Courtyard Fountain in New Orleans Oil Painting

Courtyard Fountain.......18x24......oil on canvas.....$450

I can't believe I have not posted this one yet! That's how crazy it has been for me lately! I love the way this one turned out! It got a lot of interest at the last festival.

I remember taking the photo and how the fountain was out in the direct sunlight and there were cool shadows under the balcony. When I look at the painting I think you can get that feeling for sure.

This was one of those lucky little things you stumble upon when out wandering around. This was actually a residential courtyard behind a shop that I had happened into. I could see it behind the shop and asked if I could go take photos. Luckily for me the answer was yes.

I am off to the River Arts Festival in Memphis this weekend. This past weekend my son and DIL that are expecting twins were in town for a shower thrown by my wonderful friend Tracy and attended by even more wonderful friends. I know this sounds sappy, but if you are ever tempted to take your friends for granted you need to step back and look around and realize what an amazing group they are. I am still just blown away by what my friends did for Michael and Heather and (drum roll) McKinley and Kayleigh. That will be my little granddaughters...Mckinley and Kayleigh.

I think M & H did a wonderful job on the names...they sound like twins without being matchy-matchy and they both have different initials, which will make labeling everything much easier. Heather is Heather Leigh, hence the spelling of Kayleigh's name.

Well, today's to-do list is very long and it's not getting done while I am here typing.

Tomatoes, Basil, Garlic Oil painting

Recipe......18x24 Oil on Canvas............$390

This is a really nice painting in person. I don't cook much, so I don't use a lot of fresh basil, but now I can, at least, say I have painted it.

Paintings that have yet to be posted!

I have been so busy with the planning, painting and readying for the Shrimp Festival that I have got a stock pile of paintings that have not been posted for your viewing pleasure. Since I am going to be out of town next week, I am just going to post as many as I can right now so that they will at least be on here.

First up is a series that I really enjoyed doing. All the paintings are 12x12 oil on canvas. They attracted much attention during the four days of the festival. I sold one, but had mucho requests for prints...you know, people that really wanted one but not enough to pay $125 for an oil painting. The plan is to have prints available by my next show. Plus I did get a mailing list of people that wanted them when I had them available.

A funny for my Art Friends!

This was sent to me by a friend and since I am still unpacking and getting my feet back on the ground from our trip (we just got home from the Shrimp Festival last night) I thought I would send it to the artsy folks who follo9w my blog. It's just silly enough to make you smile. And timely, too!

A thief in Paris planned to steal some paintings from the Louvre.

After careful planning, he got past security,stole the paintings, and made it safely to his van.However, he was captured only two blocks away when his van ran out of gas.

When asked how he could mastermind such a crime and then make such an obvious error,he replied, 'Monsieur, that is the reason I stole the paintings.'

I had no Monet ...

to buy Degas...

to make the Van Gogh!'

See if you have De Gaulle... to send this on to someone else.

I sent it to you because I figured I had nothing Toulouse.
When it comes to the price of gas one must maintain his sense of humor these days, even though it is difficult at times.

Hi from the Shrimp Festival!

I am heading over for the last day of the Shrimp Festival. Things have gone very well and the weather has been beautiful. I have met some nice people and if you are tuning in after meeting my down there let me say, meeting all of the nice people and hearing your input has been the highlight of my trip. I will post new things when I return next week.

Until then....if the gentleman who bought four of my paintings the other evening would contact me via my cell phone I would really appreciate it! I forgot to get your expiration date and I cannot process your credit card transaction. What a business woman I am!

Jazz Man Oil Painting

Jazz Man.....10x20.....Oil on Gallery Wrap......$200 (SOLD)

This is from a photo I shot while walking down Bourbon Street when we attended a wedding in New Orleans earlier this summer. It was a blazing hot day, the bar that this man was playing in was dark and cool and then BAM! here was this smoking hot, glowing orange guy belting out a tune. If we weren't on our way to another destination, we would have definitely stopped. As it was I snapped a super cool photo.

Different Strokes From Different Folks Entry...

Beach Cottage.....11x14.......Oil on Canvas........$160

This is my entry for this week's Different Strokes From Different Folks entry...just squeaking in under the wire. We were gone last Wed. when it was posted and I almost missed it. This is just about as interesting as anything I have found in the art blog arena. Kudos to Karin Jurick for coming up with it.

I tried a new approach to this one. I got a book last week and it really hit home with me. I want to be loose and spontaneous and have the painting look "alive". There were things in the book (by artist Ted Goerschner) that really made sense to me. Many were things I already knew, but he put them in a way that it seemed like I understood better how I could implement them. Until I picked up a brush, that is.

