An Old Soul

This painting has been through many transformations.  I started it last fall and I just couldn't get it to work.  I loved her face and hair, but I just didn't like anything else about her.  Just like my last painting it sat in the kitchen for months and then went down to the basement for awhile and then made its way back to the kitchen to be finished.  She started out with golds and reds, probably because I started it in the fall, but  that didn't feel right.  So then  she was in very bright colors, pinks, oranges, lime greens and that felt too bright for her.  I literally peeled layers of paint off of the background and what came through was some nice old colors with just hints of brighter colors.  I then added some small bright colored pieces of painted tea bags and coffee filters and painted some brown over her bright pink dress to knock the color down and things started to feel much better.  It has the feeling of something which is old,  but still beautiful to look at.

Garden fairy

I've been trying to finish up some paintings that I've had lying around the house for awhile.  A few are in the basement, a few in the attic and more in the kitchen.  They are mostly paintings that I started and lost interest in.  This one I started back in March or April, I knew what I wanted to do with her, but was not inspired at all by the piece, so  to the basement it went after it sat in my kitchen (aka my studio) for awhile.    A few weeks ago I saw her lying there in the basement and I pulled her up out of there, but then she sat in my kitchen again as I tried to muster up some motivation to finish it.  Well, I finished her  and I'm really liking her. 
I  painted used coffee filters for her hair, I dug up some lace that I got at a yard sale for her dress and used some of my vintage metal for her wings. 
I think she might be one of my favorites that I've done in this style.   The plan is to take her tomorrow to a local store here in town to sell her.   My little Amelia wanted her hung up in her room, which I'm very tempted to do, we will see. 

"Cultivate"

Here's my first ever commissioned piece!  It's being hung up and circulated around the area for the event "Cultivate."    I did it for the Valley Stewardship Network who's mission is  "to promote stewardship and inspire cooperative efforts to improve the sustainability of the communities and ecosystems in the Kickapoo Watershed region."  Organic Valley, who's headquarters is about 20 minutes from Viroqua, is hosting this event and all proceeds from the dinner will go to VSN.   Unfortunately I'm not attending, $60 a person is not in our budget, even if the proceeds go for a good cause, but hopefully others are going.  Dr. Fred Kirschenmann is the special guest and he will be talking about building a sustainable food system.  Rooted Spoon Culinary is featuring a 5-course meal with local, seasonal and organic food.  What a great way to spend a summer evening in the Kickapoo region!

Another daisy

Daisies remind me of being a little girl and sitting on the grass in the summer with my friends as we talked about  what boys we liked  at the time.  We would take the daisies and pluck off the petals one at a time and say "he loves me" for one petal, and then the next petal would be "he loves me not" and pull all the petals off one by one and see what the last one was, always hoping it would be "he loves me".  Of course if we didn't' get the answer we wanted, we would start over with a new  daisy!   While working on this painting, I began to wonder if the boys ever did this with flowers?  or just us silly girls!  I'm almost sure they didn't.  While the girls were sitting in the grass daydreaming, I'm sure the boys were off doing fun things like baseball, climbing trees, catching frogs and bugs and not thinking about silly girls and their flower predictions!

Have a wonderful weekend

Daisies, daisies

It seems like ages since I've posted a painting.  My garden is in full swing and consuming most of my time.  Painting gets put on the low priority list.  I did find a little time to paint some daisies.   They are such a sweet little happy flower!

small things forgotten

Remembering the excitement of loosing your baby teeth and putting them under your pillow for the tooth fairy.