Life has been a bit busy to say the least. We're still working on getting into our new house. We helped our 13 year old baby girl Hedy over the rainbow bridge and we adopted a 4 month old puppy we’ve named Abby. I’ve also started teaching art classes at the local higher ed in our new home town…more on that later. We’re waiting on utilities and the inside of the modular to be finished, but we’re getting there. If I said I can’t wait to be in a house again and build a new studio it would be an understatement! I’m ready to get messy and play with tangible art supplies again. It’s been over a year since I’ve been able to spend time creating in a studio space and most of my supplies have been in storage for nearly a year.  I’m ready to unpack and create! With the urge growing stronger to work with tangible supplies, last week I pulled out my water-soluble graphite pencils and created another beautiful bird. One of my best friends is a field biologist and he very often sends me photos...

I’m working on a little something for next year. I know, I can’t believe I’m working that far in advance either. However I couldn’t hold onto the whole secret, so here’s a little artwork preview.  If you followed along on the bouquet study I did in February, some of these will look familiar.  I kind of fell in love with the look and couldn’t stop creating similar lay outs.  They seemed to fall into a flow for me to create and I kept going, ending up with 12 designs. Leave a comment below telling me what you think in coming for next year.  Remember subscribers get all the news first so don’t forget get to subscribe to the newsletter .

If you’re a subscriber to the newsletter, then you know yesterday I released the first quarterly sticker packs.  I’m excited about this brain child and can’t wait for you to stick them to all the things!   The first pack - Wings of Spring includes six stickers created from my original watercolor collection and includes two butterflies, two dragonflies, a single ladybug, and a single honey bee.  All of them are made of thick, durable vinyl.  They’re scratch resistant, weather proof and designed to resist exposure to wind, sun, rain and snow. Best of all they’re dishwasher safe, making them perfect for water bottles, coffee cups and anything else you might wanna stick them to. Wings of Spring includes: (clockwise from top right) Freya the Dragonfly (2.42” x 2.46”) Bumble the Bee (3”x 1.93”) Flynn the Dragonfly (3” x 2.16”) Bibi the Lady Bug (3.37” x 2.25”) Brit the Butterfly ( 3” x 1.65”) Cressida the Butterfly (3.4” x 2.78”) If you’ve purchased some of these designs i...

After Jennifer Nichols’ Free Beginners Class I talked about a couple of posts back , I spent a bit of time experimenting. I fell in love with the wide edge that mimicked the same look you would get from taping off your art space to create a white edge. Everyone loves a good tape pull, am I right?  I always feel like it makes a clean edge, but also adds a bold statement of completion to a piece.   Into the Woods - February 2026 Into the Woods is a compilation of several stamps from various brush sets I have.  I started with the largest elements, placing the focal pieces of the wood slices first.  Then I began adding the smaller elements.  Mushrooms and pine branches.  To complete the piece I pulled in the dried flowers and moths.  I used muted earthy tones to convey the warmth of the woods.   Creating this piece made me nostalgic for the many moments I’ve indulged in walking through the woods, from Wyoming and Colorado to New Mexico and Alaska. ...

Youtube has quite honestly replaced TV in my life for the last 14+ years. If you dig around long enough here on the blog you’ll probably find at least one rant about why I hate being asked about how I find the time to create, which talks about priorities and the lack of vegging in front of a TV show. I digress, we’re here to talk about another great tutorial I’ve gleaned a lot of cool tips and tricks from. Don’t let the name of the channel fool you.  While iPad Lettering with Karin Newport has plenty of great lettering tutorials, there are also some fab art tutorials as well.  I’ve watched Watercolor Doodles in Procreate more than once.   Field of Blue Field of Blue was my first creation after watching the tutorial, in July of 2025. Karin’s tutorial takes you thought a bright colorful piece, but I really loved how this looked as a monochromatic piece.  There is just something really striking about monochromatic work to me.  I used a variety of brushes from ...

I love Jennifer Nichols Procreate resources and classes. I have several of her brush sets and I I memory serves me her Skill Share Procreate classes were some the first ones I took. So when I saw her new Free Procreate Class slid into my inbox the other day, I knew I was all in.  Never let a class marked for beginners dissuade you from taking it, especially if it’s free.  Keep reading to find out why I feel this way. Rocks #1 So why would someone like me, who’s been working with Procreate for nearly four years now, choose to intentionally spend time taking a free beginner level class?  What could I possibly learn?  These are some of the I might elect to take a beginner leaves class: I enjoy the teacher presenting the class.   It’s a technique or style of art I have yet to try. It includes some sort of added value I’m interested in, this is especially true if there’s a free Procreate brush set involved. I can generally glean some sort of cool tips and tricks ...

I’m a huge supporter of enriching your creative hobbies with online learning, both free and paid, and today I want to talk about my experience with free options. I’ve had some great experiences that include learning how to watercolor and the ins and outs of Procreate.  I’ve had some smarmy experiences as well.   While I won’t list off the bad classes I’ve taken or the teachers that taught them.  I will say that if your free classes is basically an advertisement to get me to buy the VIP access to the course you’ve done nothing to earn my money.  Let’s talk about some excellent resources I’ve found and the great people I’ve learned from: Very Pink Knits - This is my go to for leaning anything related to knitting, it’s rare that Staci won’t have a tutorial on whatever I’m trying to learn. Let’s Make Art - Sarah’s weekly Youtube tutorials taught me how to watercolor without making me feel like I needed fancy supplies. Paul Clark - Another MVP in the world of watercolo...