The December Give Away is almost here!

HURRY!  Only two days left!

Register for the 

December Give Away 

before 12:01 December 1, 2011.

Just in time for sending to your friends and family....the December Give Away 

is nine of my most popular watercolor Holiday/Christmas Cards.

As a reminder: The names are cleared after each drawing. 

You must re-register for each months give away. 

Thanks for your interest!   Good Luck!

Enter now.

Holiday/Christmas Card WORKSHOP @ Daniel Smith-Seattle

Join me for two HOLIDAY CARD WORKSHOPS

What:   Holiday/Christmas Greeting Cards
Where: Seattle Daniel Smith Art Store
When:  Saturday, November 5, 2011  Winter Landscape Cards
             Sunday, November 6, 2011  Winter Bird Cards
Time:   11:00 am til 4:00 pm  (either day)

Cost:     $75/day

There are a couple of seats available....HURRY!


Call Daniel Smith to register
206-223-9599

Holiday/Christmas Card DEMO @ Daniel Smith-Seattle

2 FREE DEMOS

 Sunday, October 16th   

12 pm and 2 pm  
Come see a demonstration and

watch me paint a few of these

Christmas Cards!

Winter Birds and Winter Landscapes

make beautiful cards that everyone on your list

will enjoy receiving.

I'll share tips on painting individual cards as well as tips painting a special card for reproduction.

I hope to see you Sunday at the

Daniel Smith Seattle Store

Call 206-223-9599 for more details

Workshops for Painting Winter Landscapes and Winter Birds -- November 5 & 6, 2011
See my next post for more details!

Thanksgiving Give-Away -- And the Winner Is!......

Drum roll please......

The winner of the Thanksgiving Give-Away is:
Pat Knepshield from Vandergrift, PA

Congratulations Pat!

Pat will receive the boxed gift set of 10 Christmas Cards (shown below)

In the people's choice vote for your favorite card the results were:
#1 32 votes
#2 18 votes
#3 28 votes
#4 22 votes
#5 27 votes

There were 349 entries for this inaugural Thanksgiving Give-Away
Thanks to each of you for your participation!
Many of you left me comments on my DVDs, my website,
and how my tips have been helpful to you.
THANK YOU!
I read every single word! It is good to know that what I share is worth
the time and effort that is involved.

This was so much fun! Let's do it again!
On December 17th I'll post another
Give Away for January 1, 2011
I think that should be a good way to welcome a New Year!

Happy Holidays to each of you!
Keep those Brushes Wet!
SUSIE

Poinsettia Christmas card patterns are available!

Are you interested in painting poinsettia Christmas cards?

At the request of my students I'm making several of my best poinsettia patterns and photos available online for purchase. You will find these photos and traceable patterns in my Artstore

In addition to the photos and patterns I also have a free printable watercolor tips page on "How to Paint Pretty Poinsettias without a pattern" on my main watercolor website. Enjoy!

Happy Painting!
SUSIE

New Watercolor Poinsettias for Christmas

Hello!
I wanted to share the latest additions to my watercolor Christmas cards. These pretty pink poinsettias were painted from some photos I took last year at a couple of my favorite local greenhouses/nurseries.

At this time of the year when I visit the local plant places each and every pinsettia seem to be crying "Take me home with you!" I can't buy them all...so I do the next best thing... I take photos!

I'll add more as I have time. If you are interested in purchasing any of my watercolor cards you'll find them on my website in my new gift gallery.

I also have some tips for painting your own poinsettias in my watercolor tips pages.

Painting Pretty Poinsettias

Thanks for looking! Your comments are always appreciated and welcome!

SUSIE

Christmas Cards in Watercolor

Greetings!

I've been having more fun painting for this years Christmas card collection!

Here is a sneak peak at what I've been painting. Watch for my new gift shop to open on my website to see all 40 of my Christmas cards available this year. (It's exciting!)

Thanks for looking !

SUSIE

UPDATE!! The Gift Gallery is open! Click here! http://gifts.susieshort.net

Winter Landscapes make perfect greeting cards for the holidays!

I've had so many requests from those wishing to purchase my Christmas and Holiday Cards

(THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!)
I've been working on a little gift shop on my website to share them with you.
After several long weekends it's now open for business! I'm still adding the finishing touches but you are welcome to stop in and see what's happening!

Susie Short's Gift Gallery

Happy Holidays!

SUSIE

Holiday Greetings from Susie Short!

Happy Holidays!

This little landscape is one of my favorites from my Winter Landscape Collection for 2008. It has such a crisp clean and peaceful feel to it.

For those interested in learning how to paint this card I do have a pattern packet with written instructions available. Click here for more information

We are really experiencing winter here in the Seattle area this week. In my neighborhood the roads are icy and there has been about 8 inches of snow on the ground for 5 days. I took a lot of reference photos on the snow on the trees and I'm in the mood to paint some more snowy landscapes. I guess thats what happens when you get snow bound. I've never lived where the snow stuck around for very long so I like it! It really does make it feel more like Christmas!

