hobbies

It’s MerMay!

May 14, 2024 Carol Ann ErhardtLeave a comment

We’ve had some very nice weather this past week. I managed to get my porch ready for sitting. On Saturday, it rained very hard in the morning hours. I was putting laundry away when I thought I heard the doorbell. Sure enough I looked out and found a huge potted plant. As I stepped out to retrieve it, I saw a woman hustling back to her car wearing a raincoat that did little to keep her dry in the downpour. I lifted the planter to the table on the porch to read the gift tag and the woman was returning with another identical plant! Two huge and beautiful flowering plants…sunpatiens! Absolutely the finishing touch for my porch. This was a Mother’s Day gift from my son and daughter-in-love in SC.

Mother’s Day afternoon, after attending church, and having lunch with a friend, I set about arranging the porch so the planters would look best. I spent part of the afternoon sitting there and reading. It was a beautiful day.

I spent a good deal of time reading this past week. I worked on the puzzle and sorted all the pieces with book titles on them so I could easily find what was needed. I put several pieces in the puzzle, too. It is such a busy puzzle, that I must concentrate on one small area at a time. It felt good to be working on it again.

Yesterday I carried the diamond painting to the table in the garage and worked on it for an hour and a half. I’m not working on the handle of the cup. I love the colors on the cup with the bright pinks and purples. You can’t see much progress, but I’m not in a hurry to complete it. I’m simply enjoying the process.

This seems to be how I am approaching all my hobbies lately. I’m simply enjoying the process with no pressure to complete anything.

I did a little coloring this week. Two mandala type pictures I colored with markers and one picture I chose for both Mermay (May is the month a lot of colorists color mermaids) and for Mother’s Day. The illustrator is Molly Harrison and the book is Enchanted Sea. I colored this with Black Widow pencils and used Gelato for the background. The moon in the upper left corner didn’t show up very good in this picture because of the curling of the coloring book when I snapped it. The mandala pictures were color by number which makes it simple since I don’t have to decide what colors to choose—except for picking markers that are close to the colors suggested.

And that’s about it for hobbies this week. This week I am hoping to focus on the picture my daughters and I will each color this month. Haven’t made any decisions on color palette yet. More on hobbies next Tuesday!

hobbies

My Prayer Wall is Ready!

May 7, 2024 Carol Ann Erhardt4 Comments

I’ve been a little busy this week leaving not as much time for hobbies as during the colder months. Not a problem for me as I like being more active, enjoying the weather, and visiting with neighbors.

My daughter and son-in-love came this weekend to put the puzzle into the Mother’s Day frame. It is now hanging on my prayer wall, and I love it! Since the wall is directly opposite the double window, it is impossible to get a picture without the glare. So we did get a picture from the side and I included a closeup of the actual puzzle titled “The Trinity.”

I did a little work on Tea and Books. I’m halfway across the third row, which when completed will be halfway to completion. I’m still enjoying this and will be excited to hang it on the wall with some other diamond paintings. This one appeals to me because it depicts two things that are a big part of my life: tea and books!

As for coloring, I did finish Amber in the Wildflower Folk Coloring Book illustrated by Christine Karron. I ended up using my Black Widow pencils after starting with watercolor pencils and not liking the result. I like vibrant colors. The background I did with Arrtx soft pastels. I’m happy with this first picture and it looks so much better in the book than in the snapshot…which is true for all the finished pictures I share here. The other picture is from a book I forgot I had called Fairy Homes published by Jade Summer, illustrators Kristen Thorne and Candice Janney. This one I colored with Albrecht Durer watercolor pencils. After finishing I wish I’d have chosen a different color for the “house,” but I’m satisfied overall.

That’s all I’ve colored this week. I did finish listening to the book If I Were You by Lynn Austin. I enjoyed it a lot because I learned a bit more about World War II and how it affected the lives of the people in England. Since my father was killed on a battleship at age 19 during this war, it interests me. I’m beginning to read the third book “All This Twisted Glory” in the “This Woven Kingdom” series by author Tareheh Mafi. I like the fantasy story, but the narrator isn’t my favorite. I made some progress on The Passage (reading on Kindle) by Justin Cronin, but I’m only a little less than 40% finished. This is a long book, however with over 700 pages. Since I mostly read it before I go to sleep, it’s going to take a while to complete.

I have a lot going on this week, so I hope I have time for my hobbies. Life comes first, and since I will be spending time with dear friends and family, hobbies will take a back seat. More updates next week.

Disappointments Aren’t Failures

April 30, 2024 Carol Ann Erhardt5 Comments

It’s Tuesday, already? I’ve been wracking my brain to see why I don’t have a lot to share. I know I’ve been busy…but not so much on hobbies, I guess. LOL!

Here is the picture I completed for the buddy color. I was disappointed in it. First I chose to do a base color with water based markers. The purple was so dark that I couldn’t do much to change it. From there, my color choices were not working as I’d wanted. But that’s all part of learning. From this I learned only pastels will work for creating a base! And the most important, disappointments aren’t failures…only learning opportunities.

