On my tombstone: “Spent time wisely” (I hope!)

I don’t know if you remember this one, I began an oil portrait of Mark back in March. I was still so new to oils, just your standard over-achiever, and decided I wasn’t comfortable enough with flesh tones to even start anything more than the background.

Today was the day! Hey, when you can’t sit still, pace in front of your easel! He’s huge, Care can vouch for me, 2 feet wide by 4 feet tall. In other words, life sized, and possibly a smidge larger. Nice unveiling for his homecoming, eh? 😉

Good morning!

I woke this morning before 6am. I could not fall back asleep, I think the excitement is really kicking in! I’ve cleaned the house top to bottom, including the studio. I even went so far as to pick up some trays that work nicely on my drafting table, and arranged all of my oils by hue. Nervous energy perhaps? LOL

I met my goal for Mark’s arrival, lost another 1.5 lbs. which brings my total loss up to 51.5 lbs. 😀 I imagine with all the energy I have right now I will lose another pound or two before he arrives!

He’s scheduled to arrive on Thursday evening now. His current itinerary (as of yesterday afternoon) has him scheduled to depart Oct. 9, which gives us 16 days! YAHOO! And the bad part of it, he is very adversely affected by anything happening to his team while he is not out there with them, and yesterday it sounds like a couple of the guys in his unit were injured. 🙁 I hope they’re ok, it has been pretty rough over there lately and I just wish I were in charge, you know? I’m sure a lot of you feel that way, seems like we all would have a better plan to fix things there and prevent what’s going on than what is currently being done. Yea, I say put a woman with PMS in charge. We’ll take care of stuff pretty darn fast!! 😉

My version of “Girl with a Pearl Earring” is dry, and I scanned it this morning. I have a couple more images (linked) that you can look at, the first one is the work in progress collage from start to finish, I think 12 shots? It looks so wierd, different lighting makes every revision look like I did a major overhaul, so just consider the features and not the colors. LOL

Then the last one, I promise, hehe! A full scan of my painting (larger view) beside Vermeer’s.

And that concludes my 3-week long tribute to the Master!

I will finally get caught up on my e-mail now, and I would like to make a couple of revisions to my site, specifically the ordering information page. It is waaay too wordy! I will probably be removing a few things, rewording, and stop offering other medium for a while to work only in oils.

Okie dokie then! I’ve got nervous energy to spend, so I’ll catch ya later! 😉

xoxoxoxxo

I think! LOL I know, you guys don’t see any difference do you? I will update the collage of all of the work in progress pics later on.

I’ve got her hanging/drying in my new red room. 😉

Here she is in the evening, Wow. I love the ambiance!

you can click on the thumbs for a larger view, but be warned, the paint is still wet and I reserve the right to tweak her as needed. 😀

Now I don’t know when I will be updating, maybe later tonight, maybe not for a few days, I really don’t know yet! I will try to let you know!
xoxoxoxo

It’s still not dry, the digital pic turned out ‘eh’, so I cropped it and put it up next to Vermeer’s just so you can have a peek! It’s going to start getting really busy here!! 😉

Here you go, this is a pic of my current progress shot (left, obviously) beside Vermeer’s. I will be painting today!! I’ll start up the cam around 10AM. I have much to do, and just a few hours to do it in! You guys have got to be pretty ready for me to just finish this piece, huh? Today, I promise! Then I’ll scan her and post the final, and that’s it!! I swear! :P~

Here’s a screen shot of what she looks like on my cam right now….

I want to finish her tomorrow, because I have A LOT of things to get done to get ready for Mark’s arrival!!!

Back soon,
~me

HAPPY FRIDAY!!!!!!!!!!!

Aaah. Have you ever seen such a beautiful thing? We ran down to Blick this morning for a couple of things, and I just had to bring my camera to get some pics! The first place I headed, the Oil Asile. Sigh.

They just started stocking their Masterwrap Canvas recently, which is my favorite! I could have climbed up on that mountain and taken a nap! And like some people are addicted to pens, we artists tend to be addicted to brushes! (I can’t ignore the other side of that aisle, it just wouldn’t be right.)

The coolest thing that I was so tempted to buy were these new huge brushes! That’s Jay’s hand, she wanted to weech them but couldn’t! They’re pretty big, eh?

Yep, I have so much eye candy today I’m just having to hide it all behind text links. LOL

One last pic for you, I’m still working on Pearl, and really have quite a bit yet to do, believe it or not. Here’s a progress shot of her from my painting session lastnight:

She is starting to look like she’s supposed to now! Yay!!

Have a great afternoon/evening everyone!

Heya! Sorry I had to take the cam down without warning this afternoon. I am determined to finish her face tonight, and you are welcome to watch!!!

Sooo, go on and click on that cam link right over there ————>
and don’t forget to zoom it to 200% to see the whole capture area! 😉

I have a beautiful photo that I took this morning that I will share when I finish up and post her progress pic tonight. Make sure if/when you come back, you scroll down right in this entry to see the images, I’ll add ’em right down here. 😀

ONE WEEK TO GO TIL MARK COMES HOME! Whoooooooowie! We are so excited to get to spend two whole weeks with him, I can’t even describe it! I’ve arranged the first night already, kinda honeymoon-ish. 😉 Jay and Caitlin are both thrilled of course, Jay keeps talking about sharing her birthday cake with Daddy and making him wear a hat and hold balloons. hehe! (Ready for that, hon?)

I’ll be back in a bit!
xoxoxo

And one more for my bestest bud who isn’t obsessive compulsive AT ALL. I swear.

She just loves my purdyful flowers. 🙂

As you can see, I still have plenty of work to do to get this “up to par”!

I will begin painting in just a few minutes, working on her facial features. Starting on her eyes, then finishing her forehead and temple area, then I will work her nose, cheeks, lips, chin, and finish up with the shadows on the side of her face, ear and neck.

There are some small areas that I plan on tweaking a little as well, so hopefully I can get all of this done before I leave to pick up Jay from school in a couple of hours!

The cam is on and pointed at the painting, I have set the view to “large”, which means when you click my webcam link (over there—>) that you will want to adjust the size by right clicking on the cam image and zooming until you can see her face, or my hand! LOL

See you soon!
xoxoxoxox