Red Cardinal

I ran out to Trader Joes in Hyannis (I love that store!) and on the way home I stopped off to take a few photo's of houses for reference since I'm painting a lot of them lately. When I started shooting I noticed all my pics were in sepia toned and without my glasses on I couldn't change the mode on my camera. SOMEONE (Sienna) had been using my camera and didn't put it back to it's original settings....grrr.

Anyway, I couldn't go a day without seeing the water, so here's a pic of Gray's Beach in Yarmouthport- in sepia tone. That is ice on the shore, not really white sand.

Ahhhh I got my color back! Can you see the red Cardinal in this pic? He (and his mate) have been coming by lately since I put a lot of sunflower seeds in my bird feeder. He's really fast though and I never can seem to get a good picture of him.
This is the best I got yesterday. I'll try again today if I see him. Did I mention that it SNOWED again last night?! Just an inch, so it wasn't bad.

Yorkshire Terrier

http://stores.ebay.com/Cape-Cod-Artist
I couldn't resist painting this cute little Yorkie. When I was growing up we had one (along with another dog, 2 cats and a skunk), named Muffin. Muffy was a really cute but a hyper little dog, who had 'issues', and he let us know about them by peeing on everything. I don't know how my mom dealt with it on a daily basis. God bless you Mom!
Speaking of dogs, tonight Sienna and I ate dinner over at my sisters who is dog sitting this friendly 5 month old German Shepherd. Sienna took a few photo's on her camera while we were playing with him. He doesn't look very friendly in this pic, but it was a good one of her. She faded it out though and now you can't really see her beautiful face.

This one is better. She's experimenting with black and white photography.

More Snow!

See? What did I tell you- MORE snow! I can't believe all the snow we've gotten this year. I'm finding it increasingly harder to get out of bed in the morning: for one thing it's still dark out, for another it's freezing cold in the house, and then last but not least I'm not working on anything that is driving me to my easel right now.

Hmmmm ...What can I paint? I finally have a free moment (no maps) that I could do anything and I just don't know. I usually look through magazines and old photo's for inspiration this time of year. I also like to look at other people's paintings. I study the ones I like to see how they do things. That's basically how I taught myself how to paint. Oh and not to mention the trial and error thing. (I'm still doing that!) But maybe, just maybe I can find a really good subject today......
(It looks like my fish is opening his mouth as if to catch a flake or two.)

Ok, enough procrastinating- I must get to work before the day is over and I've accomplished nothing!

Winter Blues

It's that time of winter when I feel the need to see and paint with this blue/green color. It reminds me of clear tropical oceans and how that warm water feels when your fully immersed in it. ..totally free and weightless. There's nothing like it!
(Hopefully you won't be swimming near these guys though...)

But aren't they beautiful?

These 3 little paintings are going on Ebay tonight. http://stores.ebay.com/Cape-Cod-Artist
I think these guys are having a race.


Oh what fun! Not that I surf...but it looks like this person is having a great time.
(By the way we are expecting 6" of snow tomorrow, so let me dream while I can!)

Ice Skating on the Bog

Today it was in the 20's and the ice was thick, so we broke out the old skates and headed for the cranberry bog. Ok, I'm lying- I didn't break out anything, I just watched. Sienna had to use my skates because hers were too small this year.

This is the cranberry bog in East Dennis. I'm not sure if you are allowed to skate on it, but nobody kicked us off so.... Oh, and see the houses on the hill? The smaller one is the 'cottage' of the bigger one. The bigger one is a huge mansion right on the Cape Cod Bay owned by someone who I believe invented Tylanol (or some drug related thing like that).

Here's a painting I did of it in the summer months. It's a really well kept bog, and so pretty in the fall!
Back to winter now...brrrr it was really REALLY cold out. Of course I was toasty warm in the car with the bright sun shining on me.....eating Fritos and taking photos. Ice skating was never my sport anyway. For some strange reason, I just don't enjoy falling down.

Martha's Vineyard Cottage

"Martha's Vineyard Cottage"
Maybe you have been there and saw this cute little purple and blue trimmed cottage? I saw it on a trip there last summer. The ginger bread trimmed cottages are so cute. How could I resist painting them?
Here's another quaint cottage.

This one was in Yarmouthport. I think I'm in the midst of doing a series. I'll call it "Cape Cod Cottages".

And last but not least, from my "Cape Cod Cottage" series.....

"The Cottage Window"

I always see windows with starfish in them and they look so pretty. The only thing is, they are usually tropical star fish- not local ones. I wonder if the owners of the houses know that? You don't see all that many star fish around here. It's pretty neat to find one.

Any who....these are all ACEO's on Ebay right now.

Sometimes Simba sits high on his kitty perch.....

Sometimes Kiya takes over and sits up there (it is -after all, THE spot to be)......

But every now and then the 'other' cat Sienna sits up there. Meowwwww

Today is a holiday so my kids were (happily) home. First, I cut my sisters hair (did I tell you I don't know what I'm doing but they all have me cut their hair anyway!) then painted for several hours and finally, I just braved the cold for a long walk until the wet roads started to freeze and made them slippery. It was....refreshing to say the least.

