Photo of the Week

I really love the color of pink grapefruit and it's fun to photograph!  I'll admit that this photo is edited a bit.  I experimented with all kinds of patterned paper as the background and then played around with PicMonkey for a while.  This greenish-yellowish paper turned out to be my favorite.. so bright and perfect for spring!

I may have to print this one out and frame it :)

Patterson's Pond, #2

I love water.  I love hearing, seeing it, and being in it!  

This is my second watercolor of Patterson's Pond, the small body of water near my hometown of St. Johns, AZ where I like to go canoeing with my family when I visit.  It's one of the few recreational spots around. 

 I took some photos of it last spring when I visited and painted this from one of the photos.  Now it's hanging in my living room to remind of home :)

Guest Post: Everyday Art

Hey guys! Today is my first time having a guest post here... fun stuff!  I hope you'll take some time to read about my friends Emily and Jaime here.  They have a wonderful blog :) P.S. We're swapping today so my guest post is up at their blog.  Have fun!


Hi Everyone! We're happy to be here today on Grow Creative. Doesn't Elise have fantastic taste? :)
We LOVE her watercolors!
Today we just wanted to introduce ourselves a bit. We're Emily and Jaime from Everyday Art.

We're two sister-in-laws (Jaime married Emily's handsome older brother) who, like Elise, believe that everyday can be filled with creative outlets, and we love to explore them. Here we are with some of our kids.

It's so fun to have a sister-in-law that you want to find excuses to talk to each other--it's great! We started a blog because we used to live next to each other (literally a few doors down) and now that we are states away from one another we needed a way to bounce ideas off one another, show each other our projects, share recipes, etc.

 We have 5 basic areas where we create our "art" (playing chef, artistic home decor, throwing memorable parties, hand crafts, and fun with the kids) so we wanted to share our favorite in each category.

Creating Beautiful, Tasty food:

The Lemon Puff Pastry Dessert.

Light and fluffy and unique and dazzling and fun. There aren't enough adjectives to describe this one. We LOVE to cook and bake and try several new recipes a week, so new foods are always up-and-coming on our blog. Desserts are, of course, the most fun, but we have lots of main dishes and breakfasts too.

Creating Artistic Home Decor:

Apple Blossom Canvas Tutorial.

We both made a pair of apple blossom canvases, which turned out beautiful and unique to each of our styles. (Here's Jaime's). And we've shared the tutorial with you! Other of our favorites include the rag rug,  tree mural and turtle/frog canvases we did for our kids' rooms.

Creating Hand Crafts:

The Felt Flowers.

These flowers turned out great and were fun to make. Emily made an adorable yarn wreath with them, but they've been picked up by several hair-bow blogs--how cute would that be? We also knit and crochet and have made all sorts of beanies, Christmas stockings, animals, even dresses.

Creating Fantastic Parties:

Honeybee Birthday Party.

Such a cute party theme for such a cute girl! We love parties--we've thrown all sorts of fun ones--a pink puppy party, a garden lady bug party, a vintage Strawberry Shortcake party, monster party, a superhero party....

Creating Memories with our Kids:

Make your own SLIME!

Sooo fun--even for grown up! No one can resist giving it a squish with their fingers. We did it on a cold afternoon, but wouldn't it be fun for a scientist bday party? or an art party even....

We had lots of fun this year--making forts, painting, having fun with Food Dye, and just plain having fun, but this idea was a particular favorite.

We love creating lives that we want to live in and invite you to come along and see if you don't find some new recipes or projects you'd like to try. :)

Thanks Elise!

Lots of love from your crew at Everyday Art,

Crochet Sunglasses Case

I'm one of those people that need new sunglasses pretty much every year.  They inevitably get scratched or smashed somehow.  I never bothered to buy or make a case for them till now.....

I scoured the web for a good crochet sunglasses case pattern and I found a winner HERE at Dly's Hooks and Yarns.  Check it out!

I had to do a little adjusting from her pattern.  My first try was way too big so I adjusted the pattern to only chaining 8 at the beginning instead of 12.  This made it smaller and  really quick to make, but the stitches are still too loose for my liking.  In the future I plan to use a smaller hook to make a tighter weave to protect my glasses even better.

I also switched up the colors to make it more fun and added one of my mini-crochet flowers to the front.

Colorful crochet things just make me smile :)

Photo of the Week

Another bird photo........ taken at the Hogle Zoo with my son last week on free zoo day!  It was a good day because honestly, I haven't felt well enough to go out and do something like that in a while.  It's amazing how much the small things mean to me now.   I plan on taking advantage of all the free days at parks, zoos, and museums I can this year.  I have a feeling once I finally get all the way off my meds and the withdrawals subside, the migraines will be better.. at least that is my hope :)

p.s. Happy March! Spring is on it's way. I couldn't be happier about that :)

Animal Silhouette Paintings

Ever since we checked out Have you ever seen a Smack of Jellyfish from the library, I've been wanting to paint more animal silhouettes.  That book is full of beautiful animal silhouette illustrations.  awesome!

I didn't have any stencils for these like with my other Stenciled Watercolor Projects, but I found a way to make it work.  I used the same pencil transfer technique that I used in my Watercolor Portraits to trace the outlines of the elephants and bird.  Then I just painted in the lines.  It worked quite well!

I'll have to do more of these.  The Mom and Baby elephant painting sold within a few days of listing it in my Etsy Shop!  It now has a happy home in Virginia.

A Few Fun Cards

Here are some cards I've made over the last few months.....

I don't think I'll ever get tired of butterflies or flowers or stamping with watercolors! 

This one was an experiment with colored pencils.  It's different from what I normally go for, but I like it :)