8x10 Angels

Today was a windy. rainy. just generally yucky day here on the Cape- a perfect day to stay in and paint! First I spent about half the day trying to fix my computer, then I settled down in my little corner of the room and I started working. I worked on a really neat painting of a mumma lamb and her babies. I'll put it on here as soon as I get it finished.

http://stores.ebay.com/Cape-Cod-Artist

Today I'm posting these 8"x10"angels which were painted a couple of days ago and they are all on Ebay now.

The colors aren't exactly right in the photo's. There are so many more colors in this one that make it glow. I just haven't perfected the picture taking process that captures all of these colors. I'll get it right one of these days.

I've needed angels around me lately, and painting them always makes me feel better.

Soup Kitchen

What's on my fridge? Well, first of all, some beautifully made valentines by my 6 yr. old nephew; a self portrait of him; a glass cat magnet made by one of my lovely customers, the 'Queen Sienna' when she was about 5, and a newspaper article. This article was in the Cape Codder last week and Sienna took the photo for it! (She was also mentioned in the text, as you can see we highlighted it)

Sienna has a good eye for photography and she was asked by a boy at her school to photograph his senior project. He (a culinary student) was doing a pilot 'soup kitchen' in Orleans where they hold AA meetings. Sienna, who is in the school group 'Be the Change', also volunteered along with other members as a server that evening. A reporter from the Cape Codder came but didn't bring a photographer so she asked Sienna if she could use her photo's. What a great thing! Now, not only did Sienna do a wonderful community service that night, she got a photo in the paper. Not bad for a 15 year old!

Single again.....

All I can say is, thank God for cats! (and my kids of course). Life goes on.

Still Winter on the Cape!

Just when I thought spring was on it's way...we got more snow this weekend. It wasn't much, but snow is snow. This painting kind of sums up February on Cape Cod- it's cold and snowy but people still walk the beach. There's just a pull that the ocean has- a magnetic force that draws us to it- we can't resist it.
Of course, I tend to stay in the car when I go to the ocean on a day like this!
http://stores.ebay.com/Cape-Cod-Artist

Wow! What a beautiful day out today. It was 54 degrees the last time I looked; not bad for a day in Feb. I almost got the motorcycle out, but opted to go for a walk with the girls instead, since Brielle just got home for the weekend. Luckily it was low tide and we could walk on the flats.

We had to jump a few rivers, but no shoes got wet.
(Here are my sweet lambies.)

It was so good to go outside and be in the fresh air for a change. Plus, when one is walking, one can't be on the computer, and one is focusing on those around her. I'm not sure if I'm talking to my daughters, or MYSELF! It seems I'm on the computer as much - or more than they are.

I love the computer, but sometimes you just have to say NO! and be present in the world around you.
Anyway, I am so thankful for this wonderful day. It really was a bright spot in the middle of a very snowy cold winter. Maybe it's almost spring?!

Love, Love, Love

Happy Valentine's Day! I don't know if you are loving it or hating it this year. It seems like everyone I know has been divided on this issue because it's a day where expectations are involved and sometimes they are not met.

When we expect someone else to make us happy, we will never truly be happy.

Only we can make ourselves happy. It comes from within, then radiates outward. Look- she's happy! (I love this old print. I just noticed a baby -angel?- in the tree!)

Anyway....back to Valentine's Day....be happy and radiate love today, and every day. Then just notice how much love comes flowing back to you. It's the law of the Universe.

I'm sending out love to all my wonderful customers, and to anyone reading this right now!

The Outer Most House, by Henry Beston

Today I am reading the Outer Most House by Henry Beston. Most Cape Codders have already read it, or HAD to read it in school- I guess I missed the boat on that one! But as I read it I can see why. His writing is beautiful and basically he is just describing nature and the elements. I don't want to put it down!

