Happy Monday!

Between Orchard and Pie ©2008 Karen Mathison Schmidt
6 x 6 • acrylic on Gessobord

Sold • private collection, Bethesda, MD

Happy Monday everyone!

I finished this painting on Friday, but haven’t taken the time to post it here until now. Hey, I’ve been busy!

Last week after I brought these yummy pieces of fruit home and arranged them (yes, "arranged" – I’m kind of visually compulsive, I have to admit) in a vintage footed milk glass bowl on our kitchen table, they were just begging to be made into a painting, so I obliged. I sure would like to say these luscious beauties came from Ed Lester’s Farm down the road a piece, but I’d be lying. As it so happens, they came from Super Target. A spur-of-the-moment buy during a milk-and-bread run. Somewhere down the line they came from some orchard on somebody’s fruit farm somewhere, I’m sure. Well, wherever they came from they were lip-smackin’ good! (Needless to say, they never made it to the pie stage.)

Here are work in progress photos – first, the initial sketch in mars black, then blocking in the main areas of color ...



Then (in the picture below) I added color glazes to deepen the underpainting: a Pthalo green glaze over the apples, Quinacridone violet over the peaches, giving them a kind of magenta-ish cast, and cobalt blue glaze over everything else. I went with a purple-yellow palette for this one – in other words, I tried to keep the colors of the entire painting toward the purple and yellow for the most part, steering away from true reds, greens and blues. Any reds are more orange or magenta, greens are yellowish, and the blues I used are purplish. This gives the painting as a whole a more coherent and balanced feel, color-wise.


... and here are a couple of details ...

A new outlook on life ...

Summer Song • 16x20 acrylic on gessobord • work in progress ...


This one is almost done ... I just need to add a few finishing touches. I squeezed in time to work on it in the midst of the flurry of activity surrounding the installation of our NEW WINDOWS!


Yes, as fashionable a look as it was, gone are the plywood and cardboard panels filling in for broken panes (except for the half-round opening in the attic, window to come, and one itty bitty spot to the left of the front door which will have to wait until we get the new front door). Here’s a before picture. I want to give mention to Nationwide Windows here in Shreveport; we went with their Restoration Windows line, and the customer service has been terrific!

We had the windows custom styled after the originals, and we considered getting the hand rolled glass to have that true antique wavy glass look, but as it turned out that was WAY too expensive. About twice as much as we could spend. So, sadly, I had to let go of that idea. But the new windows are really pretty. And now we have all working windows, so in a couple of months when the weather turns nice and cool, we can open them up and get a wonderful fresh breeze going through here.



AND they’re double-hung – they can swing toward the inside so I can wash the outside without going out with a bucket and ladder. On those odd years when I actually decide to wash the outside of the windows, that is.

Here’s the view from my temporary studio/office (a.k.a. the breakfast nook):


Beautiful.

Speaking of beautiful, here’s an excerpt from my devotional reading this morning:

Psalm 107:9

He satisfies the thirsty soul,
And the hungry soul He fills with what is good.

“God makes every common thing serve, if thou wilt, to enlarge that capacity of bliss in His love. Not a prayer, not an act of faithfulness in your calling, not a self-denying or kind word or deed, done out of love for Himself; not a weariness or painfulness endured patiently; not a duty performed; not a temptation resisted; but it enlarges the whole soul for the endless capacity of the love of God.”

– E. B Pusey (1800-1882)

Birthday season continues ...

Well, we messed around and are about a week and a day late on this one, but we didn't want this whole Birthday Season to go by without a hearty ...


Love,
Aunt Karen, Uncle Paul, Trixie, Annie, Henry,
Buster, Bailey & Matilda!


Hold on just one second! Isn’t Ray supposed to be in here, too?



Where the heck is he?



zzzzzzzzz .............



Hmmm? ... huh? ... what?? ... I missed it?

Hey, wait a second, happy birthday from me, too!

Boy, that took a lot out of me ...

I think I’m going to have to take a breather ...

just a minute ...



zzzzzzzzzz ..............

The Big 1-6!

Hey, Scott! Grumpy Gus and the Green Duck here have been reminding me all day long that it’s my first nephew’s 16th birthday today.

I wanted to post a photo I have of you when you were 2, standing in the hall here in the big white house, looking up at me standing on the landing. I know it’s in a box around here somewhere ... I just saw it a few weeks ago.

Oh well, you’re probably breathing a sigh of relief I can’t find it.

You are, aren’t you? Yeah, I thought so. In fact, you probably think the Grumpy Gus & Green Duck photo is lame enough, thank you very much.

You do, don’t you? Yeah, I thought so.

I know I still owe you a surreal painting of a flying green pig, but for now a Green Duck will have to do.

Meanwhile,

HAPPY BIRTHDAY !

from Aunt Karen, Uncle Paul, Henry, Trixie, Matilda, Buster, Ray, Annie & Bailey!

Buster, Birthday Spokesdog

HEY! It’s me, Buster! I’m here to wish Michael Nyberg a happy birthday on behalf of the whole Schmidt menagerie here in Louisiana.

Sorry I’m a day late, but I was just recently appointed to the position of Birthday Spokesdog and I couldn’t figure out how to work this blog thing yesterday -- plus I was busy hanging out inside our new back yard fence, and I kinda lost track of time. But I think I figured everything out now, so ...

HAPPY 13th BIRTHDAY!

from me, Trixie, Henry, Matilda, Ray, Bailey and Annie.

Oh, and Aunt Karen and Uncle Paul, too.

OK, I gotta go now. I think there’s a rawhide bone with my name on it somewhere around here.

Morning music ...

This morning while I work, I’m listening to some music by
Eden’s Bridge.

I just love these lyrics from their song I Will Change Your Name:

I will change your name
You shall no longer be called
Wounded, outcast, lonely or afraid

I will change your name
Your new name shall be
Confidence, joyfulness, overcoming one
Faithfulness, friend of God
One who seeks My face.

A new season of paintings

Summer Reflections, 16 x 20 acrylic, work in progress ...

I guess you’ve noticed that I’ve been on a painting hiatus since the work on our house started in earnest back in May. Well, I got to where I was just about to bust, creative-wise, so I’m back to painting again.

I’m going in a super-impressionistic direction with this one. A carefully planned composition, combined with a spontaneous application of paint. It’s not done yet ... I spent some time studying it last night before I hit the hay, fell asleep with a few ideas about how to move toward completion swirling around inside my head, and woke up itching to get started on it again.

I just have a few things I have to do first. I have the painting propped up in the next room where I can see it from afar while I’m doing work for my graphic design job, so on one level my mind is working on the painting all the time.

Oh, and I do have a few more photos I’ll post later on to show what’s going on with the house!