As with any new thing you have to progress in baby steps. This is my first baby step and I can see what I was trying to do, even if I didn't actually pull it off yet. And then, on top of that, the photo is not too good. I am struggling with my camera here lately!

Spiderlilies and Geraniums Daily Oil Paintings

Spiderlilies.....5x7......oil on panel.........SOLD

Geraniums......5x7.....Oil on Panel.......SOLD

These paintings were done by commission for a lovely lady that says they remind her of her mother. She has two daughters and when she received these after I had completed them she said that she knew they would be something that the girls would keep for years to come. It is rather touching to me to think that my work might be handed down from mother to daughter.

Speaking of daughters......we have a little more news about the twins.....they are going to be girls! We were so excited when we found out, but then we thought, we'd have been just as excited if it had been boys....I think we're just excited period. We went to see my son and DIL up in Kentucky this weekend. We got to go with them to Babys R Us to register for baby stuff. Boy have things changed! There are so many cool things to help you out and some of the old stand-bys have been so improved! But man it all costs a pretty penny. And they need two of so many things!

I got in one more art show for this fall....The Three Rivers Festival in Covington, La. That means I was accepted in 3 of the 4 that I applied to so I am pretty happy about that. I wanted to do as many in the fall as I could since I won't most likely be doing any in the spring due to baby arrivals.

Chardonnay, Please

Chardonnay, Please....12x24.....Oil on GW canvas....$275

I took this photo at a bar in New Orleans when we went this summer for a friend's wedding. The bar is called "le Bar" I think. It was at the Royal Sonesta on Bourbon street where we were staying. When my husband first saw it he kept looking and finally said he didn't like it. He said "it's way too big with those people in the background...it look like King Kong's wine" So I took another look and he was right to a certain extent. I muted the people down some more, so that they were not competing for attention and I think I came out ok.

Best Foot Forward... Oil Painting

Best Foot Forward.....12x12.....Oil on Canvas.....$150

I have been painting in the last week, just not blogging. Much has happened, much to tell.

First, the above painting is for a new blog project started by my friend Karin Jurick. The blog is called Different Strokes by Different Folks. Her beloved dog, Jack, had to be put to sleep this week. She found a positive outlet for her sadness by starting this blog. Every Wednesday she will post a photo along with the invitation for any or all artists to paint the same photo in any medium or form...abstracted, cropped, whatever. The first photo for the first week was, of course, Jack. The above is my version. Click on the link to see others, along with Karin's and the original photo.

Next we move along to hurricane Gustav. Things got pretty crazy on the coast here in Mississippi as shell-shocked people got ready to face the first real threat since Katrina. My art show was set to be Saturday afternoon, but people were evacuating and boarding up and such. When Saturday turned out to be the calm before the storm, so to speak, and was sunny and calm, we decided to go ahead with the show. It looked great and we were all set. The bad news is that we had 3 customers all afternoon (that weren't related to me) the good news is that two of them bought paintings. I could have had 50 people come and maybe not sold more than two paintings, so I was very pleased. We have rescheduled for the 20th and will do it again when people are less occupied.

But we are not through with Gustav. We returned home fairly early Sunday so as not to get caught up in too much evacuation traffic. I got a phone call from a dear friend in Baton Rouge (the one who guessed the trailer painting name a few posts ago). One of her good friends was in Jackson (where I live sort of) and could not check into the hotel they had reservations for (let's just say I will never use Orbitz again after what they did to these people). They had confirmed on Thursday, had their conf# and email in hand and were turned away! We are talking about a woman(talented nurse), her very kind and patient husband, her 80+ parents and her 80+uncle and their dog. So they came to stay with us for a couple of days. Considering we had never met them before, we have three dogs of our own, and it was a very stressful situation for them, I could not have hoped for it to have gone any better. We hit the lottery where unexpected house guests are concerned. They were the sweetest people and we are so glad that we were able to help them. In the meantime, our friend in Baton Rouge had a huge oak tree fall into the middle of their home and have had to move out while it is repaired. Please say a prayer for them all as they recover.

One more prayer request...our Hawaiian friend Ivan has devastating news about his father. They had just returned home from Hawaii last Saturday where they had gone to help Ivan's dad move into his new assisted living quarters (at his request, I might add). They got a call on Tuesday that he had had a massive heart attack. By the time our friends got there there was nothing but bad news, organ failure, no brain activity...now hard decisions will have to be made. Ivan just lost his mother not very long ago so my heart goes out to him.

I have an appointment, so I must head out, but I will post more paintings tomorrow.