Step Five: A birthday present, an engagement ring and panic mode...

Dear Fi,

It’s horribly late: 9:30 PM and I’m just starting to write this post. My children just fell asleep. My husband is packing, he is leaving at 4AM, he has an early flight to San Diego (once again, why cannot I go?). Me? I’m totally overwhelmed lately. I’m operating in “panic mode”. Yesterday in an act of desperation I called my Mom and asked her to come and help me (if everything will go smooth she will come at the end of this month). I cannot believe that there is no end to all these “things to do”. It never stops. It doesn’t matter how much I do it is never enough...

Anyway, who cares?

About today’s artwork. In this picture are my husband’s grandparents. I have never met his grandfather, but I knew his grandmother. She died last year. More than seven years ago I came to visit S. for the summer.  We had not known each other for a full year. Two weeks before going back to Poland we went for an evening walk and S. proposed to me. My engagement ring, the ring I received and accepted that evening, the ring I’m wearing almost everyday came from his grandmother. The next day S. called his family and friends and told them that we are engaged. Then he asked everybody if they can make it to the wedding next Saturday. Somehow I never thought what they will think about me, I was too happy to bother ha, ha.

Now, seriously about today’s project ;) I was planning to paint this piece as a Christmas present for my mother-in-law. I even bought a nice frame at that time. However, it turned out that there were other things to do before Christmas, and in the meantime we found another present. Tomorrow is her birthday, this is why I wanted so badly to work on this project today.

For the first hour I really struggled. I started to paint in a bigger format - to fit this picture into a previously bought frame. However, I forgot that since the last week I’m operating in panic mode. As I was painting the background at some point I just realized that I have no idea what I’m doing. I stopped and found out that I totally don’t like the background I was working on for the last hour. Then it hit me that it is not only that I don’t like what I already did but also that the size is too big for me. I knew that I don’t have that much time to work on it.

I started from scratch working on a smaller size and after five minutes I could feel the difference. I knew I could manage this ;) I decided to take more pictures today. I really appreciate your teaching approach Fi. I do not plan to teach here but I wanted at least to show the process I use in creating my artwork. After deciding on a project I usually paint the background first, then I glue on a  previously printed picture, and finally I add the design and work on details. That’s all!

:*

Sylvia

P.S.

Dear Fi, in case you are wondering what the author wanted to accomplish by taking this picture ;)
It was Valentine’s Day at preschool today. I bought 20 packages of Hershey"s Hugs for the children. It turned out that there is a new policy and they don’t do “food” anymore, only cards. Amelie came back home with a bunch of cards and she brought all the chocolates back. Hence the picture.

The good news is that Bruno has Valentine’s Day tomorrow and his kindergarten is OK with “treats” ;)