creative jewish mom

Rosh HaShana Symbols Mobile Or Wall Hanging Craft

Rosh HaShana starts on Sunday night yet there is still time to whip up a few fun decorations to add extra meaning to your holiday. Or maybe you are celebrating at someone else's home and would love a fun way to add a special holiday touch to a bottle of wine or wrapped gift? Here is it my friends, simply paint some whimsical shapes that look like a fish, a carrot, a pomegranite, a beet, a gourd, and an apple for starters, and either use them together to make a mobile, or use them separately as gift tags, place markers, cupcake or cake toppers, or you name it!

Having spent two good weeks going to museums in the USA this past month, I am all for crafts and creativity that use the simplest of materials and therefore the most creativity. And you know what, generally the results are also the most heartfelt. Who ever said ahhh about something cut from a die cutting machine? Got it? So get out those paints and enjoy, because quite honestly just applying color to paper is so very very satisfying and a great way to jump start your family's (or your) creativity!  Ready?.......

Paint The Kotel In Rainbow Colors For The 17th Of Tammuz !

I have pulled this post from the archives, as it is truly a perfect one.

Today is the 17th of Tammuz, a solemn fast day on the Jewish calender which marks the beginning of a three week period of mourning for the destruction of the Beit HaMikdash, (The Holy Temple/King Soloman's Temple.) So with the boys home from school early, and my daughter just starting her summer vacation, there is no time like the present to try and get back into our crafting groove which I have missed greatly! So today I pulled out the watercolors, and grabbed a white corrugated cardboard box, and we all spent some time painting the stones of the kotel, and I just love the results!

Yes, my boys smirked when I told them to use bright and beautiful colors for the stones that they know as beige, but I explained to them that we were painting the stories that the stones had surely witnessed, and all the beautiful prayers whispered in front of these stones every day by countless individuals from both near and far.

Brush Lettering With Crayola Marker Paint Drips Background

Thanks to my teenage daughter's love of brush lettering and faux watercolor backgrounds, I have yet another great idea to share with you! I will admit, this piece is actually the back of the brush lettering birthday card I shared with you yesterday, and I thought it was just too lovely not to get its own post. While this faux watercolor paint drips background is the back of a card, you can do this as a stand alone piece as well......so many fun ways to go! So grab those markers, familiarize yourself with either brush calligraphy (using a brush marker) or fauxligraphy and lets put that creativity to great use!

Watercolor One Stroke Leaves On Branches

With just a few very simpe techniques under your belt the mystery of painting simple and beautiful watercolor illustrations becomes so much clearer! I'll admit, learning how to paint leaves with just one stroke was a new one for me, and I am in love with this technique! Yesterday I shared with you my fern leaf watercolors, and today we're going for a denser bush/tree look by painting leaves on delicate branches.

So get out those round watercolor brushes and some watercolor paper, or at the least round brushes and paint of any kind, and lets get started!

Simply Lovely Watercolor Fern Paintings For Mastering Brush Control

Tu B'Shevat, the Jewish holiday that celebrates the New Year for the trees starts tonight, and if you have 30 minutes or so you can still whip up some gorgeous watercolor leaf paintings and learn about practicing your brush strokes a win win crafting experience! While I have yet to actually put in the time I'd like, I'm in the process of honing/learning some illustration skills, starting with watercolor painting. It turns out that the first step is learning brush control, using a round brush, and leaves like the ones used in my fern illustrations are created with just one stroke. Pretty great I must admit, and so relaxing to paint. A friend was over the other day and she thought I had stamped all these little leaves! Of course there are so many designs one can make once you master the one stroke leaf, so give it a try and enjoy!

How To Paint Loose Watercolor Florals

I just love all the watercolor floral patterns that are everywhere these days, on stationary, on fabric, you name it. And so of course, I am dreaming of creating my own lovely patterns, but first I have to learn how to paint, so don't anyone hold their breath! Okay, I'm not starting from scratch exactly as I did once upon a time do gouache paintings for a course in pattern design at Parson's in NYC, but I'll be honest that was quite a while ago, and I'm not exactly even sure why I took that course in retrospect, since I had no painting or illustration background. I guess it sounded good then, and it still sounds good, only today I can learn quite a bit by checking out all the amazing resources online, and especially at skillshare, where I am in the middle of a 7 day challenge called Expressive Florals.

