Death Valley 2007

This is one of the over 300 photos I have taken in the Death Valley area so far. It is so cold that we have taken major advantage of our motorhome propane, heavy coats and whatever we can do to keep warm, but the scenery here is the usual spectacular.

We will be here until at least January 2 and will probably head toward home (or at least Quartzsite!) then.

Girls with Christmas Paintings

We had our family's Christmas tonight with our son Ben, his fiance Deb, and her two daughters Kennan and Destiny. I had done paintings for all of them as part of their Christmas gifts. Kennan collects Marilyn memorabilia so I did my rendition of Marilyn Monroe for her. Destiny's desert tortoise, Roxy, disappeared for a long period of hibernation this summer and then reappeared, ravenous. I did this painting from a photo Deb took of her (Roxy) eating everything in sight, including these pink petunias. The girls were so happy with their paintings, it made it even more of a joy to give the gifts to them.

Canyonlands WIP 1

I took this photo several years ago while in Canyonlands Nat'l Park near Moab, UT. I put it through the color filters in Photoshop Elements and really liked the orange-red version so decided to paint the scene in those colors. I have a terrible time painting canyons, I get so lost down in the depths. So, I am trying this one with a grayscale underpainting to at least try to keep me on track. The mass on the left is very typical of Canyonlands, where there are great slabs of rock with layers visible in a diagonal patters as opposed to individual boulders. I am hoping it doesn't come out as a huge blob of rock when finished, that is one challenge. I will enter different phases of this as I get time to work on it, we are taking a holiday motorhome trip so this blog will become more of a travelogue blog (or would that be "traveblog"?) once again and I will finish this painting after we return. It, being a half-sheet painting, is too large to take with us and work on it while gone so I will take along smaller things. Since we are going back to Death Valley I know the emphasis will be on photography as opposed to painting! We will be exploring more of the surrounding areas this time, should be interesting.

Christmas Card 2007

This was our Christmas card for this year. I had done the painting some time ago and decided to use it for our card. I am wishing all who follow my blog the very best of holiday seasons and a great 2008!

Blessings,

Susan

Peggy's Cove Lighthouse

I am mentoring someone who wanted to paint this lighthouse in this morning's session, where we painted together. I like the angles of this lighthouse and how the light hits it. Not bad for one morning's work and it was enjoyable to do.

Succulent Project Painting

Here is another project painting for the Watercolor Workshop online group. The theme was to be succulents and I wanted to do this loose agave since I liked the lights vs darks aspects. I stayed loose with it and like the mood of it, but it isn't one of my best. It helped pass the time at the latest art sale, though.

Glacier Alpine Flowers

This is a project painting I did for the Watercolor Workshop online group. The project theme for this month is alpine flowers and I had photos from Glacier Nat'l Park to combine to come up with this scene. Well, the TeePees were just outside the park, but they were close! I painted this while sitting at my sale table at this weekend's ArtChix sale.

Art Chix Sale

Tomorrow, December 15th and Sunday, December 16th the ArtChix will have their last art show/sale before Christmas. If you have the time, please do stop by and see us! We will be at the Sun City Grand Art Club on Sunrise and Remington Drives from 9:00-4:00 both days. Hope to see you there!

Painting with Aubrey - Finished painting

I finished this painting of our Aubrey while sitting at a weekend art show. She draws a lot of attention, even when only in a painting! I will have to say this painting has been very well-received, although most of the credit for that comes from Aubrey being so adorable.

Budding Artist - WIP 1

This is the grayscale underpainting of our Aubrey that I want to paint to commemorate our first painting session together. She grasped the entire concept of using the caran d' arche watercolor crayons first and then using this big brush to add "wa-wa" to it for paint. I will next start adding color to it and see how this grayscale underpainting works for skin tones. It is an experiment! Stay tuned for either the successive stages or the announcement that it didn't work and has been filed with my pile of tears.

Christmas is Coming!

This is a teaser for part of a painting I am doing for xxxxxxx for Christmas. Can you guess what it is and for whom I am painting it? Just wanted you to know I am not slacking here, but can't show the WIP until it is seen by the recipient at Christmas. Working, working, working.....