It is a classic book about Beston's year living in a rustic cottage in Eastham -way out on a spit of land, that looks much like this one (above)- but is actually no longer there. In fact, his cottage got swept away by the 'storm of 78'. Being made mostly of sand, the landscape on the outer Cape is ever changing, especially when there are storms, as most of us here on the Cape are well aware of. Your house is there one minute, and gone the next! Whoops, it fell right into the sea! (of course, for those of us who don't live anywhere near the water, we don't have to worry quite so much.)

But I digress. I am reading it because the Henry Beston Society asked me to make a map of the area, showing where the cottage was located back then and that same location as it is now. I've been doing research with antique maps of his time -(1920's-ish) and comparing them to Google's Satellite Earth map and the difference is huge and amazing. I'll have to post my map when I get further along with it, so check back to see what I mean. Give me a couple of days.....

This map will be available for sale from the H.B. Society, and they may make post cards out of it.
Well, back to the book!

New on Ebay tonight. I'm thinking spring, in case you can't tell!

http://stores.ebay.com/Cape-Cod-Artist

"Unconditionally loving a person is the graceful acceptance of them as they are in this moment" Archangel Gabriel

Brielle's Poem

I just found this poem in one of Brielle's old high school homework binders. I really love it so I wanted to illustrate it with one of my little paintings, then share it with you. (I hope you don't mind hunny....)



"Sun blazing about my head,

digging my toes into the sand.

The ocean looks like a thousand diamonds

strewn across a blue blanket.

I lean against the wind and

pretend that I am weightless.

I watch as the tide so effortlessly give new life to the land.

I am in paradise."

by Brielle Bryden

Winter's Angels

Here are the angels that I was talking about last night. This one amazed me because I was 'directed' to pick up some brown paint right in with the white- which puzzled me, but I've learned not to question and just DO it! So, I put it down on the paper and it came out perfectly as hair! It's just so fun to see these things happen right before my eyes!

Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it. -Rumi

I was just looking at my daughter's photos online and I came across one of 'Belle' from Beauty and the Beast. Anyway, if you look at the girls they both kind of look like her! Kind of funny. Beauty and the Beast was one of their favorite movies when they were young. (We) I must have watched it a MILLION times!!

Ok, it's Friday night and I'm bored. What can I say?

I did paint some amazing angels today but I'm just too tired to put them on here right now. Maybe tomorrow. It's been a long day.

More snow tomorrow.....

Antique Map of France

Yesterday I worked on a few antique maps from a customer in NY. This one is the Bordeaux region of France- before...

and after... I love this cartouche.

And it had a really nice compass rose for coloring. These little things can make or break the aesthetics of a map. (And frankly, I'm just looking at them from the artistic point of view).

One last little detail. Gotta have the sailing ships and sea creatures!

It seems funny that I can jump from impressionistic angels to precise hand coloring of antique maps (which you CAN'T make a mistake on!!). It's actually not an easy jump, and I have to prepare myself before hand. I have to clean my work area, which in turn 'cleans' my head out, then I have to put on something appropriate to listen to. With the maps, I really have to settle down- to the point of lowering my breathing so I don't make any mistakes. When I do the angels, it's the opposite; I have to totally let go. I really LOVE painting the angels, but the maps help pay the bills. Plus, antique maps interest me and I do enjoy coloring them. The difference is they are actual 'work' and the angels (to me) aren't. Either way, I'm still doing what I love to do for work, and that is: painting. I feel so blessed to be able to be an artist.

=

Angels in the sky

12"x 24"

http://stores.ebay.com/Cape-Cod-Artist



Here's an angel painting I just finished. It was inspired by the angels that comforted me on the plane recently (see photo below) and read my Jan 16th entry: http://breten.blogspot.com/2011_01_16_archive.html

Today is a rainy Wednesday (better than the snow that everyone around us is getting!) Sienna is late for the bus so I'm going to have to drive her across town to another stop. I'm just wasting some time until she's ready. Listening to those heavy drops pounding on the skylights, I'm not looking forward to going out in the freezing cold rain first thing in the morning.
Here she is. I'm off. A mothers job is never done.