Keeping Myself Accountable

Please finish me. I'm a nice spoonbill.

Everyone seems to have stories of moving and not unpacking things for months, even years afterwards. I'm certainly no stranger to the phenomenon. I am rather ashamed to have just discovered this unfinished painting amongst my still-packed stuff, though. I started this waaaay back last spring and it got put on hold and then forgotten when we moved over the summer. What a shame! I see so much potential in this piece. My subject is from Myakka River State Park in Sarasota, Florida. It was sunning itself up in a tree in beautiful morning light. (I found it amazing to see a whole flock of spoonbills perched in the trees!) So I am posting this piece here to keep myself accountable. You all are my witnesses that I am making a commitment to finish this poor forgotten painting, agreed?

In other art news, for years I've wanted to have cards of my paintings available at my shows, or to send as thank you notes to anyone who buys my art, but the price and large inventory involved kept me from doing it. With the advent of online printing-on-demand, getting cards has now become quite manageable so I got a few made of some of my best work. I just ordered another two sets from Zazzle.com, being very pleased with the price and quality of the first two. There are a couple of shops here in town that carry local artists' cards, so I may approach them with my new cards. I've toyed with the idea of selling on Etsy or someplace like that, but I have to admit to being a little intimidated by internet selling. (Cue chicken noises in the background.)

The beginning of my note card collection

I guess this will be my last post in 2011. Thanks for following my blog thus far. Happy New Year to you all!

Full Moon

I was too lazy to get up at 5 am on a cold Saturday morning and see the lunar eclipse, but I couldn't resist getting a photo of the full moon rising over the mountains at dusk the night before.

Painting Finished

It is done...or I am done; I'm not sure which at this point! This one really was a struggle. Thanks to Marianne, Sonya, Ken and Elva for their invaluable suggestions and support through this process.

My new favorite palette earned its stripes!

Because I suspected this painting was going to take a while from the outset, I was trying to figure out how to keep my acrylics from drying out so I didn't have to mix all the colors again every time I wanted to paint. A few years ago our local grocery store was having a give-away and we received a set of sealing plastic containers. When we moved last summer I threw out most of them (they weren't very practical) but there was one shallow square one that I kept just in case. Turns out it makes a perfect small palette and it kept my paints moist throughout this whole painting, even in this incredibly dry climate.

I may take a short break from painting now. I've been feeling the urge to work in pen & ink lately, so stay tuned.