"My Personal Taste in Art" chapter 3 The Kitchen

I didn't think I had much art in my kitchen but I was wrong.  When you live with things on an everyday basis I guess you get so used to them that you loose site of what you have.  I have both functional items and decorative items in my kitchen.  Like I mentioned in my last post, most of these things have special meaning and memories of people I love. 

I'll start the tour with the area between the living room and the kitchen.  This is where the door to the garage, the entrance to the downstairs art studio, and the staircase going to the second level of the house are located.

The first thing I want to mention is that the walls are not yellow like they appear in this photo.  They are a shade of beige.  Some of the walls are a dark beige and some a lighter shade.  This is a little cabinet that I bought at Target in Tucson and painted as a companion piece to a couple of other items that I had in my office in AZ.  You saw the game table in my living room post.  The large pot was given to me by my mother.  She went to Ohio State University when she was over 60 years old for a BA degree.  While there, she had a part time on campus job assisting a well known ceramic artist.  He would create the molds and she would pour them.  He gave her this pot which she gifted to me. I have the back of the pot facing out.  The front featured a large high heel red shoe!  I love the back and dislike the front so have always turned it backwards.  I bought the cross at Hobby Lobby when I moved here.  It was the perfect color so no re-painting necessary.

This is the wall next to the garage door.  I bought this chest at a yard sale.  It was in my office in AZ with the other two pieces that have the same design.  The mirror was from Hobby Lobby and was silver when I bought it for my master bathroom here.  Later I moved it to this spot and painted it to match the chest.

This is the stairway down to the art studio.  At the time we finished this remodel project I did a blog post going into detail on what we did.  If you are interested you can research older posts and read all about it there.  The shelves are full of favorite things.  I did the painting and the wall hanging is from Hobby Lobby.

I'll move on to the kitchen.  Since the room is too big to show in one photo I took two shots from different angles.

I took close ups of the various "art" items I have in the kitchen.

This one shows a pot I got from Ross, a container filled with a plant that my friend Nancy gave me and a small vase that my mother made and painted that are on top of the cupboard.  The large bowl and matching small bowls were a housewarming  gift from my mother that she bought at an art fair in Columbus, OH for us when we moved to AZ. The little gold leaf dish was a 50th anniversary gift from friends Rubin & Jan.  The copper container which holds my kitchen utensils was from a garage sale.  Notice the apple on a stick in the container.  It was made by my dad and painted by me back in the 80's.  The two trays were also garage sale items.

I painted these as a matching set.  They are functional as well as pretty decorations.

As we move around the counter I have a few other special things that are also useful.

My napkin holder was made by my dad and painted by me many years ago.

I can say ditto on the tray...made by Dad and painted by me.  I use it to hide all the cords from the phone.  The fruit bowl was a gift from my friend Jean and the small bowl and vase came from garage sales.

The items on the top of my dish cabinet are a mixture of garage sale items and a pot made by my mom.  I painted the cross painting and stool.  The stool came from a garage sale here in MI. Roger made the stained glass windows.  Below is a close up of the stool.

By the door to the backyard I have a painting I did on a board made by my dad.  This was in the 80's.  The small cross is a very special to us.   It was given to us as a going away present by our Bible Study group in OH when we moved to AZ.   Roger has just started work on a stained glass window for the door. When it is done I will post photos.

The wooden bowl which I have on my island is another yard sale find which I painted.  I use it to showcase some seashell balls given to my by my friend Nancy.  You have probably notice I have lots of items that were given to me by her.  She was always changing out decorative items and when she bought something new she  gave me the things she was replacing.  I put a piece of coral that came from (you guessed it) a yard sale on top of the balls.

Last are two glass items.  The plate was made by my friends Don &  Leila"s  daughter.  She had it on display in her home and when I told her I thought it was pretty.  She gave it to me saying "her daughter made so many of these that she would just get another one from her and I could have this one." The glass flower is something that I bought from the Three Rivers Art Guild Holiday Show.  It was blown by one of the guild members. It is a perfect match for the plate.

You have now seen all the art in the first floor of my house.  When I decided to share my personal collection of art I didn't realize how much I had.  Everything I own is full of memories of people and places.  People who have passed through my life and places I have lived.  Doing this series has reminded me of how I am surrounded by love of all these people.  Some have passed away and I no longer live close to the rest, but owning things that they gave to me will always keep them close.

Happy Valentine's Day 2018

I have been working on some functional items in the past few weeks.  Around the time they were finished I got a commission for a painting from a previous customer from CA.  I am going to show you all these items on today's post.

These three pieces seem appropriate for Valentine's Day because they all feature flowers.  The first is a 12" wooden plate.

Next is a 7" high pedestal bowl.  I am posting two photos so you get a better idea of what it looks like.

And....as always on Valentine's Day....a red rose painting.  This one is on a small 5" bowl.