So much fun to get out the paints and watercolor paper, and I can't wait to spend some more time honing my skills......though truthfully one can and should dedicate just a small window of time to learning something new, and for that skillshare is just too perfect, especially since you can download the videos to view off the grid, now wouldn't that be great?

How To Paint Red Poppies With Watercolors

After the holiday rush I decided that it was truly time to start dedicating some time to learning some new artsy skills, which really doesn't have to take a whole lot of time or money courtesy of skillshare, which I am happy to say is truly an amazing site with sooooo many great things to learn. I totally recommend it, and when you click HERE, you can get 3 months for 99cents, really folks, don't miss out on this one. (Or click on the ad below for a free month, but I'd go with the 99 cents.)

Given my wide range of interests I had a hard time figuring out where to start, (after the crayola calligraphy and brush lettering which we need to get back to) but something using supplies that we had on hand surely seemed like the best way to go, and i loved the idea of a challenge of sorts, so I started the Expressive Florals 7 Day challenge, which starts with painting poppies, a favorite of mine as they are native to my area here in Northern Israel.

The poppies I painted here, can certainly improve, but I'm happ with this as a start especially since this was done with brush only, no drawing with a pencil folks, as that makes things too tight, and the point here is to get loose, which I succeeded in only partly, but it is a start!

 

Crayola Calligraphy Is A Great Way To Learn About Brush Lettering

As it turns out there are no brush markers to be found in our neck of the woods, so while we await a visit from my nephew in a few weeks (and the brush lettering pens that I had sent to him in New York) we are making do with supplies that we do have on hand. I don't know where we've been, but it turns out the crayola calligraphy is a thing, and a really great thing I must say! Because of the shape of the crayola marker, and the fact that it is water soluble, one can not only draw brush lettering style calligraphy, one can also use the pens to do a number of really fun artsy effects.

While mom is taking the more pragmatic approach of practicing my calligraphy strokes using the crayola markers, my daughter just jumped right in and created these two cute phrases, among others of course. I am one proud mama and so happy that we find joy in the same things! Oh, and while you can find info about crayola calligraphy all around the web, we were introduced to it in our new favorite go-to spot for inspiration, which would be Skillshare, and THIS VIDEO . If you love to get inspired by folks who are doing something you'd like to do, this is the place for you......download all the videos you have space for and watch them on that car or plane trip, or at the off the grid location! It is so inspiring I really don't want you to miss out! You can sign up now and get a few months for free, and cancel anytime, so really the only way you'll loose is by not taking my advice.

And I can't wait to take my own advice about bringing along some of the videos on our next vacation, as there are quite a few that teach you how to do travel journaling, something I've always wanted to try, but just haven't figured out how to do. I think skillshare is going to make it a reality on our next trip, can't wait!

10 Tips For The Beginner Interested In Learning Brush Lettering

This post contains affiliate links.

Before we get started with this post, I just wanted to make it very very clear that this lettering is not mine, but rather the work of my 15 year old daughter! While she has not been exposed to all the brush lettering one might see living in the USA, or frequenting places like instagram and pinterest, my daughter has seen enough examples of brush lettering to know that it is something she is interested in learning, and I'm happy to say we've gotten a nice head start this Hanukkah vacation, yippee. Now if I can just find a bit of time to catch up with her everyone will be happy!

How did she go from zero to creating the brush lettering examples you see here within just a few days? Well, I'm going to share with you everything we've learned in the last three days, but first I'll just mention that a large part of our continuing efforts to learn brush lettering involves consulting the myriad of brush lettering and calligraphy videos that you can find on Skillshare, my all new go-to source for inspiration and amazing instruction.

Click here for 2 FREE MONTHS, no obligations, just canel anytime. And you can download the videos to view offline, amazing amazing amazing, right? Perfect for watching while doing some travelign this holiday season, or anytime, anywhere.

Watercolor Butterflies Painting Lesson

I'm thankful to my fourteen year old daughter who has been doing some watercolor paintings and supplying me with some material that is simple to photograph and share with you! Of course my joy goes way beyond that.....I'm so happy that she is following in my footsteps in the creativity department, yippee! As I write this she is searching the house for some little plastic toys to make some DIY snowglobes, a creative energy surge that I surely recognize and am more than happy to encourage. Ah yes, and more blog material for busy mom who can't seem to find time to photograph all those things she has been crocheting......

Oh, and about this sweet painting, a garden scene with butterflies done with just a simple palette of watercolors. Keep reading for a bit more information about how to make this into an actual art lesson.