Snow days

So it appears Phil's prediction was only true for part of the country.  Here in western Montana, we have hardly any snow on the ground and it has been warm enough for wimps like me to run outside.  My family in New England, however, will be digging out of a snowstorm for days.  The pictures they have been posting on facebook are awesome!  Remember when we were kids and winter had so much snow you could actually tunnel through it and build forts and stuff?  It's like that.  Cool.  Poodle would love it.

But back to Montana.  I'm hoping it stays just warm and sunny enough to run outside again tomorrow.  Gotta let my knees know who's boss.  Oh, and I restarted my 21 days today.  I hardly ate any chocolate at the thingy last night, but I did have two glasses of bubbly.  So of course I went directly from that event to the grocery store, where I bought some other chocolate, and put myself in a food coma when I got home.  I really need these next 21 days.  I'm going to be a superhero by the end of the month.

Here was my door prize when it was all dressed up.  I left the event early - I hope they remembered to give it away.

And here is a photo to show that there is a tool for every job:

That was my lunch yesterday.  No microwave at work so thank goodness for the heat gun from our shrink wrapper.

Hmm.  What else.  I've got another poodle dog painting.  I think I need to name it Stretch:

Heh heh.  And here's a sneak peek at what I've been doing when I'm not at work or reading or painting:

I have so much of this stuff hanging around at home so I've decided to open a cvbead Etsy store.  It's a ton of work, taking a zillion pictures and then trying to remember what all the stones are and writing up descriptions.  Like the necklace above - I know what the blue stones are (blue lace agate), and I think I know what the yellow ones are (butterscotch agate?) but I'm not positive.  There is nothing in my store yet - I want to have a handful of crap ready to go before I list anything.  Next week, hopefully.

Now back to work.  Derek is insisting I take down the Christmas ornaments today.  Poo.

Oh hey - P.S.  I sold GIRL POWER yesterday, and here's the funny part.  I told the customer that this is my second GIRL POWER painting and that the first one went home with a family from New Zealand.  Her eyes bugged out and she said, "But I'm taking THIS one to New Zealand!"  HAHAHAHAHA!  Internationally collected, with the same painting going to the same country TWICE!  Hope it's not going to the same girl....  I've got a little landscape in Australia, and three of my Hello Kitty flowers went to another foreign country.  Can't remember which one.  Something Asian, I think.  I am creeping out into the world.  Look out.  World domination is next on my list.

Okay, now to take down the ornaments.

Show Us a Little Love

A new show opened down the street at the Museum today.  It's this one:

The premise of the show is to submit pieces that represent something you love, and each piece has a description with it explaining what it is you love and why.  I have four pieces down there - Fire Flowers (I love Windex), Heart of Gold (the first painting I did after Nonna died), I Fly (the word painting that says WHEN I RUN I FLY) and a new one called Blue Skies:

That's my girl.  Speaking of my girl, here she is from the other day, getting comfy and playing with a new toy:

She doesn't really fit on there, but she loves it.

We ran three miles outside yesterday.  Yes, outside, in February, in Montana.  It was quite glorious, although I actually ran only about 2.25 of those miles, and poodle was barely trotting.  Momma was slow.  And Momma's knees weren't very happy about the whole idea.  We got back home, ate some junk for dinner, read a book, then worked on four paintings.  Here's one, so far:

Hey now, don't judge.  It took an artistic eye, a light hand and three different shades of yellow to make this mess.  I am awesome.

As a final note today, here are some poodle parts:

She's a keeper.

LMAO yeah yeah whatever

I'm not a fan of the deterioration of the English language thanks to text messaging and social media.  I don't LOL.  I will never be ROFL.  I've never LMAO, or LMBO (for those more sensitive souls) or even LMFAO.  And I don't plan to.  Ever.  I will admit to a couple of OMGs, but that's as far as I go.  With the one major exception of this.

I almost didn't post this because I will be embarrassed if my mom calls to ask what this means (mom - it's a bad word).  But sometimes a girl just needs to say WTF.  And to take the sting out, I'm saying it in party colors.  So there.

I finished the triptych.  Are you tired of me talking about it yet?  We've picked moulding and hopefully by the end of next week it will all be on its way to Boston.  Then I will post pictures.  The middle panel took forever.  There was math involved.  And a wee tiny paintbrush.  How unlike me.

I blew my second round of the 21 Day Sugar Detox so I will be hitting the reset button on Saturday the 9th.  I figure I will wait until after the champagne and chocolate event on Friday, rather than beating myself up when I blow it again.  Chocolate truly is one of my favorite food groups, but I know after Friday I can give it up again for 21 days.  Three short weeks.  Then February will be over and it will practically be summer.  Shoot, which means I need to start running.  Once a month isn't going to cut it.  My marathon relay teammates will be horrified if I show up in May all flabby and out of shape (good thing they can't see me right now).

Saved!

Yes, that's right, I saved it.  Fire Flowers, that is.  Giving it a Windex soak and a good scrubbing was probably not the best way to fix it, but hey - it worked!

Phil has predicted an early spring, and so far his prediction has come true.  The high today is supposed to be 44 degrees, but the sun is out and I could probably take the roof off the jeep and drive around quite comfortably.  Most of the snow here in town has melted.  Spring is here, at least for today, and poodle can't figure out why nobody is taking her to play ball.

Here's a wee bit of bubbly in anticipation of Valentine's Day.

