Danielle Calabro

I know I said I was done doing trees for a while but I picked up this really cool handmade watercolor journal from hand-book journal Co from Hobby Lobby. The pages  have deckled edges, Love it! I wanted something to go across the first two pages and what better then a big tangled tree. As you can tell by this painting I really like Blue and green together and I added a touch of yellow. I also wanted to test some new white pens, which I have been on the hunt for forever and after a very intense search for the perfect white pen I stumbled across a few reviews on Uni-ball Singo Broad. I had never seen these in the store here so I ordered them off Amazon and I can say I absolutely love these. They have a nice thick line and have a great opaque white pigment. I didn't have a problem with them pulling up the black gouache, only one minor  problem, I went though the whole pen with this one tree. I also picked up the Uni-ball Angelic, it is great for the thinner lines but it doe...

We are have now made it to negotiations with the bank for our new house, hopefully they do not come back with a ridiculous counter offer. Then it is one to running the numbers then inspection. If everything good good then hopefully we will be moving in a couple of months. Then my poor children will get pulled out of school to start a new one, wish this would have been finished before school started but I have lost hope with that. So I have been a little stressed and have hit an artist block again, painting is being forces so it is time to step back. Instead of forcing an idea I have turned to my trusty sketch book and doodling. My way of keeping my creativity flowing, when I can't focus. I do plan on starting the next painting I am going to use for a Christmas card, that should be one of the next couple of post so look for it, think Carrot and coal.

In my attempt to stay focused on creating artwork I did a full page Zentangle™.  I started with this one, of course this left the entire bottom of the page white  and I couldn't have that so...... I got my ruler and draw out a couple of lines and just let it flow. It was a nice  break. These were colored with Copic Sketch markers, love these markers and even though I have around 30 or 40 of them, there are plenty of colors I wish I would have had. 

I know I have been away for about a week, I have been working on a few things. I got over my little grumble about the business license and I am moving forward. As I said in one of my last post I am making my christmas cards this year, so I have started my first one. The background is done, all I need to work on is the lettering. I have not decided if I will do the lettering myself or have a hi-res scan of the painting and just use a font. I think I will do a couple of more then go from there. The background was done in watercolor, I used a watercolor mask for the stars. While the background was still wet I sprinkled table salt on it and got a nice speckled effect. The tress were painted with gouache, I wanted a nice opaque cover, along with a gold paint pen, this added a nice little shine to it. Of course I doubt I will be able to get that effect on a printed card and if I can I may end up paying more, something to think about, I then tangled the trees.

As most of you know I have decided to hold off on selling any of my artwork, I need to make sure I am completely legit before I make the move. I need to get a business structure and a business license, which of course both take money. If you have read any of my other post and my about page you will know we lost our house a few years ago, well we our getting a little closer to being home owners again. It has been a LONG drawn out process but hopefully worth it we, still have to get the inspection and praying that all will be good. Of course with every new home there are things that need to be purchased and thing that will have to wait. I have choose to wait on the business license until I know where we are with the house, if it passes inspection and we get the right loan then the business license will have to wait, if it does not pass inspection then I will probably go ahead and get my "art" business set-up. Either way  I will continue to create, this is just another test in ...

At the advise of my husband I did a little research on the legalities of selling my art. Little did I realize, I still need to have a business license and set up a business structure. Honestly I didn't even realize that I need that to sell online. So I have made the decision to hold of on selling my artwork online until I have done my homework on this. I also did not realize how expensive it is to get all this legal mumbo jumbo stuff. So for the time being I will still continue to paint my pretties and post them but I will be shutting my Etsy store down for a little while while I do my research. If anyone has any information regarding this legal stuff your advise is greatly appreciated. I do not intend on letting this bump in the road stop me but it will slow me down a little.

I have finished my final Zentree, as I have mentioned before I have decided to have prints made of my ZenTree Collection. There will be 4 of each for know. The first three I should have in a couple of weeks. They will be on cold press watercolor paper and printed with archival inks. I have made sure I have picked a high qualityArt printshop, I also did a walk through and I was very impressed. Needless to say I am very excited and proud of myself making this step. I know it will be an investment well made. My Etsy shop will be going through a name change and facelift over the next few days also. Watercolor, gouache and pen I let my daughter pick the colors for this one and in observation of the 4th of July she picked Red, White and Blue.  So it is on tho the next project, I have decided I am actually going to follow through with something I keep saying I am going to do. I will be creating my own Christmas cards this year. I know its a little early but I have had a habit...

I wanted to try the wave again, I wasn't satisfied with the first one I did.  I used watercolor, gouache and table salt, I made the tree a little bigger and added more palms. I defiantly like this one more then the first attempt.  *IMPORTANT NEWS*  I have decided to make prints of my ZenTrees. I will actually be going down to the print shop today. These will be high quality prints of my original artwork. For though of you interested they will be available in my Etsy store in about 2 weeks and will be reasonably priced. I am so excited to be taking the next step. Honestly I can't wait to see what they look like once completed. I know this is an investment but I know it will be a good investment. So be on the lookout I will be letting everyone know when they are out.