Thank you, Val

Remember my last post (scroll down the page) I am the lucky gal who won Val's beautiful pendant. What service our postage is, I received it this afternoon.
It's even more beautiful in real life. It has come at a good time, I needed a pick me up today.
I put it on straight away and can feel the good vibes.
It's just the perfect colour to be wearing over the Christmas period as well.
Thank you Val from Valzdero Art.
Hugs,
Anna

Val's giveaway

Val Zdero Art makes beautiful jewellery and she's having a giveaway.
Go check out her blogspot. You'll be impressed with her artistic ways.
Hugs,
Anna

Holiday in Vanuatu

At the last minute I decided to paint this good luck charm for the bride.
Arriving at Port Vila, Vanuatu airport. Warm, Balmy, friendly place.

The chief was waiting out the front to greet us at Le Meridian Resort, blowing his large shell.

While we were waiting for the celebrant to arrive the Groom was looking a bit nervous and agitated. I suggested I go back to the Resort and fetch him a drink. Just as we arrive at the bar, we got a call to say the Celebrant has finally arrived one and half hours late, so off we high tail it back to the wedding on the beach in this golf buggy.

When we got back to the beach there were two policemen with the city mayor.

Apparently they couldn't find the celebrant and the Mayor of Port Vila was found by the police walking down the main street, so they picked him up and he came and preformed the ceremony. I hope its all legitimate!

The chief of the village is calling to the bride letting her know the groom, celebrant and guests are awaiting her.

The happy couple-Naomi and Mark saying their wedding vowels on the beach. Such a beautiful, peaceful setting to get married.

This photo was taken of all the wedding party and guests. All of us flew to Vanuatu for this special occasion. Lucky we had plenty of warning to plan our holiday.

If you don't know where the restaurant is for breakfast-just follow the music. These musicians are here every morning in the open air restaurant playing their sweet music while you eat breakfast.

This guy is here to make whatever you'd like in your omelette's every morning. He was a bit concerned that I wanted to take his photo.

I took over 300 photos but I won't bore you with all of them. I would be sitting here for hours trying to publish them on my post.

We saw some wonderful and sad sites and heard some funny and weird traditions.

One of the traditions that really bothered me was-the young guys had to buy their wives, it cost at least 80,000 Vat converted to Australian dollars that's over 11,000 Oh, he does get to dance and celebrate after buying her, then the new wife has her two front teeth knocked out or taken out to say she is married-hands off!

Woodberry Designs giveaway

Hey, do you want a chance to win this great piece of art by Kerryanne at Woodberry Designs?

Click on the link, and see her new range of patterns, paintings and faux cakes.

Kerryanne is a great mate, creative and artistic artist and a wonderful wife and mother.

Hugs, Anna

Roses for you

These roses are for my followers and the lovely visitors to my blogspot.

I've called this piece "Rose through my window"

Since painting the piece and looking at it for a few days I decided to apply two part "Craft Smart, Liquid Gloss" to the insert of the frame. It has a real shine and glow to it now, It does look like glass.

I've also been working on this piece. I can only give you a sneak peak. I can't tell you what it is at the moment because its for my sisters birthday present and she just may pop in here to see what I've been up to.

I'll fill you in and show you more photo's after her birthday.Hugs, Anna

Published again

The latest Handmade magazine has some very talented artists published. I noticed there are a few blogger names that I recognise. Well done ladies.

This piece was painted using Chroma, Jo Sonja's Artists' Colours and Mediums.

The editor has written "Anna Martin knows how much boys love trucks" oh, if she only knew how much trucks are involved in our lives.
Short post this time.
Thank you for popping over to my blogspot and leaving your comments.
Cheers, Anna

Latest workshop & Kinder Quilt

Yesterday I attended a workshop run by True Blue Decorative Artists. The lovely, talented teacher was Tracey Sims who came down from Queensland to teach a couple of workshops this weekend.
This piece (Boy with Chickens) was painted using Atelier, Interactive Artists' Acrylics.

