​Color of the Year
​

I started a large painting with the idea of featuring Living Coral...(there has to be some sort of launch of inspirarion...right?)
I love mixing color....I could do it all day!!!  ...  (sometimes I do!!!)

The painting hung out for awhile while I waited for the initial layer to dry.  Feeling lost about where to take it next, I sanded it down a bit and added a big amount of white to see how I might be inspired.  For me this is a difficult part of the process of making an abstract painting.  I've learned to listen for what it is telling me that it needs.  Sometimes I just can't hear a thing, but I want to paint.  When I don't know were to go with it, it's best work on something else until what is being asked for is clear to me.  Then this happened.....

...  Jonathan Van Ness's post on Instagram. (click on the image to go to IG and follow him!)
  He's been diligently learning how to figure skate with some sort of olympic aspiration.  He's really serious and passionate about doing this and he posts his progress with entertaining short videos of his rapid improvement as well as his painful falls and awkwardness.  Somehow witnessing his hard work and dedication is an inspiration.  I was really surprised at how that inspiration showed up for me here.  It's the backdrop to this skating  rink.  I really like the shapes and colors.  My painting was telling me where it wanted to go by watching Jonathan practice!  The following  images show my paintings' progression.

...and peeking through all the layers is some of the original color... Living Coral. 

​ I titled this painting Heck Yeah because toward the end when it the pieces were flying into place, I stood back and said...Hell Yeah!  (a bit of my father comes through me once in awhile).   
This painting is BOLD!  It spoke to me boldly while it was growing up.  It's strong and makes a statement .... like Jonathan.  It's one of my favorite!  Click here to see more details.

Just like anything that takes energy, focus and momentum, the energy to keep paining takes tremendous self care.  One of the things that helps me continue to have the energy to work in the studio is my daily purple green smoothie.   Here's a youtube link of my fabulous Functional Medicine Dr. demonstrating how to make it.

https://youtu.be/nOH7of2Uxus

​To your health!!!!!

*  Dream Tending Three day/night workshop...
If you have the desire to bring to light the messages your dreams are providing you, I highly recommend the workshops and books of Stephen Aizenstat PH.D. After spending thee magical days at his workshop at Pacifica Graduate Institute in Santa Barbara, I am taking notes of the stories and images that happen when my body goes to sleep and another part of me wakes up.

*  Park City Utah Gallery....
9 paintings just shipped to Olive and Tweed on Main Street in Park City.  The Park City Arts Festival is the first weekend in August.  

I'm working with a new painting medium and it is pulling me to create in a more non-representational way.  I spent years working with traditional Encaustic painting, before I found my way back to oil painting.  The Cold Wax medium is a wonderful combination of the two.  I am deeply inspired and full of ideas to explore.  Here is a peek at what I'm doing.

12x12 inches mixed media

I have a very sweet old grandmother who was living in Apache Junction Az.  She was 104 when I made the above painting.  She is now almost 108.  Here is a picture of her on her 100th birthday.

Geneva is still is a big baseball fan and has always followed the home team.   Therefore she never missed a Diamondback game on television.  We decided that it was time to go to a game in the stadium with her.  So we pulled some strings with the team's corporate office and got the privilege of being on the field during warm up.  The players, one by one, gallantly came over and shook my grandmothers hand and signed the ball she was holding.   The expression on her face told me that she was meeting her heroes and she was delighted beyond measure.  The team even had a jersey made in her size with the family name on the back.  She wore it with pride.

So what does this have to do with the above mentioned painting?   I took the below picture of the hotel swimming pool while walking to breakfast on the morning of the game.  I knew I was going to make a painting of this composition.   So now you have  the back story of Apache Junction Breakfast.

​The inspiration for my paintings come from moving through the world with my iPhone.  

In August 2017 Grandma will be 108.  wow

I planted this climbing rose outside my studio, in our backyard.  I am not experienced in gardening, but I fell in love with this rose when I saw it at the local nursery.  I hoped for the best.  The first few years it did well, with the following years not so well.  This year it burst into life.  Here are some more images as well as the paintings' progression that was inspired by these heavy hanging beautiful pink flowers.