Topic #48--"Chair" Entry

From Tricia!:

Sing a song of sixpence a pocket full of rye,
Four and twenty blackbirds baked in a pie.
When the pie was opened the birds began to sing,
Oh wasn't that a dainty dish to set before the king?

"I had been waiting for the right opportunity to use the image of the little girl (or perhaps it is a young boy) and was so excited when I saw the topic for this week. The original plan for the piece was for the child to be holding an artist's palette in one hand and a brush in the other with words that said something about the importance of honoring imagination in our children, but as I went along I discovered a scrap of paper with the nursery rhyme Sing A Song of Sixpence and the whole idea was quickly changed.
I did the background part using watercolors and a charcoal pencil. The photo which was colored in photoshop was mounted using those pop dot foam thingies. I needed the child to be raised a bit from the back. The sign is also held in place with a foam dot. The feather is one I found on the back porch.
Red oil pastel lines the edge (though in the photo it looks a bit pink).

I added the 4 and the heart, then rounded off the edges to also turn this into an oversized playing card for a yahoo group I joined not long ago. The theme for the 4 of hearts is "birds." -there is a different theme for each card. Isn't that cool? I am a bit late jumping on the bandwagon but I thought it would be fun."