Just Mary Designs

Little Girl With Flower - Click Here To Purchase Print

Taking time to stop and smell the flowers.  It's something we all hear we should do, but seldom take the actual time to do it!  I painted this picture after seeing an adorable picture of a little girl in a bowler hat.  I thought it was so cute that I had to paint one myself.  As the painting took shape over many months, flowers began to appear - everywhere!  If you look closely at the top left hand corner, there are some flowers that look like they are fading into the blue.  I drew those in the Boston airport while waiting for a flight last summer.  I used a transfer technique to add them to this canvas - and I love the way they blend in!  The drippy blue background was an experiment with inks....turned sideways!  The collar of her dress was from an old wall paper sample booklet.  The rest was pure imagination! So I encourage you to take a moment to smell the flowers, just like this little cutie!  Reminiscent of more innocent times gone by, this sweet little girl in her beribboned bowler hat smells the daisy as flowers rain down upon her. I hope you (and I!) can remember what it feels like to be enchanted by the scent of a flower!

Why attend an art retreat?  Because it can change your life.  Seriously.  It changed mine!  How?  Because it opened my eyes and my heart it an entirely new world.  I had never even picked up a paintbrush.  But there was a little voice whispering inside me... I kept looking at paintings and thinking - I think I could do that, I just don't know how!  I saw an add for a retreat in Portland, OR so I ordered some art supplies, packed up my bag (and my courage!) and set off on an art journey.  What I learned there was amazing.  Not only did I learn the HOW behind the gorgeous art I admired, but I found a whole new community of women to celebrate creativity with. I will be teaching at the Creatives Celebrating Sisterhood retreat in April 2013.  Find out all the juicy details here.  The other teachers are Junelle Jacobson (yes ladies - she is a serious rock star!), Kris Lanae Binsfeld (who has a smoking new deal with Demdaco!), Rachel Payne (big time advocate of artists), Ann Marie (awesome and inspirational mixed media artist), Linda Kinnaman (who will be debuting an awesome collaborative art journal there!), and Jacquie Williamson (artist extrodinaire!). The head of the retreat asked me to do a video about this retreat.  This is my FIRST attempt at video - but its from the heart and it shares with you my journey about what a retreat did in my life.  I hope you come.  I hope it changes your life!! Check out the video!  Mary's Retreat Video   See you at the retreat - and don't forget the early bird discount available until July 1!  

Your Worth - Click Here To Purchase

Your Worth Is Never Measured By A Number On The Scale. Isn't that the truth? So many of us measure our very worth by that tricky little number. We give the scale SO much power over us - over our self esteem.  Wouldn't it be nice if we stepped on a scale and what it reported back was that we were AWESOME?  GORGEOUS?  ENOUGH? It's time to stop measuring your worth by what you see on the scale. You are enough. Right now. No matter what the number on the scale is - you are enough! And the first person you need to convince of that is - yourself. Now I'm not saying that being at a healthy weight isn't a good idea.  It is.  You and I both should definitely strive for that for a whole host of reasons.  But I am saying that a healthy weight does not equal what you are worth.  And a healthy weight should never dictate your self esteem, your sense of self worth, and your own believe in your abilities to be awesome.  So take this to heart.  You are Body Fab-YOU-lous! Prints of this piece are available for purchase here.  They look like this!

[caption id="attachment_622" align="aligncenter" width="687"] This IS the Life I Want To Live
Click Here To Purchase Print[/caption] I've been doing a lot of thinking lately about what kind of life I want to have.  Where do I want my company to go?  What do I want my romantic life to look like?  How do I want to guide my kids and my grandson as they grow up?  How do I want to look?  How much do I want to exercise?  What do I want my future to hold?  Where do I want to travel to next? I think the secret to having a joyful life is actually wanting the life you already have. Sometimes the desire for things - material things, relationships, jobs, experiences - makes us feel that our lives are not good enough. Like we somehow are failing because we don't have everything we want right now.  I have come to think that the act of wanting can be good - it can be a driver, a motivator.  It can drive and motivate us in two ways - one positive and one negative.  Wanting can  make us feel small or hopeless, or wanting can make us feel abundant and grateful.  If we want for more out of life from a starting point of wanting what we already have, then I believe that wanting can help his grow in a aura of hope and expansion of the light  in our life. I hope this piece reminds you that the life you want to have starts by wanting the life you DO have! [caption id="attachment_624" align="aligncenter" width="692"] Print Available For Purchase By Clicking Here[/caption]

