Inspirational Shorts - Poet - Gwendolyn Brooks, Product Review - Neocolors Pastels

Welcome to the post today.  You are in for a double TREAT!  Inspirational shorts will be changing slightly, I will be sharing on the podcast a poet.  This month the poet I have chosen is Gwendolyn Brooks.  Each and every month I will either feature one poet or more and on the blog give you a bit of information about them.  On the YouTube channel Inspirational Shorts will be a short product/art supply or book review.  I hope that you are staying blessed and inspired.  Let me know who your favorite poet is.

Gwendolyn Brooks

Gwendolyn Elizabeth Brooks (June 7, 1917 – December 3, 2000) was an American poet, author, and teacher. Her work often dealt with the personal celebrations and struggles of ordinary people in her community. She won the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry on May 1, 1950, for Annie Allen, making her the first African American to receive a Pulitzer Prize. Throughout her prolific writing career, Brooks received many more honors. A lifelong resident of Chicago, she was appointed Poet Laureate of Illinois in 1968, a position she held until her death 32 years later. She was also named the Poet Laureate Consultant in Poetry to the Library of Congress for the 1985–86 term. In 1976, she became the first African-American woman inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Letters. (Wikapedia page)  More Information HERE

The poem that I will read today is called a Song in the Front Yard and you can find the words HERE while you are there check out the Poetry Foundation, they have information about a wide range of poets.

Inspirational Shorts - Review

Weekly reviews on art supplies, tools and books to inspire and encourage.

Neocolor Water soluble Wax Pastels

In this video I share a review of the water soluble wax pastels known as Neocolor.  They are lovely to use and can work well on a variety of surfaces.

You can check out the variety of sizes that they come in HERE

Art Supplies Review - Inspirational Shorts

In this post I share with you a selection of product reviews as part of Inspirational Shorts, to share with you the way in which I use a range of supplies and also how I have found using them.

I would love to hear what your experience of these supplies are.  You can also check out my Amazon page to see other supplies and resources you will be able to see.

Conte Pastel Pencils

Bees Wax Review

Apple Barrel Review

You can also Listen to the Podcast to hear about the Inspirational Shorts reviews as well.  Click on the link or the image.

Thank you for joining me, stay blessed and be a blessing

inspirational Shorts - Video Review Series - Mod Podge Review

Welcome, today I will be sharing Episode 188 of Inspirational Shorts where I review the art supply Mod Podge sharing with you how I use it and other varieties of mod podge that has been created.  The word for the day is Brave, so it is to also look at your creative life, or activities and see where you either have been brave or need to be brave

Listen to the Podcast

Watch the Video

We all need to step out of our comfort zones at times and try something new, or take our art into a different direction.  Learn about a new artist or get some supplies in that you are new to.  

Get out your art journal and maybe create a page that has tapped into the answers to some of the questions that you might be asking yourself as you decide where the next brave steps will lead you to.

Stay blessed and be a blessing.

Kindle Fire

When the Kindle first came out I was convinced that it wasn’t for me. I am the sort of person who loves the feel of the book in my hands, turning the pages and smell of a new book is something you can’t replace.  

Fast forward and the Kindle Fire comes onto the market, I debate with all the extra features it might be useful, and with a hint here and a suggestion there, my son and husband got me one for 2012 Christmas.  I never thought I would say this, but I absolutely adore it. The storage is 5.5 GB and along with books it can store music and film, it has quite a good speaker, wireless so you can download apps easily and you also have access to all the other social media, such as twitter, pinterest and whatever else you can think of. Photographs can be uploaded via Amazon cloud drive, videos can also be stored and if you connect to love film you have access to movies.

My screen is 7 inches in size and it’s very handy and fits in my bag without taking up too much room. It’s a slightly heavier than the earlier kindle, at 400g. The selection of books available for the kindle has improved and many eBook stores now have a converter for you to increase access to other eBooks. You can also download documents and PDFs via cloud.

