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                                                  …to the thought of Spring,

Winter sketch

Winter is hard to let go of this year, it has been a good friend. It's cold, gray, quietness a comfortable place for my grieving heart. I don't feel ready for sunshiny, carefree warmth, long days and new life…

I wish I could accept the season's change with faithful innocence like my children eagerly anticipating the ice cream truck's return. Still, spring breezes and budding flowers are surprising me and wooing me, and I feel myself giving in, tilting my face to the sunshine…

but I'm hesitant and pull out my favorite winter day, muted by snow, captured by my pencil, and hold it close even while beginning to dream of garden walks and summer sketches…


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  • C - Such beautiful words dear friend. So glad that you are opening up the the “new” even though there is so much comfort in the grief. God has truly blessed you with so many talents. And has blessed me with your friendship. So thankful for you, for the “new” and for the journey.
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So after all the talk about Fairy Mommy, this is one of the things I love to do and a bit about how I do it… 

I mostly do portraits and illustrations of children and because they NEVER sit still, I’m forced to work from photographs even though I prefer working from life. 

I start by looking at the photo and then doing a freehand sketch of the image. I then refine the sketch with a more detailed contour line drawing over top. Often on the edges I scribble song lyrics that I hear while I am drawing. I often fall so in love with this initial constructing sketch that I have a hard time continuing – it feels so beautifully simple and architectural. Shown above…


Then if you have been trained in drawing or painting you know you areIMG_1351  supposed to do a light and general layer of color or shading over the entire image and then work up in entire layers.

I have always been completely unable to do this! Once in awhile I inexplicably succeed in correctly building up my image. Most often I fall in love with and obsess over something such as the red shoe and steer away from wastelands where I feel bored or lost such as the jeans. Sometimes this way of working produces brilliant little treasures in the work and sometimes it results in chaos…  

I don’t do as many planning sketches as my art teachers trained me to. Again sometimes this results in chaos but mostly it frees me to create in the moment, find what is important right then and try to bring it to life.I sketch all the time, not planning though, just while I am out in nature noticing little beauties that I may turn into designs.

David
This time my process produced one of my favorite paintings ever of my red loving, ever dreaming little boy! Below is the photo I took and referenced. I used it for proportions and value but took lots of liberty in expressing what I know about my little man. Working from a photo can be a wonderful tool instead of a prison, when you breath the same life into it as you would if your model was in front of you…

What is uniquely you about your creative process?

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  • Stephanie Bloomer - Love it! I need to loosen up some. I obsess when it comes to portraiture, but like you, I skip steps that I was taught to take. Lately I have been having a harder time just enjoying the process, but I think that it may be a combination of hormones in my late pregnancy and also from not sketching enough. I really need to remember to take my sketchbook with me everywhere like I used to. I agree about the benefits of working from life, those are the experiences I learn most from and it is fun because you can be more expressive with it, rather than having a photo. Working from a photo is difficult because you feel trapped into being more exact. Thanks for your blog! I am inspired, and I will be bringing my sketchbook to the hospital with me tonight when I go in to be induced.
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  • Sharon - Yay! excited for you Steph 🙂 sketching your little baby sleeping will be so fun, but don’t worry if you are too wiped out to do too much sketching…
    I always am more creative when I am pregnant but by the end it gets to too hard to sit upright and I end up laying around and reading instead of drawing
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  • lisa leonard - this is so so so beautiful. do you take commissions? xo
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  • Sharon - thanks so much Lisa – I love your amazing work! I do take commissions – got somethin in mind? thanks for stoppin by 🙂
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  • Laura - Wow! This is amazing!!! What a talent you have!!! I saw your post on KC’s blog and it brought me to yours.
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Fairy mommy real
My friends and I were talking about our moms and what they are and are not willing or able to do for us. I innocently described my mom flying out to cook me a freezer full of food when I was pregnant and unable to merely glance at raw meat without gagging. I continued to detail many such tasks, thinking all moms did these things at the drop of a hat. 

Finally my friends desperate to come up with something my mother would NOT do for me, "Well she wouldn't clean your windows would she?"

"Not only would she offer to clean them, she would then put on soft music and the entire time she scrubbed she would say things like – Don't nice sparkling clean windows make you feel wonderful!" I replied with a laugh and a new realization that this was not altogether the norm.

My friends needed to hear no more, they instantly crowned her "THE FAIRY MOMMY" I know they all love and appreciate their moms, but mine does have something a bit magical about her and this is not the last you will hear of her… I plan for her to grace you with a bit of her magical fairyness!

BTW – this pic of The Fairy Mommy was taken 20 years ago, give or take a few, so she looks a bit different now but still very beautiful and yes she still has the wings 🙂


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  • Crystal Z - I LOVE IT! Very true! The picture is too perfect! Most of my friends say the same things about my mom as well. I’ve heard, “she’s like an angel”… lol! But I would always tell them, wait until she stubs her toe and some very non-angelic music comes out of her mouth..:) Isn’t it wonderful having such an awesome mom!? I love the entire Pemberton crew though, I’m a little biased! 🙂
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  • Tess - I remember when she looked like that, wings and all!
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After reading Wind in the Willows my boys went outside to be “Ratty” and “Mole” together. They were so cute they needed a special sweet treat (even though we don’t eat a lot of sugar) but I was way too tired to bake. Sooo…

Pretzel sticks sprinkled with white chocolate chips. They approved and now Mom needs some. Mmmmm 🙂

 

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   I drew this sketch of the flowers my husband ordered for me on Valentines Day.

They were Ugly, a Disappointment,

just like much of the rest of my life recently…

He said the website claimed they would bloom into “a hundred blossoms of love”

but they appeared well past blooming,

the little buds were crushed, wilted, hopeless.

I thanked him, put them in a vase and tried to politely ignore them…

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  Then one morning I woke up and there was hope.

Unbelievably they were opening up

uncertain, bedraggled, shaky, a long shot,

but they were beginning to think about…

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…becoming Beautiful.

Shockingly they persisted in continually blooming 

for days and weeks longer than any flower should.

Different, Beautiful

  Here’s to hoping for things to bloom


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  • Tess - Beautiful poem. Sometimes love doesn’t blossom right away…sometimes it can take so long you wonder if it ever will…but eventually, with patience, it blooms.
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  • Heidi @ ggip - What a lovely post. It is the small things that sometimes remind us of hope.
    I had those flowers in my wedding bouquet. Alstromeria (might not be spelled right). Since then they have been a favorite.
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