[caption id="attachment_613" align="aligncenter" width="692"] To Change Your Body
Purchase Here[/caption] We all want that magic pill...that miracle diet that will immediately transform our bodies into the icon of beauty that we desire to be.  The path towards that body doesn't start with anything external - it all starts with something inside of you.  Your thoughts are the key.  I learned from the amazing weight loss coach, Brooke Castillo, that your thoughts create feelings - and those feelings create actions - and those actions create results.  If you want the results in your life to be a body that is changing towards what you want it to be, you must start by changing those internal thoughts. Our internal thoughts sometimes are really mean.  So many women beat themselves up - for eating that extra cookie, for saying something dumb, for carrying that extra 20 pounds (again!), for somehow failing as a mother, as a wife, or as a friend.  If we are not busy beating the crap out of ourselves with the negative track that runs rampant in our heads somedays, then most of the rest of the time we are busy ignoring ourselves.  Distracting ourselves from things we are afraid to feel.  Sometimes we disguise distracting ourselves with being busy.  Or caring for others.  Or working too much.  Or eating. The path towards finding peace with your body all starts in your head.  Pay attention to your thoughts.  If you don't like them, find some new ones that you do like.  Some new thoughts that you can buy in to.  Thoughts that support the direction you want to go.  That support the fab-YOU-lous life and body you can have!

[caption id="attachment_603" align="alignleft" width="692"] Art Journal Page - I Really Am...[/caption]   Ever have those days where your fears rise up - even if they don't make any logical sense?  I took a class about art journaling and the assignment was to journal about your fears on one side...and your reality on the other side.  I think women tend to universally fear some of the same things.  We fear loosing love...our health...our money...our very lives.  We sometimes even fear looking in the mirror to see how our pants fit today, or fear stepping on the scale to get the same bad news day after day.   I'm done with these fears.  They really don't serve me.  I don't make forward progress with my life when I sit in a puddle of fear.  Or when I anxiously fret about what "could" happen or what "they" might think.  When I think about being bold, embracing my strength and the beauty within me - well it just makes me feel strong.  Like I can conquer the world.  Like I am solidly here and a force to be reckoned with.   So here is what I really am....I'm a damn good business woman.  An emerging artist.  A loving mother.  A doting grandmother.  A pilot with a sense of adventure that goes as far as my airplane will take me.  A classy girl with a little flair and a lot of pluck who intends to live her life on her own terms.   Goodbye silly fears.... hello sweet life!

I'm so excited to tell you about a retreat that not only am I attending - I am teaching at!  The Creatives Celebrating Sisterhood Retreat promises to be an amazing time of art, connection, and learning.  This retreat was created by Linda Barutha of Live, Laugh, Love Retreats. Have you been to an art retreat?  I went to my first one in Portland, Oregon about a year and a half ago.  I had barely even picked up a paintbrush before, but I kept looking at art around me and thinking "I can do that - I just don't really understand HOW to."  But I knew the creativity was inside of me.  So I found a retreat, signed my bad self up for it, and off I went to Portland - paintbrush in one hand, blank canvas in the other - not knowing a soul there. What I found there was the artist inside of me.  What I learned there is that mixed media art was the home I didn't even know I had been longing for.  What I took home with me was the knowledge of how to do all those cool techniques that make me stop and want to TOUCH a piece of art.  The texture, the colors, the layering, the beauty....I learned how to do it all.  Going to that retreat might have been the best gift I have ever given myself. The Creatives Celebrating Sisterhood Retreat will be special for another reason too.  I took an online class with several hundred amazingly creative women last summer.  We have stayed in close contact, supporting each other in our creative and artistic endeavors.  Many of them will be attending this retreat.  And I am DYING to meet these women who have become my creative sisters!! I am going to be teaching a mixed media class on how to create the painting below.  It's called Believe In Your Beauty and is part of my Body Fab-YOU-lous line.  I will show you how to do the layering of paints, ink and papers.  We will learn how to do collage and incorporate an awesome transfer technique.  Plus, you will learn all about creating hidden messages inside of a painting for yourself.  While things dry I will share with my class what I have learned about finding peace in the body you inhabit - right now.  That is what Body Fab-YOU-lous is all about! I hope you join us at the retreat - we would love to have you there!!

