I know I haven”t been on here much lately, but that is mainly because I have been sick and haven’t been able to paint and so haven’t had much to post.  Plus, Chris has the camera and is gone.  But, he will return late tomorrow–yay!

I seem to have some ongoing stomach thing going on and today it decided to attack my head as well.  I really don’t have time for this as we are moving in a little over a month.  ugh!  Whatever this is be it a bug or a flare, it has me feeling quite yucky.  Not so sick that I am on my death bed, but sick enough that I can’t get much done.  So, I hope to be back soon to post a painting, but it will be scattered as we are in the midst of packing and sorting and throwing and storing.  You get the idea.  We have moved 10 times in the past 6 years.  I kid you not!  This time it is to a motor home where we will be living full time.  So, we have to pare down to the main essentials and that is a big task.  We are now living in a three bedroom house and will be living in a 33′ motor home.  So, I will be here when I can.  And hopefully I will be up and running again soon.  We should be in MN by the beginning of June where we plan to spend the summer with our kids.  I hope to do lots and lots of painting and will be here more than ever.  I hope you are all doing well and again, I hope to be back soon.

I have no pictures to show. Inspired by the “Sunflower on Canvas”, I’m working on larger sunflower painting using a full sheet of water color paper. I won’t be able to show this work until Chris gets back around the 25th. I wrote a poem today which sums up life as I have known it as an adult.

Possibilities

A cloudy morning

brings memories

of long ago.

A day of walking

on campus at U fo M.

Drinking in my autonomy,

loving myself.

And seeing possibilities, so many passing through

my thoughts of life

and what it holds.

It is cloudy here today,

rare, though it may quickly

change to sun.

I feel promises,

and smell the possibility

of rain so welcomed

in this desert.

Interesting how one thing

can be so welcomed

here in this Southwest desert,

yet often unwelcomed

in the greenness of the north,

the place I once called home.

Here the water speaks its life-giving

phrases and we gladly

welcome it.

Dancing in puddles of summer monsoons.

Stopping, halting at raging

washes, be careful.

Rain, life giving force.

Gentle, or thunderous filling

rivers to overflowing.

One moment taking, trampling,

pummeling until the loss is

too much.

Rain so welcomed

on this dry Southwest day.

Spring rain sprouting forth

wildflowers in abandon.

Spring rain raging, flooding,

taking life as it so often gives.

This cloudy day of

memories past.

Of thoughts of possibilities.

The anticipation of new life.

One of my own creation.

Those long ago thoughts happy

with possibility.

Until that possibility became the daily life

created by another of my choice.

Falling into a life led

by terror, by sadness.

A life of empty promises.

So much pain.

So much suffering.

Stuffed daily to make life

“happy” with forced smile,

with children.

Teaching them to think of possibilities.

You hide and stuff and dream of life lost.

Of those possibilities not so long ago

that too long have been forgotten.

Remembering being too painful.

Stuck in a life chosen

by another.

You are a manikin, a shell,

living life, or not.

All energy focused on

loving children.

Your only saving grace.

Eggshell walking daily you

face the double edged sword.

Fearful of life.

Sick and unwanted,

tossed out

and…rejected.

Unloved, never appreciated

for who you really are or were.

For in this daily living,

survival was all you knew.

And self was lost the day

you were led down the aisle.

No possibilities here and you knew.

Desert Rain, cloudy skies

opening me up for new possibilities.

Life full of promise,

full of love for my Beloved.

Thoughts, no memories

of all possibilities felt

when life was still so young, so naive.

Life, older now, living

in a body of old pains, complaints,

leftovers from fear.

Feeling my unique and

wonderful self.

Treasured for who I truly am.

New Life.

New Possibilities.

Cloudy days full of promise.

Cloudy times turning to sun.

Turning to turquoise skies,

to light,

to painting and loving.

To being cherished,

soaking up all promises

of possibilities.

Living, creating a life

full to the brim.

Happiness is mine, ours.

New Life.

New Possibilities.

I have had this 12″x12″ watercolor canvas sitting around and I thought I would do a tulip painting on it, but when I was looking through my flower photos I came across some sunflowers and one just about jumped out at me. The photo is one I took when we went to the Denver Botanical Gardens. We didn’t actually go in as the cost was too much so I took some pics of the flowers that surrounded the area and this sunflower was one of them.

This past fall some friends of ours in Arivaca got married and they had sunflowers in their garden as the back drop. I decided I would do a painting for them for their wedding present. So, I asked Jenni (the bride) to take some pics of the sunflowers that she liked and she gave me some and I have been looking at them for months and in the end used one of my own<G>. It is the kind of sunflower that is their favorite though, so I think this will be great. All I need to do is spray some fixative on it and it will be finished. I do that outside because of the fumes and let me tell you today it is so windy that it wouldn’t be a good idea to try. I will do it in the morning. It tends to be calmer in the morning and the wind picks up as the day goes on. It is so dry here that there is a ton of dust in the air. It is one of those days that if you were a cowboy you would be wearing that bandana up over your face.

