creative jewish mom

Watercolor Fern Paintings For Shavuot!

I am taking this one out of the archives, as we could all use a simple yet great looking craft project right about now, right?There is something so accessible and wonderful about watercolors, so give them a try!

Shavuot the Jewish holiday that celebrates the receiving of the Torah starts in 2 weeks on the evening of May 16, so now is a great time to whip up some gorgeous watercolor leaf paintings and learn about practicing your brush strokes a win win crafting experience! As part of my creative journey I'm in the process of exploring creating with different media, including 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!

Simple Watercolor Feathers To Paint Today, For Lag B'Omer!

Tonight we welcome the festive holiday of Lag B'Omer, so why not carve out a tiny window of time to paint some watercolor feathers? It is true Lag B'Omer generally brings to mind images of bonfires and bows and arrows, but I'd say feathers, which are used to write the Torah, and certainly the Zohar, originally, are a perfect symbol as well! Plus, feathers are just so fun to paint, and I ended up filling two pages in my watercolor journal with them, and can't wait to paint more, next time in a mix of rainbow colors or pastels, we'll just have to wait and see! If I had the time I'd paint some of these on watercolor paper and cut them out to hang anywhere, so lovely! Wishing everyone an amazing Lag B'Omer! Keep on reading for simple painting instructions!

A Peek In My Sketchbook: Simple Glass Bottles With Flowers

Sometimes a super simple waterproof ink pen sketch filled in with some watercolor paint can look fresh and fun. After all of the floral sketches I did in various sketchbooks this summer, the time came to introduce some color, and this is the result......not a work of art, but a sweet illustration that one can do rather quickly, even in this large A4 sketchbook! Of course, first practice drawing flowers that you love, then practice drawing simple glass bottles, and then bring them together, and that is it. A sketch like this could be done in so many ways, with a variety of flowers as I did, one with just one flower, or with even a few stems lying on the table waiting to be place in water. The main thing is, just draw it, and paint it, without worrying too much about anything, as this is supposed to be enjoyable and relaxing, got it?

Sketch Flowers Over The Abstract Watercolor Landscape To Improve It!

In the last 5 or so months as I've upped my sketchbook game considerably, I've also been slowly mastering the art of fixing mistakes, as pages in a sketchbook should depict a journey, but in my case not the stumbles, I prefer to forget about those! So, while my other fixes have been via paper collage or acrylic paint, fixing a watercolor landscape that isn't pleasing is actually a fun creative endeavor, as once you realize that the not so great watercolor sketch becomes a background for something else, ahhhh, the fun can begin. On a whim I decided to sketch a few large flowers not in proportion to the scale of the little brightly colored landscape watercolors, and I just love the accidental success of it! Now, covering a spread in my watercolor sketchbook is not four little landscapes as planned, but something more akin to a wall mural, so take a look and keep this in mind if you ever find yourself in a similar situation (which I hope you do!)

Abstract Watercolor Landscape Sketches With Pen

Last week I shared with you some very simple abstract watercolor sketches, check it out here, which are really lovely, and now I'm want to show you what to do when those sketches are not so successful! It is true you could just leave them alone, or paint over them entirely, but first, try defining some of the spaces with pen or colored pencil. I used a black waterproof pen and and white gel pen, but do experiment, as that is what a sketchbook is all about. After all my fears of messing up in my sketchbook, this week I entered a mind space where at long last I feel freer to experiment in my sketchbook, as first of all it is small and therefore makes more sense timewise, and ahhhhh, no one needs to know about it! Well of course no one except for you all, my dear readers. So, I really really do recommend trying to start a sketchbook practice, I am finding it to be so very rewarding and interesting, especially since this week I've moved into my landscape orientation watercolor paper sketchbook! Okay, have a look at the rest of the group, that were painted across two pages......

Watercolor Landscape Sketches Tiny And Abstract

I am dreaming of painting landscapes in my sketchbook, or not, on a regular basis, and yet something always seems to get in the way. It took me all summer long, but at long last I grabbed some watercolors and got to work on what should be some very quick and quite abstract landscape watercolor sketches. I have to say, I was quite pleased with the results......not professional use of the medium by any means, (and the watercolor palette I used is low quality and not dense pigment) but happy and still can't believe I actually painted these little studies. The funny thing is, after painting these I got overly confident and went for a full page, and......disaster, well not entirely, but I have to laugh and try to reclaim that innocence of the first attempt! At the very least a few more pages of this landscape orientation sketchbook have been filled, and am looking forward to filling some more, and then getting something whose first pages won't fall out, and thus need masking tape as you can see here. I am learning that the purpose of a sketchbook, whether for drawing or painting or both is to experiment and capture whatever is going on in your brain at that moment, without being overly concerned about the results. I am working on that one! I have a few tips for making little abstract landscape watercolors, so keep on reading......

