I'm totally in love with the colours on my cherry tree right now. Every time I catch a glimpse of it through my laundry window, or step outside my back door, it makes me feel happy. A reminder of the beauty in the world.

Love the golden colours on my cherry tree right now!

Last week I desperately needed some inspiration for an assignment on modernism that I was really struggling with. I had ideas, but just couldn't pull them together and move forward. One of my friends suggested taking inspiration from a landscape, and suddenly everything came together. I thought of my cherry tree, and that gave me my shapes and colour palette. I picked up the paintbrush and went to work.

Painting inspiration - leaves from my cherry tree, love these colours!

I posted a work-in-progress photo earlier today of the beginnings of the painting. It was looking so pretty, I wanted to capture it just in case I stuffed it up later (it happens, trust me).

Beginnings of an abstract geometric painting, inspired by my cherry tree

And here is the finished piece - an abstract geometric watercolour painting of my cherry tree, with brown and grey accents to represent the trunk / ground and winter sky. I'm really pleased with how it turned out.

Cherry Tree in Autumn

The next step was to scan the painting and import it into a program called PCStitch. It's software for creating cross stitch designs, but can also be used for any grid-based designs such as Fair Isle knitting or latch hook rugs. I used it to create a design for a 3 x 4 foot rug. The pattern will form part of an artwork proposal along with the watercolour painting.

Oh, and while I had my paints out, I made an index card using a similar design too :)