Bridal Shower Gifts Part 1

So! This weekend I was back in my home town for one of my best friend's bridal showers.

I decided to hand make her gifts because I like making things for people (if you hadn't already guessed....) and so I sat down and thought of what I could do.

Immediately I decided on doing some paintings because I love to paint, and I chose her corgi and her cat as the subjects of the paintings because.... well, she loves her pets, and of course because they're adorable. 

If you know me well at all, you know that I don''t do much detail in my oils, so I decided that while I still wanted to use a canvas, I was going to use watercolors for the actual dog/cat because I find it's easier to keep control of an actual subject in that medium.

So, I got some 6x6 canvases (I did still have to put these in my carry-on luggage!) and I painted them in a solid base. And let them dry for a full week before I did anything else with them.

Then I made a template of the square and sketched up her pets. Something simple, but that helped me keep the lines of the actual animals themselves.

And then it was all about the water colors. Which I let dry and then put on the canvases. Here's a comparison shot:

The Corgi had to be trimmed down because I apparently measured incorrectly :/