Wise One

"Wisdom is the reward you get for a lifetime of listening

when you'd have preferred to talk."

-Doug Larson

"Wise One"

Please come visit me and my art during the East Austin Studio Tour!

All works are copyrighted and all rights are reserved by the artist.
 

My original paintings are available in my online gallery.

Prints of many of my paintings are available in my Etsy shop. 

Let me know if you're interested in prints of my paintings.

  I welcome commissions.

Please click the links below to share my blog.

I'd love to hear from you...feel free to leave me a comment.

Left

Left over, left out, left to my own devices,

all that is left to tell, I left you far behind.

"Left"

Please come visit me and my art during the East Austin Studio Tour!

All works are copyrighted and all rights are reserved by the artist.
 

My original paintings are available in my online gallery.

Prints of many of my paintings are available in my Etsy shop. 

Let me know if you're interested in prints of my paintings.

  I welcome commissions.

Please click the links below to share my blog.

I'd love to hear from you...feel free to leave me a comment.

Be Mindful

I began this painting a couple of days after the election. I was feeling keenly aware of the need for mindfulness...that our nation's children are looking to us to show them how they may remain positive and loving in this world. I had planned on adding many more layers but somehow she felt complete as is, her rawness making the need for our mindfulness that much more powerful.

"Be Mindful"

Most of my paintings are for sale and I welcome commissions.
Please click the links below to share my blog.
I'd love to hear from you...feel free to leave me a comment.  

Click here to purchase my paintings.

The Eyes Have It

I'm working on creating some whimsical faces for a class I'm taking. Tonight I worked on eyes as my focus.


Dave: "Why are you making aliens."

Me: "I'm not, I'm making whimsical faces."

Little guy: "That's such a weird word."


I take that as a big thumbs up from the family!

Click here to view my gallery.

Most of my paintings are for sale and I welcome commissions.

Please click the links below to share my blog.

I'd love to hear from you...feel free to leave me a comment

A Sideways Glance

This is the first whole face project for the class I'm taking. I have to say that I rather like her. While she doesn't look exactly like the woman in the photo I was working from, she could definitely be a relative.

I'd really like to know what she's looking at...I bet it would be something worth painting for sure!

Click here to view my gallery.  Most of my paintings are for sale.

I'd love for you to share my art and blog with the links below.  Thanks!

Big Eyes

Dave's been using our family as his guinea pigs lately for his photography. It's actually quite fun. But one thing I'm noticing is that if I'm smiling, as I'm apt to do, I squint...like crazy! So I figured, why not try not smiling and see how it goes. Well, my eyes were still not what I'd hoped. So I tried opening them a bit more, you know, just to see how it'd go. Did I look like a supermodel? No way. Nope. Not ever, really. But I looked like a cross between a lemur, Marty Feldman, and Crazy Eyes.

"Big eyes" fail.


P.S. Yes, this wee one looks sweet...that was so not the look I pulled off.

Click here to view my gallery.  Most of my paintings are for sale.

 

I'd love for you to share my art and blog with the links below.  Thanks!

The Look of Compassion

So the little guy is a slob. His floor is covered with all kinds of everything. Dishes linger in his room for days on end. And it never, ever occurs to him to empty his overflowing trash can.


Me: "You oughta clean your room, kiddo."

Little guy: "What? It's fine."

Me: "Well at least bring your dishes to the kitchen."


He stood up right away to do it because he is an awesome kid, took one step, and landed SPLAT on the ground...because he tripped over one of the gazillion things on his floor.

Me, being the kind supportive mom that I am, looked at him with sweet tender love and compassion.


Little guy: "I know you're laughing on the inside, mom. Let it out or you'll explode."


So I did. Such a great kid to take care of his mom like that.


P.S. No, it's not a self portrait. I wouldn't dare attempt such a thing.

Click here to view my gallery.  Most of my paintings are for sale.

 

I'd love for you to share my art and blog with the links below.  Thanks!

Dark Side

A couple of weeks ago my mother gave me two canvases. She'd decided that she was no longer going to need them because she didn't think she'd be able to paint the images she'd hoped. Her hands no longer work as well as they once did and her giving the canvases to me was incredibly symbolic. A passing of the torch sort of thing. While my mom and I don't share the same style of painting, we do both share a love of it and I count her as one of my biggest fans and supporters.

So this morning when I started on one of the amazing assignments I've been doing as part of Dancing with Your Dreams, I felt this was the right time to pull out one of my mom's canvases. This project/assignment was titled "Dark Side" (taught by the amazing Michelle Kral). For me, "dark side" doesn't necessarily mean negative, it can mean the place within, perhaps something private, something that is being worked on. Dark perhaps means shadowed.

Anyway, the project started with writing words with charcoal...words that just popped into my mind. And the first word I wrote was "loss" which I think the canvas represents for my mom. But then many other words spilled onto the canvas, "vision", "love", "taste", "bliss", and on and on till it was covered. Then the paint, colors that are not part of my normal pallet. I don't know why, but I found myself putting paint on spots and then closing my eyes and painting blind. Faces then appeared and I did my best to bring them forth. I was surprised to find that they didn't need all of their features, that they lacked parts of what make us feel fully formed, yet they felt complete to me. And then out of nowhere a delightfully plump goddess appeared. My favorite thing my mom has created, both in sculpture and paint, have been her plump goddesses (I'm not sure what she calls them, but that's what I think of them as). Welcome little goddess! Scroll down to see the stages of this piece being created.