My dogs love the fluffy white stuff and can't wait to go outside to play. Trouble is the snow attaches to their fur and they don't like sitting by the door with the hair dryer to melt the snow balls that collect on their feet and bellies.

Maybe tomorrow I'll build a snowman.

SUSIE

Painting a Pretty Poinsettia

Merry Christmas!

When we see a poinsettia we automatically thing of the Christmas Season. They make the perfect flower for the holidays. Painting a poinsettia can be as easy or as difficult as you want to make it. Easy is painting them like this on, looking down at them from the top. Painting them from the side view or other angles includes more shapes and perspective.

I've added a new watercolor tip on my website for Painting Pretty Poinsettias. Check your print preview before you print it. You may need to adjust your margins a little. I hope you enjoy painting these pretty flowers with me. Please email me a jpeg of your poinsettias I'd love to see your paintings or cards. I'll be starting a new page for paintings created from the watercolor tips on my website in a few months.

Merry Christmas!
SUSIE

Christmas Roses

Merry Christmas!

May the Joy and the Blessings of the Season

be with you through the coming year!

I thought I share a completely different type of Christmas card with you today. This was the card I painted as my own to be sent by me for 2006. Next year I will include it in a collection of Christmas Roses Cards for the public to purchase. I love to paint white roses surrounded by winter greenery like holly with red berries and sprigs of fir or pine. Each card is unique because I "build" them as I go. I'll share another of my Christmas Rose cards I painted this year in a day or two.

Perhaps this subject would make a good watercolor video. What do you think? I'd appreciate your feedback.

Meet my boys!

Allow me to introduce you to Rocky and Casey our two Cavalier King Charles Spaniels. They are

the official "greeting committee" for students and guests coming to my studio. This photo was taken on one of my photo excursions to a local nursery to get reference photos of poinsettias of future painting or cards. If you live in the Seattle area you are invited to stop by my studio to be welcomed by the "boys" and see some of my latest paintings.

Merry Christmas to you all!

SUSIE

Susie Short Studio is located in Kent, WA @ 1311 Central Ave South Suite D

(Plemmons Bldg) (not too far from Emerald Downs)

Happy Holidays! Greeting Card by Susie Short

Warmest wishes for a wonderful holiday season!

When I sit down to paint winter cards I usually don't have an exact composition in mind. I like to paint on 4 or 5 at a time and let them evolve as I go. Do I ever mess one up? YES!

But I like to give myself permission to try something new and if it doesn't work try again or do something different.

One of my favorite techniques for starting a winter landscape card is using a plastic card (expired credit or gift card) to "scrape" or "scratch" out the white birch or aspen tree. Then I add the darker bark features and darker evergreen behind the 'scraped trees' to make them stand out.

If you are interested in learning more about this technique you will find instructions on my watercolor tips page on my website. Try it!

For my original cards I use blank greeting cards made for watercolor. Two brands that work well for me are Strathmore Watercolor Cards and Canson Watercolor Greeting Cards. Both come with envelopes in economy packs of 30-50 cards. Enough to goof up a couple and still have plenty of cards to paint on!

Of course you can always use regular watercolor paper and cut it to greeting card size.

If you do try this technique I'd love to hear your comments.

Happy Painting!

SUSIE

Winter Landscape Christmas Card

Season's Greetings!

Brrrr! It's been snowing at my house in Washington state. Talk about inspiration for winter snow paintings! This is another card I painted with a winter landscape theme. It is a composition that "happened" as I added brushstrokes to my paper. Instead of being painted from a real place it evolved from my imagination. I like to paint on several cards at the same time and while one card is drying I add something to the next card. Its always surprising how a little detail in one card is just what the other card needs too. That happened with the rocks in this card. And after the rocks I decided to add the hint of frozen water. I like the final results, don't you?

Being a gal from Texas where it doesn't snow much and when it does it usually melts almost as fast as it hits the ground I try to take advantage of "snow days" and soak up as much as I can. I do take photos for reference but nothing beats good observation and painting from memory.

Thanks for your comments! I enjoy reading each one.

SUSIE

Christmas Greeting Cards

As many of you know I paint what seems to be hundreds of cards for the Christmas Holiday season. My Christmas card classes and demos always seem to be a favorite topic for my students. And each year I try to come up with new and different ideas to share.

As a test to see if there was a market for them I took 10 of last years original watercolor cards, printed them and put together a sampler pack to sell on my website. The 2008 Winter Landscape Collection has really been selling well. Many thanks to those of you who placed your orders! In addition to the package of 10 greeting cards I also wrote step by step instructions for painting each card. Call them a watercolor mini lesson, because each little landscape "could" be a larger winter landscape painting.

There is still time to get more in the mail if you are interested.

Click here to order from my artstore. Or just to take a better look at them!