Happy new year! Woo 2018!

January 2, 2018January 2, 2018 | Sal Scheibe

Happy new year to all of my art friends! Hope it’s a wonderful year for everyone and we’re all very productive and successful with our artistic endeavors.

This year, I’ve signed up for a batch of online art courses. I was lucky enough to get the Art Bundle Bundle for Good this year and there are soooooo many wonderful workshops included that I’m a bit overwhelmed. I’ll work through those as I can. I’m also working my way through two year long programs, Book of Days 2018 with Effy Wild, and Moonshine 2018, also with Effy Wild. Both are focused on art journalling though BoD is more general art journal stuff and Moonshine has a witchy/pagan bent. They’re both looking amazing so far! I didn’t sign up for LifeBook this year. I did it last year (well, maybe a quarter of it) but with all of the other courses, I thought it might be too much. I still have to produce art to make a living and can’t spend all of my days on the super fun stuff! LOL. Above is the first journal spread for the new year, this one from Book of Days. My word for the year: ENERGY! Hope I can sustain it! I usually fade in February.

This January, I’m doing the Doodlewash Watercolour challenge! It’s 31 happy things to paint for the month of January. I’m a day behind already. Par for the course! But I’ll catch up tonight I hope. I usually do the 30 Paintings in 30 Days January challenge but that’s been postponed until February this year. Works for me! I can do it next.

Above are a few ATCs from various swaps and events over at illustratedATCs.com, my favourite trading place. I think I might make some larger versions of the octopus Art Nouveau hair. So much fun.

I’m participating in Art Journal Journey this year! My first post 🙂

Born to be wild, but only a little bit

November 10, 2017 | Sal Scheibe

This is me to a T. You should see me on pub night. LOL.

Actually, I’m a night owl in real life. I stay up late making art or playing Dragon Age but the wild part only happens when we’re actually out doing something and then only until the sun sets. Then I’m done! I used to be out every weekend until 2 or 3 am in my youth but I think that might kill me now. Middle age. Wow.

The artwork above was done as part of LifeBook 2017. Such a fun workshop!

Below is a quickie for last week’s Illustration Friday. The theme was Women (I’m the one with the martini). I’m clearly a slack poster. I have no idea what the theme is this week.

The annoyed look

October 13, 2017 | Sal Scheibe

I think I’ve felt like this girl looks most of the week. It was a really busy long weekend that just passed and my husband and I took a day off of work as well (visitors) so I’ve felt behind and not on track. You see, fall is my busy time. I plan out the new graphic sets I’ll be working on, I get my stores in order and I seem to have the most illustration inquiries and projects around this time too. I have a long list in my notebook and hardly anything is crossed off! Plus I haven’t had a lot of time for personal art either. This folded arm art was finished last night after I went out for a drink. Maybe that’s why my lines are a bit wobbly, LOL. I haven’t had a chance to post recently but I have been busy making lots of graphic and journal sets. I’m almost ready to release a batch of new stuff! Yay! That always feels good. Next week I hope, when my entire week is my own.

This weekend we’re off to the symphony. Mozart and Dvořák. WOO! Looking forward to this one. I used to have subscription tickets and don’t anymore so it’s been a sad while for the symphony and me. But I did spy on the calendar that my local symphony is doing Beethoven’s 9th in the spring. Oh JOY! That’s on my list now too. I saw the 9th with the Toronto Symphony a few years back and it was so beautiful. Actually, maybe I will paint Beethoven in my new art journal. Brilliant but grumpy. It’s a good look for composers.

Butterflies & Tomatoes

October 2, 2017October 2, 2017 | Sal Scheibe

The weather is pretty weird lately. I’m in Canada and normally at this time of the year, it’s starting to chill quite a bit. But this year we had a crazy warm hot spell at the end of September and my tomato plants have re-blossomed! It’s way too late in the season for them to develop into fruit but it was a valiant effort. Makes me sad too – hot weather this late in the year. On the brighter side, my fall gardening is mostly done now. I only have to rake… like 50 times. I am surrounded by trees.

Above is a mixed media piece from my new art journal. I was feeling the warm autumn colours and wanted to go with something cheerful and fun before the snow starts. Winter is coming. OMG. I had to say that. It’s my GoT addiction showing. I’ll work on a few snow ladies soon. I’m ready for the white stuff to appear!

I’m going to have a whole new set of prints soon for my art store. And a new batch of original ACEOs and probably some postcard sized art too. I’ll be uploading and announcing some sales over the coming month or two!

Yet another new journal

September 28, 2017September 28, 2017 | Sal Scheibe

I have an addiction to new sketchbooks. I’m sure I’ve mentioned it before on this blog. It’s hard for me to pass by the paper shelves in an art store without flipping through the sketchbooks and touching the papers to see how smooth they’d be for paint or pencil. I just went in to buy picture hooks, I swear!! But on Tuesday, I came out of the art store with yet another mixed media soft cover journal. And I’ve been on a major painting roll since then. Coincidence? I think not. It’s a large Strathmore Mixed Media journal and I love the thing. Super paper for messy art makers and the soft cover makes for some easily bendable pages. All of these ladies are in the new art journal and I’ve decided to fill it all with different mixed media portraits. There’s more art actually. But I didn’t want to plaster the portraits all in one blog post. I’m positive I’ll be totally art burned out by next week so I’ll save them for a blog post then. LOL.

