My Bob Ross Adventure

I thought it would be nice to do a condensed re-cap of the three weeks. Extra paintings from CRI Fridays and group challenge. And here are all the shirts: And because a few have asked, here is the brief and anticlimactic story behind my Twitch handle: "BobRossStar".  My wonderful goofy husband makes a hobby of "playing on words". When I started my painting journey this year he walked in on the middle of one of my paintings and said,  "You are such a RossStar! .....so there it is! Well this is a lot of Bob in one place people! I hope you can handle it!

It's the last day, and here is my last t-shirt.  I'm going to miss all my new friends, but thanks to social media we'll be able to keep up with one another. I realized today that this isn't the end of a wonderful experience but rather the beginning of a much bigger adventure.   I can't wait to get out there and bring joy to others through this medium. Does anyone want to be my guinea pig students now that I have my license to thrill? Check it my peeps! How ya like me now???? I wanted to share my painting apron, it was sparkly new three weeks ago.  Boy does it have some stories to tell! Here is the last painting of our training. We painted this without the usual guidance from our instructors.  We learned how to set up our classrooms and some of the ins and outs of the business side. This blog is far from over. I'm going to post a re-cap tomorrow so you can see all the paintings together. ......and I have decided to come back...

I am just as crazy about animals as Bob was. I have had so many fun animal encounters since the first day I arrived. I saw squirrels, lizards, a racoon, armadillo, snake, egrets, pelicans, ibis, and a plethora of other birds. I swear it's Bob visiting me. This especially cute little guy visited me one morning before class. He landed outside my car window and hung out with me for quite awhile. Then one evening after class I decided to check out an antique store because apparently that was one of Bob's favorite pastimes. I didn't expect to find anything. I just like to browse and wanted to kill some time, then all of a sudden this thing basically cocka doodle doo'd right in my face so of course I had to take him home! It's a stained glass rooster lamp! It's the greatest thing since EVER! Thanks Bob! I know you are watching out for me!

This was the first painting of the day. We practiced mountains without snow. It's a little different; a bit harder to get the paint to break.  Doug showed us how to paint boats and gave us the option to do so today. This is my first ever boat. It's kinda cute!  This is our second painting of the day. Purple plus waterfall? What's not to love? Here is today's T-shirt. I call it "Barnacle Bob".  So I showed these boxes before.  This is what our Bob Ross canvases come in when they are new and then we use them to wet stack the paintings for travel.  If you tape your boxes together like so, you can ship them as one parcel. Bob Ross students get a 10% discount at the local UPS. The price varies on the distance,  but to give you an idea what to expect, this parcel plus a smaller box of paints cost $100 to ship from NSB to San Francisco. That is including the discount. I can't believe tomorrow is our last day. I'm elated to be get...

Oh man! Today was one of my very favorite days of this certification program. We were given a maximum of 10 minutes to complete a painting, and I completed mine in: Holy stink, I mean remember last week when I was so proud of myself for doing it in 40 minutes???? After completing our 10 minute paintings we had to move to our neighbors painting and improve upon theirs, and then again to the next painting.  It was a blast! So I think the point of this exercise was to prepare us to demo once again in front of a group. But this time we had 30 minutes. So if we can do it in under 10, imagine what we can do in 30. I completed mine in 26 minutes and my team challenged me to throw in a cabin in the remaining four. Challenge accepted! We got done early and Doug treated us to a wildlife demo. This is the demo about halfway through. Even with the demo, we finished class with a healthy amount of time left over.  So I went rogue  and took the cruddy 10 minute paintin...

Look who I got to meet Today! It's Faye y'all! Seriously,  it's the first time we've met in person but I feel like I've known her forevs! If she looks familiar it's because she is another Twitch CRI. Today started out crazy. I love this this tutorial though because as a teacher, what better way to break down the elements of a concept? This could be done for mountains, trees, clouds, etc. THE ANATOMY OF A WAVE Today was yet another day of firsts for me. Check this out! This was a crazy fun painting! I would like to try it again now that I've learned a few things. So I wanted to briefly touch on the personal sacrifices it takes to be here. Three weeks is a long time to carve out of your life. Of course this certification can be achieved over time by doing it one week at a time, but even that can be difficult, and may take a few years. There is travel, lodging and food to be considered. The materials needed are many. You can bring your own or y...