Brielle got an umbrella for her birthday so I saw a few photo opportunities....

Simba with the umbrella.....Kiya with the umbrella.

I know, little things amuse me.

Ok, it's back to work. Have a nice day!

It's Saturday and the dark skies are sunny and bright (blinding even). The ground is covered with a few inches of snow. I love how it's so pristine the first day, like a crisp white sheet laid over the landscape.

Of course, I'd rather have the ground look like this! (Garden shack in W. Dennis)

While painting yesterday, I realized that I have been incorporating more buildings into my work lately. These are a few that I just finished and are on Ebay now, or will be by Sunday night. http://stores.ebay.com/Cape-Cod-Artist
Provincetown Dune Shack.

I've also been experimenting with color. Buildings are a perfect backdrop for that. These photo's don't really show it, but there is a lot going on with unexpected color in my recent paintings. It's fun! I think I'm on to something.

Ok, there's not much of a building in this one, but I really like it so I thought I'd stick it in here. It makes me think of warmer days......ahhhhh.

Snowy Thursday

Remember that squirrel from my last entry? Well he came back in the middle of a wonderful snow storm yesterday and foraged underneath the cold white stuff just to get the sunflower seeds below. They have a really good sense of smell.

The snow came down all day long and school was cut short. It was really pretty as it fell- there's just something magical about falling snow. I think that's why -in my snowmen paintings -everything looks glowing and magical. I guess that's just my interpretation of it.

(Of course, it loses much of that magic once I have to pick up a shovel!)

And this is what was going on INSIDE yesterday. My Simby was all snuggled in for a warm winters nap. Can you blame him?

Here are a few birds in my yard gathering up as much food as they could today because we are supposed to get more snow. I have to get my bird book out because I can't remember if this is a nuthatch or not. When I was a kid, my dad used to show us what the birds were in the back yard bird feeder. It was always interesting to me.

This is one of the local squirrels that I like to feed. (See how fat he is? )

"I'll have a Nutty Sunflower with a slice of orange, on ice please."

I joke, but it's pretty cold out. Last night my oil burner didn't work for several hours and the house got prettttttty cold before it was fixed. Oh and at the very same time I found a big puddle on my basement floor. Come to find out the toilet tank had been leaking. That got fixed today along with the cracked sink, and hole in the pipe...All these things happened at once. Oh and then, worst of all..... my camera died while I was shooting these photo's. I put new batteries in but it still didn't work. I was fearing the worst when I realized that they were just in wrong. Phew!

(Harwich)

It's been snowing out for the past couple of days- not amounting to much, but just falling gently from the sky. Yesterday I stayed home all day which is very unlike me- I usually need to get outside at least once during a day. But it was a good day to paint and be with my girls.

(Harwich)

So other than posting a few snow photo's I don't have much to report. The highlight of my day today is going to the the dump and getting my car inspected. Whoopee! But you know, I love days like these, when all is quiet and I have no appointments, places to be or people to meet. Of course what I don't mention is that in between what seems like a day of nothing I'll probably work 9 or 10 hours, but I enjoy it so much that I never think of it as 'work', I look forward to it.

Jamaican Snowmen?

It's a cold, snowy Sunday and I've been painting all day to try and catch up for the week I was on vacation. Somehow, I've been coming up with snowmen in Jamaica. Ha ha. Can you believe it? Oh well, it felt good to paint them, so there you have it. Now if you'll excuse me, I have to go shovel my driveway.

Brielle's 18th Birthday

Brielle and her long time best bud, Lucy having fun.

18 years ago on January 7th I had this beautiful baby girl. I was so happy. She was sooo wanted. Spidey took to her from the very first day she came home. I think he could sense her good, and calm energy. I love this picture.

At 4 years old she had developed a curiosity for nature. One day I found her with a slug placed on each of her fingernails just curiously looking at them. To this day she still enjoys animals and nature and wants to study Biology in college next year.

Then little sis came along and she took on the role of nurturer. Brielle has always been kind, sweet and caring. She's always been mature and very responsible for her age. (lucky me!)

Now she's a full grown woman. It's hard for me to believe that 18 years have gone by. We had a little family birthday party for her last night. Grandmom and Auntie Grethe bought her all kinds of goodies for a hope chest (or should I say the 2 plastic tubs they bought). I think she relished the idea of looking towards her life as an adult. I'm not so sure I did.
(Look-I finally got a good photo of my Mumma!)

It's also hard for me to believe that my mom is now 72. It seems like just yesterday I was 18 and she was helping me with my hope chest. I remember she made me an 3-D ornament for each memorable occasion in my life, out of felt. For instance: when I sprained my knee skiing, when I was a pumpkin/witch at Halloween , a fried egg for when I cooked at their restaurant...etc... I still have all of them and they mean the world to me.

*Oh, and by the way, that is a light up necklace that she wore for the special occasion. (It's so 'my mom').
3 generations....Happy Birthday my sweet baby.