Mary in Aya's Mole

Madonna and Child with the friendly Breezes

 Turner Acryl Gouache

Why was I in a Hurry?

 pen and watercolor

Down the rabbit hole

pen and watercolor

Sweet Treat

Pitt Artist's Pen

This is my collaboration with Mike Kline and an open collaboration for Steve or Aya. (So far just by me.)

Alice and the White Rabbit

 Watercolor and Pitt artists Pen

May I present the White Rabbit

 Turner acryl gouache

The Mad Hatter and the Cheshire Cat

 watercolor, pen and marker

Chines Shadows--the Rabbit

 after Ferdinand du Pulgaudeau

Keith as the Caterpillar from Alice in Wonderland

Pitt Artist's Pen, collab for Steve Spetseris

Happy Holidays--back of envelope

 Acryl Gouache and Faber Castell PITT artist pen

front of envelope--I'm not the Easter Bunny

Acryl Gouache and Faber Castell PITT artist pen

pocket items, small cards

Last gasp in Mike's

Everyone cheered to watch racers run
"final?"
by me, Mary Stebbins Taitt

I am finally finished with Mike's Moleskine, and will mail it ASAP on hopefully Monday or Tuesday.
*The paper is getting progressively thicker!  Below is the prior version.  Since then I have repaired the head of the last wolf, opened Frankie's eyes, changed the color of the grass and added detail.  This was the hold-up. I kept fiddling with it, trying to get it right.

"Had Races and Won"

Acrylic on thin Moleskine paper*

4th coat

Because I had it so long, I did some additional pieces:

Biker Buddy
by Mary Taitt

At the end of a long day
By Mary Taitt
markers, Copic, Faber-Castell pigment artist pigment markers,

The Nature Conservancy wants to publish 20,000 elephant pictures, so I am trying to help them out.

Old Bull
collab for Mike

And a new pocket item--with elephants:

Dusk
card by Mary Taitt for Mike's pocket

Painting the envelope or should I say drawing?

front of envelope
drawing with faber-pitt artist pigment pens
by Mary Stebbins Taitt
click images to view larger

back of envelope
drawing with faber-pitt artist pigment pens
by Mary Stebbins Taitt
click images to view larger

I'm getting there.

Blast from Past: Henniemavis Hijacks Ballookey's Mole

I hope this is permissible, but Mary is visiting me in NH & happened to be traveling with Ballookey's book... so... I couldn't resist! These 2 pages are entitled "Conversations Between Friends I" and "Conversations Between Friends II". All imagery is directly related to snippets of tales told between Mary & I. We spent a lot of time outdoors & did a lot of drawing, painting & blabbing. No further explanation will be given. Not that you would want any further explanation, I'm sure :-)

Slow progress, Balookey's Mole

I am sorry to report that my scanner is still not working, so I have tried to photograph the pieces I am working on.  The first one is a collaboration with Andrea.

Collaboration with Andrea,
PITT Faber Castel pigment pens and colored pencil

Day 1

The second piece is the one I am currently working on, showing two stages of work. It is for my book, Frankie and Noah have a party.

day 2
I don't think the colors show up quite right.

After a week of work I still haven't got the first layer of paint down!
This is with a different camera!
Getting the colors right without a good scanner is a pain!

Day 8 on this piece
Still not finished!

Collaboration, 1st half, for Mike

The last piece is a collaboration for Mike to finish.  My intention was to do a simple graphic black and white but I got carried away and colored it.  "The owl and the Pussycat went to sea/ in a beautiful pea green boat." Mike, feel free to change the these, paint or color over or change any part of what I did, etc. You can erase the lines of the boat and the ear of the owl if you want to do something entirely different--it could be a scene in the daytime.It could be a graphic abstract.

Click images to view larger.

Passages: Collaboration with Andrea

Passages
Collaboration with Andrea
faber-Castelle India Ink pen, water color

A bit closer
click on these to view larger

Wolf envelope revisited
(Played with it a little)

My collaboration and first page in Andrea's, 4th round, 2nd pass.  Plus the back of the envelope to mail to Mike, when I finish my set.  (I think the spots on the first two are sensor spots from my husband's camera, as my scanner isn't working.)

"Tut tut, Woman Scolding" Collab for Mike

"Tut, tut, Woman Scolding"
First half of a collaboration for Mike to finish
pen and ink with watercolor "wash"
click image to view larger.

Okay, here's my collaboration of the second pass of round four in my own Moleskine, for Mike to finish.

