My trip to Comic Con and San Diego

We just got back from Comic Con in San Diego. I didn't take any pictures there--it was a madhouse, I barely escaped alive. My favorite bit was meeting Lynda Barry and getting her autograph on her new book, "What it is". But I did see some other nice things in the city.

I spent one day in Balboa Park, so here are three photos from there. The black and white people are painted on a wall around construction at the art museum. I saw a very interesting photo show there, as well as Georgia O'Keefe's paintings (plus work by other women artists of the same era). The palm trees are next to the museum. And I always love to spend time in the Spanish Village--it is full of little shops selling handmade things, and many artists are there, making more things.

I just discovered this marvelous sketch blog for you to check out--the artist's name is Pete Scully.

Watercolor postcard

A painting buddy, Linda, sent me a card with a sketch of her cabin where she is spending the summer. I used that reference to paint this quick postcard to send to her. I'm also working on a more "formal" painting of flowers, but it's fun to mix things up and do something looser sometimes.

Future quilts?

I took pics of the photos that I printed on fabric after the SAQA workshop--they are still pinned to my design wall, waiting for me to do something with them. Too much knitting! As you can see, in the top image (ferns) one print did not fill the page, so I need to figure out whether I want to chop all of the ferns off to match, or somehow fill in that space. Also, I want to paint the white areas to tone down the contrast. The others are all pretty close to what I wanted, it's just a matter of figuring out how to sew them together, if they need borders, etc. NOTE: All of them are still attached to the paper, so that's why you see white borders around the edges in some places--I have not trimmed them off yet. Sometimes those white borders end up inside the seams when I sew the photos together, so I leave them on until I have chosen a layout.

a new quilt is born!

This is my contribution to the SAQA "1 foot square" fundraising auction. I took a photo of a lion statue at the Getty Villa in Malibu, California earlier this year, printed it on fabric and altered the colors with Photoshop. The "exit" sign is from another photo that I printed last year. My daughter helped me print some of the fabric with rubber stamps, several years ago.

farmer's market flowers

I don't know what these flowers are called, but they called to me at today's farmer's market. It's a great place to stock up on fresh vegies and fruit from local growers. I've been very busy knitting, no new paintings to show you yet, but soon!