Ivy Lily Creative

I was in Mallorca for a week earlier this month and since I've been getting interested in growing plants again, I wanted to buy some seeds from the trip. A lot of the gardens in Alcudia had cactuses in them and I figured that's the easiest thing for me to try, they're not likely to die even if I forget to water them at times. And they should work fine as houseplants. The two photos above are from some wasteland, not anyone's garden. I got packs of 10 cactus seeds and 5 aloe vera seeds, 2.50 euros each. When I got home, I soaked the seeds in water for 24 hours before sowing. Then I sowed them in pots in a soil/sand mix about 0.5 cm deep, watered and added plastic covers with holes to keep them damp and warm during germination. I also sowed some orange seeds and an apricot seed at the same time. I had soaked those seeds before sowing, too. For the orange seeds I was going to use all clay pots but I only found one so the rest of them are plastic. In the bottom o...

  There was a big change in the weather between this week and last week . Sunshine turned to rain and the temperature dropped about 20 degrees. Blog post about seeds I bought from my Mallorca trip coming tomorrow.  Kuvia sateisesta puutarhasta.

Puutarha kukkii.  The garden is blossoming right now. 

  Rhubarb Leaf . Watercolor on watercolor paper. 300 gsm. Size A3. Time 30 min. August 2010.  I posted two charcoal drawings I made on a plant painting/drawing course earlier. I also made watercolor works during that course. The first one, a rhubarb leaf, was a quick painting. The assignment was to make the sketch with a brush instead of a pencil. I usually sketch all my paintings in pencil first so that was new for me. I've gathered all art supplies and other tools I use to make my watercolor paintings in a 3-page guide you can download for free .    Flower Close-Up . Watercolor on watercolor paper. 250 gsm. Size A4. August 2010. The other paintings are close-ups of leaves and a flower. The assignment was to go very near the subject and magnify it and pay attention to colors, shapes and patterns. I had applied a blue wash on the paper before painting the dried lupine leaves and that turned out to be a bit tricky but it did set a different mo...