The Museum is hosting a fundraiser for a non-profit group next Friday called "Champagne, Chocolate and You."  I think I'll donate this painting as a door prize.  Minus the poodle-face, of course.  I might have to take a one day break in my second round of the 21 Day Sugar Detox, which I started yesterday.  It will be hard to spend a couple of hours in a room full of champagne and chocolate - those are my two favorite food groups!

Darn it!

I made a boo boo.  I had a little 7" x 5" canvas that I painted a lovely red with some swirly copper bits.  It was going to have a word on it, but I accidentally ended up with too much texture.  Which was cool.  I added a couple spots of teal, and was going to name it Fire Flowers.  The first layer of varnish went on and this is how it looked:

See all that chunky goodness?  It was my ultimate downfall.  I added the second coat of varnish and went to do something else.  Came back later and the varnish was all puddled up in between the chunkiness.  It was horrible.  You know how thick white glue looks when it is the type of glue that doesn't dry clear?  Yeah.  Instant learning experience.  The bottle of varnish says it is removable but you have to call the manufacturer to find out how.  Something to do with ammonia.  So I got out my trusty Windex and soaked the whole thing.  I ended up at the kitchen sink for about ten minutes with the Windex, a scrubby sponge and running water.  I may have salvaged it, but I'm still waiting for the wooden stretchers to dry.  It may be warped.  Darn it.

*** We interrupt this program to note that Derek is upstairs cutting a bunch of moulding and it smells like cake.  A boxed cake mix.  Weirdness.  ***

Here is the piece I was afraid of ruining - the one with the cool background.

I added this one to my Etsy store today.  Maybe it will sell.

That is all.  Except for the sleepy poodle.

Ducks, in a row

Derek has been in Vegas since Sunday for a tradeshow.  He taught a class on how to stack mouldings in an interesting and most clever way (which, I must say, we are famous for) and this morning he is part of a breakfast panel.  I told him to make sure he gets me a job while he is there.  I've already got a possible lead on one thing, but it can't hurt to be prepared.  Get some ducks lined up.  Well, he may have come through.  Possibly.  I'm not sure.  He says he's not kidding, but we'll see.  Hmm.  This may be the year....

Speaking of none of that, I meant to tell you yesterday about the dinner I have been cooking lately.  As in four times in the last week.  You peel four carrots and chop chop chop them into matchsticks.  Throw those in a pan with some olive oil.  Flip them around, then add some salt and freshly cracked pepper.  Cook.  Add in a sliced giant shallot.  Cook some more.  While this is happening, defrost one of those lovely pieces of tilapia from the frozen section at Costco.  Take carrots/shallot out of the pan and add the tilapia.  Sear on both sides.  Add a little extra olive oil if it looks like your smoke detector is about to go off.  Put a lid on the pan for a minute or so.  Add some butter (organic, pastured butter if you've got it - mmmmmm) and dump the carrots/shallot back on top.  Put a lid on it again for a minute.  Arrange gracefully on a plate.  Admire your own genius.  Open your flip-top head and toss it all in.  Yum.  I could eat this every day.  Which of course explains why I had chocolate and potato chips for dinner last night instead.  Oops.

Getting back to the ducks for a minute, I painted another rooster.  I know, I know, but they're both fowl, right?

The background on this one is a bit startling.  When I was painting it, I opened the lid of that metallic green paint - it comes in a jar - and I had a senior moment.  The lid went flying and, as is always the case with me, it landed butter-side down on the carpet.  Once again I give thanks and praise to Windex.  I use that stuff more on the carpet than I do on my windows.

Oh, and here is the fourth of my mini Midnight Pears:

Wee.  I finally finished a word painting last night that I started a couple weeks ago.  No pictures yet - that'll be tomorrow.  I've got another one in the works but I'm a bit afraid to paint the words because I love love love the way the background came out, and I don't want to ruin it.  HA!  One of these days I need to finish the one I was so excited about back in July....

I'm designing myself a new business card.  Here's the draft:

I need to stop looking at it - see if I still like it in a couple of days.  Feedback?  Bring it.  Gracias.

Breaking news ... or not

I know it's been a while since I've posted anything, but in my defense there has been no breaking news.  Unless you count the beautiful pottery bowl I broke on Sunday.  *sigh*  It was my fave.  I'm going to keep using it as long as I can - a big piece broke off the lip but the bowl itself is still good.  With my luck I will be sitting on the couch one night, with something steaming hot in the bowl on my lap, and it will crack into a million pieces.  That'll be awesome.

Also in my defense, I am still totally without internet service at home.  I wait patiently.

Last night I picked up a sketch book leaning against the ottoman that is currently acting as my coffee table and sat down to draw a weird idea.  I'm sitting with the book on my lap, pencil in hand, and something catches my eye.  I don't know if I have mentioned it in the past, but I had a friend in high school named April, and April's mother saw negative people.  She saw people who weren't really there.  I, however, see negative spiders.  I will see something moving on the floor out of the corner of my eye, but when I whip my head around - nothing is there.  Last night it was a little different story.  A REAL LIVE spider was sitting in my lap with the sketch book.  Yeah, I did some crazy cool circus tricks trying to levitate away from that sucker.  Poor Roxie was startled out of a dead sleep when I shrieked.  That spider was big.  So big, I could practically see it giving me the finger as it ran under the couch.  Or maybe it was Charles - he's still around.  Anyway, my heart was pounding like nobody's business.  I'm getting a little adrenaline rush right now just thinking about it.  Creepy gross.  Gotta change the subject.

No new pictures today - maybe tomorrow.  I've been working on resurrecting cvbead and it has been incredibly time consuming.  More on that later.  Right now I've got to get back to the IRS website and finish filling out my SS-4....