I've never been a clothes person - I thrift 95% of all my clothes, and only wear comfortable clothing, unless business demands otherwise. But in 2023, after my cancer diagnosis, one of my thrifting trips took an extra-bold turn: I bought a couple of crazy denim jackets and a pair of faded denim jeans, and I used those three wacky, happy pieces as my painting inspiration. 

For the zebra pattern, I only did a tiny print (three tries to get this one), using a stencil for the pattern, but am pleased that I got brave enough to hand-paint (no stencils or tracing) the two flowers. I was too chicken to try for a third. LOL! (And I added tiny floral stencils to my list!) Just noticed that the picture didn't capture any of the pink flowers on the jacket, but they're there somewhere. 

For the faded demin jeans, I also only did a tiny print with a stencil, and love how it turned out. I don't have flower stencils, so I just used floral type vine, and experimented using Payne's Grey acrylic INK - and it worked! I was so excited. LOL!

Now for the really wacky green and pink ones. Whew. I painted the two large ones first, and didn't really like the way they looked, but had some paint left over, so I smeared them on some small cards, then cut out hearts the next morning. I like the way they turned out. I use the hearts for different kinds of projects - here, I just laid them on a white background for visibility. This evening, I also added marks to the larger pieces, and liked them enough to share here. 

Even though I used the exact same paints at the same time, I got totally different looks - because I painted the background different colors before I did anything else. One was painted with the light olive green that I added a drop of white to so it would be opaque; the other was painted the aqua, which was already opaque. I didn't have yellow on my palette at all, but I guess the green with white dried more yellow on the one with the green background, and more green on the aqua background.

This was a fun and challenging class, and taught me so much. (And probably changed my shopping habits from this point forward! Ha!) I love having great paint days! Thanks!!!