When I saw the Bleeding Heart flowers a flood of memories came over me. I thought of my grandma's garden and how much I loved those little heart shaped flowers. She lived far from me but when we visited I remember playing in her garden. In those days (this was the late 40's) there was no such thing as landscaping. Flowers grew in a garden just like vegetables....row after row of beautiful flowers. I started to think of the others that made an impression on me. Hollyhocks came to mind. She taught me how to make little dolls out of the blooms. Then I thought of the colorful Gladiolus and the tiny little blue Bachelor Buttons and of course my favorite the Iris. With these thoughts in my mind I decided to do a painting and title it "Grandma's Garden". How will I present all these flowers in a folk art style I wondered? They suddenly I thought of doing them as a quilt. I slept on that idea and the next morning my eyes rested on a crazy quilt was made for my mother in 1931 when she was 10 years old by her grandma. Here is a photo of the quilt.
The odd shaped patches both floral and plain told me the direction to go in. I found the perfect 11X14 frame. I chose a color pallet and started by painting in the shapes keeping in mind which flowers would go where.
After doing some internet research on the flowers I wanted to incorporate to make sure my memory of what they looked like was correct I drew the pattern then did the painting. I was obsessed with getting this done. I spent one day on the background and drawing and spent seven hours yesterday painting the flowers. Here is the painting.
I had another inspiration while writing this. My grandma's name was Flora. Isn't that perfect for such a painting. I am changing the title to "Grandma Flora's Garden"
Thank-you Nancy for your post that was the inspiration for this painting.
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