August 23, monday!

We just hung my show at the Birchwood last night! I even had my camera along but I forgot to take any photos, except for of Penny, the Shepard mix~ so fun! SO this is one of Kari Maxwell's shots- she is a wild woman with a camera, let me tell you!
And man, I am SO freaking lucky! My incredible art collective, L-7, helped me hang the show so it went up incredible fast- I was just reading something from an artist mom who felt she wasn't able to do as much once she had her child, and I was sure that would be the case with me as well, but thanks to so much incredible community support in SO many ways, I have been able to be amazingly active! Just know that I couldn't be doing ANY of this without the unwavering support of ALL of our incredible friends and communities! I mean, just yesterday there were at least 7 people over at Duane's house, helping paint in this humid heat, and climbing all over the roof and up and down ladders and sawing and grinding~ oh AND watching Max so I could help~
Thank you Jemiah and Anne and Greg and Amy and Tri and Tonya & Lily!
...and this is a painting of our neighbor's house across the street! I should probably let them know...

August 16th, Tuesday...

Thank GOD it has cooled off around here and is acting more like Minnesota.... I thought we'd have to move to Canada soon~
Here is our house and the black walnut in front at sunset just the other day. I am loving the shadows and shapes of light, filtered flickering highlights all over everything, just like my car...

August 11, Wednesday~

So, I got a piece in the State Fair! Second time for me- the first time was 2008, that magical year of marrying Duane, Kansas art cars with Jan, honeymoon in England and Wales, and being impregnated!!!!
Here's a few examples of what I'm doing in this heat~
I am somewhat enamoured of the shapes of sunlight and shadow... your basic lights and darks....

August 6th

I had to take a bit of a break earlier this week, after all the wonderful festivities and the delivering of several dogs to their owners on Wednesday~ Max helped me do the rounds. So I have a few more to get out to their owners and two need to be mailed, one to England and the other to Wisconsin, both lovely desireable locals...
So this is Mallie, who was commissioned while I was in the midst of the "30 In 30" and I thought I wouldn't be able to get to her for a while, but gosh darn it I DO so love to paint.... So here she is! Great eyes, great face...
I've been besieged lately by requests/demands for the start of my "30 Cats In 30 Days" series, and what I've said is I need to practice on my own cats first. They are COMPLETELY different from dogs, as I am sure you know, and I am not sure I will be able to get their personalities across as well as I can the dogs. So we'll see. I want to paint more Maxs and shadows... like we saw on our walk this morning as you can see in this photo... I am intrigued by the darks and the lights....

check back for what I paint today, if Max stays asleep!

August 2!

Hi all!
I was a little busy yesterday, what with the heat and getting all the Dogs ready for hanging and labeled and then heading over to Wet Paint with Duane and setting up the whole shebang and THEN spending the next three hours with four other artists sketching our little hearts out! TONS of dogs showed up for the "Paws on Grand" Event and Wet Paint was hopping! I have no idea how many dogs I sketched! Duane helped me set up the 30 Dogs on Margi's display panels and we set out my cards and an envelope for money and I was RIGHT THERE as you can see, but I had NO TIME to talk to hardly anybody!!!! It was a HOOT! I really got into the sketching, altho now that I look at the photos mom took (thank GOD for mom! I don't know what I woulda done if she hadn't been able to come up and run my booth for me!!) all the dogs look the same to me~ ah well. Sketching under pressure... never really done that before!
So if you are able to make it tonight, we'll be at the North Loop Dog Grounds behind Bunker's Bar on N Washington Ave and N 8th Ave~ from 5 t0 7pm! With some wine!!!! And maybe lemonade~

And I've also included a link to Max Hayne's Newest Website, "Tiny Tales", that I ASOLUTELY love!!! Max is the guy who took photos at out wedding and made us that glorious book! He's got lots of great things going on always! http://tinydogtales.com/