Sotterley Gardens

Sotterley Gardens 16" x 20" watercolor Copyrighted Carrie Waller 2010

I have completed my painting! Yay! I'm posting a little early because I will be out of pocket for a few days. This painting is of Sotterley Plantation's Gardens. Sotterley Plantation is in Maryland and has a lot of importance for our good friends the Marce's. I was fortunate enough to visit during the summer of 2005. The Marce's invited me along on their family trip while Brian was in Iraq. It was great to go with them because I had heard so much about Sotterley. Melleive's Grandmother was a caretaker of the plantation. Melleive spent her childhood on the grounds of this beautiful house. It was also the where Dave and Melleive got married. The house was gorgeous but I found the grounds to be just as impressive. I took a photograph of the gardens and from that picture comes this weeks painting.

Here is the link to their site if you would like to read more about the plantation http://www.sotterley.com/

I also completed our Master bath. I am so happy to be finished. It was difficult all the way through, from the wallpaper that didn't want to leave it walls to the swiss cheese walls that were an end result, to the patching and sanding, leaving a coat of dust everywhere, to the priming, taping of stripes and finally painting the last coat. I love the end result!! I was hoping that the horizontal stripes would help to make the bathroom a little more cohesive. It is a large bathroom but it is chopped up with a lot of walls. I think it looks great and I do not miss the wallpaper at all. I still LOATHE wallpaper!


bathroom before and after


So happy to be finished:)

Steven's painting this week in my opinion is terrific. I think that he is an artistic genius. He painted a fish jumping out of the water, so I'm calling this one "Fish out of Water". I love the colors, I love the fish, I just love it!!! I'm so proud of him! He's the best! I love my boys.


11 x 14 watercolor

Work in Progress

watercolor 16 x 20 In Progress

This week, obviously my painting is not complete. It is taking a very long time. It has a lot of details and I don't want to rush the process. So I will post the completed one when I am finished with it later this week. Since it is in progress I decided to show you the entire process from the beginning.



Steven did a lovely painting this week, which he told me was a very beautiful roller coaster. Very creative!!

A Vase of Sunshine

watercolor 16 x 20
This week was a struggle. These daffodils caused me some trouble. I saved these guys from a snow storm a week or so ago. I brought them in and put them in my favorite German crock. They were so pretty I decided to photograph them and then paint them. I had the hardest time figuring out my pallet. This is actually my second attempt. The first one I used a paint that was too opaque. So on try two I went with a much more transparent yellow. I'm glad they're finished:) They did turn out pretty sunny, so I guess I'm happy with them in the end.

Steven doesn't have a painting yet, he's a little under the weather. Hopefully tomorrow or sometime this week.

I am happy to report that Brian took a few days off this week and the wallpaper is down, Yay! We ended up renting a steamer, so worth the $20!! I have the walls patched and I will be priming them this week, in between taking care of sick babies.

We took advantage of the good weather and worked on the backyard also. We weeded the beds and Brian mulched and mowed. It's starting to shape up. I am also thrilled that two hydrangeas that we had in pots are actually starting to bud. Hopefully they will bloom this year. Spring is in the Air!!!

See everyone next Monday.

Carrie

Sunny Palms completed

watercolor 8 x 10


both paintings together watercolors 8 x 10

This week I have the second painting in my Sunny Palms series. I think that last weeks painting is more dynamic, but I do think that this one goes nicely with it. I'm going to do a few more botanical pieces since I'm on a roll. I'm excited about next weeks painting but I am having trouble getting motivated. My goofy master bathroom is looming in the back of my mind. The wallpaper removal is a tedious task. Those are some botanicals that I don't enjoy looking at. Oh well one inch at a time:(


mixed media 5 x 7ish

Steven did another painting this week. He has turned a corner and has gone from abstractly putting paint onto paper into trying to make a more realistic painting. I wasn't sure when that would happen. I love the innocence of children. They have no fears they just paint. They aren't worried about the outcome it's more about the process. I knew from teaching art classes that eventually their self consciousness starts coming through in their art. They become more worried about making a picture that looks like something and then eventually they become frustrated that they can't get it to look exactly like it and aware of others giving negative criticism. So when I was teaching I always had a policy that only constructive criticism was allowed. I do think that hearing what others have to say about your work is important but in a positive manner. So back to my point, I found it interesting that Steven is starting to do this at an early age. When I asked him about his painting this week his description took about 3 times longer to explain than I think it did for him to paint.(wonder where he gets that from) Steven says his painting is a tornado-inator (Inspired I believe from Phineas and Ferb his favorite cartoon--2 brothers constantly inventing and building things). So his tornado-inator sucks up all of the tornadoes in the tri-state area (Phineas and Ferb reference). There is also a lizard in his painting? He also discovered crayon resist all on his own--he's so smart:)

We'll see you next Monday!

Sunny Palms longing for Summer

watercolor 8" x 10"

This week the sun made some appearances. It made me long for summer. We are getting the pool ready in hopes of early swimming. I know this is all very premature considering there is a threat of snow next week, but a girl can dream.

