All In One Basket

Another finished pastel painting. All In One Basket is a 16x20 pastel painting on paper.

I recorded the progession of this one from the start. You can see the five earlier stages documented here:

http://theenchantedline.blogspot.com/2008/03/new-drawing.html
http://theenchantedline.blogspot.com/2008/03/this-is-how-it-lookes-transferred-to.html
http://theenchantedline.blogspot.com/2008/03/new-work-3.html
http://theenchantedline.blogspot.com/2008/03/new-work-4.html
http://theenchantedline.blogspot.com/2008/03/new-work-in-progress-5.html

The Cardinal and His Lady is nearly complete

I'm going to let them rest for a couple of days before I tweak some of the lights. I'm really pleased with the way its turned out. Its a 16x20 dry pastel done on sanded pastel paper.



Misty Morning is a 20x24 oil on canvas.

I went and had another birthday

Birthdays appear determined to arrive no matter what we do to ignore them, so I baked myself a cake. Looks pretty good on the outside. . .




. . . and even better on the inside. Served it up with a little orange ice cream and a little raspberry coulis. . .


. . .invited my newest friends from next door. There was Alex. . .

. . . and his brother William. . .

. . . and their mother Manon. Isn't that just the sunniest smile you ever saw?

. . . and a great time was had by all.

the visitor at my kitchen window

This little fellow has begun to visit the bird feeder in front of my kitchen window. He senses me on the other side of the glass because he saw the flash from the camera when I took the first pic. That one just gave me a good view of the glare you get if you take a picture with flash directly at a pane of glass.




He's not sure if he wants to run away or risk helping himself to the bird feeder. Eventaully he settled for helping himself to the spilled feed under the feeder.



The Cardinal and His Lady is coming along nicely.

first flowers

Well, here we are just a few days into the new year and we've already got flowers. the crown of thorns has been very stingy with its flowers in the past year, but when it does bloom it goes all out in terms of size and color. The flower in this pic is life size.


And the first hibiscus bloom of the year is about to open any day now. I've had serious problems with aphids since I brought them in at the end of September. I finally gave them a double dose of soap and left it on for a much longer time than recommended before I showered them. It took most of the day to do all seven of them, but it seems to have worked. I think it helped that I washed the soap down into the soil. It may have made conditions unfavorable to any emerging critters. At any rate (and cross my fingers and touch wood) I hope I won't have to do it again real soon. The worst of it is that I don't think the aphids came in with the hibiscus. I think they were in the money tree which was actually in the house most of the summer. I had put it out for a week or two in the late spring but it didn't seem to like the outdoors at all so I brought it in and I'd been battling aphids ever since. They just seem to like the hibiscus more than any other of my plants and seem especially fond of the buds as they emerge. I also found a couple of lady bugs that were hibernating in the windows and came out when the house got really warm, so I've given them a home in among the hibiscus too. Here's hoping it works.

Another year's almost over

Well, here we are, another year almost over, and the days are finally getting longer again. I took this picture on 28 December. Three days after Christmas and it had rained so much at temps of just below zero that the brances of the pine tree on the north side of the house were so heavy with ice they lay on the ground. This branch is usually at least twelve feet (four meters) off the ground. The rain was followed by high winds. It thawed enough that the pine branches were ice free by the time the winds were at their worst, but we lost a few small branches from the oak trees and the plum tree.


I'm thinking on a new pastel painting. The rough draft on newsprint turned out quite well. The composition seems to be good, but I think the male cardinal need to be just a touch bigger and the branches of the pine are not quite right. I'm going to have to go out and take a few pics of the pine tree and work on them a bit more.

True winter has arrived

I took these pictures about six PM on 28 November. This time the snow is going to stick around unlike the first snow of 28 October. It was a soft wet snow, perfect for snowballs which the dogs love to chase. It never ceases to amaze them when the "balls" they are chasing simply disappear, and they never get so disappointed that they stop chasing the disappearing balls. The temperature hovered around the zero mark so clearing the deck and the steps was not much of a hardship. Its snowed a little every day since and I imagine I'll soon be tired of the white stuff, but as long as the temperatures stay mild it will be ok. The oil furnace hasn't started yet and here it is December first. It won't start till the temperature goes below minus 12, and I don't mind if that condition is never met.