I cannot say enough about this amazing course I'm taking. Thank you, Amy Burke O'Toole, for putting it together!

Click here to view my gallery.  Most of my paintings are for sale.

 

I'd love for you to share my art and blog with the links below.  Thanks!

 

 

This painting in stages...

Scribing words with charcoal that popped into my head.

Applying paint with my eyes closed.

"Scratching" the surface of the paint with my charcoal.

Finding the faces.

Adding details...and the goddess appeared! Yes, that is a basting brush.

More details...and what I thought was a toothy grin became a hand.

Realizing that this was a vertical piece, not horizontal.

Final touches and signing the piece.

What Kitty Cat Wants, Kitty Cat Gets

Our cats want in. Then they want out. Then they want in. Then they want out. And on and on and on....

So my brilliant husband installed a cat door. It should all be fine and dandy now. The cats should be totally independent. Right?

Well, perhaps someday, but for now here's how it goes.

The cats want in. We go outside and shove them in the cat door. The cats want out. We shove them out the cat door. And on and on and on....


Our cats sure have well trained humans.

Click here to view my gallery.  Most of my paintings are for sale.

 

I'd love for you to share my art and blog with the links below.  Thanks!

Wonder through the Eyes of a Child

Its beautiful to see the wonder in my child's eyes.  Even at fifteen (almost sixteen...two more days) he sees the amazing in things.  We boarded an airplane set for California this morning and he sat glued to the window as we took off in flight, rose over the city, and then above the clouds. 


Me:  "This is what your rockets get to see."

Little guy:  "Yeah."


And then I let him enjoy the view in silence.

Click here to view my gallery.  Most of my paintings are for sale.

 

I'd love for you to share my art and blog with the links below.  Thanks!

I Fell for It

My little guy was playing music for me in the car as is our routine.  I groove on it.  Then the non-radio version lyrics get to me (I'm old, you see), I turn it off with my steering wheel stereo controller, he turns it back on, lather, rinse, repeat. 


Me:  "I'm not a fan of that one."

Little guy:  "That's because it's 'up dog'."

Me:  "What's 'up dog'?"

Little guy:  "I can't believe you actually fell for it and said, 'What's up, dog?'"

Me:  "Ugh."

 Click here to view my gallery.  Most of my paintings are for sale.

 

I'd love for you to share my art and blog with the links below.  Thanks!

The Second Layer

I've fallen into a trap.  I'm finding myself digging a layer whose very reason for being is to end up mostly covered up...but it's just so darn happy and full of love!!!  I was warned of this phenomenon, and here it is.

I may just have to sit on this one for a couple of days and then dig back in.

Tune in tomorrow to see what's happened.  Or what hasn't.

Click here to view my gallery

 

I'd love for you to share my art and blog with the links below.  Thanks!

Eye Opener

My big guy's car was in the shop and he needed...he needed...to go see his lovely girlfriend.  I get it.  She's awesome.  So, anyway, he borrowed my Prius.  Over the years he's made little comments about my car.

"It's funny looking."

"It's a girl car."

"I'd never be seen driving it."


But when he got back with my car he had seriously changed his tune.

"I can't believe it...I drove all the way out there and back and the gas gauge didn't even go down one tick!"


My funny looking girly machine is looking better all the time!

Click here to purchase this piece.

 

I'd love for you to share my art and blog with the links below.  Thanks!

The First Time I got Busted by the Cops

For some reason, lately every time I see the color green, this old memory comes flooding back.


I must've been nine or ten.  It was a perfect summer day, with perfect weather, in perfect Palo Alto, California, in my grandparents' perfect neighborhood.  I was riding my beyond amazing green banana seat bike with tall handlebars.  Proudly printed on the frame were the words "Dill Pickle," and the playing card I had clipped near my spokes was making the most satisfying purr.  My brother was seated behind me.  No helmets.  No worries.  Wind in our hair.  Bliss!

And then a police officer pulled up beside us and demanded that we stop immediately.  Which we most certainly did.


Police Officer:  "Only one passenger per seat."


I looked at my banana seat that clearly provided ample room for my bottom, my brother's bottom, and at least one more friend's bottom, and looked back at the cop.

I think it was at that moment that I realized that not all laws made make sense...or at least the bad ones shouldn't apply to me.

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Shyness and Flatulance...is there really a connection?

I was telling my kid that I admired him.  It was a short-lived feeling.


Me:  "I thought it was so cool that you wanted to go to the homecoming game, and you were fine just being dropped off there, and you totally knew you'd find friends to hang out with.  I never would've done that as a kid."

Little guy:  "Yeah, mom, you were shy.  You still are."

Me:  "You think I'm shy?  I guess so.  What makes you think I'm shy?"

Little guy:  "Well, when you fart in public and I make a huge deal of it, you get upset."

A brief pause as I took a moment to ponder.

Me:  "Um, that's not because I'm shy.  That's because you busted me for doing something publicly inappropriate."

Little guy:  "Yeah, well you're still shy."

Me:  "Unlike you, I always at least make sure they're silent."

Little guy:  "Uh, that's how you know I'm not shy."

Click here to purchase this painting.