Storm Clouds and Toothy Jack O'Lanterns.

Painting these guys was complete and total art therapy.

I'm kind of in love with them both.

There's collaged papers underneath the paint.  If you squint  you can see it in this shot.

I started out with those paper mache' pumpkins that are at every craft store these days.  Then it got covered with torn paper and glue.  Then, paint.

I enjoyed them like that for a few weeks and then got crazy and gave them life. You have to imagine the scene from Frankenstein here where the mad Doctor yells "he's alive, allllllliiiiiiiive!"

Ok maybe not.

But I did get some eyeball practice in.

Then I got distracted by the schennanigans out the window.  These clouds came and I couldn't stop watching them.

How do you even spell schennanigans?  Apparently not like that, but I couldn't find it in dictionary.

The rain came, badly needed.  I could hear the slurp-slurp-slurping of the trees taking a big drink.

I forgot their ears so they couldn't hear anything.  Its just as well.

Tomorrow is October.  Wasn't it just springtime 10 seconds ago?  Let me answer that.  Yes, it was just springtime 10 seconds ago.  But now its not.  And we all need to accept this.

The days are getting shorter and its happening fast.  The real zombies will be here soon, not those fake California/Mexico zombies, I'm talking the real zombies.  So get ready party people, get ready to be scared because this is happening.  Get your Jack O's painted up to scare them away; surely this will help us all to survive the horror.

Getting The Owls Out Of My System.

 Once again I made the 5 a.m. painting on that crazy luscious smooth sensuous wonderful mineral paper, my new 5 a.m. lover. Yes, we are in. love. and getting married straightaway.  (not the owl, the paper!!--as if I would ever marry an owl)

The beginning stages:

I must be working the owls out of my system.  Its taking a while too, but I don't mind, they're so therapeutic.  Especially at 5 a.m.  I must be delirious and unable to think of a different bird, or even a different thing at 5 a.m. before the coffee kicks in.

Meanwhile, yesterday was a positively glorious day, warm in the sun but long sleeves were fine.  Well actually it did get hot in the middle of the day for a New York minute.  The sunshine was everywhere, making everything glisten.  My plants were basking on the window ledges.


This one blooming away...

Absorbing the light...

This guy has flat-out gone crazy lately and quadrupled in size.

This Christmas Cactus is either the white one or the pink one but I can't remember which one.  Only time will tell.  All I have to do is blink and it will be Christmas and I'll know.

And this sweet baby was a studio gift from JAH.  My humongous aloe vera kicked the bucket in the Polar Vortex 2015, froze plum to death.  I've really missed having a aloe plant and now I do.  I'm going to take much better care of this one.
So far so good, its been 3 whole days and he's still happy.  And so am I.

Art First and A Little Pink Owl.

This morning's owl turned out so sweet.  He's almost finished.

Earlier version.

and even earlier...

the beginning of the little pink owl.

And these.

Owl. Paper. Rocks.

I took pictures of some of the 'in progress' stages:

This paper is so smooth and luscious.  I'm in love.  I want to make gazillions of watercolours on it.

This paper is my new love, made from rocks, not trees.  I found it at the Hobby Lobby and now I want to go back and buy more.  I need all they have in stock, all of them.  I'm sorry about everybody else, I need them.

Owls In Progress.

Its all in the eyes.

So I've been practicing.  This guy is sort of looking 'over there'.  So is the one before.

Unfinished, all of these, but this one even more so.  I want to somehow make this guy's eyes pierce your soul with a silver earring.  We'll see how that goes...

This might be the framing choice for these owls.  I'm experimenting.  Once I get Owls out of my system-if that's even possible-I'm moving on to Crows.

Flumadiddle and Trumpery.

Owl practice.  Each one has his own personality.  I am still learning that the subtle shift of a line will drastically alter the personality.

Eyeball practice.  With owls, its all in the eyes.  I have a ways to go with this but the practice has been thoroughly enjoyable.  I could paint these guys all day long 'til the cows come home-or in my case, the ponies.

det...

Next please.

I tried to stay loose with this guy.  Staying loose is tricky, as you can see by this attempt.

More eyeball practice.

Stay loose.  Sometimes it gets away from me.

This one is personable with his little tilt.

There's a certain freedom that comes with writing this blog.  See, nobody reads this.  Nobody.  So I can say anything, what does it matter?  Ok, so my MOM tunes in every so often, along with a few loyal friends-but only because I badger them "have you seen my blog?, I put it on my blog."  They roll their eyes and once they're at work they check out my latest masterpieces, my magic kitten, my ponies, my kefir, my little life.

I don't promote this blog in any way, mostly because I am a dinosaur and I blunder around on this ancient laptop-the first MacBook ever made- until its a post and I'm barely able to do that, let alone promote it.  I've got a kitten climbing around on the keyboard, how am I supposed to promote something when that's going on?  So for now its just me, mom, a few others and maybe one person out there in this vast cyber universe that I don't know.  Hi.

This means I'm free to use my two new words-of-the-day (trumpery and flumadiddle) without being laughed at by hundreds.  I think they both mean sort of the same thing, trumpery is nonsense/useless knick-knacks and flumadiddle is utter nonsense.  I find the one word quite timely and am going to try to use it every single day through Tuesday, November 8th.

Are these even real words or is this a trick?  I mean, I got them on Pinterest so they must be real, right?   And speaking of tricks, here's the very first trick or treat house in America 2016!

Just look at all that flumadiddle.

The trumpery is everywhere.

Isn't it just fabulous??!?  And the tropical Santa that dangles in from the rear-view mirror in JBS's car makes it even more magical.  A beautiful marriage of trumperys.  Yeah, I know, not grammatically correct, but I like it.

So I suppose its official.  Let the holidays begin.