Photoshop, bushfires and some art

Well Carmen and I had our first Photoshop lesson last night and I don't know about her but my head is still spinning. Got on the computer this morning and tried to do some of the things we did last night and it's just completely gone, empty head, mushy brain and I can't even decipher my notes that I scribbled down. Lord, I hope it gets a bit easier as we move along, or that's $180.00 wasted. Carmen and I got the giggles as well, damn it, (that always seems to happen, we're like a couple of school kids sometimes) after the teacher had made this great long spiel about how easy it is, and the wonderful things you can do, and we'll pick it up in no time, we just looked at each other and thought, no not dumb and dumber sitting here mate, and then couldn't stop giggling.

This morning I went to Coles to do the grocery shopping along with every man, woman and child in Perth it seemed. So great to see everyone supporting the victims of the terrible fires in Victoria. People had trolleys filled to overflowing, almost like they have shopped for the next month just to be able to have the money they spent donated to the cause. The lines at the checkout were so long and the wait was pretty close to 30 minutes before I managed to get through, but unlike most times when standing in line and waiting, everyone was very good humoured and patient. Thankfully the lady in front of me had a sense of humour because I told her I would break her dozen eggs and squash her sponge cake if she even dared have a 'price check'. People have lost loved ones, homes, businesses, everything they own so a 30 minute wait in line was a piece of cake. This piece is 4" x 6" watercolour paper with several coats of paint and tissue paper and old postage stamps and some antique lace. The image is from Designs Galore.

Now with this one I've kind of gone out of my comfort zone a bit. Much brighter colours and quite a bit bigger than I normally work. It's A4 size and I could tell you that I imagined that the black dots across the centre made me think of a path and I just happened to have the quote at hand and the butterfly on her ankle was metaphorically helping her to fly down the path, but that would just be a whole lot of bull$#%. It just worked out that way and ok.......there may have been an incident with the scissors, and I might have accidently cut off her stilletto..... so I had to hide it.....if you must know!

This image is from a magazine and I hand coloured her dress with oil pastel and there is random stamping, splotches of gold, circles and flowers and a butterfly and the quote is another closest book, page 56, 5th sentence down. They're a bit spooky sometimes because 9 times out of ten, the sentence you get just goes with whatever you're doing. Very strange and somehow almost 'twilight zone-ish'. Cue the music.