Hot and destructive!

•  Must be the hottest summer ever! Up in the nineties and hundreds since early June. Humid too, feels like 115 degrees! It is hard to stay on task these days!

• I have destroyed nine or ten paintings in the past month.  Not out of frustration or anger, and not from the heat (I don't think), I just got tired of trying to fix older paintings that were never finished.  I thought I could brighten, rearrange, add more detail, or whatever. I thought I might like them better, but I decided it wasn't worth so many hours to try to resolve the issues.  It is always a risk to rework a painting, but sometimes it works out and the results are amazing, so I kept taking out another one and working on it until I saw that it was not working out.

• Each one ended up sanded down and re-primed, or thrown out. The underlying textures couldn't be undone and interfered with the direction I wanted to go.  Sometimes it is better to start fresh than to keep struggling through it.

• After the third time, I wondered what was really going on with me.  I haven't destroyed a painting in a long time. Why so many these days? Tired of so many unfished pieces? Don't care anymore? Frustrated?   
•  I'm still not sure what is going on with me, but I stopped pulling them out of storage - didn't want to destroy any more of them! (Some are worth the effort to hang onto until I figure out what to do with them next.)  

• Most of them were unfinished demonstration paintings that needed attention, but one was a medium to large painting that I wanted to go back over in a more impressionistic style, which I regretted that I messed with it.  But I didn't want to continue with the extreme detail I had started out with. Hours and hours of work just thrown out. 

•  My style is changing again.  I'm trying new ideas. Things don't come together like they used to. So I am backing off, searching for what really inspires me, and not taking it so seriously for now. 

• I am all over the place! I love detail, but I love painterly styles too. I like the abstract nature of reflections and moving water.  I like thick textures, but mostly on things like bark, wood, or rough water. I get bored easily and want to try new ideas and techniques.  

• Some judges have told me (over the years) that I need a consistent style and a more cohesive body of work.  But I honestly don't seem to be able to settle on any one way to create things.  I guess that's Ok too!

Life is good

Just realized it has been over a year since I posted anything on this blog, so I thought I would just share a few of the great things that have been happening these days.

I have been staying busy at my little art studio and teaching center, which is doing much better this school year.  This is my seventh year in business.  Most of the after school classes stay full now, plus I have an adult class once a week.  The custom framing is also a nice compliment. 

I have found new inspirations these days!  Some are filled with treasure hunts and new ideas from a new series of mixed media paintings I started last fall.  Now I am experimenting with impasto techniques, as well as how to best adhere things.  The gel medium dries clear and shiny, so it is good for adding things after the painting is finished.  The modeling paste creates wonderful relief effects, but it can be difficult to paint over at times, so I like the thick heavy gesso the most for my impasto techniques because it is easier to paint over.

  I can't put into words how much I enjoy adding my treasures and found objects (like seashells, charms, or beads).  I am also using some metallic paint and/or glitter paint, which really catches your eye at different viewing angles.

 I am pleasantly surprised at the results -- even sold a few! Click here to see an example.

I did a small show this January and received a blue ribbon for my new mixed media paintings! That was encouraging! Click here to see more about the show.

On a personal level, my husband was in the hospital a lot last year, but now he is on immune therapy and is responding well to the treatment.  This has made for a year of getting back to better things and enjoying life again.  We don't take any of it for granted.

May the Lord God Almighty bless you and yours in amazing ways!

Click here to see more paintings!

Healed, girl on beach, inspirational painting

"Healed"

20 x 24 inches

This inspirational painting is full of symbolism. 

I started this as just a wave. Made it up for fun, but It kept making me cry as many of my earliest memories are from when my family was stationed in Hawaii. My step father was in the Coast Guard. He abused me, even burnt me once with a hot iron. So I prayed about it and began to see the root of the lies: believing I was unwanted and unloved, a terrible person from the start. 

As I worked on it, The Lord gave me a new perspective and his words of truth from scriptures in the Holy Bible. Forgiving others, renouncing the lies, forgiving myself, and accepting the Father's love have helped me overcome years of battling with bouts of depression. 

Life was hard: a different step father, more abuse, foster homes, and then failed marriages. 

While praying, I saw Jesus and me playing on the beach, and decided to put a little girl in the painting. Then I added the shadow of a cross, and the face of Jesus. I made the rain blowing away.  I added an angel dancing in the clouds, and a dove coming down the wave near the girls head, to symbolize the Holy Spirit. 

Then I noticed the shallow wave encircling the girl actually resembled a heart, so I enhanced it to symbolize the love of God our Father, the Good Father, who makes life turn around for good in spite of everything that comes against us.

