Tag Archives: house paint

The Christmas Angel Set Design

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My friend Gabrielle Reed with Celestial Stars Arts Academy puts on an annual ballet she created called The Christmas Angel through her Nova Ballet dance company.

I got to paint one of the sets for the 25th anniversary show! She sent me these pictures and gave me the wood cut out pieces. I scrounged some house paint from my garage coupled with a box of acrylic paints, and got to work.

There had been a cold front that week, so the costume studio I worked in was cold. It reminded me of the old days working in the concrete floor art studios at University where they funded business programs and fountains, but not heaters for the art students.

I was talking to one of my art friends from high school about this project and we were joking how our backs were hurting from bending over to paint. We both just happened to be working on installation projects! She had an “aha” moment where she said to “prop it up!” The second session I worked on it, I did prop it up against the wall. Thank you Elsa with No Bones Left!

Once painted it was mounted, and Gabrielle’s husband Gene put it together and added curtains.

When it was finished it was used for one of the dancing acts. One of the dance mom’s had put four of her daughters through the dance program and wanted to dance with her daughters in the show. Gabrielle put together an amazing idea of a puppet master giving a show to the toys during the Christmas festivities. It turned out great!

Our kids were in the performance as well! Here are some fun backstage scenes I took, and some proofs from So’ Creative Studio.

Mural Painting at the Vineyard Church

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The Vineyard Church here in Springfield, MO wanted a mural for their children’s ministry, and I am always looking for ways to use my art as ministry since that is my gifting.

Josh, one of the pastors, wanted a tree with the fruit of the spirit. In the New Living Translation (NLT) Bible, Galatians 5:18-25 says “But when you are directed by the Spirit, you are not under obligation to the law of Moses. When you follow the desires of your sinful nature, the results are very clear: sexual immorality, impurity, lustful pleasures, idolatry, sorcery, hostility, quarreling, jealousy, outbursts of anger, selfish ambition, dissension, division, envy, drunkenness, wild parties, and other sins like these. Let me tell you again, as I have before, that anyone living that sort of life will not inherit the Kingdom of God. But the Holy Spirit produces this kind of fruit in our lives: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control. There is no law against these things! Those who belong to Christ Jesus have nailed the passions and desires of their sinful nature to his cross and crucified them there. Since we are living by the Spirit, let us follow the Spirit’s leading in every part of our lives.”

I was actually inspired from the Harry Potter movie series.

After looking at some pictures of the “Black Family Tree,” I sketched up this drawing.

I brought the mural painting supplies and kept them in a closet at the church while I worked. I used pencils, ruler, willow charcoal, eraser, paint brushes, Velspar house paint samples, acrylic paint (Winsor & Newton Galleria: Burnt Umber, Yellow Ochre, Mars Black, Cadmium Yellow Medium Hue, and Pale Umber. Golden: Cadmium Red Medium Hue and Burnt Sienna. Liquitex Basics: Raw Sienna. Liquitex: Raw Umber. Grumbacher Academy: Titanium White and Burnt Sienna), brushes, soap, latex gloves, paper towels, palette knife, plastic cups, baking pans, palette paper, painters, Masters Hand Soap, a tarp, ladder, and diaper bag.

I drew up the top and bottom borders with a ruler and pencil.  The projector I use sometimes was too small to cover such a large area. So, I just freehanded the mural using willow charcoal.

   

I then printed out copies of the sketch and used inktense pencils to decide the color scheme for the mural.

I used Velspar house paint samples from Lowes to paint all of the mural except for the scenes with the people, which I used acrylic paint. It took three to five coats of the house paint for some colors to cover the wall.

A couple of my artsy/artist friends Kara, Lindsay, and Stashia came to help me paint while our kids had a playdate (now that’s multitasking at its finest). And of course M jumped in a bit to help paint as well.

E loved the scene depicting self-control. She kept pointing to the cupcake saying “cupcake” and then pretend eating it with her pincher fingers and making “mmm” noises.

M and our daughter E would go with me most days and sometimes my friend Lacy from Gallery Gal would also meet me because she was painting the Lord’s Prayer on another wall. It took me about three months to complete (going about three times a week for roughly one hour each session).



Hopefully this mural will not only make the space more fun and enjoyable for the kids, but it will also make it easy for them to learn the fruit of the spirit: love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.