An update on the background series: it will go on; however, I'm working on trying to make it "bite-sized and fun"! Maybe even some video! So, my current plans are to have the series resume early next week. Thanks to everyone who left comments! It makes a difference to find out what you all want too!

So let's hear it - yay or nay! If you would care to comment about the current direction or a direction you would like to see the series take, please share it! If there are no comments, I will assume from the silence that there is not sufficient interest in the series and cease posting it. If there are several comments, majority will rule. Let me reiterate, you will not hurt or harm my feelings either way, so please share your opinion!

That's what AccuWeather said the "feels-like" temperature was and it did! I think it was actually about 93º with little breeze to stir the air. But despite the intense heat with only the slightest of breezes, I did get in a little plein air time this weekend!!

This is 201 S. Evers Street in Plant City, Florida. Chris and I went and spent the day antiquing in Plant City on Saturday, and found some fun stuff to bring home - just what we needed! More stuff! The old downtown area is a maze of antiques, boutiques, restaurants and the like all nestled around some parks and the old train depot.

I managed to talk Chris into going back today so that I could get in some sketching. I had about 50 minutes before the weather started to really get serious with thunderstorms moving in. Since I'm not a huge fan of lightning, we left and it wasn't but ten minutes later and the rain started to pour.

This is the start of a new watercolor paper sketchbook that I can't say I'm overly fond of - yet. It may grow on me. I need to do more work in it first. I also didn't have the right tools for painting bricks but decided to go for it any way. When I got home, I finished the sketch at the kitchen table with the same tools that I started with. Why? To make sure that I didn't lose the feel of the piece by swapping out tools in the middle and getting a different effect. Just call me glutton for punishment!

Regardless of all the weather issues, ant bites, lightning and wrong tools, this was a blast and I'll be going back to do some more sketching in Plant City very soon! Care to join me?!!

Isn't she pretty?!! This beautiful peony reminds me so much of wearing petticoats when I was a child. They were usually white and sometimes had a touch of pink trim, and boy, oh, boy, did I think I was something! Of course, those kinds of petticoats were usually reserved for special occasions so they retained their frivolity. Then, after I turned 5 or 6, you couldn't get me to wear a petticoat, skirt, or a dress to save your life. Most especially if it was pink - yuck!! (I had two older brothers to keep up with!)

I am painting this flower on Sennelier hot press watercolor paper. This particular paper damages easily from tape or masking fluid so I've opted to paint around the flower's yellow center rather than run the risk of tearing the paper. As you can see, I still have a good deal of work to do, including the background. Oh, yes, with regard to backgrounds - that series will be continued tomorrow. Himself and I received an unexpected dinner invitation for this evening and will be going out! That didn't leave me with enough time to do the whole post, so it will be up tomorrow.

I've decided to turn this situation into a positive by giving everyone the chance to post any questions they would like answered about either of these subjects in the comments section. I will then attempt (assuming I know the answers) to work them into this series of posts. So, if you've got a question, here's your chance!

The first award is from Lori of Twin Cedars Drawing Board. Lori is a very talented graphite and colored pencil artist who has just entered and been juried into her first art show earlier this year. Thank you, Lori!

The second award is from Soulbrush! Her blog is Soulbrush as well. She and I met in the ABC ATC trade group that I'm playing with! She is a wonderful ATC and collage artist and author of several blogs as well! Thanks so much, Soulbrush!

With these awards, I am suppose to tell you seven things you don't know about me and then pass on the award to seven others. So here we go . . .

1. I grew up in a family that grew strawberries here in Florida. My oldest brother still grows berries on a 95+ acre farm.

2. Strawberries are not my favorite fruit. In fact, I seldom eat them.

3. I don't watch television. I will occasionally watch a movie, but Chris has to step on my tail feathers to get me to sit down long enough to watch it. Once the movie starts, assuming it's any good, I'm okay.

4. I don't watch the news either. The media are not our friends. They're there to sell ads and they do that through negativity. "Catastrophic fire in New York today" sounds much better (to them) than "Old vacant, abandoned warehouse burns in New York."

5. I do listen to music and have it on all day long all over the house! Classical, jazz, rock, you name it!

6. I believe in Santa Claus!

7. I hate doing the laundry. No, actually, it's not doing the laundry, it's putting it all away (she says as she sits looking at a load that needs to be put away).

As to the seven people that are deserving of this award, in no particular order:

Claire from Claire's Sketchbook: she is a wonderfully talented artist, incredibly creative and so very honest about her struggles to paint and draw more.

Pat of Pat Reese Design: this woman is soooo talented and extremely prolific. Her talents are spread over a wide area of interests including gardening, landscape design, sketching, and painting just to mention a few.

Caroline of From the Studio: another fine artist that speaks frankly about her goals to improve and be her personal best.

Krista of Hope In Everyday: this lady has a lot going on and I admire her tenacity in refusing to allow art to slip away by keeping it front and center in her life!

Gabrielle of Inner Artist: Gabrielle has recently embarked on a journey (challenge) of completing 100 paintings in a year and has been so kind as to share her adventures on her blog.

Teresa of Teresa Mallen Studio: Teresa is a topnotch colored pencil artist and has recently had work juried into the CPSA International Exhibition showing in Atlanta.

Steve of Steve Penberthy's Adventures in Watercolor: I have just recently "met" Steve, but I am very impressed not only with his work but his willingness to share about his learning experiences and what he has learned.

These are just a few of the fantastic people out here in Blogland, and I encourage you to pay them all a visit as they all have talent in spades and are more than willing to share! Again, thanks to Lori and Soulbrush for the honor of these awards and for passing them on to me!

