Little Splash For Amber...Face 16 of 29

I mentioned that I was sent a beautiful background by one of my Facebook friends, Amber.  Amber made backgrounds for the ladies in our group, sent them out for us to add our personal touches to, and then we'll mail them back to her.  I finished my piece today.

Here's the beautiful background that Amber made:

This background is so pretty...I really hated to cover even a little part of it up!  

I thought long and hard about what I would make to go on top of Amber's background.  The more I looked at it, the more I thought it looked like a bunch of raindrops splashing in a puddle, sending ripples out in all directions.  I almost made a girl with an umbrella...but that wasn't quite right.

No, the more I thought about it, the more I leaned towards my second thought...that this water was much deeper than a puddle...and that something underneath the water was disturbing the surface instead.  And so it was:

Lo and behold, hiding under the surface of the water was a feisty mermaid in all her half-fish glory.  This is my pencil sketch of her, that I then cut out and glued to the background.  I think that's the wisest course when one is nervous about wrecking something beautiful...make some rough drafts, get it right, and finally, cut and paste once you're happy!

And so in the end, I was very please with this version of the mermaid, who was hiding in the water all along:

Underneath that riotous surface, she was merely making a little splash with her beautiful tail!

I thought about adding more to the piece, but I couldn't bring myself to do it...I loved Amber's background too much...there needed to be plenty of it showing through!  

I used watercolors, faux gelatos and Silks acrylic glazes (as well as some black Microns for the detail work) on Amber's mermaid.  She's got some lovely glimmer to her that the camera just refuses to pick up, so you'll just have to take my word on it...but it's there, all shimmery and pretty in her hair, her eyes, and her tail.

I hope that Amber will enjoy her Little Splash as much as I enjoyed making her...now I'm tasked with another project that will hopefully go as well as Amber's did.  I get a little nervous about adding things to something someone else has already done!  When the work is already so very beautiful, I get scared that I'll go and mess the whole thing up!!!  But, fingers crossed, ...at least till I start to hold the pencil...that my gal pals will like what I add to their already stunning pieces...

Don't forget to come back on the 29th of September for a surprise prize giveaway...in the meantime, I hope you'll be getting some art on, just as I will be doing every day till then.  Until tomorrow, my friends.  <3<3<3