Back to the painting. I had a lot of fun with this. Canvas is so different from paper for the watercolors. It takes some getting used to. I painted the center of the sunflower with really thick paint. that isn’t a typical watercolor technique, but it was fun and I think it works for this painting. The petals have many, many glazes on them. The nice thing about this watercolor canvas is that if something isn’t working, you can wipe it off and start over. On the other hand, it is difficult to apply a glaze over existing paint. It really takes some practice and you have to have a very light touch. In the end, I think it worked. I was a little worried when I was in the middle of it, but today it all fell into place and turned out just how i wanted it too. Don’t you just love it when that happens? So, here is the painting, “Sunflowers on Canvas”

I have to say that it looks way better in person.  I’m not happy with this photo at all.  Chris really tried to get it to look like it is supposed to, but it didn’t work.  So, the center is not as crazy looking in real life.  The blue background is a little bit darker, and the petals well, they just look better, fresher.  so, use your imagination with this one!

The other day I started on a new piece. I was looking through some papers I have thinking that I may do a collage. I found a piece of white paper that has a fan like design. I don’t remember the names of these art papers, but this one is fan like and sort of feathery. Lots of holes etc. So, I glued it onto a piece of 300# Arches CP watercolor paper. I then thought I would paint some more tulips. I looked at it some more and decided lilies would be a better flower to paint. Plus, it has been a while since I have painted lilies and I really love to paint them. Especially the Stargazer lilies or varieties like that. So, I took out some photos I had taken years ago of some lilies that I had purchased and drew on the paper in pencil. This paper is very delicate, so I had to be careful when erasing lines to not rip it. I wanted to see how this paper would look with a watercolor. And I thought it would be fun to begin with the background. Well… it was interesting. I’m pretty sure there is no sizing in this paper, so the color spreads quickly. It was near impossible to control which made it kind of fun. I was able to just abandon all thought of control and go for a much looser, abstract of lilies. When I had finished the background and painted the lilies I realized that it wasn’t really working as a watercolor so I decided to get out the acrylics and have a go at it. I had so much fun painting it really thick. I painted the white right out of the tube, mixing on the paper with the pinks. Lots of fun. I re-did the background too after painting the flowers. Still the same colors,(I mixed a rosey gray), and made it very thin so there is still some of the papers texture showing through. The end result is a painting with lots and lots of texture. It is more impressionistic than anything else.  This was the first time that I have painted flowers with acrylics and I gotta say I loved it! I’m thinking I may want to try oils at some point too.  What I loved about the acrylics was how quickly they dried. Remember I live in Southern New Mexico and it is very dry here). I could see where the fast drying could be a curse though. I did use some extender in parts of it and some water as well. Generally I had enough time to work with it, and it was such a fun and interesting learning experience as to how the paint works and the different brushstrokes to use for the various effects. Overall it was a wonderful, textural experience.

Last week was mostly a wash as far as my getting anything finished in the studio. I did finally finish a watercolor yesterday, but can’t post the pic yet as it is a present for my daughter and she reads this blog:)

I’ve been reading a lot about perspective lately on other peoples blogs and wasn’t sure if I was quite “getting” what they were saying. With my florals, perspective is totally different than with my landscapes. I get it now. I was doing a small (5×7) pastel landscape to work out the details like values and composition. Well, of course perspective plays into this. I did a preliminary sketch and seemed to have it right. But, when I then went to sketch it on the pastelbord(I never trace my drawings, maybe I should start doing this), I thought I had it right. Well, I guess I knew it was different than my sketch in my sketchbook, but I didn’t realize how this would affect the whole painting. This painting involves concrete stairs and an iron bridge. Not easy for me. I’m not a mathematician, and so I usually guesstimate on the perspective and let me tell you, this is not such a good thing when you are dealing with stairs and bridges. I really hate to have to measure things out and get it wrong even when doing so, thus the whole guessing thing. I drew the main parts of the painting on this pastelbord and didn’t notice at this time how wrong it looked.  I had to mostly have it finished before I saw that it was all wrong. Funny how that is. I am glad I did it on a small piece of pastelbord. I ended up having to wash out the whole thing. I had already washed out several parts of this painting and had to re do them. Well, now the board is sitting with an abstract under-painting, as the whole thing didn’t quite wash off. I may tackle this project again, but for now it is shelved. I think at this point it is too frustrating for me and too complicated for me to do it justice. Maybe I am wimping out. But, after working on this small painting for several days, I am already tired of it and think that I may not even do it in the future. I did learn quite a few things though, so all is not wasted. Still, it is frustrating to not have anything to show for all of my efforts.  I do know that this is all part of the process, part of the journey.  After all, i wouldn’t really be stretching and growing as an artist without failures along the way.  I am really quite proud of myself for taking up pastel in the first place.  I could have stayed with just watercolors and limited myself to just florals.  But, even though this was my comfort zone, I felt the need to expand my horizons and try new things.  I’m sure loving these pastels.

