Saturday, June 9, 2012

Happy Weekend!

I hope everyone is having a wonderful weekend!

I am steadily painting for the upcoming show, and have truly missed blogging ~

 I had to participate in "Pink Saturday", though, and I definitely have something PINK to show you...

First, I want to apologize to all who have left me comments and messages that I have yet to respond to...for days I have not been on the computer AT ALL...not even for a minute; (not to check e-mail, not to check the bank balance, no Facebook ~ nothing, nada, ZILCH) which is a "first" in a very long while!

 I used to be a much faster painter...with increased acceptance of boo-boos and such, it seems I am so much S-L-O-W-E-R getting the actual painting done... I used to drive myself crazy, being such a perfectionist and SO picky with what I was painting; now, not so much ~ however, this particular painting had a corner that was just NOT working...everything else was transparent (watercolor) and going well, but one corner (which I had not drawn anything in, really ~ I was just kind of winging it, but it was leaves, so I didn't think I could mess those up...(I did).
...To make a long story short, I totally changed colors a couple of times and it just got heavier and heavier looking.

 It didn't look like it belonged with the rest of the painting.

 Pickiness re-surfaced, and I was ready to throw it away; then I had an idea ~ collage might save it.

And collage it I did.

 I'd recently bought a little French pamphlet from 1877 on eBay ~ (an almanac, not really a piece of history that would be missed if I tore it up) ~ thinking I would use parts of it in a painting of the stack of cups I photographed earlier this spring...it would work with this! The pink of the lilies was so intense; HOT pink, really, that I got the phrase "Hot August Night" in my head...and it got me to thinking what a hot August night in Southeast Missouri would be like...(sans AC) ~ I had already painted in a firefly (I'd recently read that fireflies were disappearing from some areas, and have been kind of on a firefly-kick; check this site out ~



 What else?... CICADAS...by mid-August here they start their droning by noon (earlier on they're only sounding off in the evening, and it sounds pretty cool, for a while) ~ getting louder and louder, enough to drive a person a little batty ~ so along with the watercolor-painted cicadas collaged on, I put in text from the almanac that had to do with cures for insomnia...melancholy...the phases of the moon, and so on.

 I also put in a big golden moon, painted with Lumiere acrylics...

 I had fun.

SO ~ all that said, I will show you the finally finished painting that was visible in my photo of my painting space last weekend...

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Here is the detail of the firefly...(we signed up to log our firefly-sighting...only one so far in our yard this year! (That we've seen; for this Museum of Science survey you only look for 10 minutes or so once a week.)

So sad if this little beacon-of-summer does disappear...


Have a great Sunday, everyone, and upcoming week !

I'll be in the basement painting if anyone needs me ~ (just yell really loud) ~ ;^)

♥ ♥ ♥

Saturday, June 2, 2012

Saturday Doings...



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Here is my photo for "Pink Saturday"...my first Zinnia (from seed)!

I was so excited!

 My friend Elaine and I saw HUGE ones last fall at a a pumpkin/gourd place in Arkansas...

I knew I wanted to plant some this year, for sure...

It's going to be a while before mine look like those we saw, though...;^)

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It started out as a yawny kind of day...
 
I don't really want to go paint...
 
I'd rather play with the kitties...
 
 
 
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"Play with me, Mom...get the feather-toy..."

How could I refuse?


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Mom, there's a moth on the ceiling!

Someone needs to put it outside...

If it comes down here, I'll have to eat it...

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Here's Tallulah ~ "Woo" ~ she loves those little foil-ball kitty toys...there's no telling how many of them are under the couch...

I write about her, but I don't take many photos, as she is just not
a "poser" like the boys are. She's always running; flying up the stairs and down the stairs, hoping Leo or Cyrus will chase her and play.
Sometimes they do. Not as much as she'd like, though..
.
Sometimes I think I need another little girl kitten for her to play with...
I've been pretty good, though. My Crazy Cat Lady tendencies are under control right now ~
But I could fall off the wagon at any time...:^)

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"Woo"

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It seemed like a good idea to procrastinate about painting a little while longer, so I went out to the herb garden and got some fresh catnip....Ummmm!

We had a little Kitty Party.

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Okay, back to work...I don't know why I put it off; I really am happiest when I'm "in the zone" painting...I wonder why we "put off" happiness?

Surely I'm not the only one...

Some of you have asked how the paintings are progressing, and you can see a little here. My little saucers with an individual paint color or two allow me to go back and forth between the two paintings (although they have a lot of colors in common), without worrying about having to switch colors around in the big palette.



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Okay, one last litte bit of PROCRASTINATING...

I've had these beautiful deep blue and purple hydrangeas in my Mom's little crock for almost a week, now...

I was going to set up another still-life, but I just never did...

I thought I at least needed to try and photograph them before they completely gave out...

But of course, I immediately had "Kitty Help"...

Tallulah was fascinated with something deep inside the bouquet...the water?

Who knows...

She's not going to leave them alone for me to take a picture, though...

"Talk to the tail!" Tallulah says...

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Now Cyrus has to get in on it...

I've given up...;^)

I need to paint.

Hope everyone is having a great weekend, "allowing" yourselves happiness!

Anne

♥  ♥  ♥