Time for some old stuff!

Phew! It's a good thing that I have some "Old Stuff" to show you when I'm too lazy to take photos of the weekly update (I photographed all the olds stuff a log time ago). It's also good to use it as a "filler" when I'm to lazy (or busy) to do actual wrecking to show you. The summer just isn't the best wrecking time for me. I'm too busy at the moment. But don't worry, I haven't given up on the journal yet, you can just se it as a bit of vacation.

Anyway, this is the last old stuff I have to show you so I'd better get my act together later. LOL

These are some cats I panted with oil pastel crayons back in -93. Oil pastels aren't my kind of medium. I like things that are more precise like watercolor or pencils.

Some quick cat sketches

Time for some "Old Stuff" again. I did these quick ink sketches of my darling Ragdoll Elvira back in -96. She's the mother of my crazy bunch and I still miss her a lot (I lost her in 2006)

More cat sketches

I thought is was time for some of my old sketches again. I hope you haven't grown tired of cat sketches by now! But if you have you can skip right to the last image since that ISN'T a cat. *faint* LOL



-94



-95



-95



-95



-95



-95



The view from my kitchen window in -95
(I've move 4 times since)

Portraits of Ragdolls

Time for some Old Stuff again!

I used to be a Ragdoll breeder back in the 90's (We're talking Ragdoll CATS, not rag DOLLS) so of course some of my cat drawings were of Ragdolls.



Unknown bi-color Ragdoll, -92


"Bissen", blue colorpoint Ragdoll, 1 year, -95


The first picture i most likely painted from a photo and I no longer remember the name of the cat, even if I have my guesses. (It's not one of mine) The second picture is drawn of a live (but sleeping) model, Bissen, a kitten from my very first litter and the cat I lost a month ago. I miss him BADLY! I'm sad that this drawing have been so smudged, maybe I should try to clean it up.



Duttis, blue colorpoint Ragdoll, 14 years, -2009


Duttis is Bissen's younger sister and like all my cats she craves to be involved when I take photos. LOL A lot of the wrecking photos includes a gray paw or a brown tail somewhere in the corner. LOL

Sweet sixteen

Time for some more "old stuff". I've already shown you things I made when I was 11, now it's time for some things I did back in -85 when I was 16.



(watercolor on paper)


(watercolor on paper)


During this period I loved to paint flowers. Well, flowers have always been a favorite (along with cats) but at this time I pretty much was a walking flora since I only painted realistic flowers and I knew them all by name.

These are unfortunately not my best flower paintings but I gave a lot of them away and the rest are still hidden somewhere in my boxes and cupboards.







As I said, cats have always been a favorite as well.





But wait, doesn't this cat look very strange?



(oil on canvas)


The last one I did when I was 17 but I think it's okay to cheate a bit. LOL

Here fishie, fishie!

I've already shown you some of my pencil/brush on paper work, now it's time to show something I've painted on the computer as well, especially since this image fits so well today.

About ten years a go I worked at a place where they had a small aquarium. This was before I got my own tank but I've always been drawn to aquariums and this was no exception. I was particularly found of some blue, marbled fishes.

Since one of my friends is very in to aquariums I tried to describe my favorites to her to see if she could help me find out which breed they were. Now this was when digital cameras still were considered exotic and very expensive and when cell phones were just PHONES (and scanners were crappy, see crappy scanned photo in a previous post) so the best way I could think of to show her how the fishes looked was to draw one (we didn't live in the same town so e-mail was a must)

I wasn't sitting near the aquarium so I had to go back and forth SEVERAL times to look at the fish and then draw from memory so it took me quite some time to get it right. Also the fish wash shy and hid most of the time I came to look it and every now and then I actually had to work as well. LOL





It's mouse drawn in Psp and while the perfectionist in me isn't completely satisfied with some of the details (the shape of the mouth isn't 100% correct and neither is the bodyshape or the curve of the feelers) I must admit that the likeness is still quite good and my friend had no problem to identify it as an Opaline Gourami (hope I got the English name right now).

