Return to the humble pear

I painted in the breakfast room while my granddaughter took a nap the other day.  Peaceful.....

Look what arrived in the mail today.   It's the book I designed, through Blurb, with 70 of my favorite small paintings.   I love it...

     The reason I decided to do it was because my computer was not working, and we thought we might lose everything on it, including all my pictures... I thought I'd better get them into a book before that happened.  --We DID manage to get the computer working again, too !  yay !

Here are some of my peonies from my garden.  I've got to paint fast.  They completely disintegrate in one day, when I bring them inside. 

I've set up my paints and table easel in the breakfast room, currently.  That means I can sit and paint instead of standing, but it also means I'll probably be working smaller, which I'm not sure is the greatest idea.  It WILL get my energy back into painting, though, and that IS a good thing.  
     Here's another small one from yesterday.  It's my tulips from Trader Joes.  I love their flower selection.

Farmer's Market succulent

     I haven't painted for awhile, and feel bad about that, but last weekend the plein air event in Webster got me going again.   I'm going to do my best to keep my paints handy, and MAKE this happen !  Yesterday I was able to set up in the breakfast room, while my granddaughter napped in the studio.  I managed 2 paintings.... whew.... here is the first one.

PAINT WEBSTER event May 10

Our neighboring community sponsors an annual event for artists to paint and draw the city, it's business district, churches, wonderful old houses, etc.  There were over 150 participants in their 8th annual plein aire event.  I decided to paint this lovely home in the area, with the early morning sun casting interesting shadows on it's face.  The biggest 2 challenges for me were the hot sun shining on my back, neck and canvas, and the constantly changing arrangement of the shadows on my subject.  I had a great time and had fun seeing all the entries at the award ceremony later in the afternoon.  The collection of paintings will hang at a nearby gallery for the next week.

Baby Marigolds

Getting ready for Spring... FINALLY !   We still have weather here that's a bit out of whack, but I'm hoping for a pleasant, not too hot, spring, and summer, too !
     Time to think about shopping for new plants!  They say that rabbits don't like to nibble on marigolds, so I'm giving them a try !