Making A Monogram

Back in the spring, a funny thing happened.  I found out that my second cousin (my grandpa and her grandma were  bother and sister) and her family were moving to the base where we live.  She and I exchanged emails about the base and the surrounding area and I was excited to have some family living nearby soon.  Little did I know, they would be two doors down form us on our street!  If that's not God at work, I don't know what is!  When they first moved here over the summer, my cousin Laura, was expecting her third child.  She was definitely in the nesting stage, which was tough considering they had tons of unpacking to do and she was eight and  a half months pregnant!  Nevertheless, she along with her husband and two boys, managed to get settled before the baby girl arrived.  I was so honored when she asked me to do some artwork for baby Liesel's nursery.  Laura loves the idea of monogramming so we decided to do three canvases with baby Liesel's monogram and some other fun details.  I started with the middle canvas, a giant letter "B" with one of the butterflies from the nursery bedding.  This was an interesting color to mix.  It ended up having a lot more orange in it than I'd expected!


Once the background colors of all the canvases were in,  I used a sort of glazing technique to give them a pearlized finish.  I mix metallic off-white paint with water and them paint a thin layer over the dried color.  This way, I can mix the perfect color first and give it a very unique finish!

Next, I started on the letters themselves.  I have recently perfected the woodgrain effect with my paintings and I thought it would be a nice contrast against the plain background.  I have always loved the natural beauty of woodgrain.  When I used to work as an interior designer, I loved to study all the different designs made by the various types of wood.  Yes, I'm a nerd.  I'm ok with that!  Totally comes in handy sometimes!

I completed the "L" and the "R", painted in shadows, highlights and the whimsical little curls on each of the letters.  I also painted the sides of each canvas with the same woodgrain effect as the letters.


The finishing touch to these paintings was the thick, satin ribbon to hang them by.  Laura even let me hang them above the crib to ensure that they were perfect!

The best part about this project, is that I have the privilege of getting to know the tiny little client that I painted them for!  Up next, more kids art!

Making Tiger Cookies

Last night, I attended a cookie exchange with some of the other wives from my husband's squadron. I make a mean sugar cookie but they always look so plain so I decided to jazz them up! Of course, I couldn't just throw a few sprinkle on top. Our squadron's mascot is the bengal tiger so I decided to make little tiger cookies. I can't miss an opportunity to make food into art! These were actually so easy! I started with my good old sugar cookie recipe:

Ang's Famous Sugar Cookies

2 3/4 cups flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1 cup butter, softened

1 1/2 cups white sugar

1 egg

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

-Preheat oven to 375 degrees

-In small bowl, stir flour, baking soda, and baking powder. Set aside.

-In large bowl, cream together butter and sugar until smooth.

-Beat in egg and vanilla. Gradually add dry ingredients.

-Roll into rounded teaspoon balls and place on ungreased cookie sheet.

-Bake at 375 degrees for 8 to 10 minutes on regular cookie sheet, 12 minutes on stoneware.

So here's how these little dough balls turned into tigers....

Once the balls were rolled, I made two fat little triangles for each ball.

Then I stuck the triangles on the little balls and smoothed the edges to attach, kind of the playdough technique.

After baking, I had a little tiger head!

I gathered my decorating supplies: gel frosting tubes and little ball sprinkles.

I placed two orange stripes between the ears and on the sides of the face.

Then a black stripe in between the orange stripes, an upside down triangle for the nose and a smile! :)

Next, the white triangles in the ears and two white blobs for the eyes.

Last, one black sprinkle in the center of each eye.

They ended up looking a little surprised (!) but still cute! YUM!

Making Airplanes

I usually don't ask my husband for advice on paintings. Mostly because he is not quite the perfectionist about art that I am. If I ask him if one of my paintings needs more refining, color, or detail, nine times out of ten, he doesn't give me that answer that I want to hear. Poor guy. He can't help it. He's an Air Force pilot so his head is filled with airplanes, not art. However, for my latest project, I was pretty glad to have him around! My husband's boss' wife asked me to do a watercolor painting of three different military aircraft for her husband as a gift. I thought it might be fun to branch out a little plus I would get to experiment with painting clouds, which I love! The first airplane of the series is the C-130. It's nicknamed "Hercules" to an Air Force guy but to me, it's a big, grey, plain plane. What's so hard about that? I figured I would have it knocked out in a week, tops.

First I sat down to do the sketch during my daughter's nap, like I always do. The main body of the plane wasn't that difficult but when it came time to draw the details, I found myself stumped. What the heck was I looking at? Was that black mark a shadow or part of the engine? What about all the initials everywhere? What if I painted the wrong letters in? Luckily, I just happen to be married to an Air Force pilot! That night, we sat down with the digital photograph and my sketch. My sweet, patient husband walked me through the details of good old Hercules. He explained that the landing gear was not actually called a "hoo-ha" and the wing flaps were not referred to as "do-hickies." Apparently, I have a lot to learn about aircraft terminology. Whatever. At least I knew what I was drawing now.

