Faux paint and murals

    Painting sort of fell in my lap, so to speak, prior to retiring from teaching. now we're talking walls painting not canvases. A friend of the family wanted some painting done & she had a leather look in mind for her dining room. For some reason, I was intrigued with faux painting ..actually painting my bathroom vanity top to look like marble, so I had quite a few books to get ideas . She had more faith in me than I did at the time. Doing that kind of painting can be great.....or a disaster!!!
 After some research, the "smooshing" technique seemed to be the one I wanted to use for this faux look. now the problem with this ..or most faux painting techniques is that it has to be done pretty fast, even though a glaze gives you an extended time ..........however, when you are trying to get a whole wall done at one time you really have to be FAST!!!

  Smooshing requires placing plastic over the tinted glaze, pressing it to the wall and then removing it. The wrinkles and folds of the plastic create that leather look. Luckily the dining room was fairly small , so I could roll the glaze, then get the plastic on pretty quickly. 
  A butter yellow eggshell paint was used as the base with the glaze tinted with hitching Post ( Shermin Wms )
   My next foray was a bathroom (for 3 brothers) who wanted some kind of underwater theme. As if figuring out what to do wasn't enough of a problem, I had to take wallpaper off first ( I could strangle the inventor of wallpaper!!!) Which then required an oil based primer....this was a tiny bathroom, with no vent , nor would the window open. When I got dizzy getting up on the stepstool, I knew I needed fresh air!!
 For murals that have to do with kids, I check out the kids book section in BAM. I'm the kind of painter that has to have an image to go by, even though I'll put my spin on it. Graeme Base's book Sign of the Seahorse was the perfect springboard for images. All three boys played musical instruments, so the Seahorse Cafe was reinvented for the "Clark Trio" with fish playing the instruments that the boys played. The lobsters suddenly became members of a band, marching across the shower ( with colors of the high school ). Snails riding skateboards formed the border of the mirror. Here are a few photos of the finished product:

   The 2 younger boys liked this so much that I had to create " new" planets to form the border of of his bedroom. The youngest wanted music notes as his border & for his headboard, I created a stick jazz band with modernized instruments.

 There are times I feel like Eldon on Murphy Brown....who came to paint one small room and stayed for the rest of the seasons continually working on other "artwork"  LOL

  A friend's daughter was expecting a little boy & she wanted a little bit of painting done for the nursery. There wasn't a lot of wall space between baby furniture, closet, windows & door. The older daughter loved monkeys, so there had to be a monkey in it. Soooo, it had a slight jungle look.

These were painted on either side of the closet