I love being able to carry a huge selection of books that I can dip into depending on my mood, and I have got though more books since I started using it.  The kindle has some good features - storing or book marking your last place read, make notes within a book or highlight specific sections and apparently you can share what you've highlighted on your social media (though I haven't done that yet.  An audio function so that the books can be read to you and in effect you have an audio book (not sure if you can change her voice and she reads in one tone), I use this function when I am in the studio working. Another great thing is being able to look at a sample of the books before you buy, and option to change your mind if you have purchased something in haste. I found quite a good selection of Mixed Media Art books, though with these books I don't think anything can take the place of their visual impact on the pages I still want to hold them in my hands.

What I like most about it is that it has so many different functions; short of making me a cup of tea or having a phone function it has so many great uses. There is of course a down side, I guess we have yet to see the impact of staring at multiple screens and our eye muscles, and remembering to take the necessary breaks.I also find the battery life not as good as it could be currently supposed to last for 9 hours (I find with continuous use I get around 6 hours at best). I was hoping that it would have been like the earlier versions of the kindle that can last for up to 8 weeks, but I find I have to charge it every day, if not twice a day depending on usage which can be a pain, as you need to carry the charger cable around with you.  I found that to preserve the battery slightly you have to shut it down after use rather than leaving it on standby. And other down side is it only comes with the lead to plug into a computer which is a very slow way of charging your kindle. You have to buy the plug separate which to me didn’t make sense considering how much you would have brought it for.  A way round depending on your phone (as many come with a plug with usb connection) and if you already have one of these you won’t need to purchase the kindle plug.

That being said, the benefits and uses of the Kindle Fire outshine the down sides and hopefully with new and improved versions these things can be addressed. I think you will definitely enjoy using the kindle fire and wonder why you didn’t get one sooner!  Blessings, for the weekend.

Reflections - January Challenges

 

It has been a month full of posts as part of the Ultimate Blog challenge, and I hope you have found some thing to inspire you.  It is always great to come to the end of a challenge and as you look back at your journey, you are able to see areas that you might like to pursue.  I managed to fit in two challenges in the same month and also took part in Motley Souls 21 day challenge and produced a series of Art Cards.  It has also been great doing this as I have been able to experiment with different materials.

Sharing the inspiring websites I come across and celebrating the work of the lovely creatives who follow this blog each week will continue.  I enjoy reading, so will review and post - If you are a writer I would love to hear from you and you can share your journey on my wordpress site.

 

A challenge certainly stretches you and enables you to learn new things about yourself.  As well as my own post it has been lovely to visit new blogs and make new acquaintances which I am sure will continue. If you are contemplating starting or joining a challenge I really do recommend it, you will come out the other end with new insights and purpose!  Let me know if you come across any interesting challenges, or perhaps you too are just completing one!

Letraset Neon Markers - Product Review

I recently received a free set of 6 Letraset neon markers and I’ve been trying them out to see how versatile they are for my needs, and working with my other mixed media materials.

They are a twin tip water based ink marker and come in a range of florescent colours.  I have been playing around with them on different surfaces to see how they stand up.  

I used moulding paste on this journal and had no problem adding colour using the markers.  And the heart below is made from tissues paper.  They work well over glitter, and gave it extra sparkle.   They are water soluble so it’s a good idea to use them at the end, but you can also use them with water to add a hint of colour to your work.  The Letraset Neon Markers bring a vibrancy to whatever surfaces that you are working on.

 

You can also use them on gesso or to colour your gesso.  I put some of the marker on a plastic sheet then added some gesso.  You get a lovely pastel type finish but with the same vibrancy of the neon marker – depending on how much gesso you use. 

They also work well on fabric, this is a page from a fabric journal that I made recently, I decorated the flowers with the neon markers. 

The other thing I like about the markers is they have a colour stickers at the end of the lid which makes them easy to store and find the colours that you need without having to pull everything out.  All in all have found a use for them in quite a few areas of my mixed media work, and as an additional tool they will definitely come in handy.  If you would like more information about their products you can see more Here

Join me every day this month for the Ultimate blog challenge