The Mouse Market

I finally had time to work on my free library project this weekend, and I have loads of pics for you. 🎨

If you missed the last installment, a quick catch up: I’m designing a free library for our yard, and I decided to go full-on Wonderland.

After drawing the designs onto the wood with pencil…

…I then began the (very experimental) painting process. For each element, it seems to take me a few tries before I settle on a technique I like. I’m hoping the final two panels will be easier! 🤞

This weekend, I started in on the lower part of the panel: the grass and the pink path.

I originally painted the grass a little too uniform in color, but once I added in darker areas to frame the panel, I liked it much better.

Next up was figuring out how to do the coloring, shading, and outlining for the first of the characters—well, not quite the character yet, but the soil under its feet.

This was the first element that required outlining, so I figured I’d practice on the soil before moving on to the character. I really like how it turned out!

I’m also glad I did a practice run, because using a super fine brush to paint outlines isn’t something I’d done before, and it was tricky. The paint needed to be just the right consistency, and I had to take up just the right amount on my brush, and use just the right amount of pressure. 😮‍💨

Next up: filling in the upper swathe of grass. I also lightened the pink path—the color kept snagging my brain with a not-quite-right feeling.

I took a break for a couple hours, but the siren call of the shovel bird was too strong, and before I knew it, I was back at it…

Painting in the Night

Before I tackled the bird, though, I knew I needed to block in the background, and I started with a base layer of purplish-black.

I stared at the panel for an embarrassingly long time, trying to figure out how I wanted to finish the background. That’s when I saw the sponge that came with my paint set, and a light bulb flicked on in my brain. 💡

The sponge was a game changer! For the large back panel I’m planning a waterfall with those little umbrella vultures, and I’m already excited to use the sponge to give the water a misty effect. 😃

Next time, I’ll likely do the background first, but I was able to make the sponge-painting work by keeping damp Q-tips on hand. If I got blue paint on the tree, so long as I wiped it up before it dried, it was all good.

Finally, the shovel bird!

I started by blocking in the colors, already sweating over the prospect of adding in the outlines with my tiny brush.

And then, it was tiny brush time. This took me…a while. 🫠 I had to go back in a couple times and overpaint some of my shakier lines so I could give them a second try. But in the end, I think it turned out great!

I do need to add in soil or grass under the bird’s back foot so it doesn’t look like it’s floating, but that’ll be a task for next time.

I won’t lie, I’m not looking forward to doing some of the even tinier design elements, like these pencil and hammer birds. I might try an exterior paint pen for those outlines, otherwise I’ll be using a single mouse-whisker paint brush. 🫣

Wonderland Tiny Foods

All of this fantastical painting reminded me that, over a decade ago, I made a series of Wonderland foods. Here they are, straight from the Mouse Vault…