I purchased a new book. It’s by my favorite artist, Christine Karron. Though it is a compilation of pictures from her other books, with four new images, it has good quality paper. I started coloring a picture which I’ll be working on this week.

I have quite a bit more layering to do on both the skin and the cape but I wanted to first color the hair and then I’ll do eyes and lips. That will let me know where to add the color layers on the skin.

I listened to audiobooks and did some additional reading of “The Passage” by Justin Cronin. It’s the first book of the three books in this trilogy. It was a bit difficult to grasp all the characters and what was happening in the beginning, but I’m hooked now as it all comes together.

I worked a little on my diamond painting. Almost finished with the first blocked area on row 3, but not significant progress to make sharing a picture worthwhile. I did start setting up my May calendar page in my Creative Companion book for 2024. It’ll be the first month I’ve used the calendar page. Usually I keep progress on the blank pages between the monthly calendars. I wanted to set up a way to track what hobbies I work on each day. Why? No reason. I think it will be fun to look at the results at the end of the month, that’s

The added circles are to color code which hobbies I worked on. I will put notes on what I thought about the book of the month after I finish.

That’s all I have to share today. I need to get motivated to work on the puzzle. I love the puzzle! Just not in a puzzling mood! LOL! I’ll share more next Tuesday.

hobbies

Troll Girl and Dragon’s Eye

April 23, 2024 Carol Ann ErhardtLeave a comment

This year I’ve been trying to focus on “balance” for my life. It might be working if I measure it by the amount of time I spend coloring or working on each hobby. This week I finished two pictures, spent a couple hours working on diamond paintings, several hours reading, zero time on jigsaw puzzle, and a few hours working on sudoku puzzles. I did ride my exercise bike for an accumulation of almost 100 miles.

The major thing I accomplished wasn’t a hobby. I rearranged furniture in the house. I was getting claustrophobic with the arrangement for the winter with the sofa being closer to the television and the puzzle table behind it. I liked getting better light to see. The original goal was simply to get the puzzle table back in my office/craft room. But moving that table meant moving the television, the exercise bike, the printer/storage table…and so on. I have three major rooms in the condo: office/craft room/guest room, my bedroom, and open kitchen/dining/living room area. The move involved all of them!

But I kept myself busy. Even enjoyed some outside time because the weather was so nice. I might do a picture tour of my condo one of these days. But I have been digressing. Here are the two completed pictures colored this past week: Troll Girl in Fairy and Fantasy Coloring book by Christine Karron; and Dragon’s Eye in Worlds Within Worlds by Kirby Rosanes.

I’ll be back next Tuesday with new pictures to show what I’ve been up to.

hobbies

Dragons Are Mythical Creatures…Right?

April 16, 2024 Carol Ann Erhardt6 Comments

Dragons are mythical creatures, but I love bringing them to life with colored pencils. For the past week, I’ve been working coloring the next picture in the Worlds Within Worlds coloring book illustrated by Kirby Rosanes. Each time I look at one of these pictures I’m totally intimidated. But when completed, I love to look at them. For this dragon’s eye, I added the pupil because I wanted to create a look of the eye reflecting what he sees. I didn’t realize how much I would continue adding layers and shadowing the scales until the base coat was applied. I’m using my much used Prismacolor Premier colored pencils. I should have taken a picture before I started coloring anything, but I began when I was on my once weekly Skype craft chat with my daughter who lives in North Carolina, so I didn’t give that a thought. This was a week and a half ago and I’m still not finished. Thought I’d share anyway.

Here you can see the base layer plus the area around the eye started.

This is how it looks so far. I hope to finish in the next couple of days because I still haven’t started coloring the chosen picture for our little family buddy color. This is the picture we are all supposed to color.

I’m planning to use both distress inks and colored pencils for this one. But I can’t share the completed picture until April 30.

I didn’t work on the puzzle at all this week. With the warmer weather, I’m enjoying doing crafts in the garage. The puzzle isn’t portable enough to move. I may move the puzzle table back into my craft room for the summer months.

I did work on the diamond painting and nearly completed another row. I love working on this canvas. Thought I’d share a few pictures of what the tools look like that I’m using for those who don’t know what diamond painting really is.

The kits come with a basic pen, tray, and wax which work just fine. Over the years, I’ve upgraded a few things. I love my pretty glittery pen and it’s so comfortable to hold. The tray is nice because it has a cover, so if I need to walk away before I change colors of diamonds, I can make sure they will not spill. The colors of the diamonds (or drills) are the same numbers used for embroidery thread. However, the canvas has each little square where the diamonds are placed marked along with a symbol which matches the specific color. The diamonds come sorted into little bags. I use the case in the picture above to hold the individual diamonds and use a sticker to identify the symbol. Hope this helps to explain what the craft is. It’s very relaxing for me, even more so than coloring.

I don’t always do complex coloring. Sometimes I find a color palette and use it to color a mandala. Like this picture below I colored while watching television this past week.

I also will use markers to color pictures that are “color by number” like this one I completed this week.

And that’s all I have to share this week. Hobbies are so relaxing for me, especially in this season of life.