INSIDE THE STUDIO PART 1

Hi Everyone!

Welcome to Brees Mimi Design Studio! So happy you are joining me today as we take a peek into the room where I create.  

Remember last week the WARNING about the messiness and chaos that abides in my studio? Enter at your own risk!

There was tremendous temptation to clean up beforehand and admittedly I did tidy up (vacumned) a wee bit before my friend's visit, but it is still very messy indeed. Ok, I am going to stop apologizing for my messiness. 

 COME ON IN!! 

As you enter the studio (aka spare bedroom) you will see in the far corner a little table known as "sewing world", to the left is "art cart", to the right is small rolling cart with scissors, glue, and sewing supplies.   I'll explain these sections in more detail in later posts, for now we will just see the perimeter spaces. 

To the right of "sewing world" is where you will find me in my favorite place....at the "work table" where most of the creativeness goes on.

The Work Table at the moment is piled with hand painted pattern paper and journals I've been making. Oh there are the usual suspects that "live" in this area: paints, glues, brushes, etc. and the "bulletin boards" or as some people like to call them "idea or inspiration" boards. 

 To the right of the work table is a "drawer stack" housing more paint, spray, stencils, pencils, watercolor crayons and glitter.  The boxes stacked on top are gelli prints and stencils. The picnic basket underneath holds miscellaneous items such as a mini crock pot, applique iron, bubble wrap and paper towels, etc. Under the basket that holds up the whole shebang are two plastic bins, one filled with minky fabric (don't ask) and the other with old cross-stitch and craft magazines that belonged to my mother. 

The lime green double closet with hot pink trim is home to neatly organized projects in progress, knitting, cross-stitch, quilting, thread, large bins of fabric and watercolor supplies. The right side of the closet is "bead world". Also in that side of the closet is extra quilt batting,  projects to finish, and a filing cabinet with patterns. It is pretty organized in there.  

 Oh and there is a colorful bar chair holding a three tier mesh office filing system (LOL) that is primarily a place to "file" sketch books, journals and other various papers that haven't made their way into a bin (trash or otherwise). More "filing" in the basket underneath and in the blue cloth bin that is behind the door. 

On the opposite side of the room are a system of cabinets which hosts my picnic basket collection on top (all labeled, organized storage). There is a row of cabinets along the top, a full length storage unit at one end, a pegboard and work (lol) surface (mainly a catch-all) and cabinets below. It takes up the whole wall and I would like to say it is pretty well organized with paper supplies, embellishments, cutting machines, crafting supplies, stamps, collage materials, more watercolor brushes, palettes and paints. 

That's it for today, I'll let your imagination fill in the rest!  

Although I do feel a bit embarrassed to share the untidiness I know that you creative people out there KNOW and appreciate the realness of a working space. 

Next week we'll dive in a bit deeper (promise it will not be cleaned up or neater than it actually is). 

Till then....BEE Happy. BEE Creative!

Suzy

NOT WHITE ON RICE

Hi Everyone!

I've spent the last several days enjoying the company of my BFF.  She arrived mid-day on Thursday. As always there are lots of art supplies to be unloaded from her trunk as well as art books and a ready supply of snack goodies and clothes of course.  We spend the afternoon in the pool chatting and catching up on our lives, the latest happenings, etc. Bonnie is finally officially "retired" and she is adjusting to what-ever that means. Making plans and figuring out what she will do with all of her free time now. 

We plan a zillion things to do when she is here but as always, time runs quickly away from us and we rarely get to everything we planned.  Oh and the rain...the rain....it interferes with our outdoor plans.  But we make do with it and stand under the shelter of my patio and paint anyway.

Bonnie working out her design

The curlicue design in purple ink

 We experimented with rice paper and it was Sooooo much fun! I really got into it!!

 Rice paper is rather thin and when it gets wet well.... the color just explodes on the paper making the most incredible spidery (is that a word?) designs, the colors run freely and there is little to no control.