[caption id="attachment_584" align="aligncenter" width="692"] Alluring, Apple Bottomed, Amazing - Rock Your Look
Click Here To Purchase[/caption] We all have our look. Girl - it's time to ROCK IT!   Some of us are pear shaped women.  Some of us are hourglass shaped women.  And some of us are apple bottomed.  Whatever you are - it's time to love your look!  I believe beauty shines through more in holding yourself confidently rather than by the size of your jeans.  Enough with the message that we need to disguise our look.  Embrace your look! This is the latest painting I have done in y Body Fab-YOU-lous line.    The full line can be found here.  The Body Fab-YOU-lous line is dedicated to helping women find peace and end their struggle with weight loss and body image challenges. I create this line because it comes from my heart - from my own struggle over the years with finding peace within a body that is not model perfect.  You can too.  You truly ARE Body Fab-YOU-lous! Choose today to Rock Your Look!

Tonight  have been playing!  In my Surface Pattern Class by Rachel Taylor we were given an assignment to create a line of stationery from a brief.  The brief specified the elements desired in the line, and that it is to be aimed at a contemporary audience, trendy with a touch of sophistication.  Do you think I hit the target audience?  I hope so! The class is comprised of many wonderful and talented aspiring designers.  Most of them design digitally on their computers.  While I am fascinated by what they create, I am too "hands on" (or maybe that should be "hands messy) to design that way.  So I have taken my mixed media designs and manipulated  them to finish this assignment.  It's much more my style...and much more fun for me! I started with this background that I painted.  I scanned it before adding the words or picture. [caption id="attachment_575" align="aligncenter" width="692" caption="Believe In Your Beauty
Click Here To Purchase"][/caption] Then I manipulated it to create this pattern board - taking snippets of it that I thought were visually interesting. [caption id="attachment_576" align="aligncenter" width="692" caption="Wild Garden Pattern"][/caption] From there I took the pieces of this pattern and repurposed them into the pieces of the stationery set according to the size specs from our brief.  This was really fun for me to do.  I am imagining seeing it on the shelves of Barnes & Noble and wanting to write on these with a fresh sharpened pencil!!

[caption id="attachment_541" align="aligncenter" width="692" caption="Click here to purchase!"][/caption] It's finally here!  I am excited to unveil my new art line - Body Fab-YOU-lous!   The Body Fab-YOU-lous line is dedicated to helping women find peace and end their struggle with weight loss and body image challenges. We all spend so much time wishing for that thinner version of ourself to reappear. But here is what I have learned - it's not the thinner version that gives us what we want. What we want is to FEEL the way we think being thinner will feel. We want to be energized. We want to feel strong, lean, and alive. We want to feel beautiful. And we want to feel free - free from the struggle of weight loss and body image negativity. I don't think I have all the answers, and I am certainly not inside what I perceive the ideal body to be.  But I have learned how to find peace from what has seemed like a never ending struggle - peace right now as I am today. The key to ending the weight loss and body image struggles that so many women have begins with changing the thoughts that fill up our own minds. I hope my art in the line will be a beautiful reminder that a better future is possible - one filled with belief in your own beauty!  I want to help women believe - believe in themselves and that peace can be found right now, in the body you inhabit today. The full line can be found by clicking here!  Enjoy the images! Prints of my work can be purchased on my Etsy Store.  Come on over and have a look at the different inspirational weight loss art.  You truly ARE Body Fab-YOU-lous!