Hey Everybody!

Hope you are all doing good. It's so hard to find the time to keep up with everything. Blogs, Facebook, artwork + all the other everyday things in life.

I taught 2 more classes last Saturday. One on "Skin, Hair & Eyes" and another on "Shadows & Shading". It is awesome to be able to help people learn to like their Copic Markers.

I can't wait until the newest colors are available. Yeah! On the 12th I will teach a class on "Wood, Bark & Fencing".

I learned a new really really cool way to color backgrounds around your images. It is a kind of watercolor effect. I'm not sure which class I'm going to put it with, but maybe the Fashion Class. It is my new favorite thing to do right now with my markers.

Okay, well if any of you ladies that came to the last classes have any questions, please feel free to email me. Or even send me a pic of your work and I will try to help you any way I can.

Shadows & Shading Class

For our next class, we will focus on how to Shade & add Shadows to our images. For this class you will need markers T2, R81, R83, R85, R39, B91, B93 & B97. We will do several images so you can really get the feel for how to do this technique. Adding shading to an image is what really brings it to life. We will even make a template to help you with determining where you shadows and shading should be applied. Here are two of the images we will be using.


This class is currently scheduled at Daisy Lane Scrapbooking in Mattoon, IL on Feb 26th from 2:00-4:00. Sign up now as we expect these classes to fill up fast.














Image: Digital Image Source Unknown

















Source: by Elizabeth Bell for SCACD (Rubber)

Skin, Hair & Eyes Class

The 2nd class that is scheduled is on "Skin, Hair & Eyes". It's pretty obvious what you will learn in this class. You will leave knowing the basic color grouping for skin. But you will also have a chart of all skin colors to use. Same with Hair. We will color one of the combinations, but you will have a chart for home that has all the most common combinations on it.We'll also do a very brief tutorial on eyes. It's pretty cool! You will need the following list of Copic Markers for this class- E000, E00, E11, R20, E53, E55, E57, Y11, Y21, YR21, N2 & .35 Black Multiliner.

Here are the sample cards that you will see posted at Daisy Lane.













Image Source: Unknown Source (Digital)























Source: Charmed Cards & Crafts Digital




















Source: Magnolia (Rubber)

Copic Training

Morning Everyone,

Well I'm still working constantly on my copic training. It's going really well. I cannot believe how well my "Swatch" book is going and what a big help it is in doing your coloring. I have to admit when I first looked at others pics, I just didn't really get it. What am I going to ever use this for? Well........now I know. Last night I was coloring a picture of a watering can and flowers and I just flipped to my Metals page and there were the colors I had predetermined were best for metal and that was all she wrote....... Here is a pic of the can finished. Love the book.



Just wish my scanner picked up the vibrancy you
see in the real thing. I know everyone has this
problem when scanning, so that makes me feel better.




I'm also still getting together all my information to start teaching classes. Yes, I'm going for it. Why not? There is no one within 60 miles of me offering classes and I think it will really go over. I live right next to a college and I might even get some interest from the artsy students.
My biggest speed bump right now is finding the right location to hold them. My home is very tiny so not even an option. I have 3 places to check out, so that is my goal for this week.

Teaching some classes sounds like such a simple thing, but it is a little intimidating. And this is what I used to do before I became a WAHW. I used to train all the new hires for a large corporation in St. Louis. But that was 15 years ago. Yikes! I CAN DO IT! Can't I?

Copic Swatch Book

Good Morning, I'm feverishly working on my Copic Swatch Book. I use that term loosely cause it's an 8 1/2 x 11 art book that I'm filling- not little swatches. But it counts cause I'm actually taping my swatches onthe pages. Anyway, it is already a huge help to me. I recommend for everyone to make on of these if they can. As soon as I get it more caught up, I'll post pics.

Catching up on my Scrapbooking

Hey Everybody,

I've been working so much on my card techniques, I let my scrapbooking get behind. I keep a running scrapbook for each year. I add to it as the year goes on. It has worked out so that I use 1 scrapbook per year of our life. I am in the middle of scrapping a trip we took last September to the UP-Upper Penninsula. It is really beautiful up there. I was so surprised by how much prettier the flowers are. I guess due to their mild and wetter climate. Here in Central Illinois everything get's so dry and dies out in late summer. Anyway, Here are a few pages. Each page is a 2 page matching spread, but I only took pics of one in some cases.

This first & second one are the start of this section in my SB for this trip.