DIY nursery art

If you looked really closely at my last post on the rug for the baby's room, you may have noticed the colourful artworks I created to brighten the room and decorate one section of the very high, bare walls.

Let's get a little closer, shall we?

Doesn't seem quite close enough so let's break them down.

I've been collecting ideas for artworks or prints I thought I could create for awhile on Pinterest (check out my board here). The larger piece on the left was inspired by two things - Rachel Castle's embroidery artworks like this one:

And a DIY nursery artwork from the blog Aux petits oiseaux from which I borrowed the words. 

I had my mum mix up the colours for me, incorporating all the colours I am using (or plan to use) in the baby's room.  My mum is an artist so has a far better knack and confidence for mixing colours than I do (there is a glimpse of the abstract she did for our living room in this post and a photo of the piece she for my bedroom a few years back in this post).

I used her colours to paint strips of each colour on white cardboard. After two coats and some drying time, I lightly pencilled on the letters required to write 'every day we love you' in lower case and the French translation 'tous les jours nous t'aimons' in capitals. I wasn't worried about creating perfect letters as the aim was to create something with a child-like sense of fun. After cutting out each letter, I used clear craft glue to stick them onto white card and popped this into a white frame from a local variety store for $15. I used the same cut-out method for the dot artwork too and a smaller version of the same frame (about $11 for this one). Rachel Castle's screen printed dot artworks inspired this design.

The final piece in this little cluster is a ampersand design found on Google images (unfortunately I don't have the exact source as I printed it many months ago). I simply cut out the printed ampersand, traced around it with pencil straight onto a thin canvas I had in the cupboard (probably from a $2 shop) and filled it in with some of the leftover aqua paint used in the other pieces.

Next up are some silhouettes I tackled with my mum. We spent an enjoyable couple of hours one afternoon at my dining table surrounded by paper and paints. I showed her these animal prints by Me and Amber....

Before I knew it, she had created these beauties: 

They are just hanging out under the red lamp for now until I get around to hanging them. So cute!

Meanwhile I was stencilling and cutting out deers to create this:

For now, this one sits atop a set of Expedit shelves in the room with a framed image from a Typo calendar (middle) and a painting by my little friend Sophie (on the right). 

I love the colours in the ferris wheel. Isn't it brilliant that you can create artworks from images that grab your eye in everyday items? Calendars are great for this.

The same calendar also has an image of balloons that I will frame in the same Ribba frame from Ikea (just not keen to tackle an Ikea trip at 40 weeks pregnant!).

So there you have some DIY affordable art to brighten up a nursery (or any room). I am hoping to add a huge zebra painting above the cot at some stage. Just gotta sweeten up a certain artist ;) Wish me luck. 

Lucky me

Life works in mysterious ways, does it not? Just when I'm feeling very unlucky with the amount of work I have on at the moment, things turn around and I am reminded of all the lovely things that I can be grateful for.  There are times when I don't make enough time for the things that make me happy and winning the gorgeous watercolour above on Samantha's Black Velvet Chair blog served as a timely reminder that I need to get back to devoting more time to blogging (among other things). There are so many creative, like-minded and supportive people in the blog community and Samantha's generous giveaway made me realise I have missed being active in this space - my indulgent creative outlet. 

Not to mention that pretty things are just good for the soul! This pink floral watercolour is called 'Bouquet in Flow Blue' and is from Driftwood Interiors. I've admired this piece and others by Brisbane artist Kerri Shipp for some time - I can't wait to find a place for her work in my home. Thank you so much Samantha for this lovely prize and for the many memorable reads on your blog. Even looking at it online makes my heart break into song and you can't ask for more than that.

Trying out DIY abstract art

Between eating, sleeping and sanding every surface in our living room this weekend, I had a go at some DIY abstract art. It was so fun! Last week, I posted some of my favourite abstract art as inspiration (see here) and wondered if I dared give it a try. Just looking at gorgeous pieces by Michelle Armas and photos of art in Kelly Wearstler's divine interiors was inspiring, then I received an email with tips and encouragment from a friend. It cemented my ideas, gave me some confidence and I was off.

The girl at the art shop told me to use acrylics over oils if I meant what I said when I told her I didn't know what I was doing. So my old trusty acrylics it was - student quality, not artist, because I wasn't keen to spend a fortune on an experiment. What I was about to paint may never make it to the wall. I did splash out $12 on a small tub of impasto gel as "the girl" told me this can be mixed with acrylic paint for a textured look. I found it hard to make brush stroke marks when I tried this so I'm not sure I will use this too much.

The paintings pictured are my first attempts on some white card stock, framed in some unused Ikea Ribba frames I had. I hadn't been to my trusty $2 shop for the canvas at that point in the weekend and I wouldn't have been game to paint straight onto it anyway. I really enjoyed having a play around without the pressure of knowing I want it to go in our living room when it is finished. Below is the very first card I painted yesterday. It's not my favourite so just as well I got to try a few more things...

After this one, I stopped using blue and came up with three others using all pinks, yellows and white. This colour combo worked for me.

My mother duck is an artist and she will be very proud of me when she sees these I think. I'm pretty proud myself. I started picturing myself opening an Etsy shop with my DIY abstract artworks and taking commissions for special colour combinations to really make my clients' hearts sing! Tonight I came back down to earth when I painted another two cards and didn't like them nearly as much (too dark to photograph sorry).

I have now purchased a 60x60cm canvas. It was only $12.95 (from a shop called 'Up to $5'!) but I still feel that I need to "find" my technique or style before I put pen paint to paper canvas. Right now, the end result is a complete surprise to me. I don't feel I'm in control of how it turns out. It's a wait and see thing. Maybe that's the point of this style of painting?! Maybe I need to relinquish control and trust that the universe will provide?!

A candy shop of abstract art

Michelle Armas in the latest Adore mag

Have you noticed all the gorgeous abstract art in bright colours going around of late? I can't stop thinking about having something like this in our home, particularly one with yellow and pink, a combination I am drawn to. Already, I am forgetting how deceptively hard and time-consuming it is to paint and I'm really tempted to have a go at doing my own. This style of painting appears very different to my previous attempt at imitating the bolder, graphic designer prints of Florence Broadhurst, Kelly Wearstler and Jonathan Adler but I really want to give it a go. 

Michelle Armas

I detailed in an inspiration file post that I'm going for modern, vintage glamour with a touch of Hollywood Regency on a budget for our living room. A key part of my plan is a black and white scheme with a few yellow touches, a bright piece of abstract art is a bit of a side step. At first, I doubted whether this would look part of the room but after looking at the work of Anna Spiro, Kelly Wearstler and Jonathan Adler, I think I could make it work. If I can actually paint something decent that is.

Kelly Wearstler's home via hellolovelyinc.blogspot.com

Michelle Armas

Jen Ramos

Ish and Chi

I wish my mum had nothing better to do than paint something for me as she is an artist leaning towards abstract works. Last time she did something for me, it was very different to her usual style (you can see it here)...maybe that's why it took a few years to make it to my wall. This would certainly be more her thing and if she wasn't on holiday, I'd be begging for a lesson at least. I don't even know if I should buy oil or acrylics for a work like this. This type of painting seems the type where you should throw caution to the wind, leave perfection by the wayside and dive right in for some freestyle paint sloshing! Do I dare?!