Tracey is teaching a Still Life piece today, however we are off to celebrate a Great Aunties 80th Birthday. Happy Birthday Aunty Lil.

I have a dear friend-Michelle who recently made this Scrappy Little Fingers quilt for her daughters Kindergarten. The Kindergarten is having a Trivia night to help raise funds to improve the Kinder. All the parents were asked to contribute in some way.

Michelle came up with the idea to make this gorgeous quilt to be auctioned.

With the help from the teachers and children at the Kinder they used paints to apply their hand prints and free hand drawings.

Michelle also added some pizazz and sparkle with Stars, Gemstones and buttons. A lot of fun and effort was put into this quilt to make it one of kind. It took Michelle approximately one month with lots of hours to achieve this quilt.
Well done Michelle.

Thank you for taking the time to pop over to my blogspot and leaving your comments.

Craft Expo-2

You Hoo, I'm back to show you the apron.

Ah, I told you nothing exciting!

Oh, If you think I've grown maybe its because I'm wearing two shirts and two aprons. You can't see all of the design, the paint brush is hiding on the other side.The other winner was the young lady on the far left of this photo. She whipped up this very creative design in one hour.

Over the four days of the show, there were nearly 600 men, woman and children that helped to paint this canvas and over $2400 raised for the "Humour Foundation".


Thanks for popping in and leaving your lovely comments.
Anna

Craft Expo

Hello blogging friends,


On Friday I went to the Craft Expo-Craft fest and assisted the FDAA and SFDAV paint a Hugh canvas(25 metres long by 10 metres high) for the "Humour Foundation" for the Clown Doctors.


The public donated a gold coin to paint a piece of the canvas. We had all ages join in from a one year old to a 90 something year old.


The donations will go to the Clown Doctors, the canvas will be donated to a Children's hospital. There was approximately $500 raised each day.

I did have a lunch hour and went shopping. Oh, not enough time to see all the stalls. I popped in to see Sonja from Giggle Buttons and yes I did buy a couple of buttons and stitchery. I also bought a rhinestone applicator with a few rhinestones and some bits of lace and motifs to add to my next scrappy quilt for embellishments. It's amazing how much money you can spend in one hour. Now I just need more hours per day to achieve all the things I want to make.

As the school pick up hour came the stalls became quiet. I heard over the speaker the first five participants to the Bernina stand could enter the competition for free. As this was just across the way i was encouraged by my painting friends to join in. I approached the lady running the show and asked if I could paint the apron that was part of the competition. "No, you have to sew" was her answer. Oh dear, what could I sew in one hour on an apron? I rummaged through the pieces of material, bits and pieces and sat down and started designing in a big hurry.

I sewed a palette with coloured fabric for paint and a paint brush. I turned this into a pocket. There were some very talented ladies in this bunch.

After the hour we paraded down the cat walk in our decorated aprons.The winner was chosen by the loudest applaud.

A lovely young, creative lady from Williamstown and I both won first. Of course I had my own cheer squad because the catwalk was very close to the painting stand. I decided this wasn't really fair to the young talented lady, so I pulled out.

The winning apron was going onto Sydney to be judged to win a Bernina sewing machine. Good luck young lady, I hope you win.

Thank you for popping over to my blog and leaving comments. Hugs, Anna

I had a wonderful birthday and I was very spoilt. Thank you ladies for my birthday wishes.

I recently participated in a workshop run by True Blue Decorative Artists. The lovely teacher was Karen Brouwer who taught a Zhostovo Rooster design. Karen did a few workshops with one of the Zhostovo masters (Slava Letkov) a few years ago and is very talented when teaching Zhostovo style.

I thoroughly enjoyed this workshop and thought I'd have a go using the same technique but with oils. I designed this simple rose piece and painted it using Chroma, Archival Oils. If you like this piece, I'm happy to share my design with you.

I'm off to Craft Fest this Friday. I'll be helping to man the stall of the Giant Paint by Numbers Canvas for Humour Foundation for the "Clown Doctors".
Pop on by, pick up a paint brush and say Hello. I'd love to meet some bloggers.

Hugs, Anna