Strathmore online classes

Strathmore has a site where they offer free classes.  They promote their products this way and get to see new art work.  I took a class on greeting cards with two instructors.  One was Jane LaFazio.  You can see her work at janeville.blogspot.com and the other was the fun Joanne Sharpe.  (Remember her Whimspirations site at Joannezsharpe.blogspot.com?)  Anyway, they were both wonderful instructors with very different styles.  Jane teaches you how to really SEE what you are drawing and is more realistic.  Joanne teaches you how to interpret what you see in a loose, doodly, fun way.  They were both inspiring!  Here are some lessons from their classes:

Card and postcard backgrounds ready for lettering

 One with lettering...the inside says "Smile!"

The Wizard

There are a lot more, but this is a sampling!

Now for the fun stuff!

I was able to take a few online art classes, and continue to do so.  If you look under my Labels on the left to "Old Work" and scroll down, you will see the kind of art I did a long time ago.  I knew I wanted to loosen up my art as I am looking to get back to my roots & create some whimsical greeting cards.  And to dig out those old children's books I started way back when, and get them finished up & ready to get published!  Hopefully this will help with recovering some of my medical expenses in a really fun way!

The first class I took (and am still involved in) is called "Doodle Arts and Lettering".  It's offered by Joanne Sharpe and you can find her at Whimspirations here:  joannezsharpe.blogspot.com   She has been a teacher forever (sorry Joanne!), and is wonderful and inspiring!  Just what I need to loosen up!

So here are some of my homework pieces from her class:

First, in a little ring book of 100 pages, she gave us prompts for making our own doodles.  It was hard for me to doodle!  I wanted to make things look real!  So it was good to get out of my comfort zone!  These are just a few pages:

Leaves

 Hearts

 Stars

 Flowers

And here are some of the lessons:

The one below wasn't from the class.  

I just did it when I had a headache & needed some relief!

Doodling is very zen!

 Before

After 

Before

After

 This was a birthday card for my mom.

The inside reads:  You can wear purple!

Earth Goddess Diva

I'm still finishing up on the lessons in the class!  Her next class, "Draw Your Awesome Life" starts at the end of October!  Luckily her classes are "forever classes", so like buying a book, you have access to them forever!  Whoot!

More Doodles and Symbols

I've always been interested in symbols & how they are used.  So here are a few more that I did.  I had practiced with them in my Imagineer book, and had to copy them into my doodle book.  Plus a couple I did just in my doodle book.
This one is some I copied from my Imagineer book:

These are more I copied from my Imagineer book as well as a tag I did:

Here's a couple of heart ones I did right in my doodle book:

Studying where & how symbols came about has been very educational!