These are both 30 minute sketches of my niece. I’m hoping she decides to model for me on a weekly basis, but I think she discovered it’s harder than it looks.  She had a hard time holding these poses for the full 30 minutes.  I am pretty happy with them considering how long it’s been since I’ve had a model sit for me.

Does anyone know how to get the white of the paper to look white without washing the rest of the painting out?

Last night I dragged Joe to see Secretariat. (Don’t judge, sometimes a feel good movie is just what I want.) I went to get Joe a slushee (he did agree to see the movie with me after all) and I was stopped in my tracks by the movie poster directly outside of our theater. (Just skip the intro, I couldn’t click and drag with that one.)

As I was seaching for that image, I came across this lovely as well.

I love me some watercolor.

I am excited to announce my very first give away. While I dream of giving away goodie bags loaded with awesomeness, you are just going to have to bear with me and we will start small together.

For my very first give-away your prize will be my oversized wall calendar. This way you get many lovely images (if I do say so myself, and you know I do) and you get something for the new year.

Now for the rules.

First answer this question (in the comments, not just in your head):   If you could own any painting which one would it be and why? If you would post a link that would be even better. Although it won’t help your chances of winning it will make it much more enjoyable for us all .

How this works: I will put the number of comments into a random number generator, whichever number that baby spits out will be the winner (if I can’t figure out how those work then I will have The Man pick a number between 1 and the yet to be seen number of comments, not fancy but it works).  I will then ship the calendar to you.

I will most likely do a top 5 comments as well. You won’t win anything, but it’s an extra way for me to thank you all for participating.

I will start, I would love to be able to look at this Pasini every single day.  It has that quality that just makes me sigh. Everything is in place and it all seems to hum together. Don’t even get me started on the gorgeous spot of teal. In real life it is lovely.

The winner will be announced next Wednesday! Good luck!

(p.s. I’m so excited.)

(p.p.s. Sept. and Nov. will have full size images by next Wednesday)