Ballerina

When I was a kid I danced.. not just randomly, I had lessons. In fact I was made to go 4 times a week and I hated it. I took lessons from being 3yrs old to about 12yrs old. I was so glad to stop. I did all my grades, in ballroom, latin, modern sequence and disco and took part in competitions, I wore stupid frilly dresses with net underskirts and I had ringlets in my hair and I hated all of it. it was never my choice, and after I stopped I never danced again until I was about 40. A friend talked me into trying tap dancing, something I had never done before and it was exhausting but good fun. for the first time in my life I was actually enjoying dancing. Maybe that was more to do with getting new shoes!

Now ballet is something I have never done, I have an idealistic view of it, that I would be graceful and beautiful ... that I would somehow lose 60lbs by putting on the shoes and would grow 6 inches taller. Of course the reality is I would look like a fairy elephant! 

But the shoes... I want the shoes... and not just because I love shoes. 

Ballet shoes have something magical about them..something nostalgic and ethereal. 

So i made a ballet page. 

I started with PaperArtsy Infusions, I painted the page first with Satin Glaze, sprinkled on the infusions and then lightly dragged more glaze to seal them. 

Next I sketched my shoes. 

I then painted them, sorry no progress shots. I used Prima watercolours and just built up the layers using pinks, grey, brown and white. 

On either side of the shoes I added more Infusions this time in blue. I allowed them to soak a little so that the walnut started to show through then I dried them. 

In parts they were  a little dark, so I flicked on some clean water and then dabbed this off to remove some colour. 

I added shading to the shoes using Derwent XL charcoal 

Added some flicks of white paint. 

and a border using black Crayola slickstix.

Finally I wanted to add some text. Initially I wanted to use the text from the Everything Art stamp {#3} but the stamps were too small for what I wanted. So I used a white pen to write the same text out, adding more words of my own. 

I am really pleased with this page, it is as close as I will ever get to ballet lol. 

what did you always want to do but never could? why don't you create a page about it. 

Darcy x