I still have one full page to do of my own work, plus I was going to do the back cover.  I may skip that until later, same with decorating the envelope,  If I'm running late.

Final Spoonbill/Duckbill Plus Envelope Plus in-the-pocket

Spoonbill, Hornbill and Duckbill
Acrylic, by Mary Stebbins Taitt
Click on this or any image to view all of them larger

Spoonbill and Duckbill
with their friend Hornbill
Rode a red wagon downhill
with glorious freewill
past the sawmill
and came to a standstill
at Frankie's doorsill.

 Frankie is my grandson.  One of four.

I can't find the paper with the "poem" on it, and I'm not sure I'm remembering it right.

I forgot to mention that my over-enthusiastic painting damaged the thin paper and I had to apply two patches.  If you click on the upper picture to make it bigger, you can see the patches at the top left on a smaller patch just left of center at the top--sorry about that.  :-(

I am working on removing the gutter between the pages
for my book for Frankie.
and tweaking it
(not quite done yet.)

Roseate Spoonbills envelope
acrylic, Mary Stebbins Taitt

Pumice Fish
Acrylic, Mary Stebbins Taitt

I never went to art school, so I have to learn everything by experimenting.  I bought some pumice medium and played with it on the envelope for the first time ever (dumb, I know).  It was so rough, like sandpaper,only worse, so, worried about the mail carriers and postal employees injuring their fingers, I put a couple layers of matte medium over it, but that made it look dull.   :-(  It has lots of texture!  But less than before. (I also used a tiny but of the pumice medium on the rocks and on the road in the Spoonbill hornbill duckbill painting.)

In the Pocket:

Twin Poppies
oil on Graham Cracker box treated with acrylics
Mary Stebbisn Taitt

Flute Practice
oil and Arches Oil Paper
Mary Stebbins Taitt

Flute practice, side view
showing topography of oils

Mike, take the oils out and let them dry some more.  I hope they survive the journey to your house!!!

Cassandra Elise Lapwing revisited yet again (I'm probably still working on this):

Cassandra Elise Lapwing: An Extra and a Collab in Mike's by Mary

I had a bout of fairly severe insomnia the night before last and was up for several hours between 2 and 6 AM, and spent my time painting. First, I covered the backside of the painting of Frankie and the spoonbill, hornbill and duckbill with a painting of Cassandra Elise Lapwing, in profile. I THINK she is played by Julianne Moore. This is acrylics, and it is an "extra" painting, to covered the bleed-through. Since there seem to be MANY pages in this Moleskine, I didn't think Mike or anyone would mind my doing an extra.  I used 3 "colors," black, Payne's grey and neutral #5 grey.

Cassandra Elise Lapwing profile
acrylic
Mary Stebbins Taitt
Click images to view larger.

Now I was really into Cassandra Elise Lapwing, so I did another HALF portrait of her for a collaboration with Mike.  This is entirely done with one black gel pen and some Faber-castel PITT artist pigment pens in 4 colors, black, sepia, sanguine and grey.

Cassandra Elise Lapwing collab
gel pen and Faber-Castelle PITT pigment artists pens

Mary Stebbins Taitt

Click images to view larger

Here is the two-page spread:

Two-page spread

Mary Stebbins Taitt

Click images to view larger

Here is the collab image doubled.  This is not what I expect from Mike; I'm sure he'll be much more creative.  Doubling it like this tells me there is something wrong with the original that I couldn't see (or didn;t notice) in the half-image.  That is one weird-looking chick, LOL!!!!  (I did not complete the process of doubling her because my main computer has died and the Cintique is still attached to the dead computer.)

 

Cassandra Elise Lapwing half doubled.

Cassandra Elise Lapwing half doubled
and slightly fiddled with

I really need to get the Cintique on the piece of junk I have to use for a computer now, since my Mac died.

I need to stop playing with this, pointlessly, and get back to the actual Moleskine. What remains to be done is finishing the paining of Frankie and the spoonbill, hornbill and duckbill and the collab with Andrea, which I have started on, but not completed.

Round 2: Castle LeFini

Sissy and Garryd at Castle LeFini

I sent off Aya's sketchbook to Mike, because I was having surgery and not sure how I would be afterwards.  I had the surgery and am recovering, and wanted to paint, so I painted in one of the old returned Moles from 2011-2012 (Was that Round 2?).  This is an illo for another kids' book I am working on, faber Castelle Pitt Pigment pen and watercolor.  If interested,you can read the chapter here, it is fairly short (3 pages typed).  I gave it the tag children's picture book, but it probably will be a novel if finish it.