Thread, Paint & Inspiration — the Sky’s the Limit! • Create unique and impressive landscape quilts from photos you take — includes tips on taking good pictures, how to combine elements of several photos into one design, and how to use color effectively • Yes, you can create stunning pictorial effects using step-by-step techniques! • Learn how to paint your own fabrics and create striking silhouettes Let your inner artist out! Capture the glory of a sunrise or sunset, the stark outline of a tree against the sky, the placid surface of the ocean. Gloria has assembled a repertoire of techniques to give all your pictorial quilts breathtaking impact, from working with photographs to painting fabric, creating silhouettes, constructing backgrounds, and embellishing with stitching. Try one of three projects, or use the techniques in your own designs.

How to paint your world in watercolor…and have fun doing it! The day Sterling Edwards watched an artist paint an entire sky with three deft brushstrokes was the day he committed to trading his tiny oil brushes and photorealistic style in favor of big, bold strokes of watercolor. In the years since, he's developed not only a wonderfully fresh, luminous painting style, but also an approach that takes the intimidation out of this beautiful but often-mystifying medium. In this book, he shares both. • Initial chapters lay the foundation for successful paintings, from choosing the right brushes to achieving vibrant colors, interesting textures and strong compositions. • Step-by-step demonstrations illustrate techniques for painting rocks, skies, trees, foliage, buildings, water and other landscape elements. • An easy-to-follow, four-step painting process makes for easier starts and stronger finishes, complete with rich darks and sparkling highlights. • Eight complete painting projects cover a range of breathtaking scenes and seasons. Whether you're dipping into the medium for the first time or you're a watercolor devotee on a quest for clearer color and more personal statements, this book will help you make the most of the time you spend with brush in hand.

Discover the luminous landscape paintings of Lisa Mee that capture the mysteries and essences of the natural world. She looks for places and themes that evoke and inspire her dialogue with nature.There is a mood of elegy in her work, which reflects her deep concern for a threatened and fragile ecosystem. Her paintings celebrate a world full of light, movement, gentle highlights and vibrant colors. There is power without overstatement and deep feeling without sentimentality.

Award-winning Expressionist Nature Painter and Mackinac Island summer resident Maeve Croghan presents a collection of her work and describes how summers on the island as a child fostered her deep love of nature. Quiet, meditative scenes and the ever-changing water and sky are integral parts of the Mackinac experience reflected in her oil paintings of amazing places. While the artist's appreciation for the natural world is rooted in the limestone rock of the island, Maeve explains how she honed her unique style when she moved to the West Coast and was inspired by the long views of California where wild open fields flow into the Pacific Ocean. The scenes instill an emotional response in Maeve just like the view across the Straits of Mackinac. It's a feeling like there's nothing holding her back. Possibilities are endless. Throughout "The Essence of Nature," Maeve shares paintings of some of her favorite Mackinac Island spots as well as inspiring scenes in Michigan's Upper Peninsula and Canada, California, Hawaii, Italy and France. May this collection give readers the same sense of peace and connectedness to nature Maeve feels when she paints.

Here, readers can discover how to add dramatic depth to their landscape applique quilts using easy-to-follow techniques from master quilter Gloria Loughman."

To celebrate Saskatchewan's centenary, internationally renowned master photographer Courtney Milne has returned home to celebrate his first love-Saskatchewan. The breathtaking images in Saskatchewan: The Luminous Landscape pay homage to the beauty of the province's prairies, hills, forests, lakes and skies. From the Cypress Hills in the southwest to Selwyn Lake and the Crackingstone Peninsula in the far north, Saskatchewan: The Luminous Landscape transports viewers from iconic images of the prairie to the seldom seen vistas of the north. The 225 images-coupled with personal notes, stories and journal entries-reveal why, like all prairie natives, Courtney Milne's world travels always leave him longing for his cherished province. "It comes as no surprise," he notes, 'that we become spoiled by the dazzling displays of light-sunsets, sundogs, harvest moons, northern lights, not to mention thunder clouds, rainbows, hoarfrost, blue spring ditches and fields painted canola-yellow, mid-July green, or ripened gold."

• Reveals the afterlife as a fluid realm of imagination and invention, a luminous landscape created entirely of consciousness • Explains how to navigate the early stages of the afterlife, how we learn and grow in the spirit world, and how to release anxiety about the end of life • Includes exercises and meditations to prepare you for navigating and communicating in spirit There is no better source of information on death and the afterlife than someone who has died and lives in spirit. Channeling his late son, Jordan, psychologist Matthew McKay offers a postdeath guide for the living, revealing in vivid detail what to expect when we die and how to prepare for the wonders of the afterlife. Specifically describing the transition experience and the early stages of the afterlife, including how to navigate each stage, Jordan shows how death is a fluid realm of imagination and invention, a luminous landscape created entirely of consciousness. He explains how a soul that has newly crossed over is an amnesiac, arriving without senses, a nervous system, and all that has anchored us to the world. Jordan details how to navigate without a body, how we learn and grow in the spirit world, and how to release anxiety about the end of life and instead view it as another stage of being. He shows that the inferno described by Dante is an optional nightmare caused by thought projections that overwhelm the newly transitioned soul, and he reveals that the bardos are where souls who are beset with fear and false beliefs spend time learning and recovering. Providing profound relief from the fear of death, as well as exercises to prepare you for navigating and communicating in spirit, Jordan’s message reveals how love is the bonding element that holds all of consciousness--and the afterlife--together. McKay also documents the unbreakable bond between the living and the dead and teaches the skill of channeling, allowing you to connect to loved ones who have passed.

A brilliant photographic account of the wonders of nature details the splendor, magic, and subtle, spiritual beauty of earthly creations and features sections accompanied by literary samplings from Ralph Waldo Emerson, Rachel Carson, Annie Dillard, and other notable writers.

Bloom: The Luminous Gardens of Frederico Azevedo presents the accomplished work of Frederico Azevedo - the award-winning Brazilian landscape designer who has established himself as the leading designer of the Hamptons. With stunning projects, Azevedo's work carries an emphasis on flowers which he uses to 'lure the eye through the flow of the design'. His signature curving, floral borders are the hallmark of an Azevedo garden. He also often creates multi-dimensional vistas using layers of flowers, trees, grasses, shrubs, and hedges for a dramatic effect. The results of his impeccable designs are soft and romantic, but always sophisticated, well executed, and most importantly, adaptable to whatever its environment may bring. Discover the luminous world of Frederico Azevedo and his dazzling gardens.

Infuse your images with glowing, luminous light From high-profile wedding and portrait photographer Elizabeth Messina comes this beautiful guide to shooting lush, romantic portraits exclusively in natural light. Whether you’re photographing children, weddings, maternity and boudoir, or portraits of any kind, The Luminous Portrait will inspire you with Elizabeth’s personal approach and award-wining images, sharing the art to making flattering portraits that appear “lit from within.”