I bought a new scanner this week and I want to recommend it to my artist friends. It’s an Epson V370 and WOW – do I ever love this thing! It’s so amazingly clear and it scans my artwork a gazillion times better than my old Canon LIDE (which did me well for years but has slowly died). What I especially like is that it picks up ALL of the colour. My old scanner would totally skimp out on the pinks and the yellows, and purples too. I often had to heavily edit in Photoshop to get my scanned art to look like the original art. But now I don’t have to. Yay! This Epson scans the art and the scan looks just like the art. It’s brilliant.

I’m still blogging along with Effy this month though I’m clearly slacking. Work gets in the way, and painting in new journals too! Happy weekend everyone.

Breaking out the jazz hands!

September 8, 2017September 8, 2017 | Sal Scheibe

I honestly can’t say I’m a joyful person. I’m often happy for sure but I’m more shy and quiet with a simmering current of mellow most days. I can definitely be hotheaded or giggle like a giddy schoolgirl though my general mood tends toward navel gazing silence. But every once in a while, I totally break out the jazz heads and spread joy! This usually includes warm summer sun, good food, friendly people and wine (or beer in a past life). I like hosting holidays and family parties, even though it’s really taxing on this introvert. But I like to entertain at home in my comfort zone and be surrounded by people I enjoy and love.

Art makes me feel joyful too. When I get on a roll, I can paint for the rest of my life. Those are the very best days.

I’m happily working on digital journal kits right now. A friend told me I should probably cater more to the art journal crowd and that’s what I’m doing! I’m taking her good advice. I have tons of collage sheets and lots of cool little journal kits on the go. I’ve already finished a super creepy vintage journal kit in time for Halloween and am working on Hot Burlesque and Vintage Recipes. I hope to have all of them in my store next week, after I complete some ‘how to’ PDFs along with the promo graphics. It’s the admin stuff that always takes the longest. I can joyfully work on the art and then sludge and stomp my way through promotion and marketing.

This month, I’m blogging along with Effy. Join us!

Happy weekend everyone!

Empathy Monsters with real feelings

July 21, 2017July 25, 2017 | Sal Scheibe

I’m still on the Life Book 2017 thing! Surprisingly, since usually after about 3 or 4 weeks of a workshop, I move on to something else. Above are a set of empathy monsters meant to be sent to a swap partner to give them positive messages. It’s a cute idea. I made one for myself and one was sent to Texas. I haven’t received mine yet but I’m looking forward to it! Life Book is filled with lots of art therapy type of lessons and to be honest, I’m beginning to find it a bit overwhelming. I’m more of a “show me the technique” type of learner than I am a “feelings” type of learner though I can see why the program is so appealing for so many. It’s very positive. I just like the nitty gritty. How do you like to learn? Are you art therapy or art techniques or both? Or something else?

Below is art from my sketchbook, a challenge from my 11 year old daughter. She asked if I could draw a lazy, fat cat with a t-shirt on and the t-shirt had to have cat puns on it. Challenge met!

Instagram user? Please let me know your instagram name! I know I follow a few of you already but I love to see daily art and I love instagram. You can find me as SLSLines.

A bad art bonfire happened

July 10, 2017 | Sal Scheibe

I recently signed up for Lifebook 2017 and have been working my way through the weekly lessons and found one that really floats my boat. The idea is to write out negative words about yourself and then burn that piece of paper and use the ash/gel medium mixture in a piece of art. I didn’t want to write more negative thoughts so I decided to burn some bad art. I have a lot of it. Mine I mean! So many ugly sketches, misshapen bodies from life drawing and half done trading cards, LOL. I could literally start a big bonfire with my shoddy offerings to the art gods. But I went small and only burned a couple of drawings in a bowl in my kitchen sink. Even that was enough to have me waving my arms around trying to dispel the ridiculous amount of smoke. If you do this art exercise, go outside!!

Another week’s work below, whimsical owls. I’m not big on drawing quirky critters but these are ok.

Sky space hair and sloths… in watercolor!

July 6, 2017 | Sal Scheibe

I’m still playing around in my new Strathmore journal and loving it. I love that I can go pencil, watercolors, collage and paint all in the same journal on a nice quality, thick paper. So good! Above is the space and sky Mucha hair girl. I’ve been seeing a lot of sky or space hair lately and I wanted to give it a whirl. It was fun but honestly, it took me ages to paint in between all of the hair bits, lol. I usually enjoy a quick approach to art.

Above are another couple of pages. If sloths could talk, I think this is what they would say.

Happy weekend everyone! I hope it’s a good one for you!

Watercolor illustrations & mixed media

June 29, 2017 | Sal Scheibe

I’ve really been enjoying mixed media art over the past couple of weeks. I signed up (super late, I know) for Life Book 2017 a week or two back and all of the wonderful videos have totally inspired me to get working on new canvas art. I’ll be posting a lot more soon! I also bought a smaller 5.5″ x 8″ mixed media sketchbook from Strathmore and wow, do I ever love this thing! It’s a softcover book so really easy to bend back the cover for double page spreads and the paper is high quality and thick. I love it. I’ve been working in it for the past couple of nights, having lots of watercolor and mixed media fun.

Anyone else in Life Book 2017? It’s my first time taking an online course like this and all of the woo is a little weird for me but it’s such a positive experience and I’m really enjoying it. I wish the course was in person though. It’s much more fun to create in a group with art friends, right? If you’re in my local area, let me know! I’m in K-W. Maybe we can art together 🙂