Art for the Kitchen: Woodburned Wooden Spoons

The kitchen holds so much of our lives:

cooking, eating, washing dishes, chatting and laughter, playing games, singing...

It makes sense to fill our kitchens with things that we love, don't you think?  Since I can't always find those quirky things I have a liking for, creating some becomes the only option.

Having a Russian father, I have a special place in my heart for Russian nesting dolls (matryoshka dolls), which aren't always easy to find, so I decided to wood-burn one on my spoon..

Making Borscht will be extra fun now, I think.

Here is the process I use to go about wood-burning wooden spoons.

First I sketch the design I've chosen lightly with pencil.  I then begin wood-burning as if I was using a pen.  (There is not way to erase with a pen, so that is why it is more like drawing with a pen rather than a pencil.  There is no room for error so having a steady hand is necessary.)

Being careful 

1. not to let the wood-burner sit too long on any spot: this makes a deep, dark burn;

2. not to accidentally touch anywhere on the spoon with the tool where marks are not wanted because it can make marks rather quickly.

These are two tips that I had to learn the hard way.

When the burning is finished and you are satisfied with your burning, turn the wood-burning tool off and set it aside in a place where it can safely cool; it stays hot for a bit of time (and be sure to stop when you like it as it is: better to stop when it is satisfying than to continue and possibly make an un-fixable mistake).

Once you have made sure the spoon is also cooled, erase the pencil markings from the spoon.

Next I use coconut oil and rub it into the spoons.  I also have some beeswax around, so I rub in a small bit of that, too.  You just want to rub in an oil that wouldn't be harmful to eat as some will come off when you use it in cooking.  I have found rubbing coconut oil into my wooden spoons every few months helps to keep them from cracking.


The backs of the spoons are also fun to burn but be sure to do them before you rub the oil onto the spoon's front.

I enjoyed doing these spoons more than I expected, so I bought a selection at a kitchen store and burned them to sell at the Christmas craft sales.  These were fun to work on in the evening when the kids were in bed and I was sure to have quiet (and no bumping).

I got some ideas from Pinterest, some from calendars or cards, some from things I have enjoyed drawing before.  The scope of ideas is endless!

 

 

 

I think these chickens were from a design I saw on a piece of material; I liked their quaint simplicity.

 

 

 

 I did not sell all of the spoons, so some were great to give away in Christmas gift bags.

 I had fun making these and I'm sure you might, too!

Thanks for stopping by!

Sketching Several Photos into One Piece of Art: the Farmer and the Horse.

  My house has been busy with several projects lately, and I thought I'd stop by to share one of them today.

   I was asked to do a piece for a lady that would be done in pencil.  Her husband has told their children stories about a farmer and his work horse and she wanted for me to create an image to remind them of those story times with him.  She wanted the man to be indistinguishable, as we all know how we form pictures in our heads when we hear stories, and she wanted each child to be able to keep their own ideas of what he looks like.

We looked up some images on Pinterest to try to get a working idea together, and I began to use these as basics of what to work toward.  (I will suggest if you like horses, type in 'work horse' or 'draft horse' on Pinterest...there are AMAZING pictures of them!)  I found several photos ideas for the farmer and the horse.

  I started by measuring out and drawing a box in the size that was wanted for the image to be.  This gave me guidelines of how large to make the sketches.

I spent a considerable amount of time sketching the images onto tracing paper.

(There were more eraser crumbs on that page than is probably legitimate for one piece of artwork!)

Often, I would stop and take a picture and then walk away, come back, and look at the picture in the camera.  Something about doing that makes me get a clearer perspective on it.

I could see in the image above that my horse's nose was off from what a work horse's nose should be.

In this sketch, I could see the horse's eye not right, and the man was a bit disproportionate as well.

I finally got a sketch I thought I could work with,

rubbed charchoal on the back lightly,

and then traced over the front drawing lines so the image would go onto my good paper.

I then began first with the eye of the horse.

When that was where and how I wanted it, I added some detail around it.

I did not mind that my horse was not exact. I wanted to take some artistic license as to the coloring and the angle that the horse would be approaching the farmer because I was using a few different photos to create the image I was trying to achieve.  The photos were just used as guides.

 

Here is a picture that shows you the light sketch that was transferred of the whole image.

 

I continued adding more details to the horse.

At this point, I realized I did not like what I was seeing in the nostril/chin/lower muzzle shape of the piece, so I set it aside to pick up for another day.

I will do the same now and will show the pictures/progress of that part in my next post.

Thank you for stopping by!

Art Lesson: Shading Water with Watercolors.

Hello!

Today I am going to post a video I made a while ago and just never got it on the blog.

I was working with watercolors, a picture of a cat drinking from a pond

(it was actually something I was working on for a book I had written hoping to get published,

but have put that on the back burner for now while I am working on something more pressing).

The original picture of the cat had much more detail in the water of the sky and the trees overhead,

but I chose to just shade some of the ripples around the cat drinking and leave the rest whites and grays.

Here I will show you how I worked on shading the ripples.

 That is all I am going to share today.  I do hope to be back again really soon!

I hope this was helpful for somebody.

It is fun to work with watercolors and it seems that the more one works with them

the more confident and fun one can have with them.

Thanks for stopping by!

Art Lesson: Watercolor Painted Vintage Wall Art

I was feeling the need to make my mantel sing of spring,

so I dug up these old wooden oval pieces I had once painted on and decided I did not like.

I decided to paint the edging of these ovals in black.