What new things have you tried lately?

I know this is an art blog so I will make this non art post short.  Yesterday Chris and I went to IHOP for breakfast. (Love the Swedish crepes with lingenberries).  We are sitting talking and drinking coffee.  They seat an elderly man in a booth right next to ours.  I mean he was on the other side of our booth, but the booths are short so you can see the people and they are really right next to you. The guy starts hacking away.  I look over and he isn’t covering his mouth!  He is just coughing and it is disgusting and gross and I imagine all of the germs flying in my direction as his whole head moves this way and that.  Ok, I do have compassion for my fellow human being, really I do.  What kind of person goes out to eat when they are really sick and then this person makes horrible hacking noises(use your imagination here it was really bad), and to top it off this same person doesn’t even bother to cover their mouth?!  I started talking to Chris about how I haven’t gotten sick sick yet this year.  Last year when we had so many visitors I was sick every time because they all brought some terrible plague with them.  My immune system is compromised.  When I get sick, it lasts three times longer than most healthy people.  Fast forward to IHOP yesterday and we get our order.  I am trying to enjoy my wonderful crepes(we don’t go out very often) and here this guy is doing a pretty good job of ruining the whole experience for me.  I’m sure I was making all kinds of faces every time this guys started up.  Then my hero Chris looks over at him and says, ” Sir, could you please cover your mouth?”  Dang was I proud of him!  So often we just sit and try to pretend the offending person isn’t there.  We are so annoyed, but say nothing to them.  But not Chris, no he tells him to cover his mouth and he did it in such a nice way too.  I may add here that Chris had a face to face view of this guy.  I didn’t, I had to turn my head to see him.  But to my delight this guy  actually did start to cover his mouth.  Maybe it will be a one time thing for him, but maybe, just maybe Chris has educated another human being on the fine art of covering your mouth when you cough.  My hero.

Sunday morning found Chris and I in the car heading south to El Paso. Our destination; the Franklin Mountains. We had been told that there was usually a great display of poppies there in the Spring. We missed the little festival that they had the weekend before celebrating the Spring poppies. So we figured there must be some if they had a festival. El Paso is about 45 minutes south of Las Cruces. We had packed the car with my new French easel, a bag full of different media including a box of pastels and my new “artcomber” chair/cart that held the easel. Well we got to the mountain and after turning around because we had missed the exit to the State Park there, we found it and proceeded in. So far we hadn’t seen a single poppy which had me wondering if they were there at all. We pulled up to the pay booth and asked the “Ranger” if there were many wildflowers out yet and he told us a few verbena and some others, but not many. We asked about the poppies and he said that they were on the other side of the mountain. ugh. I forgot to mention that it was a very windy day which would have made painting outside unpleasant at best. The wind would have been directly on us on the other side of the mountain. We decided to turn around and maybe come back on a nice day. So we headed down from the mountain and stopped for lunch at a DQ that was right near the highway. Ah, Easter dinner at DQ, not exactly following tradition but I guess in the scheme of things it was ok. I got to have my lemon-lime mister misty freeze although they did neglect to put extra ice cream on top as I had requested. sigh. So few DQ’s know how to make them right. We then got back on the highway heading north and when we got home we were so tired that we both ended up taking a nap. It was a gray, chilly, windy day and our arthritis and other ailments were making themselves known. So, it ended up being a good day for rest. I have photo’s of poppies, some that I have taken. I want more close-ups though. sigh. If we were still in Arivaca we would be seeing them. Oh well, maybe next year.