A week later, the drawing was perfect. Now I could actually get to the fun part of painting! I painted over the plane itself with masking fluid, a very stinky but very useful liquid that acts like masking tape. Then, I started painting in the blue of the sky. I always like to layer different shades of blue in for the sky because they sky is never just one shade in real life. Then I used white gouache over the blue watercolor for the clouds. Once I had the clouds and sky painted in, I peeled up the masking fluid so I could start on the actual airplane. It may sound strange, but I love peeling the masking fluid! Like when you were a kid and you would cover your entire hand with Elmer's glue and let it dry just to peel it off (don't act like you never did that!). It is especially satisfying when it comes off in one giant piece, like it did this time. FUN.

Next, I had to mix a color for the body of the airplane. Unfortunately, Windsor & Newton does not have a paint called "Air Force Gray" so I had to mix. I don't mind mixing but, as many people know, I am a perfectionist so I just kept picking it apart. Was the gray too gray? Was it more of a blue gray? Once again my handy airplane-advisor stepped in and told me I was on the right track. So useful, that one! Next I added shadows, which really made this bad boy start to pop!

Last came the details. A few years ago my lovely, intelligent, scientist sister gave me some art supplies as a gift which included two teeny, tiny paintbrushes. I remember looking at them and thinking, "I am never going to use paintbrushes this small!" Well, it turns out that I use them more than any other paintbrushes that I have! And they were absolutely perfect for the details of this plane. So thanks, sis! The lettering took much longer than I expected, mainly because the Air Force uses a very angular font. Oh, if I could only settle for mediocre! I finally got every angle as good as possible. Two weeks into the painting and I was almost done! The propellors were the only part I had left. These propellors were on my mind constantly. I seriously had no clue what to do with them. I tried watercolor paint, watercolor pencil, charcoal, regular pencil. I even experimented with my daughter's crayons. Nothing looked right. I always keep a practice sheet handy while I'm painting and it was full of propellors (and one tiger eye; see previous post.) Finally, I went back to my teeny, tiny brushes and just dove in with the white gouache. Once I stopped thinking about it so much, the propellors actually came to fruition. With those complete, I was DONE!!!

So what did I learn from a C-130? I learned that sometimes, I do need what I never thought I would. I would probably still be obsessing about this painting if it hadn't been for my husband. Plus, I used my teeny, tiny paintbrushes so much, I had to replace them! Stay tuned for something completely different!

Making a Good-Bye Gift

As an Air Force wife, I am lucky to be part of an amazing group women! We are each others' support, friends, and surrogate families. Typically, the squadron commander's wife heads up things like social activities, fundraisers, and informational emails for the other spouses. Jill Hubert, our squadron commander's wife, has been that and so much more. She and her family are about to move to another base and as a parting gift, I wanted to create something special for her. Our squadron's mascot is a tiger, so a watercolor of this majestic animal seemed like the perfect choice. The first thing I did was search for the perfect picture to reference. There are a few things I know about Jill: she is strong, experienced in life, and very unique. I wanted to reflect all of those qualities in her tiger painting. Finding the right mood in a tiger photo proved to be tougher than I thought! I ran across mean tigers, cartoon tigers, mating tigers, even Tiger Woods. Not helpful. Eventually, I found the perfect picture. I sketched my tiger in the car on the way from Mississippi to Destin, Florida. I like to use my time in the car efficiently! The sketch was tough because the little intricate stripes and patterns were each so different. One shape looked like a little fish, the next looked like a little triangle, then a half moon. It was pretty easy to get lost in it.

Next, the fun part! I love to splash in a messy background with watercolor. Lots of water and splashing of paint! It took a few layers but I got the background to look like a blurry, out of focus jungle. I completed that part during my daughter's naptimes on vacation. Next, I mixed up a lovely shade of tiger-orange and started shading away to make this guy look three dimensional.

As I painted and studied the photograph up close, it really hit me just how beautiful tigers are! This was what I like to call a "That's God" moment. Like when you see a beautiful sunset or rainbow that is so stunning, you think "That's God!". Sounds cheesy, I know, but the gorgeous stripes and intricate patterns on this animal just made me think about God. He had a plan for the design of this tiger and he's got a plan for all of us, too. Feeling inspired, I added in the details of the stripes, fur, and face.

When I finally finished, I was pretty proud of my tiger. He looks strong and confident with some pretty distinctive patterns. It's always fun to watch a painting come to life and even more interesting to see where my thoughts wander while I am painting. Throughout the two weeks it took me to complete this project, I thought about Jill and how much she has done for our squadron, how she is not the "typical" squadron commander's wife, and how much she will be missed when she is gone. I thought about how strong Jill is to be able to pick up her life and family and move every time the Air Force says so. I thought about how tough it is to be a military spouse sometimes. We never really know what is coming next and we just have to go with it when it comes up! I also thought about the tiger and it's beautiful patterns. Up close, the patterns don't make too much sense, but when you step back, they really come together to make the tiger beautiful. Last, I thought about God some more. He has a plan for us, just like he had a design for the tiger. The events (moving to a place where you don't know a soul, your husband deploying for a year) might not make sense at the moment, but eventually they will come together in a beautiful plan. :)