I found some vintage images on the Graphics Fairy of birds and printed them up in the center of each page by pasting them into Word and situating them to the size and place that I wanted them.

 (We've had a visiting blue jay to our yard in the last 2 weeks who is as blue of a blue jay I have ever seen).

I wanted to add a bit of color, so I splashed water all over the page with a paint brush

and then added some blue

and then some touches of red.

 Once that had settled into the paper a little bit,

I began painting the bird with a darker and less watered down blue.

 I filled in the leaves, branch, and flowers as well.

 Once the jay was done, I followed the same process for the Robin picture.

It is always a nice break to just paint an image that is already all drawn up for you.

Who doesn't love a bit of coloring-book style painting?

 I let these dry thoroughly and then cut them to fit into the oval shapes

(I did this by tracing the full oval shape onto the page and then cutting it down evenly on all sides until it fit, but a piece of tracing paper would also work to be more precise.

Laying it into the frame and running a pencil around the inside edge carefully should work).

Once I had them cut, I spread glue all over the backs of the images and then pasted them into the ovals, using paint containers to hold the image down on all the edges.

 Wanting a more vintage look, I heated some water and, using a damp teabag,

dabbed the warmed tea bag all over the image until it was stained as I wanted.

(This could also be done before gluing the image into the frame).

 The teabag was so used up, it cracked at bit and shed some bits of tea onto the images,

but I left them there to dry to add more character.

Once dried, I painted two coats of Mod Podge, allowing the first coat to dry completely before applying the second coat.

I then applied a squeeze of Martha Stewarts all purpose gloss paint from the bottle it comes in around the edges to make them look sealed in to the frame.  I used a paint brush to carefully brush it in and a few damp q-tips to clean up any smears.

Here they are all finished.  Can you see the difference with the Mod Podge?

The shine makes them look more like framed pictures.

I then put some frame wall hangers on the backs of the bird art

and hung them over the mantel in the living rooom

They added a touch of quaint, older looking decor to the wall with no expense at all:

I just recycled and used the supplies that I had...

aren't those the best kinds of projects?

Have you added any spring to your home this season?

I am still working on the bee picture.

It is coming along pretty well, but I am trying to wait until it is all finished before I share the processes I tried with it.

Thanks for stopping by!

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Living Spaces in the Flower Gardens.

Hello!  Did you do anything creative this weekend?

I did a few things but mostly spent a lot of time catching up on housework...the plant sales and kept me so busy that my house was in desperate need of some drastic attention.  It feels great to have a good part of the house done but I still have a few areas I hope to finish this week.

It is so hard to be inside when the weather is perfect.  The sun shone all weekend and it was a perfect temperature of warm out.  I took a few pictures because it is incredible how a couple weeks can transform the gardens.

 

I have a few different types of allium, but these are my favorite.

The flowers are about 4 inches in diameter each.

I did spend some time to clean up the basement porch.

The winter woodpile by the door was finally used up as it has been such a cold spring.

I love how adding a few plants on the porch seems to extend the garden in.

I painted the long bench and the wooden bucket some cheerful colors.

I was going to separate this hosta I dug up from one of the gardens but ended up planting it into the bucket for now.

Perennials are my usual choice for plants, but this dainty purple plant was a gift to each of the ladies at our mother-daughter banquet so I potted it up and set it on the window sill...

as long as the curious cat doesn't knock it off.

It always seems that by the time I have caught up with the house and gardens,

a group has formed of new plants I want to put in.

(My husband and kids started the winter woodpile back where I had plants stocked for the sale just as soon as I got them moved back to the field again.  His work never ends).

I collect hostas; this one is called Pineapple Upside Down Cake.

There are hundreds of hosta varieties and they have great names and beautiful colorings and textures.

I try to limit myself to just a handful of new varieties each year.  As they grow, I separate them and plant them into three different gardens and then I can dig one up and every year or so to have the extras to sell at my plant sale.

(This lets me feel like my collection pays for itself...eventually.

I enjoy collecting something that stays outside and becomes beautiful without my having to dust it or vacuum around it; and the fact that it grows and can be shared makes it even better).

This year I chose Queen of the Seas, Popcorn, Northern Exposure, Miss Suzie, Ripple Effect,

and Ulysses S. Grant.
See what I mean?  They have fun names, don't you think?

Of course, simple blooms like that of the Cornflower are sweet to see.

The Bridal Veil Spirea is in full bloom right now.  The scent of it takes me back to my grandmother's when I was a child.

This is what the gardens look like most of the time in the spring.

I found some dwarf wisteria shoots in the place where I had moved it from and dug them up to see how they would do.

Unfortunately, my walkways are seldom tidy.

Chickens and ducks seem to like the gardens as much as I do,

no matter how much I try to shoo them out.  I kept them penned up until the plant sales were done

and it just seems hard to keep them penned all season with all the thousands of bugs to catch and the green grass to nibble on,
so I try to work with it.

It's hard to believe how much has grown since my earlier post on this flower bed >HERE<.

My plans now are to extend the garden below, clear the center of it, and make an area for our picnic table so we can spend time eating outside this summer.

I would love for my husband to build a support system over it for the wisteria to grow on,
but that may have to wait until the wood is done and the hay fields are mowed and the barns are cleaned out...

Still, it is fun to imagine what I want this place to become.

Until next time, I'll try to finish up the bee picture I mentioned in the last post.
It might be a struggle to stay focused with the blooms calling to me outside,
but I'll get to it!

(Viburnum Doublefile)


Thank you for stopping by.

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