Ready for Travel!

I'm off to France!  Before leaving, I made myself an art bag suitable for Ivory Blush Roses to carry all my supplies while painting around Paris and in Monet's gardens in Giverny!  If tucks neatly into my carryon bag or suitcase. 

It has a nice big zippered pocket inside in case I need to stash something securely.  I love the lacy zipper I found!  All my art supplies fit very nicely!  Paper, palettes, and brush kits as well as a couple of boards to use as painting surfaces.  

It also fits the stitch kit that I put together! More about that in a bit.

Here is a look at my primary painting kit.  It fits my Winsor Newton professional ½ pan palette of 18 colors plus 2 pans from Greenleaf & Blueberry.  There is a set of Notan markers for value study, a kneaded eraser, tube of white gouache, a view finder, and a roll of artist tape. 

On the opposite side, there is plenty of room for my preferred set of watercolor brushes and an assortment of pencils and micron pens.  It has everything except my collapsable water cup and paper to paint on.  

I've also tucked in my palette of Daniel Smith watercolors along with a set of "Mayan" colors from Greenleaf & Blueberry.  Should be plenty of colors to play with in Monet's garden!  

I'm really excited about my new little stitch kit!  I was going to make a bag from scratch, but then I found this one from Project 365 (a scrapbooking company).  Of course it was coral orange, which as you know is NOT my favorite color!  So I added a piece of the same fabric as my art bag to the front, which toned down the coral orange color and made it look more pink!  

The inside however, is blaze orange.  Wow.  No time to change it, so I'll live with it for now.  In the pocket, I've tucked a 4" embroidery hoop, needles, a thimble, a postcard of a Monet painting for inspiration, and a few business cards.  The other side, meant for pencils and pens, as my teeny tiny pair of scissors, which hopefully will pass through airport security without difficulty.  If not, they were only $3, so not a huge loss.  The tag has felt on the other side and an assortment of my favorite needles to stitch with.  

In the main compartment, I created a felt case to hold a broad assortment of threads.  It is lightweight and squishable if needed!  The thread colors were chosen based on photos of Monet's paintings and gardens.  I hope to not only paint in watercolor, but also thread!  On the left is a stack of muslin pieces that I repainted with watercolor in a variety of schemes to stitch on.  Also a piece of plain muslin if none of the pre-painted ones fit the scene,  

Tucked behind the thread box is a couple extra skeins and some fancy floss from the "Painter's Threads". One from Monet and one from Turner.  They should add a bit of fun to some stitching!

Next time you hear from me, I should be in Paris!  Stay tuned!  I'm going to try hard to blog nearly every day for the seven weeks that I am traveling!