I no sooner finished these projects when I got a commission via email from a customer who wanted an ocean/beach scene.  I had a 8X10 of "Beacon of Hope" so sent her a photo.  She liked the subject but wanted a larger size in a blue frame.  She said 11X14 was the perfect size.  I had a nice frame that size and refinished it in blue and painted a new version of "Beacon of Hope" to fit the frame.  I mailed it yesterday and it should arrive in CA next Tuesday. 

The first two winters here in MI were pretty mild snow wise but this year we have been hit hard.  I mention this because we were snowed in for 3 days and I never left the house.  I spent all my time in my studio working on this painting.  When I looked out my window all I saw was snow building up but doing this beach scene painting cheered me up!  We are really missing Tucson this winter.

"My Personal Taste in Art" chapter 2, The dining room

After I finished my last post I spent time walking around the house and really looking at all the art and other items I have collected over the years.  It got me to thinking about each item and the story behind it.  There is history in each thing that I have on display in my home.  Some things were built by my father.  I have pots that were thrown by my mother.  There are all the paintings that I did.  All the yard sale and thrift store items that I have re-purposed bring back memories of time spent with good friends and my mother as we went out on Saturday mornings spending fun time together looking for bargains.  I also realize how much stuff I bought new and repainted as soon as I got it home.  I never let an item that I knew was perfect except for the color stop me from buying it.  Another realization I had is how little money I have spent on decorating my home.  I could call this series of posts "Decorating on a Shoestring Budget."  I love a good bargain and I love creating art.  What fun to combine them both and bring beauty into my home!

Now to give you a tour of my dining room.  The first photo shows the whole room  I took this picture standing in the kitchen looking into the dining room.

I'll go clockwise around the room.  Starting with the credenza which is something I DID NOT paint.  Everyone who sees it asks if I painted it.  The answer is no.  I bought this beautiful piece of furniture from our friends who lived across the street from us in AZ.  She is the same friend who gave me the dried artichokes that I mentioned in my last post.  These neighbors were moving to Idaho to be closer to family and were getting rid of most of their furniture and offered this piece to us for the price of $75.  They also included the statue of the lady with the flowing cape.  I love both of these items and they will always remind me of Dave and Nancy.  The grandfather clock was bought  in Michigan from the neighbors who live across the street here.  They were having a yard sale and sold us the clock for $10.  The key is missing so it doesn't run and is always at 12 o'clock but I don't care.  It is a perfect fit for that corner. The painting on the easel on the floor is my first version of "Study in Patchwork".  I painted it is AZ and had it hanging the hallway on the bedroom side of the house.

The painting over the credenza was also something I painted of our AZ house.  We had high ceilings and I had a large open space near our entertainment center.  I did this painting to fill that space. I call it "In Flight."  Here is a photo of it hanging in the AZ house.

Here is some pottery I have sitting on the credenza.  The vase and small pot were made by an artist friend I met not long after moving to MI.  She commissioned me to do a painting and I told her that instead of paying me for it would she be willing to barter.  She said yes and I chose these two items.  The small dish is a gift from one of my grand-daughters.  It is a perfect match to the pottery.

As we go around the room to the back wall of the dining room we find this small bench.  This holds many memories and has special meaning for me.   I took a woodworking class back in the late 70's and made this bench from a step between our house and the attached garage.  We removed the step when we converted the garage into a new kitchen.  We no longer needed the garage because Roger had built a new three car garage in the back of the house.  We tore out the wall between our old dining room and kitchen and made one large combined family room and dining room and converted the old garage into a new kitchen.   When we took the old steps out I saved this board and made the bench in the woodworking class.

Next are a few yard sale items that I painted. 

Notice the key hanging on the wall.  I got it at a yard sale shortly after we moved to MI.  I paid $5 for it.  It was bright blue.  I had no idea what I would do with it so stored it until we finally redid our dining room.  I knew it would look good there so I painted it to match the room.  Here is a close up of the plate and bowl and also a photo of the back of the plate which I painted in a different design.

I have another painting hanging in the far right corner of the room.  It is titled "Vase of Elegance". I painted it AZ and showed it a few times.  When it didn't sell I decided to keep it for myself.

The last photo is of our dining room table.  We brought the table and chairs from AZ.  The flower arrangement consists of silk flowers that have been in various arrangements over the years.  I wash them and recycle them into new arrangements as the mood strikes.  The container is a companion to the magazine container in the living room that I bought at Ross in Tucson.  It has has been repainted to change the original color.  The table runner was made by a friend from Tucson.  She and her husband came to visit us here in MI and she gave it as a gift for our home.  She is a great seamstress and makes many beautiful items.  I talked her into joining the artist guild in Tucson so she could show and sell her fabric art.  I love the table runner.  It is so elegant.  It is the finishing touch for the room.

My next post in this series will feature the kitchen.  It may be awhile before I have time to do the posting.  I just got a commission to do a painting from a customer from California so will be working on that for awhile.