I laid down purple waterproof ink on the wet paper (above)  making a few curlicues with a brush. 

Adding watercolor in the background

A dash of yellow in the background and a touch of red in a few spots and to sharpen it up a bit, then watch the colors spread across the paper. After adding the watercolors I came back into the drawing with black ink over the purples to define the final design. 

Final design 

 It is pretty exciting working this way, but maybe not so much for the faint of heart and definitely not for those who need more control in their work. I happen to love the unpredictability! Jumping up and down and clapping, oohing and aahhhing as each color spreads its way around the paper.

My friend on the other hand was not as pleased with the unpredictability and was ready to give up on her piece so I asked if it would be ok to "play" with it and see what would happen. With permission and a sense of wild abandon, I added blues and greens to the background and then used black ink to redefine some areas.  

Reworking Bonnie's design

I really liked that Bonnie followed the directions of wetting her paper and crumpling it before drawing; it gives the paper a batik look and once it is flattened it will look pretty cool.

The next in my curlicue series of paintings was this design.  It reminds me of an old fashioned garden fence or gate like my Granny had at her house.

Old fashioned garden fence or gate

 What better way to spend a rainy afternoon than to discover the joy of a new medium and color?  Oh, and Bonnie did another one too, this time using waterproof markers to outline her shapes for tighter design control. 

Using waterproof markers for tight design control.

I think it came out lovely, don't you? 

That's just the beginning of our little adventures, won't you come back next week and see what else we were up to? 

Grab you paper and pencils and go sketch/draw something this week! 

Bee Creative!
Suzy

PEEK INSIDE STUDIO INTRO

Hi Everyone!

Thanks for stopping by and joining me for a new series of posts on Inside The Studio.  Maybe a little bit of background will help prepare you for The Studio.

I say, PREPARE because what you will see in the coming weeks may be a bit disturbing to some. The studio is NOT a very NEAT or TIDY area,  it is a place where I go to be creative and yes, messy. MESSY...that's right, I have my most used supplies out which enables me to work intuitively, but it does cause a great deal of mess and a bit of chaotic look to the space (and for an occasional visitor).  So, close your eyes to the chaos if you can't bear an untidy space and just focus on the other creative interests; there are many and they all live in this room called Brees Mimi Design Studio.


Here's a little sneak preview Inside The the Studio:

BMDS is where I work play with paint

work out designs

 sew

craft

collage and journal

And, Oh yeah, there WILL be plenty to see in this room that we will explore each week.  

So looking forward to sharing my creatively (and messy) space with you each week! Hope you will stop by often and join me for Inside The Studio.

Till then BEE Creative! 
Suzy

SKETCHING...... ARCHITECTURALLY SPEAKING

Hi Everyone,

Happy Sketchbook Tuesday!  

I've been running around like crazy-busy this week getting ready for a visit from my VBFF.  Yes! She's coming for a whole week to visit me and we have such grand plans of drawing and painting wherever we go.  

Of course our drawing and painting en plein air totally depends on the weather and whether or not it will be raining cats and dogs in the afternoon. 

Keep your fingers crossed for sunny days!! I'm pretty excited about being able to spend time with my BFF so even if the weather doesn't co-operate we will find plenty to do and talk about for hours.

And since this is Sketchbook Tuesday I've dug a few Architectural sketches out for you today!

I love the architecture of old buildings, Spanish tile roofs, balustrades, arches and stairways all speak to my romantic heart.  Below I am practicing how to draw these types of architectural details. 

 A five minute sketch of downtown store fronts in an older section of town. 

 Throw in a quick sketch of palm trees here and there.

Another favorite architectural delight is the Cupola. According to Wikipedia: in architecture, a cupola is a small, often dome-like structure on top of a building. Well the ones I've seen and refer to as cupola(s) are rather square and usually have a nice weathervane on top. Whatever they are called, I love the look of it on a house or building. 

