Meet Luke & Ella! I’ll be working on their portrait (12×12 Canvas Panel) over the next few days. Don’t they look sweet together? Actually getting along to have their photo taken! Aww.
Life, Love, and Critters – of course!
Completed Painting : The Horse
February
14
2005
Here are the digital shots of The Horse. He’s still wet of course, fresh off the easel. I am including a sorta-side shot so you can see the sides (which are green and compliments the painting REALLY well) as well as get an idea on the size. It’s 12×16 gallerywrap canvas. 🙂
Happy Valentine’s Day!
February
14
2005
Good mornin’! How are you today? (I say this as if everyone will answer me. LOL) I think I am finally caught up on things. No, not those things, the other things.
The lovely eye candy for the day is what you’d see if you were driving the distance between my house and the Chicago burbs. Oh fun! We do somewhat enjoy the trip though, and let me tell you why. We took a trip up this weekend to do some things, and I kept a tally on the drive of the wonderful wildlife we saw out in its natural environment. It is so cool, probably one of the coolest things I could ever hope to witness, to see these big beautiful creatures behaving as though we’re not around.
We are always aware of them and look for them, this time I kept count on a lil piece-a paper I stuck to the steering wheel:
9 Red Tailed Hawks
3 Eagles. Yes, eagles. Sitting on the ice of a small pond, fishing.
1 Doe, a young one, feeding under a tall pine tree.
I didn’t count the cows, horses, and other birds, just the ones that are a rare treat to see and made me gasp.
We got to visit Paige, my bestest buddy who is overseeing the care of her mom while she’s (still) in the hospital. We ate Maciano’s pizza, which has to be some of the best pizza I’ve ever laid my lips on, and we delivered Antoinette to its new home. (Insert mommy-like boo-hoo’s, I miss my baby!)
The drive back was (if you were paying attention to the photo) BORING. Add rain, and no visible wildlife eye-candies. Yawn. We got home, and I napped. Then I got up, and before long, I was sleeping again. I’ve been wondering if I have a case of the flu, only a really mild one, because since last Thursday I have not been able to keep my energy level up where it usually is. Today will be better, I can feel it!
I am going to be finishing The Horse this morning. I will start my next piece today as well, Luke and Ella. A dog and cat combo on 12×12 canvas panel. I’m going to attempt to get the sketch and underpainting both done today.
I also ran into another dear friend of mine who gave me a few minutes of her expertise to fix my “skin” selector (just above the calendar on the left), now it will be much easier to add new skin and not hog up a bunch of space. But if you defaulted back from your previous selection, this is why. Just pick again! Firefox users should also see an improvment on my stylesheet loading, and if you don’t give me a holler ok? Grazie.
So, I’m back, I’m alive, I’m still an artist, and I’ve gotta get painting!
Quiet Weekend
February
12
2005
It’s going to be quiet over here in my lil corner of the web this weekend, I took the weekend off and have a whole bunch of stuff to do around here.
It’s really springy outside and I am antsy to get out there and enjoy some of this weather, before it snows again!
Have a great weekend.
🙂
Ellie (Dog Portrait) Final Scan & Detail
February
11
2005
Ellie’s scan turned out perfect. She’s such a pretty girl! I’m including a close up of her face too. The photograph I had to work from was pretty teenie, it was a 3×5 photo but Ellie was only about 2 1/2 inches tall in that photo, I scanned it in at a super high res so I could get as much detail from it as possible. The rest, well, I made it up!
Ellie will ship on Monday – along with The Horse. I’ve been doing paperwork, packing and shipping all morning. My poor mailman is going to freak out when she sees what’s waiting for her! Ten, Tori, Emily, Nicki, Callie, Possy III and a Christmas gift I’ve finally gotten around to shipping (’cause she finally got around to moving to her new house!). I think I should go hide until the white truck is gone. heh!
Work in Progress #2 : The Horse
February
10
2005
The horse is finished, I have to complete the foreground grasses and paint the edges of this one. I’ll do that tomorrow.
Painting on Cam : The Horse
February
10
2005
I turned my webcam on, I’ll be painting for a little while tonight.
I went ahead and booked our hotel for our vacation, completely oblivious to the sum of 3+7. Three being the number of days Mark will be home before he reports back daily for 7 more, then we can leave. I booked our room as though it equals 7, which would probably result in just a smidge of trouble with his unit. What was I thinking? I’ll be the first to admit I’m terrible with math, but that’s one of those really easy ones. Doh. I’ll use my calkeelater next time, and pay for my miscalculation by sitting on hold for another 1/2 hour to change the reservation!
We (the girls and I) went shopping lastnight. Usually we “go shopping” by sitting on the floor flipping through catalogs. This time we were online, at Old Navy. Both of the girls have new spring & summer wardrobes now, they’re growing like weeds. Cute weeds, but still, weeds. I bought the Chickeymonkey 3T’s for Christmas, and they’re above her ankles already. Caitlin had 6x shirts that still fit her in the fall, and now she looks like the young female version of the Incredible Hulk. Of course while we were there, we stopped in the Women’s department so I would have a couple new things to take on our trip, and we even picked out a few things for Daddy! All in all it was fun to do that with the girls pointing at the monitor picking what they like, and I didn’t realize that my 3-year-old monkey had acquired such discerning taste already.
Me: Clicks on adorable little frilly girlie-girl floral print shirt in a pretty spring green. Exlaims “Ooh! Jay! That’s would look so pretty on you! Would you like that one?”
Jay: (shaking head with eyebrows raised) “Uh-uh mommy, no I don’t like that one!”
Me: “But whyyyy? Why don’t you like it?”
Jay: “I don’t LIKE green, I want PINK!”
Now you can imagine what color her little wardrobe is going to be. Caitlin wasn’t easy to persuade into trying other colors, either. Her main staples are light pink, dark pink, and a couple of things in blue. Hey, at least everything will match, right?
Update on Mom2 (aka Paige’s mom), she pulled through surgery with VERY positive news, the doc doesn’t believe that it is cancer. They removed 2 large tumors and some lymph node and will have those test results in about 2 weeks. She was alert earlier today and is doing well. Thanks for thinking of her!!
In other news, I took a nap today. I should have gone to the grocery store, I needed to go to the pet store. I have many paintings to scan and paperwork to complete. And I took a nap. I must have been pretty tired!!
Alright I’ve gotta get back to the studio, John Mayer is waiting for me. Oohlala. (Hear him sing for me to Come back to bed. Sigh.)
Jeez, see how I am, I’m so obsessed over John that I forgot to show you Mark. He sent this pic this morning, he’s displaying his Purple Heart certificate and medal.
Antoinette FINAL SCAN & Detail Shots!
February
10
2005
Phew it’s taken me a few hours to get this viola scanned and pieced together, but WELL worth it, I must say. Yes I’m bragging again. I don’t do it often, so thank you for tolerating me when I do! I’m “hiding” the detail images, just read on (click “more” beneath the full painting) to see the detail shots. I am particularly fond of (read: proud) the pinstriping along the edge of the viola. That took a steady hand and a lot of patience. I am also just tickled to pieces about how the bridge turned out. I didn’t even have to pull my viola out of the case to check for accuracy on it. Cool.
Without further delay, here’s the insanely awesome and accurate scan of one of the artists’ most favoritest paintings ever.
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Dog Portrait Completed!
February
10
2005
Here’s Ellie’s digital pic, I’ll show her off again when I get her scanned!