Back in January of 2003, Chris and I took a our first trip to Arizona together. We drove my Expedition(I no longer own it), and we camped in it. First we visited my brother and sister in law in Colorado and then we went down through New Mexico and over to AZ. We stopped in the town of Portal, AZ. It is a beautiful little town and I sat at a picnic table next to the local general store and drew. There is a wonderful stone house there and I took millions of pics of it and drew part of it. I will probably use those pics for a painting of some sort in the future. Anyway, we then went to a campground in the Chiricahua’s. It was a more primitive campground at the time. There were no electric hook-ups etc. The only facilities were some pit toilets that are all metal and I will tell you they get mighty cold in the middle of the night in the beginning of January! Wow! It was a beautiful place with a fairly dense forest. I remember having to wear warm hats to bed as well as socks etc. We had sleeping bags, but no heater for sleeping. It got pretty darn cold too! But, I’m sure we were better off in the Expedition than we would have been in a tent. Chris and I have had many adventures traveling across this Country since then. Lots of good times and memories. But, we will have many more in the very near future. We are going to buy a used RV and plan to live in it full time traveling around this Country and Mexico and even Canada. Of course we won’t be going everywhere at once or even in one year. We will go somewhere and stay there for awhile and then move on. New Mexico will still be our home base. This is very exciting and should be happening by next Sept.

Here are some pics from our first trip to the Chiricahua’s and then a pastel of the Chiricahua Mountains. I just finished it yesterday and am quite pleased with it.

Wow was my hair short!

Here is the newest pastel:

Well, it has been so long since I posted a painting that I’ve done, today I have three!

Now, they aren’t brilliant masterpieces by any stretch of the imagination. No, one is downright ugly and one is so-so, and one is ok. hehehe

Here is the ugly one:

What in the world was I thinking with that background? I wasn’t that is the problem. A lesson was learned, never finish a painting when under the influence. So, today I did another one to rectify the situation. These are both about 4″x6″ cards. They are done on 140# watercolor paper.

Ahh, that is better…

The last one is the pastel I have been working on all week. It is done on Wallis sanded paper with a yellow ochre under painting. The size is 9×12″ I did it from a demonstration in the book “Pastel Step by Step By Marla Baggetta. I didn’t follow the directions as closely as I should have. But, here it is:

Still having trouble with cloudy skies. I have to say, it wasn’t explained very well either. I see lots of practice on clouds in the near future! Oh and that spruce blue behind the barn is actually the distant tree line, not the Sea as Chris thought. That would be interesting, “The Barn by the Sea” hehehe. But I can see why he got that impression:) I am so glad this one is done. I can move on. I have gotten tired of having it on my easel day after day. Some days I would just look at it and just couldn’t bring myself to work on it. Other days I would just put a few strokes here and there. This could easily be done in one day. But, because I wasn’t enjoying the process I made it drag on for days. I really don’t enjoy copying from the books. I know I need to learn these things, but I want to do my own paintings. So, we shall see where this all leads. Could be interesting.

Ok, at least I have been doing something in the studio. I really want to try to post something every day. Small paintings and sketches are about all I can do in one day. So, we shall see. Thankfully I am feeling better–yay! And it is warm and sunny here in Las Cruces. Windy too, but you can’t have everything!

I didn’t get much done again today. I did make a couple of charts of colors from 2 sets of watercolors I have. I hadn’t used either of them in a long time, and wanted to see what the colors were like. the first set I did was my Yarka pan set. I love the colors in this and they are very nice to work with. just a little water and they get nice and “juicy” hehehe. I think this is partly due to the fact that they are made with honey and also they are poured into the pans, so they stay semi-moist. The colors are nice and rich as well. I will definitely use these in the future. the downside is that these sets are large. they have 24 full pans of watercolor, so it is kind of heavy and too big to fit in your pocket. The other set I used was a Van Gogh set I got on a trip to Portland OR. It is compact with 15 half pans. They are hard though and not as easy to get nice and moist for large washes. They are good for sketches though. These are student quality paints as well. I wouldn’t want to use them for anything other than quick sketches. But the colors are really quite good and a good range as well. This set comes with a small synthetic travel brush too. All you need is some paper and a little water and you are good to go.

I plan to be out in nature more this year doing some sketching as well as some full size paintings. Most likely the full size paintings will be in pastel. I did get my French easel and my “artcomber cart” The cart has a bag attached to the back that fits a French easel, and when it is set up it has a decent chair. The wheels are large, so should be able to handle just about any terrain. The one thing that is kind of a bummer is that my pastel box is too big and heavy to lay out on the easel drawer. It weighs as much as the easel just about! So, I will either need to lay the box out on the ground or get something to lay it on. The other alternative is to find something smaller that would work with fewer pastels when painting “en plein air”. In the meantime, I may try to line the easel drawer with foam and place the pastels in there with more foam on top so they don’t roll around. I should have enough foam from the boxes that the pastels came in for this to work. And it will solve the problem for now. The downside of this is that every time I want to go out to paint, I will have to put enough pastels in the drawer to do a full landscape. I guess maybe I would just end up leaving them there, instead of going back and forth from the big box to the drawer. Too much wasted time!

I’m still not feeling the best, but today was definitely better than yesterday. I just have to remember to be kind to myself.