When we moved in our backyard was a tropical paradise. We have a beautiful saltwater pool surrounded by tons of banana plants and I added Hibiscus into the mix with their gorgeous blooms, it was heavenly. Well this winter when the banana plants died off Brian chopped them down and uncovered our palm trees that were camouflaged among all of the foliage. So right now the palms are loving life, they get all of the sun they want. They were looking so pretty, Brian and I took some pictures of them. Out of these pictures comes my labor of love this week. I do love the colors in this painting. They are so tropical and summery, they make me long for my pool lounging days. Next week I will be painting an accompanying palm painting, I think it needs a friend. I loved painting this one so much I think I may start the other one right now:)

I did hope to report this week that the my wallpapering project was done, but sadly it is not. It is closer, but not complete. I really do hate wallpaper. Hopefully by next week:(

Steven did a lovely painting this week. Out of a happy little accident (Oh No I'm quoting Bob Ross) he created his masterpiece. He accidentally spilled his cup of water on his painting. It could have been disastrous, but Steven and I are both in agreement that it enhanced his painting. He may be onto a new technique. Hopefully not because we had turquoise water all over the kitchen floor, we also had Sam crawl through it so it was doubly messy.


watercolor 5 x 7

See everyone next week.

Carrie

All paintings and photographs are copyrighted by me, Carrie Waller and must have express written permission to be used.

Isle of Palms Revisited

2.5" x 3" watercolor it's so little and cute:)


both are 5" x 7" watercolors



5" x 7" watercolor

This week I am revisiting Isle of Palms in South Carolina. This time I have painted the beach in color. The first one is itty bitty, and it's really cute. It may be my favorite one. It reminded me of a contest I always entered in high school. You could only do miniature pictures. It was a lot of fun to do. I plan on using these paintings in my master bathroom as soon as it is finished. We are currently and by saying we that would be mostly me, removing all of the lovely wallpaper. It is a big job and I LOATHE wallpaper. I also firmly believe that flowers belong in a vase or garden not on a wall. So off with their little floral heads. Hopefully I will have it done soon Did I say I LOATHE wallpaper?


Steven on wallpaper removal

I re-purposed some frames and mats that I already had. So once my bathroom is in it's finished state these will look great in there.


framed pictures

Steven got back in the act of painting this week. He painted a lovely watercolor for me for Valentine's day! He's so sweet!


Steven's watercolor 8 x 10

See everyone next week.

All paintings and pictures are copyrighted by me, Carrie Waller, and must have express written permission to be used.

It's Carnivale Time

watercolor 22" x 30"

This week I painted a scene from our travels to Venice. Brian took the picture that I painted this from and it has always been one of my favorite pictures. This was during Carnivale in February. After we went the first time we were hooked and went every year. It was an amazing time to visit Venice. People are dressed in the most elaborate costumes arriving by Gondola into the floating city. It is all pretty dramatic. These costumed creatures were more than happy to stop and pose for anyone to get their picture. They were very experienced at this and knew exactly where to stop so that each photo was posed perfectly with the best background possible. The costumes were absolutely terrific. From an artists standpoint I just sat there and watched the costumes walk by in amazement. Brian and I chased people down like the paparazzi to get perfect pictures. Besides the beautiful costumes there were also original costumes. One year there was a family completely decked out in bubble pack outfits that looked like french royalty from the 1700's. The female even had a tall Marge Simpson-esque wig made of bubble pack. It was truly amazing. Unfortunately our photo of the bubble pack family didn't come out, it was dark and they weren't lit very well. But we have plenty of other wonderful pictures to remind us of our visits. Every February I get a little antsy to get back to these crazy beautiful celebrations. I miss you Venice, but I will be back before you sink:)


photos Brian took during our Venice visits

This weeks painting was a bit of a challenge for me. I will admit I have a phobia of painting with color. I am very happy staying in my comfortable monochromatic color schemes. I have actually attempted to paint this pic one other time, and I wasn't happy with the outcome. This week I tried to take the same approach that I did with the London sketch. I just relaxed, tried to not be too detailed and just had fun capturing the colors, lights and shadows. I'm fairly happy with my results. I may try this color thing again. I also have another dilemma, I'm running out of paint. I bought my beloved Schmincke watercolor paints in Germany. I like to paint with pans not tubes and I can't find Schmincke for sale in pans anywhere. I may have to bribe my friend Melleive, that is lucky enough to be back in Germany, to visit my favorite art shop and pick some up for me. Until then I may have to break down and buy some tubes on line. Oh, Well!! I'm also thinking about trying my hand at oil painting.

Steven was too busy watching the Superbowl to paint. He was also super excited to have his Daddy home. Brian was gone all week. I'll give him a pass this week:)

See everyone next Monday!

All paintings and photographs are copyrighted by me, Carrie Waller, and must have express written permission to be used.