the little windows. It was my hubbies's suggestion to model a little telephone handpiece for the enterior as well...great idea! Wow, this creative stuff is even rubbing off on my seriously right-brained math and IT boffin!

The mailman just delivered a huge box filled with art goodies right on my doorstep!

some linocutting in preparation for a three-week project with my art kids