Here is today's T-shirt.  Week three is here. Unbelievable! Seriously! I don't know if it's because it's Monday, or what, but everyone is quiet today. Perhaps it's because we are all scared what this week will bring. Everyday I am amazed by how we can all paint the same composition with more or less the same colors and still come out with paintings that have their own personalities,  just like their creators. I LOVE this aspect of class. I can walk around the room and learn something from everybody. The above photo was taken the first week, and I put them in a collage for you to see what I mean. If you go back to week one in my blog you will see that mine is different from these. I hope today is not a fluke but I finally feel like I'm hitting my stride. I finally got that stinking palette knife snow thingy down. My clouds have improved immensely,  and push up bushes....fuhget about it!!! Here is the first painting we did today: This is one of...

I did end up painting with my superstar friend Faye live on Twitch.Com last night. This time things ran more smoothly with the technical side than last Friday, however, I did end up painting in the dark again. Lol! Also, this is the first time I've painted 3 full 18x24 paintings in one day. I can't believe that just a few months ago it took me a whopping 3 days to complete just one painting. Boy, I am not feeling well today. Sad face. I had lovely plans for how I was going to spend this day. I'll guess I'll have to postpone them until tomorrow. I'm super thankful that my body waited for the weekend to misbehave. My singular goal is to feel better by Monday! From what I gather, we are in for another big week. Happy weekend!

Can two weeks really have gone by this fast? I'm moping around a bit today because some of my new friends aren't coming back next week. I hate goodbyes! There are 3 weeks of landscape certifications. You can come all at once or divide them up in the manner that best suits. So every week the classroom chemistry changes. Anyhow, I'm pretty sure I've already made lifelong friends, so I should stop being a sad sally. Today was fun! We did a monochrome painting, which I LOOOOVE! I love using a limited palette because it pushes you to focus on values which results in a lovely outcome. I've been saving the leftover paint from my palette all week and I'm sure you can guess what color I ended up with when I mixed it all together? That's right! The green sludge that you find in the bottom of your thinner bucket. Well, I happen to find this "Olive Drab" to be a gorgeous color. So while everyone else used Mountain Mix and titanium white, I used ...

Gave a new look to a classic Bob Photo on this t-shirt! So today we really shook things up! The class was set up a little differently which was the first clue that things were going to be non-standard. I don't want to spoil Doug and Eddie's fun and hard work by detailing every thing they do every day, but I will say that I am very proud of myself today. A huge and nerve-racking challenge was presented and I overcame! This picture is all I'll say about that! Nevermind the horrible painting, at this stage in the game, that is beside the point. So nobody would ever guess, but I'm a bit of a nerd. Wait what???? You already knew that? Okay, so I guess it's obvious. Anyhow, before I came to CRI training I researched and gleaned every bit of information I could find about what to expect. I like to be ultra prepared for EVERY eventuality. I don't know about you, but the whole thing seems a bit shrouded in mystery. I emailed the company and asked if I ...

I got up extra early today so that I don't get into the same situation of posting too late like last night. You're welcome. We've been informed that today will be the most challenging day of the whole series. So my response to that??? Bring it baby!!! I call this one "Paint me Bob". (Note that the colors on Bob's palette are in the correct order.) I wanted to share this neat container which helps me keep organized. It fits everything in my bag of tricks and is very portable. I actually have more than a full set of paints and brushes here. I picked it up after Christmas. It is an ornament storage container, and you can completely customize the compartments. I got this one at Wal-Mart, but you can get them online as well. Amazon is a good place to start. Here are the paintings we did today. There are a lot of firsts for me with both paintings. The first time using tools in certain ways. My first time painting clouds with a one inch brush, paint...

This is me and my buddy Gini, she is my neighbor and we share stuff, ...mostly giggles. This was the first painting of the day.....and just...wow! It was a lot! A lot of crazy colors, a lot of paint, a lot of techniques and a lot of time. Today was pretty intense and apparently so is tomorrow! I think everyone was feeling "it" today. "It" meaning a whole gamut of emotions. Anyhow we were all relieved to get on to the second painting. Bob's famous "Northern Lights". Ooops, I almost forgot today's Bob shirt. I call this one "Happy Little Bob". I have so much more to share but it will have to wait. Sooooo tired! L8ers!