Faces -

Sorry, it's been awhile since I have posted.  Here are a few more faces - done with France online at Sktchy.  I feel I have improved.  I used to not work so deeply on my portraits, but drawing along with someone as good as France, makes me feel the depth which is needed to portray the character in detail.  She helps you look at every little nuance as you draw.

Other things are happening here...I have begun a complete going through of the studio.  I figured  there is no better time than the present.  Gardening is happening, as well, the growing season is pretty short up here at 8500 feet elevation.  Today the wind and rain are happening...that will keep me inside. Hardly EVER a day when you wake up and it's already raining..that weather event is usually left for the afternoon and evening in these parts.

NOTES on the virus - I live in a small mountain community, where there are and have been 2 confirmed cases.  There is no hospital within 50 miles of here.  There is barely medical care..just a small clinic with nurses.  Therefore, we DON'T have much of a safety net and we don't go out much. If we do it's with a mask on, to protect others mainly.  We order take-out on occasion...and eat in the car.  We even had margaritas TO GO the other day with our taco lunch.  That was fun.  But that's it, other than a trip to the grocery store about every week and a half and the post office every 3 - 4 days.

I chose to give up my activity in the local gallery for this year which amounts to no longer being a gallery host, or having my art on the walls, or manning the sales desk during monthly ART receptions.  No more Monday Paint Group.  Too much hassle for personal social distancing...being amongst too many strange and 'from faraway' visitors, as well as familiar friends.  

One thing I understand and it actually pains me to consider it, I have come to look at this situation as EVERYONE is infected.  And although it should be stated 'could be' infected, for me it's 'IS' and that is just how I have chosen to look at it.  This virus does not discriminate.  This has also eliminated visitors or company or going to someone's house as a visitor, including my daughter and her family who live in the northern part of the state. Summer RV travel will be a welcome activity...if we can get a reservation, they seem to be not so available..but with RVing, you don't NEED to be around anyone else if you choose not to be.  I notice that the reopening of many things that were closed down, has seemed to bring on this sense of relaxed concern for the spreading of the virus..a false sense it would seem, since case numbers are increasing.  Anyway, I try not to dwell on this..I stay super busy and let ART save the day.  Stay safe and social distance.

DAY 28 - Painting 30 Paintings in 30 Days (Muscari/Tulips)

 

"Haley's Comet and Muscari"

12" x 12"

oil on wrapped canvas

  As I started today, I anticipated taking 'go along'

photos, got a few, then completely got

lost in the venture of painting

these tulips and grape hyacinth.

Here are a few at the beginning...

 

Discovered I needed to take out that 'blocked in' color

of the sky, it dulled down or mudded the sky

color as you can see in the next one..wipe, wipe...

 

 I got really excited about the muscari - they were what

kept me going on this one.

ONLY 2 more - I hope I am ready to slow it down now.

A Pastel of Purple Hydrangeas

"Purple Hydrangeas"

image approx. 6" x 9"

framed 9" x 12"

soft pastel on Art Spectrum (aubergine)

Several years ago, I went to Guatemala with a group of painters and Kaye Franklin.  Kaye painted the hydrangeas in the beautiful gardens at the Hotel Atitlan as an oil painting demonstration.  There wasn't enough time for us to paint them, however, I took a lot of photos, never thinking I would paint them someday.  Just goes to show you, you just never know.

I think that is why so many artists collect things, save a tremendous amount of photos and have lots of art supplies, because "YOU JUST NEVER KNOW - 

when that photo or art material or item will inspire you to paint it!"

This is the mat and frame added today.

Never a Dull Moment

May starts the tornado and hail/wind/storm season in Kansas.  

It has started with a vengeance - we have had several days

of our 'weather radio' alarm singing at all times of the day -

thank goodness we have that.

Monday, Memorial Day, we spent the early evening watching the skies..that is our best guess for what is happening in the atmosphere above us, as we aren't near a town and are hardly ever considered on the big city TV channels

that are hundreds of miles from here and treat us as a we don't exist - 

like the left-out (dare I say, 'bastard') stepchild.  (click 'read more' to go on)

Where I Stand Sunday

Would you expect any other photo at this time of year?? 
I was not a good gardener last fall to not take the overgrowth
out of my flower beds that hubster made me.
So that is what I have been doing today. 
These little spring bulbs couldn't see the forest for the trees..so to speak. 
Stretch up to the sun now plants and let's get some color going! 
The only problem is with my work here is, we were inundated with sandburs last fall
and they come out in bunches and go through leather gloves - OUCH!

Where I Stand Sunday is an ongoing photo essay examining the different places I spend my life standing.
Too often we take for granted the everyday places we spend our lives walking on.
There are several others who also write this on Sunday, see sidebar.

Where I Stand Sunday

Seeds of all kinds travel across the landscape

in various modes of transportation.

Lifted on the wind

carried by birds

attached to a host.

This one landed in the cracks of the concrete of the parking pad. It came from a seed from the dead head of last years crop that was sitting outside the fence for several days last year. Ornamental sunflowers need more TLC, than this one has been getting. Garden and plants didn't fair too well this year...hubster couldn't take care of it all while I was gone and we had enlarged the vegetable garden twofold. We have lots of yellow squash though. Tomatoes are just beginning to turn orange. Can't wait!