This building was a challenge with the arches and complicated roof lines. 

Next week I'll have new sketches to share with you and more adventures from Bonnie and Suzy. Hope you will join me again soon. Meanwhile, pull out your sketch pads and get busy!! 

Happy Sketching!
Suzy 

A CHANGE IN THE PLAN

Hi Everyone!

Over the last month we been on an adventure exploring The Neighborhood and The Parks near my home. I've been sharing my sketches and paintings of the areas. I do hope you've enjoyed visiting and getting closer to my home destination. 

When I began this series it was originally planned to go for four weeks but soon discovered when it came to A Walk in The Park, it just wasn't complete without sharing the special places where I love to paint.  A slight detour in the plan but isn't that what you do when you are out and about? Sometimes it pays to take a turn down an unfamiliar street or path to discover hidden delights. Anyhoo, that is what we did when we veared off the path and explored my favorite painting places. Last week we ended up in my Backyard, and this week a final destination post was planned for Inside The Studio.  Sorry that just didn't happen this week! BUT......

I have some GOOD news!  Let's just say there has been a change of plan and the Inside The Studio post will now be expanded into a mini series!!!  Ohhh, I'm SO excited to share these posts with you!! So please bear with me while I gather my wits and photos and join me next week for the Intro to Inside The Studio.   

Remember, I'm a fly by the seat of my pants kinda girl!  :-) Some days that is a good thing, other days not so much.  I'm finding in bloggerland, there is a definite need for pre-planning. ;-)

Thanks for being patient while this series is under construction! See you all next week!

xoxo
Suzy

SKETCH BOOK MOJO RETURNING

Hi Everyone!

The weather this summer has just been so weird, really. Sweltering heat up north and cooler temps and lots of rain here where I live! That means the water in the pool is cooler than the usual bath water we get this time of year.  So, I've been inside sewing and painting this summer, which is okay with me because I love to be in my studio.  

Yesterday I was cleaning up the "art cart", which is a portable kitchen island on wheels that is used to hold supplies and kiddie craft stuff. The top has a great piece of marble to use for printing paper with the Gelli Plate (sticks to it) and space to spread out your painting supplies.  But I digress, I was cleaning out the cart and found a few old newsprint sketch pads.  Don't you love it when you find stuff like that? I do. It is like a trip down memory lane getting to see the forgotten sketches from a class. I'd like to share a few with you.  

As you might know, I've been participating in a few challenges with multi-media and haven't spent a great deal of time painting or drawing. 

Drawing/sketching is something I'd like to get back into the habit of doing on a regular basis and to be truthful, practice is the only way my skills will improve. 

 I did most of these sketches during a class I took one summer at the local high school, the instructor is a well know artist in our area and she teaches the adult education course in drawing.  She would demo a drawing technique and then we were on our own to find a subject from her pile of magazine pages and draw it.  Then she would critique our drawings individually. 

 It was a fun class with lots of people with various talents from beginners (like me) to advanced.

 Lots of different mediums were used so we had a chance to experiment and learn what medium we liked using the most. I loved pen and ink, charcoal and pastels. 
All the drawings here were done with Ritmo charcoal pencils. 

Finding this sketch pad gave me the boost needed to make me me want to grab the nearest pencil and spend time with my sketch pad.  Quiet time working out a drawing.

I've promised myself to start drawing or sketching something every day. I'll let you know how that works out. 

Happy Sketching and Drawing! 
Suzy

INDEX CARD A DAY WEEK 7

Hi Everyone!

Time is just flying by this summer with all the activities around here. Can't believe I've finished another week of ICAD, in the final stretches now, here we are at Day 50. 

I'd love it if you would take a few minutes to click on the ICAD tab on the right side bar and view the daily index cards from Week 7, Day 43-49.

Hope you enjoy the individual creations on each card. Drop me a comment and let me know if you have a favorite.

BEE CREATIVE!
Suzy