Chris and I had kicked around various ideas and nothing really seemed to fit the bill - too complicated to manage, too fussy, and then not too long ago we cleaned out our foyer closet as we were installing new flooring. Chris came across some frames I had purchased to create a family photo display but never got around to doing.

Chris called me over, and said "What about using these to display your paintings? You can include your website and contact info, it's a nice, clean look, a bit understated so that the work shows well, and we can put your business cards near by?!!" I thought it was a fabulous idea! Yippee skippee!! Problem solved!

I purchased the frames from Bed, Bath and Beyond with their 50% off coupons and I created the images to fit the 4" x 6" (10.16 cm x 15.24 cm) image area, printed them out on 8.5" x 11" (21.59 cm x 27.94 cm) paper and then cut them to size. It would be easy to duplicate this idea even if you doesn't have a color printer by taking any images to a photo kiosk at the mall or drugstore and have 4" x 6" photos made. Then print out any contact info on a black and white printer. Kinko's or another copy shop may also be able to help with color copies, etc.

This idea is very handy if the work you're is creating mostly commissions and you don't keep the paintings for very long, if you are just starting out and do not have a lot of paintings to display, you want to display your work at several locations all at once or if the work is selling faster than you can create it! This may also be a good way to approach a business about displaying your work as the overall size of the display is 11"x 23" and can be hung vertically or horizontally. Without a big space requirement, more businesses are likely to play with you!

As you can see from the lack of progress on this sweet little rosebud, I haven't been doing much painting. I've been in video land learning about file types, resolution, conversion, clips, cuts, breaks, transitions and all sorts of video-speak. And so far, I've learned that I am totally clueless, and quite dangerous when I get hold of a piece of video. But as a wise person recently commented "You're learning a whole lot of things not to do again!"

The rosebud is coming along. I just love that touch of yellow under the front petal coming towards us. Sweet spot! I've just started on the leaves and stem. Haven't decided whether to put in a background yet or not. What do you think? And what about a title? Any ideas? If so, please leave them in the comments!

. . . . in wishing my lovely husband, Chris, a very, very

I have been having the best fun today! I've been playing in the land of HTML and Blog! They are absolutely fascinating places with lots of nooks and crannies to explore and become lost in! The lovely Susie of 1stFloorFlat posted a tutorial about favicons on her Computery page. What's a favicon you ask? See that cute little ladybug up in the address bar? That's a favicon! I replaced the "b" from blogger!

Well, one thing lead to another, and then another and the next thing you know - changes galore! Not all of them apparent yet, but they're coming. And talk about getting into a zone! I was in front of the computer from 9:00 this morning until about 3:00 this afternoon! Where did the time go?!! The hours flew by! But I have a small confession to make - as enjoyable as the day was, it was an exercise in procrastination.

You see, I am trying to put together some painting videos and today was the day! Today was the first day I was actually going to videotape myself painting, and, well, ummm, I guess you could say I was just a little bit nervous about it! It took until about 5:00 this afternoon before I got around to it and then, wouldn't you know - I LOVED it! I was having a ball!!

I had intended to post a piece of the video today because I was painting the rosebud you see at the top of this post, only to find out that I can't edit the file because it's incompatible with my editing software! Arrrrrgggghhhhhhhh! I go back to Apple for one of my training sessions tomorrow - bet they can solve my dilemma! Until then, we'll stick with scans.

After setting up the cherries just thus and so today, I would sit down in my chair, get all ready to draw and . . . . . one of the cherries would get bored and roll off. Sigh. I would get back up and go put the cherry back, just thus and so, sit down and . . . . . another one would depart. After about the fourth time of this nonsense, I went and got my roll of double-sided sticky tape.

No more wandering cherries! I don't know who invented that stuff but it borders on magic. So there sat my perfect little cherries all in a row so that I could paint them for the new blog header! Tell me what you think of the new header! Do you like it? Yes? No? Tell me why!

I'm hoping you can get a better idea of the texture from this image. It has lines, folds, and knobs as well as hills and valleys. I really thought this was going to be one of those pieces that bled and refused to lie flat but thankfully those issues did not happen.

After looking at the piece all day on Saturday, I decided to make some adjustments to some of the values in the lower left corner as well as beneath the flower. By darkening those areas, the eye was not pulled away from the center of interest, the rose.

Please click here for purchase information!

This has been fun, I am surprised to say! This paper has a very unique finish that makes it very interesting to paint on and challenges me to think differently about how I apply the paint. To look at this paper, one would think that it would bleed into a fuzzy mess when touched with water and paint. It doesn't. However, the pigment does sit up on the top of the paper somewhat. That makes for easy lifting but it's nearly impossible to go back to the white of the paper.

For that reason alone, I've had to sneak up on the darker values on the bottom petals. I can go dark all at once, but there was no way to judge whether or not I had the right value. So those darker bottom petals probably have a dozen or more glazes of blues, greys, lavenders, greens and yellows. With that many glazes, I'm glad it wasn't a bigger piece! (Click the image to see it larger.)

The other challenge with this paper is getting a good scan. The scan above is decent, but it took two tries and then I still had to take the image into Photoshop and adjust the levels to get it closer to the actual painting. The colors are richer and not quite so dark in the real painting. Once it's complete, I'll try photographing it to see if that does a better job. Day's Last Light will be available for purchase on Monday morning should you interested!

On a final note, before the weekend kicks off, I wish you all a safe and happy Fourth of July!!

I am hoping to make it back into the studio for several hours tomorrow and should (hopefully) have some new artwork to post. So, in the meanwhile, what are you up to?