ICAD, Index-Card-a-Day 2013, day 1

 

This year has been a very different year for this blog, while last year I blogged two or three times a week, this year I have barely kept up with two or three times a month.  At the beginning of the year I found this quite distressing because I love this little blog but I soon realized that this is just a different year.  Each blog post has it's own little life and story and if they are not as frequent as in the past, so be it. 

Today marks the half way point of 2013 so maybe this is a good day to start something new.  This morning reading my favorite blogs in bed with coffee at my side I found out about Index-Card-a-Day 2013.  You create anything and everything on an index card for June and July, 61 day in a row!  This is just what I need to get my creative juices flowing.

This is my first submit.  Hungarian folk art flowers drawn in pencil, ink and marker on a pink index card that I have literally had around since college.  I used to take notes on these and I must have bought a HUGE package because I still have a nice stack left.

So here's to trying something new.  I'm not sure if I will post every day or save up a few to post at once.  I will definitely post to the Daisy Yellow Flickr group every day.

Head over to Tammy's lovely blog Daisy Yellow to learn more.

Santa Cruz Island aka Fluid no.3

I've finally finished my first commission.  As you know if you read here often, I was worried about the dark colors in the painting before and the fact that it didn't match it's mate so well.  I didn't want the dark colors to look like a stormy sea so I played up the sunset colors and finally I am happy with the way it came out....and so is it's new owner. 

BEFORE:


AFTER:


TOGETHER: 

 Obi photobombed:

 

I'm looking forward to my next project, feel some Hungarian flowers coming but it's been a crazy week around here, fires AND earthquakes.  My kids have experienced fires (unfortunately) but this was their first earthquake.  It was a relatively little one but they didn't understand it was an earthquake and froze in place, especially after I yelled at them to follow me outside.  My yelling scared them more than the earthquake that they didn't know was an earthquake!  I need to work out our emergency plans!

Next week is the last week of school and I am looking forward to summer, even though the kids being home with me makes my life much more complicated.  They have a few camps planned and I am hoping work slows down so we can have some fun around our beautiful town.

 

Happy Mother's Day

In honor of Mother's Day...some of my favorite pictures of some of my favorite mothers.

 

My mother in Isla Vista, California shortly after moving to the US from Hungary

 

Where and when unknown...somewhere in Europe and she has a baby bottle in her hard so I'm guessing 1968. 
This was converted to a digital file from slides that were molding...
LATER: AUSTRIA

 

Santa Barbara, CA.  1970.  My older brother and I with our mom.

 

In the backyard of their new home (and the home I live in now!) 1971

 

California. Early '70's

 My grandmother, mother, me and great-grandmother (after whom my daughter is name.)
 Subotica, Serbia (then Yugoslavia. )1972

My mother, me and both my brothers.  London, 1976.

 

 

Santa Barbara CA.  November, 2008. 
My sister-in-law, niece, grandmother, mother, me and my blondie daughter.

Happy Mother's Day to all you mothers out there and

especially to the mothers in the picture above. 

 

Progress Santa Cruz Island

 I've been working on my first commission (and first sale!)  It's quite a change for this late in life, self taught artist to paint something for any other reason than fun and personal fulfillment.  I try not to remember my "customer" but it's hard not to get a little nervous wondering if the painting will live up to expectations.

After my first painting session

Continuing to add color

This is where I am now (below.)  I've added a lot more color and movement to the water.  My worry now is that it is getting to far away from it's mate, they are intended to be hung together.



Besides the color variations (which is more subtle in person than in these pictures,) I worry that the water looks flat in the other painting now...but I hesitate to go back and mess with it. 



 What do you think?
Is it OK if they are not matchy/matchy.   I wasn't given any direction but they will hang together so I want a cohesive look. Is it enough that they are tied together because they are two ocean paintings?
 

Happenings Today

Last year I had a banner vegetable garden year, I had more tomatoes than I could handle.  I made Homemade Marinara Sauce.  I peeled, seeded and froze the extra tomatoes before I found a much easier way to preserve by pureeing them in my blender.  I am still using up my pureed tomatoes that have been in my freezer!

My vegetable garden is off to a slower start this year but I still have plenty going on in other parts of the garden.

 

 

 I'm growing better strawberries this year thanks to a tip I learned in Sunset magazine - spend the first month of growing season pinching off all the pretty white flowers from your strawberry plants.  The berries that grow later will be bigger and sweeter.  It worked!

Hoping for a lot of blueberries, I have 6 bushes but they are still young.

These are baby Golden Dorsett apples which grow nicely here because they have a a very low chill requirement.  I have had this little tree for a few years and it's amazing how many apples I get.  Given my success pinching strawberries I thinned some apples hoping for better fruit but it was really hard to cut off the baby apples...I want them ALL to grow!  I also have a Fuji apple tree which is still young, it only gave me 2 apples last year.

Pole beans

Chives.  I love to put the purple blossom petals in mashed potatoes, they look so pretty.

Pomegranates.  I have two small trees in pots, I thought this one was non-fruit bearing because years went by with no fruit so I got another and then this one woke up!  I only got one fruit last year and it was tiny.  It's covered in blossoms, so I hope at least a few of them turn into fruit.

I also have Fuyu persimmon, Santa Rose Plum, a dwarf avocado, blood orange, Meyer Lemon, Pixie tangerine and a dwarf navel orange.  Nothing much going on there...I have a strangely hard time with all my citrus...but I keep tyring.

And today is Oberon's birthday!  He is one.  This is his serious look.

Santa Cruz Island WIP

A little more than a year ago the prompt at Illustration Friday was 'fluid' so I painted the ocean.
I was happy with the painting and decide to do a trio of ocean inspired paintings.

The first Fluid is a close shoreline view. The second, Fluid no. 2, which I painted about a month later was a mid view of a crashing wave. I had in mind that Fluid no. 3 would be a far off view, such as the way Santa Cruz Island looks from the mainland, but I took several detours into Hungarian folk art, drawing with colored pens, journaling, and experimenting with watercolors. That third canvas stayed white as snow...hidden in a closet.

My dear friend L's brother, who is decorating a new home, took Fluid and Fluid no. 2 home and asked me to paint Fluid no 3. for him.  I sold three paintings!  (my first three!)

So here it is, a work in progress.  Santa Cruz Island at sunset.



 

Some lovely roses from my garden for inspiration.

 



I'm sharing at Sunday Sketches and Artists in Blogland. 
Click on the lovely links above and check out all the talented artists!

The Tree

Years ago one of the first paintings I felt good enough to give away as a gift, and I mean a real gift wrapped and presented at a birthday party, was this Cypress tree I painted for A's birthday.  If you are from Santa Barbara you would instantly recognize it as the tree at the end of the bluff of the Wilcox Property (Douglas Family Preserve) which is an open space and off leash dog walking area not far from my house.

 

Like most people around here, especially if you live in this part of town, I have a relationship with this tree.  I have sat under it.  I have run past it as I turn around and head for home.  Sometimes I even tag it because it's just the half way point of a 5 mile run from my front door.  Lots of people have climbed it, but not me...as I find climbing a tree at the edge of a cliff a little too scary. 

Mostly I've just admired it and painted it and stood next to it.

 

This past week we had some fierce winds.  They lasted a few days but one night was so windy that I was woken up several times during the night hearing wind and the crashes of pots falling over and gates banging.  I knew we'd lose some trees around town but I was hoping it might be one of the trees on my street that blocks my ocean view!

 

I was so sad to hear the Cypress fell.

 

The dog and I went to visit and say goodbye.  Poor tree.

 

A very different view without that tree.