Faith, the substance of things hoped for

So much sorrow in the world.  So much pain and suffering.  Not only from terrorists and evil forces, but just in everyday living.  We all have loved ones we ache for.

My pastor's wife recently shared a truth with me that has helped me walk through the shadow of death with my mother-in- law.  My husband also faces serious health issues. Sometimes I feel like my life revolves around suffering and death.

"Hold your hands out, palms up and say, 'Father, I receive the strength and the grace you have already provided for me for this situation,' instead of continually asking.  It's alright to ask, but we also need to receive!"

This is especially helpful when my faith is not so strong, and the tears have taken over.  Now I am seeing the Father's hand at work. Prayers are being answered, and faith grows.  Not just in me, but in those I pray for too.

May Daddy God, Abba Father, put his truth in your mouth as you do the work and study his word! May he bless you and your loved ones mightily!

Not walking in the shadow of death

My life has been enveloped in the sick and dying.  My mother-in-law (98 years old) has been in and out of the hospital many times the past few years.  This time she gave up for over a week.  My husband of 16 years, who is quite a bit older than I am, has also been through many serious life threatening events.  We have come through cancer, respiratory failure, two brain surgeries (non cancer related), and now severe COPD.  He and his mother have both been in the hospital at the same time this past week.  It threw me for a loop.  Spending so much time at their bed sides can be emotionally draining to say the least.

I started to head into a deep depression again, but this time I took some time out and went for a walk to clear my head. This is a splendid time of year in Florida.  The cool breezes and warm sun are amazing. I went for a walk at sunset up on the levy at the lake.  This is one of my favorite things to do to rise above the circumstances.  My husband is home now, and his mother is doing better, so that helps too.

While I was out walking, I saw this little area across the rim canal that was lit up with pinks from the sunset.  I have seen this little stream coming into the canal before, but this time I decided I needed to paint it.  So after supper I pulled out a large canvas and painted it! It was exhilarating to be inspired and motivated and stay up late to create something so compelling!  It pulled me out of the downward spin I was giving into.  

This world is on a downward pull, always throwing things at us to destroy us.  If we don't fight it, it gets overwhelming!  I am finding out some things that help me fight back: getting up early to have time to pray and have devotions, painting at work (even if for just for short periods of time), walks at sunset, playing Christian music, and painting at home in the evenings.

Looks like the shadow of death has moved on, and I am living again. Currently I'm working on some animal portraits, which is always my favorite subject matter! It is amazing that even in the middle of the pain and chaos I can find joy and see goodness and truth!

Goals

Trying to get back to painting more often and posting more too.  Seems like the most important thing (painting) gets put on the back burner more than anything else. Feels good to get up earlier to paint, and get back to better habits than watching tv or oversleeping!

Have to stay with it this time, and not give up.  Hard to be inspired these days.  Most of the time I am teaching art classes or creating frames, so I am really tired, and certainly not motivated.  So I have to make my painting time come first.  Then the rest of the day can fall into place.

Having said all that, now I must make it a personal challenge, and find ways to stay inspired. Paintings that have a deeper meaning, or that have things hiding in them seem to hold my interest the most.  But if they do not come together right off the bat, then I tend to put them aside and resolve them later.

 I need to plan ahead better, and stick with it.  Also, I need to not start the new ones until I finish current paintings.  When I enter some art shows I tend to get excited and finish up a few more too.

My problem is that I don't see  results very often.  A sale now and then, A commission.  A ribbon or an award here and there; it is all encouraging, but hard to make enough to make a living.  So I teach more classes, or take in more framing jobs. Then I don't have the time to paint.....not a good cycle.

I am open to hearing ideas on how you get inspired or what helps you stay on track.

Undoing the traditions of stress

I am not sure how it happens, things just get out of hand.  Used to keep it all simple, like baking cookies for my friends.  Now I rush about trying to find the right gifts, trying to get something in the mail, wanting so much to use this opportunity to reach out and touch others as so many have done for me.  Yet I find myself in tears, frustrated, out of time, and out of money. I am not sure how I lost sight of the true meaning of this beautiful season.

Today I slow down, take a breath, and remind myself that if things are late then they are late!  If it doesn't happen now, it can happen latter!  I don't have to wait all year for one day to tell people I love them or to do something special.  It can happen whenever it happens.  America has made the Holidays into traditions of stress, and deadlines, and even worse, debt.

I heard this and it really helped me: make a plan, talk it out with your spouse, stick to your budget, and do something for the Lord first.  The rest will work out fine with or with out you!