Simple Watercolor Poppy Wall Art

After sharing a few posts last week showing the watercolor poppies I used to make holiday decorations I decided to hold off and publish this watercolor poppy wall art separately so that it wouldn't get lost in all the gorgeousness of the watercolor poppy cut outs and the watercolor poppies centerpiece! After making those watercolor poppy cut-outs with straight stems, I realized that I could paint a panorama (two sheets of large watercolor paper used horizontally) of curved stem poppies to fill the width of my kitchen picture ledge for some more lovely decor! And yes indeed, simply painting a long row of poppies with no added background looks quite good, and can be done fairly quickly. Best of all, flat art like this is certainly simple to store until you need to add a festive touch once again. Of course these poppies are so great looking you'll likely leave them up for a while! I have 3 picture ledges in my kitchen that are used to display art generally, and I love to change them up, so these poppies have been a nice addition, and quite a bit more calming than my flower paintings hung clothesline style! The great thing about watercolor paper is that I was able to simply stand the sheets on the shelf, and with just a bit of masking tape to secure them, voila, lovely art was born. Okay, I did have to paint the poppies first, but that was pure joy! Want to make some painted poppies to decorate a spot in your home? Let's do it!

Blooming Watercolor Poppies Centerpiece Is Festive And Very Budget Friendly!

I am totally in love with the watercolor poppies in a pot centerpiece, well one-sided centerpiece really, and I have already made two more! This idea, is something that you can play around with depending on your own needs, and there are so many ways to go! I actually made a small one using a small round plastic peanut butter tub, which would make an adorable teacher appreciation gift or a token of appreciaion for a neighbor, for example. Then again, making larger pots of poppies really doesn't take that much more time, so go for it, as this burst of festive and artful color is a joyful addition anywhere or anytime! The Jewish holiday of Shavuos is on Thursday night, so we'll be enjoying all the watercolor poppies as we celebrate the giving of the Torah, and then they will likely be used as centerpieces for any number of occassions. I'll admit, I can't wait to try this idea out with other flowers, but with the holiday approaching, together with houseguests, that will just have to wait. Okay, lets make some of these pots of blooming flowers, shall we?

Watercolor Poppy Cutouts To Make NOW!

Please take my word for it, these watercolor poppy cutouts are one of the best things I've made in a long time, as there is just something about them that looks AMAZING! And that is even though my illustrations and the paint job were a bit lacking.......So get out the biggest watercolor paper you can find and start making some watercolor poppy cutouts, you won't regret it, and in fact you'll be jumping for joy and planning all the ways you can use these beauties! I have this idea of a diorama of sorts with watercolor poppies, so with that in mind I drew my poppies with straight stems so that I can tape a skewer to the back (which I did in this photo) but you can also draw them as shown inside this post, and then figure out how to use them afterwards! I'd say just hanging them anywhere could look amazing, or use them as a gift topper, or make a bouquet, of any number of other ideas I have yet to think of! The Jewish holiday of Shavuot is coming up this Thursday night, and since it is the holiday of greenery and flowers to remember the lush Mt. Sinai, where the Torah was given, these poppies are just perfect! (Never mind the fact that the poppies usually bloom for Passover in Israel, we really don't need to be so literal, we just need to be joyful!) Okay, lets get to it!

White Gouache Illustration On Watercolor Wash

As you can see, I am just loving the idea of illustrating with gouache, and so I have one more simple technique that produces great results. Ready? One of the benefits of gouache, as opposed to watercolor paint, is that is is opaque, meaning you can layer one color over another, yes indeed! So, one simple way to take advantage of this attribute is to make a beautiful background with either watercolor paint or gouache, though or course something rich, like my blue backgroud, and then paint lovely details on top of this background with white gouache. And if you want to take it one step further, add some ink details, and voila, you've created something wonderful! Need a bit more information to make this happen? Let do it........