How about this pretty painting of two fine hens to use as the jumping off point for greetings cards? Ideal for a friend who loves or keeps chickens, and you can personalise to include all the features of the chickens of the person who is going to be thrilled to receive it! The great thingRead more ⟶
Author: Diane
Whimsical Swallows in Flight
Before long our swallow population will be lining up on the power lines for their last assemblies before saying goodbye and heading south for their winters in Africa. The farm will feel much quieter when they are gone, and our skies are no longer filled with the swooping, sweeping curves of their flight. This summerRead more ⟶
Whimsical Teddy Bear Family
Here’s a fun teddy bear painting ideal to while away a few idle moments! Perfect gift for a new baby great or one to do with the kids and perfect for a card for your friends! Add your own personal touches to make it yours! The great thing about this little painting is that itRead more ⟶
Leaves and Berries with Gold Accents
Today I’m using my Kuretake Gansai Tambi paints to create a richly detailed and stylishly colorful whimsical leaf design to help you practice your watercolor skills. Using a relaxed and enjoyable method to embellish the rich tones of the Kuretake paint with gold accents, you’ll be thrilled with your results and want to do more!Read more ⟶
How to bring Freedom into your Art
Today I’m sharing with you the most important secret in my artistic life! And it might just be the right thing for you to do too! Nowadays it’s very typical for people to choose a ready-made box of paints to paint from and this is definitely a good option for beginners. I’m personally very fondRead more ⟶
Whimsical Mushroom Forest
Using Kuretake Gansai Tambi watercolor paints This beautiful mushroom forest painting is beginner-friendly, as well as being a challenge for more advanced artists. It’s easy to make the design different by painting only one or two of the mushrooms, and making the whole picture bigger or smaller depending on whether you want a full sizeRead more ⟶
Kuretake Gansai Tambi Watercolor Paints – How Good Are They? 
Road test them with me and find out! I’m a bit of a traditionalist. Nowadays many people would call me a dinosaur. I actually heard that term used of anyone who believed in the difference between black and white the other day and admit to being somewhat miffed. However, I cast my traditional, dinosauric attitudesRead more ⟶
Paint Easy House Plants Fast and Free
Usually when I paint flowers or plants I do just that. Then, I have to decide what to put my creation in! The pot or vase are only too often left to a last minute sketchy thing which does nothing for the whole composition, or, even worse, left out entirely! Today though I am turningRead more ⟶
Pretty Floral Four Ways
There are days when you want to do something a bit different. Maybe your watercolors aren’t calling to you as loudly as usual, or you just want something quick and easy to do in a ten minute break. Here’s a design I did in four different ways and you can see how if you watchRead more ⟶
Relaxing Golden Doodle Circles
When we get a new set of paints, one of the first things we want to do is try them all out. It’s become quite the “thing” to “swatch out” your new box of paints in squares or rectangles to give you a record of what the colors look like, full strength and watered down.Read more ⟶
Watercolor Summer Flowers
We all love flowers, and what is more delightful than to paint a bouquet of summer blooms? Here is a simple, loose, easy summer painting for you to enjoy. Flowers look their very best when they are painted loosely and with expression, and they are most forgiving, allowing you to freely redesign their leaves andRead more ⟶
The Village Walk
Landscapes are daunting. No doubt about it, with all that perspective and the arrangement of the features you want to include. Then there’s scale, and tonal values, and proportions, and and and…. But there is an answer. Why not try my two-dimensional fun landscape of your village or townscape? For this painting I used aRead more ⟶
Kuretake Graphite Colors and Circles
Today in the post I received my order of a set of Kuretake Gansai Tambi Graphite colors. I have been the proud owner of a set of Starry Colors since Christmas when I couldn’t resist the idea of using gold and silver on the cards I was making. But when I saw these Graphite colorsRead more ⟶
How to Paint a Rainbow
Exploring your paintbox can be an exciting experience especially if you decide to pick out all the bright and cheerful colors and paint a loose rainbow! Use the resulting splash of color to form the background for an ink drawing and make lovely bookmarks and greetings cards galore! Or use it in your journal asRead more ⟶
Home Sweet Home Greetings Card to paint
How about this little Home Sweet Home landscape to use as the jumping off point for greetings cards? Ideal for a New Home or First Home message, which you can personalise to include all the features of the home of the person who is going to be thrilled to receive it! And no need toRead more ⟶
Whimsical Sheep for you to paint
Here’s a fun sheep painting ideal to while away a few idle moments before you go to bed and maybe help you sleep at night! A great one to do with the kids and perfect for a card for your friends! Add your own personal touches to make it yours! The great thing about thisRead more ⟶
Summer Flower Power – A Festival of Fun
If there’s one thing that’s bound to cheer up a petulant painter who can’t think what to paint, it’s got to be flowers. Dubbed a “perennial trending” subject, flowers can be guaranteed to lift the mood and raise a smile! Just like the feathers we did, the great thing about flower painting, which I onlyRead more ⟶
Paint Fancy Feathers for your Junk Journal
Yesterday I found four little feathers in the field where my studio sits, and couldn’t resist the temptation to paint a few feathery friends – after all, we’ve been painting a bird a day for a month now, maybe time to add a few fanciful feathers? The great thing about painting feathers like these isRead more ⟶