Little Lina’s Lovelies Home

This week I’ve found myself in the between time. Between projects, it’s like holding my breath.

Last month’s oil painting is drying, awaiting it’s final sand and varnish.

The sketch for my next painting is sadly draped over my printer watching me sand and add layers of gesso her panel. This is the between time I don’t like, the time when I am itching to put my paintbrush into the eewie-gooie of the paint and smoosh it around on the board in that semi-subconscious happiness.

So I do the color comp for the next painting, maybe that will help?

but it doesn’t because now I can only hope the final piece will look somewhat like this. Once I get going with that paintbrush I just go with it, so we’ll see what I create in a couple weeks.

In the mean time, to keep me from going too nuts during the between time, I am working on my studio, here’s a sneak peek.

Hoping this weekend I’ll get to put together my cubby unit from IKEA, the idea of myself and powertools…hmmm….But once I have this studio finished a little more I’ll restart my shows, and you’ll be able to watch me work on paintings. YAY!
Till then, have a great weekend!

During the deep freeze of the last couple weeks, things were pretty busy. Besides creating probably the world’s best fish chowder recipe, the January painting got underway and the littlelinaslovelies boutique sold some items as well. Picture time!

This is the January piece that I am painting LIVE on my lunch hour show this week. I broadcast from 12pm to 1pm so you can sit back at your desk, veg out and watch some magic happen. You might even be inspired to throw down some paint yourself!

Original sketch

Underpainting in raw umber

Fast forward through 1 picture and you have where I am today

These got out the door after the snow melted and I wasn’t snowed in anymore!

So all in all, pretty good start to the New Year. By the way, you can keep up with my antics on my flickr site too, I post more things there than I blog about here and you can see my pictures larger than you see them here. Hope where ever you are, you’re staying warm!

Very quick sketch for this friday.
The theme was Caution and since recently wasps and rashes from poisons have taken over life as I know it, I was inspired to do this piece. The leaves in her hair are poison ivy, I know they aren’t so detailed so you can tell at first glance. I really intended to paint this one this week, but time was not on my side.

I have a lot I want to say about this piece, and no time! It’s for the illustrationfriday theme of “wrapped”.

First of all I firmly believe that the word butterfly should actually change to flutterby. Think about it, they don’t like butter nor are they flies, but they DO flutter by! It’s my personal campaign to rename these beautiful creatures.

About this illo, I rushed rushed rushed to do it, and to make this post, so I hope you like the illo.

Lastly, I will have this as a print up for sale in my art section asap, just not tonight.

Thanks for stopping by!

My illustration for this week’s illustrationfriday.com theme of “Modify” not only is a modification of my usual logo for littlelinaslovelies.com, it is also to let you know:

I’m now officially on Twitter > www.twitter.com/linaslovelies

Now you can keep up with my everyday antics. I sing the following song to you (sung to the Styx song Come Sail Away) Come follow me, Come follow me, Come foooolllow meee Today! Ok, that’s lovely, I hope I entertained you in some fashion.

Anyway, I hope you like this modification to my logo, I think the bird is adorable! I might be bias though. I also tweaked some things about the eye area that I didn’t like before.

Hope to see you on Twitter my fine, artistic friends!

This is my submission to illustration friday this week for their theme of Idle.

"The Unfortunate"
I could not help but think of these harder than normal economic times and how so many are out of work and wondering what to do next. If only they had that magical crystal ball to look into the future to see if everything will be alright.

I wonder through all the good times what Fortune Tellers were doing. I don’t suppose they are idle these days.

So, that brings up the question, was this a happy painting because the Fortune teller was idle?

huh…/scratches head…perhaps.

Artist’s note for this piece: her eyes are actually sans pupils, she is blind. I thought that was more meaningful. Oh, and sorry for the watermark, can’t be too careful these days!

This piece will be up in my shop for purchase soon, I have a feeling I want to play with it a bit more. So check back often!

This piece was super hard for me to create without a reference, and I’m still not happy. But maybe some of you will enjoy the piece anyway, maybe you can find the enchantment I cannot after working on it so hard. I think it’s like when you cook, you don’t always taste the flavors.

This is my illo for illustrationfriday.com, the theme is “cracked”.

I actually did her entire face, then added the black on the sides so you have the impression she is looking out at you from behind a cracked open door. I’ll post the entire face next week, her full face is very pretty.

He saw her eyes,
before she was lost in the crowd.
Now he lives in His Confetti Dream.

This is my illustration for illustrationfriday.com. The theme was Parade, and I’ll admit, I had trouble getting into the theme. I just couldn’t picture doing parade girls. So I asked myself, what do I remember liking about parades? The cotton candy, and the confetti. So, there ya go, no big bang behind this one, but I have to say, I think this one came out beautifully. And I even did a little poem for ya! ~ Enjoy ~

When this week’s illustration friday theme came around, I instantly knew what I wanted to do, an illustration of a Queen Mother and her Princess Daughter. Perfect for Mother’s Day. So here it is:

To all you mothers out there, or mom’s-to-be, I hope that on Mother’s Day you feel like a Queen!

And to my own Mother, Love you Always and Forever, you are a wonderful person, a fantastic friend, and I could never thank you enough for being my fan. Muah!

- A little about this watercolor illustration. It’s an aceo card. What is an ACEO? ACEO stands for Art Cards Editions and Originals. Many artists are doing these now-a-days, they are a wonderful way of having a little piece of art by an artist you really love. I am getting into them now, so check back in my boutique every so often and you might see some you like!