So I am making some hand crafted ornaments, baking some cookies, and enjoying the kids.

Merry Christmas and have a very blessed New Year all year long!

gifts

Just read a great book called One Thousand Gifts,  by Voskamp.  Hard to get through it.  So challenging on every level.

My paintings have always been a way of thanking the Good Lord for the wonders of nature.  But now I am thanking him for the not so beautiful and wonderful things in life too.  

I have this deep ugly scar on my stomach, from my belly button down.  It has been 6 months since the surgery, and still it is tender and itchy.  When my appendix ruptured, and I didn't know it for a couple of weeks, it messed up my female organs.   It encapsulated on my ovary, and everything became a gooey sticky mess. (Which actually saved my life by containing the poisons.) They took it all out, a complete hysterectomy and an appendectomy.

Instant menopause has been quite difficult.  More difficult than I could have imagined.  

This book of gifts has helped me see it all in a new way.  I was honestly thankful for another chance at life, but this is different.  Now I see my scar as beautiful.  I no longer cringe at the sight of it.  And now I laugh (instead of crying) at my new weird personality changes. I am a full spectrum, like a teenager with raging hormones, and not usually the good ones. My poor husband doesn't know which side of me will burst out next!  But he is patient, and I have found that his love is enduring.  

On a deeper level, my deep scars of child abuse and foster homes are also a beautiful thing.  The healing is going to another level.  Not just being ok with it all, but being able to thank the Almighty for all of it.

Just needed to put that out there.  

I want to start a new challenge: to paint a thousand gifts.  Not sure what form it will take yet.  Don't feel that I can do one every day again, but I do want to set something in motion. I want it to be paintings of things in a new point of view:  unexpected or maybe several gifts all in one painting, even if they don't really go together. Some will be of things that aren't so beautiful, yet they will have significance.   I think it will be like a poem with images.  

Don't have time, really.  Summer art programs to create, and a gallery to run.  But I believe this is something I will lose sleep over if I don't do it! So it will be a new series, and a wonderful challenge, and I am excited to see where it takes me.

last year vs this year

A year ago I was unmotivated, easily depressed, giving up on most things, frustrated with life and most people.....

This year I am making new goals, excited about upcoming shows and events, and staying very busy!

Amazing how things can change when I get off my butt and do the hard work to generate some positive energy and be more disciplined!

Just had to share that.  LOL

inspiration

I have been uninspired for the most part for a very long time. So I am taking inventory, trying to find things that will get me out of this creative block.

A few new foals were born next door to my house, and that kind of sparked some desire to get back into painting. I got some fantastic photos of one of little colt taking his first run around the paddock! perfect lighting, dust flying, and so much energy.....Wish I could have just a fraction of that little fire ball's energy!

Then I did a paintout, plein air paintings out on location, So many cool birds and interesting sights....I just loved it. I think I am back now, have gotten up early to paint, and wanted to work on some older projects too. I hope this dry spell is over now, it has been a few months of struggling to find myself again!

I go tomorrow to bid on some murals, and I have a couple of sales pending, plus I opened a new show in town, so things are looking up that is for sure!

I think the slow economy has gotten to everyone these days, and I finally let it get me down too. That and the fact that my son is in Afghanistan getting bombed while he works on the jets for the US Airforce. That has been very depressing as he and his wife just had their first baby.

So I must take it one day at a time, look for the good and try to get lost in my art again.

Nothing

For the first time in my life I have no pets, and no kids at home. I have quit teaching at the public school, and I plan to do nothing! Nothing except paint pictures and sell my art. But that isn't at all how it is going. I am cleaning out things, re-arranging things, cooking more for my husband, running all kinds of errands, and finding constant interruptions to my creativity.

I am excited about the many new opportunities that await me. I want to do nothing -- except what I believe God is leading me to do. I am so tired of trying so hard to do everything my way and then asking him to bless it. I am learning that if I just slow down and ask first, then things work out in unbelievable ways!

I feel like I am suppose to write a book. I am not skilled in this area, but I am going to try. I have so many remarkable things in my life to write about: I moved almost every year; I was held hostage when I was just four years old, and I was a foster child as a teenager. The most remarkable thing is that I am OK. Sometimes that is questionable, but for the most part I am happily married and live a well rounded life. I give Thanks to God for the people he has put in my life that have helped me to heal emotionally. I am sure there is more healing to come too!

So I guess this will be a place for me to just talk about what is on my mind or what I am struggling through. Maybe I'll post some of my poems too.

Have a great Day!