Everything is coming up Roses

I finished three items featuring roses.  The first is an 8X10 painting of my Endless Rose.

The next item is a yellow rose painted on a bowl.

The third item is a small trinket box that had a rose carving which I painted.

I will be showing all of these items at an Arts and Craft fair in Vicksburg, MI on June 11.

Time is running out for me on getting paintings done for this show.  I have a couple more 8X10's that I have to finish and if I have time I may paint a few Mexican domino train stations.  I decide to show mostly smaller items at this show.  It will be my first Arts and Craft show in MI.

I also wanted to mention that I sold two more paintings at LA's Cafe.  Which means I have to start work on some larger paintings to show there.  My inventory of paintings has dwindled and I must get busy doing more larger paintings for up coming shows.

Here are the paintings that sold. The first is "Rainbow Ruffles" and the second is "Dragonfly Magic".

Rooster Reveille

My life seems to get busier as each week comes.  I know I was busy in Tucson but we had a weekly schedule and pretty much stuck to it.  We bowled a couple of times a week and I worked the gallery three times a month and we made time to go out to lunch with friends and go to gallery receptions. This still allowed us time to work on our art projects. We have a schedule here with once a week bowling and me having to work the Vicksburg gallery three times a month but so much other stuff seems to fill our time.  With home remodel projects and family functions we don't seem to have as much time for our art.  I'm not complaining because we moved here to be closer to family and we are enjoying every minute we spend with them.  This week I went to the zoo with my grand-daughter and her three little kids and spent a day working a farmers market with my daughter.  The previous week Roger put together a greenhouse for our daughter. This is a precious time for us because it is the first time since our kids left home that we have family living close by. We are seeing that our priorities have shifted with family coming first,  I might not be creating as much art as in the past but I still have some time to paint.  Here is the painting that I completed this week.

I call it "Rooster Reveille".  I have to tell you I had lots of fun painting this guy.  It is a new pattern that I have never done before.  So much of what I paint is a new version of a pattern that has sold in the past so when I come up with a new idea I enjoy the creative process.

I have started working on a bowl that I will be taking to the June Arts and Craft show.  I have a number of craft items I would like to get done for that show.  I'll post photos when I get them done.

The weather here has finally warmed up and the garage sales have started.  I was able to stock up on frames and got a number of interesting items that I will be painting.  Here is a photo of some of the bigger projects.

I will do the chairs as a matching set.  I will paint the seats with different patterns but something that will compliment each other.  I will probably save the chairs and do them later this year when winter sets in.  I hope to do the stool for the June arts and craft show.

Well....enough time on the computer.  I don't have any thing on the schedule for today except for painting so I better get to my shop and get some work done.

Butterflies and Quilt Pattern

I have been busier than ever.  It has been hard to fine the time I would like to have to paint.  I am going to have to start getting up at 5 AM and paint for a couple of hours before breakfast like I did in Tucson.....or maybe not. It got light at 5 there so I felt like getting up early.  Here I would rather stay in bed.  On the other hand, it is still light at 9 at night while it got dark at 7 PM in AZ.   Guess I am going to have to do more painting in the evening.  Anyway, I did finish two paintings last week.  Here they are.

This one is another version of "Flight of Fancy.  Size is 9X20.

I call this one "Compass Point Quilt Inspired"  I based it on the Compass Point quilt pattern.  Size is 18" square

This past Saturday evening was the Three Rivers Artist Guild "Big Little Art Show"  It was a fund raiser for the guild done by silent auction.  I had four pieces in the show and all four sold.  I posted photos of my pieces in a previous post.  There was a nice turnout, a great band and good food.  Here is a composite photo of the event.

I have started work on a new painting which is of a rooster.crowing.  I am going to call it "Rooster Reveille"  After I finish it I will start working on some craft items.  I have signed up for an Art and Craft show on June 11 which means I have only a few weeks to get items painted.

A new painting of roses and a new cross painting

Now that I have 12 paintings hanging in  the Vicksburg Cultural Arts Center and 12 in LA's Cafe plus the one at the Kalamazoo Institute of Art my inventory of paintings is getting low.  I hope to do an arts festival in June so that means I must spend more time in my workshop creating new art.  I finished two paintings this morning.  The first one I titled "Radiant Roses".  The size is 18X14

The other painting is another 10X8 "Decorative Cross " painting.  I sell a lot of these smaller cross paintings and decided a long time ago to give them all the same name.

One of the things I have had a problem with since I moved to MI is getting good photos of my paintings.  I had the perfect wall with good lighting in Tucson.  Here I have a good wall but the lighting was not so good.  I cannot use a flash so I have to have really bright light.  I finally solved the problem here.  Roger installed track lighting and we used very bright LED bulbs.  Here is a photo of my new lighting.

Now that I have that problem taken care of the next project is for Roger is to change out the light fixtures in my shop to improve the lighting there.

I have one more thing to share.  This is family news.  Back in early March I posted a photo of a color pencil drawing that my grand-daughter Samantha had hanging in a county wide art show for high school students at the Carnegie Center for the Arts. The same painting was chosen to be shown at another show at Carnegie which was a Three Rivers all Schools show.  I am happy to say she won an award on her drawing.  I want to mention that she had about 5 works of art in various mediums in the show and that  her sister Janaya, who is a Freshman, also had a drawing in the show.  I wish I would have thought to take photos of the girls with their art but I didn't.  Here is a copy of Sam's drawing which I posted back in March.