As probably know by now, whenever I see a project, craft or art form that I like, I almost always have to try it myself. Naturally that would have to include lettering!

 Of course, getting a new inspiration (for me, anyway) usually involves buying something: books, new pens, new paints, new drawing pads…But in keeping with my lifetime track record, once I look at the instructions a few times I usually just go back and do it my own way. So it may or may not actually be done “right”. But in my opinion, there is really no “right” or “wrong” way to create art. (Keyword = “Whimsical”, remember?)

So let’s see where all this is leading…

This is my latest attempt at lettering mixed with watercolor. I find a lot of good quotes on Pinterest, and save the ones that “speak to my heart”. Some of them, especially the ones related to grieving and loss of a loved one may seem sad to you, but they aren’t meant that way. To me, finding a quote that I identify with and making it into art is comforting and therapeutic. For people who find themselves in this situation, I can’t emphasize enough how helpful it can be to create something that validates your feelings and honors the person you have lost.

Once the drawing was finished, I needed to find the right matting for it. In the end, I settled on purple.The finished product.

While we are on the subject of grieving, here are a couple doodle drawings. On the left is my version of a quote I found on Pinterest. The one on the right is in honor of what would have been our 25th wedding anniversary. In reality Mark passed away two months before our 24th. Remember, I am not sharing these drawings to make anyone sad. I am only illustrating how important art can to the healing process.

Here is an idea I “had to try”. I got the square pad of patterned paper at Hobby Lobby. Haven’t done much with it, but at least I have it in case I get any more inspirations!One thing you will see if you spend time looking through Pinterest or art related blogs is that you can do some really fun things with “vintage” sheet music and book pages. So I got some music and two really good vintage dictionaries at a used book sale.I still have a bit of a problem tearing out pages from books and drawing on them. Maybe it’s because my dad was the school librarian when I was in elementary school. I can’t imagine myself EVER drawing in a book or tearing out a page of one while growing up. (However after 30 years of teaching public school in grades 7-12, I can safely say that many of today’s kids share a different opinion about books. But that’s another story.)

Somehow my book page drawings never look as good as the ones I’ve seen online, but as a beginner I think they turned out okay.

I’ve even tried photoshopping to color and add to some of my drawings, (with various degrees of success.) Below, just for fun, are a few more random doodles and attempts at lettering.

And, just because it’s an “art-related” blog doesn’t mean you can’t have a guest cat artist once in awhile!

Okay, so it’s more than “once in awhile”…