Watercolor - Cave at Pedernales Falls State Park

After working a looong week and loooots of overtime, I relish being able to go outside and paint again!!!!!  I very much enjoyed visiting Pedernales Falls. Unfortunately, there wasn't a whole lot of falls because of our drought, but we found a gorgeous spot to paint nonetheless. I hope you like it! :D

Tiny Painting

Dear Blog,
Life is a bit complicated right now. I'm sorry I haven't made time for you. Believe me when I say, "It's not you... It's me". Work has been taking up all my time right now. I know... I know you need attention, and love, but I did it for us. For you and me. If I didn't work, I will die of hunger, and then where would we be? Please accept my tiny painting with my apologies. I know... I know you can't be bought, and it is insulting that I even try and bribing you out of your feelings of disappointment and neglect, but will you give us one more chance?!

I'll take your silence as a "yes". Horray!

Watercolor - Colorado River, East of Lady Bird Lake

When I paint outdoors, I struggle with two things that often contradict each other, and that is value vs. depth. The hill that the blue house is on was really a dark value, much darker than how I painted it. But darkening the value decreases the perceived space between the viewer and the hill. So which truth do you express? That truth of the lightness/darkness or the truth of the depth? Today I went with depth. Sometimes I go with value. I really don't know what is right or better. How would you solve the problem?

Tiff

Watercolor - Zilker Botanical Gardens Gazebo

Austin weather is absolutely gorgeous right ow, and so is Zilker Botanical Gardens!

My Ohio Vacation, RIP Skinny - My Singing Kitty.

Dear Readers,
My last post was a while while while back ago. I am usually a regular poster, but I have been at my in-law's and they have no internet access! So, sorry for not posting. Hopefully you will still come and visit me because I'm back in town, and I DO have internet :)

Well, the art party was a success, I think. I sold a painting! Unfortunately the painting just almost covers the cost of framing and matting the 12 featured paintings. Oh well. The host of the art party did specifically tell me that people aren't there to buy, just to party and look. At least now my art is all framed. They used to sit in a manila folder under my couch. Now I can actually hang it! That, and I can actually say it out loud that I have sold a painting (2 if you count commissions!). The experience was, for me, educational. I could observe people's faces as they scanned my work to see what sort of work they liked the most. I had to research pricing, and had to think about how to price my art. These are things I never thought of before, so it was a good learning experience!

So now, on to my trip. The purpose of the trip was to meet my new neice-in-law. My financial circumstances are getting pretty dire at this point. I am working, I have a full time job, full insurance coverage and all that, but our pay schedule has been erratic due to several cash flow issues within the company. The trip from Austin, TX to Cleveland, OH was made in our 2003 Nissan Sentra because we couldn't afford the plane tickets and dog boarding. My dogs are insanely well behaved though. And they weren't a problem at all.

On our way to Ohio, we stopped at Falls Creek Falls, TN, where I painted this overlook. The Falls themselves weren't so magnificent at that particular time. It was just a trickle. Maybe it hasn't been raining there too much. Either way, it was still pretty. The leaves have started to turn in Tennessee, so it was a beautiful drive. Pretty state. I would love to visit again.

 

 It rained non-stop in Ohio. Very troubling, because I wanted to get a lot of Plein Air painting done. This is the only landscape painting I got out of Ohio, and it was painted indoors looking outside the window. It was overcast the entire time, windy, drizzly.

So I did a lot of still life, my least favorite subject compared to figure and landscape. Waiting for inspiration to do work can be a bad thing. It's better to just keep the brush moving and get your skills and practice up for when something DOES inspire you. This is a lantern and gardening tools my mother-in-law owns. The tiny red plant is an Air Plant. Very little soil in there, mostly pebbles to let air in. Anyway, thankfully, unlike me, my MIL has lots of neat objects to paint. I don't collect knick knacks, which makes it hard to me to put together a still life at my house.

My MIL has a lot of bottles.... The blue one is my favorite. Such a gorgeous color.

These are my baby neice-in-law's baby toys. I liked their colors so I painted them.

My trip ended very very tragically. On our last day in Ohio, my pet-sitter notified me that he found Skinny dead in the kitchen. We still dont know how or why because the vet said it was too late to do a necropsy. He was too young! At most, he was only 9 years old. I will miss my dear cat. We found him many years ago without fur on his head, neck, and belly. He had open wounds. Flies were following him around. We took him in. He was so weak, he couldn't jump on our futton, which was already kind of low. With the help of the vet, we turned him around. He grew healthy, and beautiful. I rarely talk about Skinny because he's a quiet, reclusive cat. He doesn't have the antics of Friendly or Poco. But as with all my animals he was very very loved and appreciated. He's the only cat I have that sings in the bathtub at night. How cute is that? RIP Skinny. Mommy loves you.

this was painted in 2009, my favorite painting of Skinny.

Watercolor - My Lake

I love country living. Some friends and I painted my lake today. I love living in Texas. The land is so cheap. How can a video game artist like me have land like this otherwise?

Watercolor Sketchbook - Cafe Sketches from Quack's Cafe and Bakery