Where I Stand Sunday is an ongoing photo essay examining the different places I spend my life "standing".
Too often we take for granted the everyday places we spend our lives walking on.
The ground we tread on has its own stories to tell.

HAPPY BLOGIVERSARY!!

Today is my one year "blogiversary"! Yeah!!!!!

My blog was started to keep my friends and family up-to-date on what is happening here in the middle of nowhere; and to showcase my art and write about what it is like to be an artist living where I live.

It's a really good way to keep an ongoing journal of your life, I have found. I have some dedicated readers and have met some amazing people and made great friends through my efforts to blog.

My blog has logged 6511 'page views' and 3406 visitors from all over the world. I have posted to this blog 209 days and included 66 photos of my artwork. Right now, 81% of the traffic/lookers/readers that comes through my blog is from the United States. I'm still learning how to interpret the stats, which was explained 'a very important' part of this for marketing artists.

Probably the biggest impact made on 'visits' within the last year that increased traffic and recognition (not that that was my goal, but it's kind of exciting when it happens), was attending the Daily Painter's Workshop, in Austin, Texas with Carol Marine and Karin Jurick and writing about it, networking with the other artists and painting EVERY single day - when I can. I am now known to occasionally attempt to create a topic - and see if traffic increases. It's sort of an experiment in psych. Another great time spender I am involved in is reading others' blogs. It's my daily reading in place of the newspaper. (Although I do get a Sunday and Monday Kansas City Star from mom and dad.)

I would like to encourage you to blog, if you aren't. It is NOT hard. It keeps you thinking, allows creativity and it liberates you into the big wide neighborhood of others - who do the same. You should blog especially if you have something to say, a position to take, a gripe, some news, a life that needs to be shared with others, a craft or an art, travel....the sky is the limit!

Now - onward to Where I Stand Sunday...

I spent most of the day Saturday, getting plants and seeds in the ground in the vegetable garden. It seems I am a little late, but all the same, they will have a nice long growing season.
This little strawberry plant, if it makes it past the bunnies and birds, will multiply and provide us with some juicy red berries!
I suppose many more than usual, are planting their gardens this year...
due to the high cost of grocery food.

WE will have zucchini, yellow squash, little pumpkins, hot peppers and bell peppers, sunflowers and lavender in this space.




Here is a view of the acreage we just
mowed the last few days. Yes, it takes a few days to mow it.

Took this photo last night, if you look closely or enlarge it, you can see a cat on the fringe of the grass, beneath the left tree. She is the momma cat that lives at the farm across the road. Every night she comes along the tree line, looking for little critters, and tonight I watched this great hunter catch a mouse in that very spot.
Here is another view of that part of our property, I think it is so pretty after it is mowed.

But, even that is becoming a question...the high price of gassing up the equipment - does the mowing and making it so pretty (about 5 - 6 acres) warrant the cost?
We think so!
Where I Stand Sunday is an ongoing photo essay examining the different places I spend my life standing. Too often we take for granted the everyday places we spend our lives walking on. The ground we tread on has its own stories to tell. If you would like to also post this subject, please let me know. There are several of us (see my sidebar) and we would love to add your blog to our list.

Little Boy Blue..

come blow your horn, the sheep's in the meadow, the DEER'S in the corn!! Next year, we are going to have a "rockin'" veggie garden, with solar powered electric fence surrounding it. The deer are destroying whatever corn has popped out on the stalk. Our corn is in the "milk" stage, the best eatin' for deer. Luckily, our nice neighbor (a farmer for life) has some corn that is at the harvesting stage, due to his ability to irrigate his crop (we can hand water. although we have been gone), so he has shared with us, and IS IT GOOD!! We were so looking forward to our OWN corn, but that isn't going to happen I'm afraid. We put up a 4 1/2 foot wire, but to little avail..of course, the deer are great jumpers (we did know that ahead of time). I am going to work on a "noisy" addition to the wire, to maybe spook them, however, just wonder how long it takes them to get used to the noise and ignore it. It's not like we don't have wind to blow the noise makers around, ha! Maybe a scarecrow?? At least they don't like zucchini or squash! Oh well, better gardens next year...we worked so hard and took such care, even after two destructive storms. Such is the life of a gardener/farmer.

BIRD GROWTH

Yes, he's growing and maturing. We have had to move him into a small dog crate. He keeps getting out of his bowl/nest...getting ready to fly soon, so in the dog crate he can hop about and get his legs strong.



Today was a day of planting. We planted corn and pumpkins in the south forty, (not that big, but it seems very large). Nine rows of sweet corn and three mounds of pumpkins. Also, here's a photo of the zucchini and pepper garden. It was started about a week ago. Sprouts are happening! Tomatoes plants have been planted in the barrels by the house. We also put together a new dog run out behind the studio building. Dogs are needing a place to be when we have to leave from time to time, the crates don't work for BIG dog anymore, he got out the last time. Time for being "city" dogs is about to run out. I even found a BIG FAT GRUB, while we were adjusting the fencing by digging a little around the bottoms of the kennel fencing, put that little guy in a bowl of dirt, until tomorrow when I can grind him up for bird food. Photos of planting above!