I want to thank michelle at following the master blog...(http://followingthemasters.blogspot.com/). I decided to join in on this challenge. For my portrait I picked one of my favorite artists.  I found a self portrait of Mary Stevenson Cassatt (May 22, 1844 – June 14, 1926)
I started with her hat and worked down.













This second painting is from a photo of her when she was older.  I used a very limited palette and used a small squirrel mop with no drawing.

I really enjoyed doing both of these since I really love all her work.

Flight

There is so many good thing about living close to the ocean.  One of them is all the different birds that are here, from the beautiful blue herons to the little ones who run in and out with the waves.  I think my favorite though is the pelican. When I am on the beach nothing gives me more pleasure than watching a flock of them fly over.  I was lucky once to have my camera and was able to take this shot.  For this painting I used two Daniel Smith Watercolors. Phthalo Blue ( green shade) and Quinacridone Rose.

Orange

 This little painting was done for a challenge in our Painting Friends forum. The challenge is to do some type of  art for each letter of  the alphabet.   This was done for the letter O.  I'm  really happy how the orange interacted with the greens I chose. To give depth in the painting I did negative painting and added a second Chinese Lantern peeking out.   On to P 

Lighthouse

 Here is a painting I did for our Painting Friends Forum.  A photo was provided and we were all to paint it in our own style. We then emailed them to a person who posted all of  them without any names.  The goal was to see how many we could recognize by just the style. I knew a wopping 4, it was harder than I ever imagined.  But it was also a lot of fun too. 

Haley At The Beach

       
Good Morning everyone and hope y'all are having a wonderful Friday. I have only been practicing  painting people , so nothing brand new to show here. I  hope this changes soon.  I though I would show a painting I did a couple of weeks ago.  This is my youngest Granddaughter Haley.  For the painting I used a photo of her on the beach. She is looking into the sun thus the squinting and just out of the water.  I am very happy with this portrait because I  feel everything clicked  in here. From the skin tone, how the hair looks, her eyes and how expressive this is.  
   I am going to start a Painting Friends challenge soon in oil and hope to be able to have it in here by the weekend.  That is if it is any good, I have tried to do it in colored pencil and watercolor, neither turned out well.

My cupcake in the DSDF's Challenge

I have now began to participate in The Different Strokes for Different Folks challenge.  I have wanted to do this for a while, now that I have a blog, I went for it.  I really enjoyed doing this painting  and happy it turned out so well.  I had to laugh though the cupcakes in the photo are the same I bought for Cindi's  and I desert wishy washy challenge. I may in a different post show that cupcake I painted.

September 3 2009

The weather here has turned cooler for the week.  So this morning my DH and I decided to ride bikes.   As we were riding I was thinking of all the beautiful things that I see on the way, but decided on this painting instead.  This little painting I did today showing Jim as he rides ahead of me.  Used Ulta Blue, Burnt Sienna, Raw Sienna and Vermilion. I also have spent the day doing little sketches for Cindi and I 's next Wishy Washy project.  I think I'm ready now to paint this photo that we picked.  Well at least it will be the first attempt anyway.   

 

September 2,2009 My very first post.

   Well Cindi and I challlegned each other to paint dark colors in this last wishy washy exercise. For our painting we picked this very lovely Namibian girl.provided by Patrick Hedges. Thankyou Patrick.  It took me three tries to finally say this is the one I'm showing. I used  Ultramarine Blue, Burnt Sienna and  Cadnium Scarlet for the colors. I think I did her justice and am pleased with her personality coming through.