I decided that one day, if I ever got an aquarium of my own, I should get Opaline Gouramis. Today is that day!!! :o) I now have 4 gorgeous Gouramis swimming in my tank (or mostly hiding in the corner, they're a bit shy. LOL) and it "only" took me three years as anquarist to finally get them. LOL Sorry, no photos if the real fishies yet, they REALLY didn't like when I brought out the camera. (It seems like painting them still is the easiest way to portrait Opaline Gouramis. LOL)

Watercolors and Vacations

For about 20 years ago (Eeeek! I'm OLD!!!) my mom and I used to go on vacations together evere summer, just the two of us. We packed everything we needed in the car and then we just drove around in Sweden, rented a new cabin each night, talked, cried, laughed, argued, had an absolutely wonderful time and grew really, really close. I think those vacations are the reason I these day consider my mom to be my very best friend and soul mate. (That and the fact that I DO have the best mom in the world, as yes, she DOES read this blog so what else can I say? LOL)

Anyway, this particular summer (probably the summer of -91) I brought my watercolors and we spent some time painting together.





In this particular case we'd placed some food items between us on the table and were painting the same objects, just from different angles.





We also did the same thing with some rocks and an elder flower.





Afterwards we held our on private art exhibition on the cottage couch. LOL Unfortunately it was quite dark in that end of the cottage and this photo is scanned more than ten years ago on a really crappy scanner (the original photo is packed away in a box somewhere where I can't reach it ) so the image quality is REALLY bad, but still...

The two 1½ paintings on the left are mine and the two 1½ on the right are my mom's (the very right one is the view through our window)





And here is a close up of the vegetable from both sides.

REALLY Old Stuff!

Talk about OLD stuff! These drawings are from 1980 when yours truly were just eleven years. I still thought they would be fun to share here though.





I'm not just from the land of Abba, I'm from the land of the Sámi people and their reindeers too. Although, to tell the truth I live a lot further down south than they do (or rather where they originate from, these days the Sámi people of course live wherever they want and I actually believe the majority live in our capital, Stockholm, and I don't live a lot further south from Stockholm, just a tiny bit.) and I don't have any Sámi connection what so ever (I AM however the queen of long parenthesizes and longwinded explanations) that explains this drawing.

*phew* I need to catch my breath for a while now. LOL





Sweden also happens to be the land of the little red cottages with white corners. The very characteristic red color called Falu rödfärg/Falu red is made from pigments from a copper mine in the town Falun (hence the name) and it's very commonly used since it's both cheap and conserves the wood well.

*phew* Did I say longwinded explanations? LOL I hadn't planned for this update to turn in to a lesson about Sweden. LOL What I had INTENDED to write was that it looks like I'd started to use things like perspective when I was eleven, I just hadn't fully got the grasp of how it worked yet. But it seems like my brain accidentally slipped today and caused this unnecessary long post. Oooops! Sorry! LOL

Old Stuff

I've decided to start a new category in the blog; "Old Stuff". I've been going through some of my old sketches and paintings (while looking for paper to use for doodles and color experiments and such.) And I thought it could be fun to take pictures of everything and show here on the blog.

Now keep in mind that the perspective might be a bit skewed because of the angle I've taken the photos in and some of the subtle hues in the sketches might not photograph very well. Also the sizes of the original varies which means some of the images have been shrunken a lot.

In an effort to be nice and not overwhelm you completely I will not show everything at once but there will be an "Old Stuff" update every now and then. Nothing will be shown in chronological order though, it's just in the order which I've taken the photos, to make things easier for me.

So should I stop taking and actually post some pictures then ? LOL



Cat -95



Quick doodle of one of my guinea pigs "Lillgisen" -97



Cat -95



Domherre/Bullfinch (undated)



Kitten -95



Cat -95


Yes, I like cats. Didn't you know that by now? LOL

Doodles and dogs

Tonight I really felt like doodling (it can become addictive LOL) and I didn't find something in the journal that fitted what I wanted to do so I decided to just doodle on a piece of paper. A bit tired with the cheap paper in the journal I dug out and old sketch book.





I KNOW it's lopsided. It's just a doodle, it isn't supposed to be perfect, it's just supposed to be fun to create.





While looking in the old sketch book I also found a drawing of a collie I did for school project back in -88 (the same school I went to when I walked around with cutting pliers in my handbag. LOL) and I thought it could be fun to share it with you. After all, I kind of found it thanks to the journal wrecking so if I stretch the rules a bit it too can be considered a side effect. LOL