Valentine Giveaway! A First Peek!

"Garden Curiosities" by Michelle L. Palmer

This mixed media illustration is almost complete!
To celebrate adding over 20 mixed media designs
to my Etsy shop... I thought it would be fun
to share one of the antique paper pieces with you!

It will be a fun giveaway!
This is my FAVORITE one~ you'll see why!

I love to own originals...
I love to own antiques...
That's why I love this collection...

A few last details will be a surprise...
But I thought it would be fun to share a peek
of what I've been working on this morning.

Love these words from original sheet music...

When I'm in my garden and I hear the bees
all gathering around the fragrant blossoms~
I love the hovering, hummmmm...
of the bees...

This beautiful lady is an original... fragile antique papers...
She has been carefully cut from a 1870's publication.
The tree swallow is from a worn birding book...
These originals (no copies) are arranged on
a gorgeous scrapbook paper.

I am so thankful to have met a fantastically generous
woman, who collected paper her entire life.
She is retiring from shows.
Downsizing...
I have known her for over 20 years.
My daughter and her have a sweet relationship...
She was a professor of woman's studies, so she
shares history, knowledge and humor as we
select pieces from her damaged, worn, stained
collection. She sells them at a discount
because of the condition.

I have a copy of each of my mixed media pieces...
I will enjoy knowing these beautiful women
are out in the world, not trapped in boxes
becoming more and more fragile.

The file folders on the left...
I have taken photographs since I was a teen.
Tiny details, landscapes, paint textures,
patinas... bugs, birds, etc. all subjects have their
own folder. When I'm at the fair I find reference
material... I have a cool pamphlet about bee stings
from the doctors office tucked in one of them...
magazines, old papers, sketches I've made...
I love to put several references together,
study the object I'm going to draw...
put the reference materials away and sketch.
I love to learn...
I will never copy...
We all have to respect other peoples illustrations,
photographs, artwork, etc.
these images are copyright protected
just like my original watercolors.

The old papers, however... are over 100 years old.
That is why many sites can offer free images.
Perfectly safe...
Great source of reference material and
design sources for mixed media.

Here I'm sketching a honeybee...
Then I ink over my pencil with waterproof
inks with a very fine tip...

Sorta looks like a fly...

...until we add some color!

You can see from the above photo,
I use all brands of colored pencils.
I choose color collections rather than brands.
All are professional grade.
I sharpen my pencils by hand with a tiny
metal sharpener as to keep them from being wasted.

The Derwent brand watercolor pencils are
nice for smooth paper...
I wanted to add a little yellow around my
honey bee to warm the area a bit more.

Once I have a thin pencil layer down...

With a DAMP brush I smooth the color
to the edges of my cut out images...
Not a lot of water.

I can soften the edges for a soft glow effect...

Tickle! Tickle!

I want to get the yellow tone up to my lady~
making sure there are no halo images.

Fun stuff!
Now I'm heading out to my studio to put the
finishing touches on the entire collection!

To have a chance at winning this sweet lady
please leave a little note on this blog or become
a follower. This post and the next few will be
included in the giveaway pool!
The drawing will be February 10th!
I hope she will be in your mailbox for
Valentine's Day!