Ben and Bailey

BEN

I don't have time right now to post the WIP to go along with Ben and Bailey so I am just going to go ahead and post their finished portraits for now...and I will post the WIP pics that I did manage to take on the WIP page....(((sigh))) after Christmas!
... (when will we learn to not do renovations in December!)

Bailey

...aren't they just gorgeous animals, and very much loved by their happy owners

Ref photos and WIP's to come!

Please leave a comment if you enjoyed Ben and Bailey!

It's been a while...

OK, I suck at blogging! I knew I would which is why I hesitated for so long to start one.  Even though I look at lots of other peoples blogs - art blogs, quilting blogs, gluten free blogs etc and read with interest what other people are "up to" I just can't wrap my head around the idea that there are people out there who want to know what lil' ole "me" is doing day by day.  Do you care?  If you do please leave me a comment...that is if anyone out there is still interested enough to be following! LOL

I really didn't mean to be gone for so long...I was away for a while, well a couple of weeks actually, after hubby and I caught a miserable flu "bug" that laid us flat for way too long. The start of it was quite interesting from a purely scientific point of view...within hours of each other we both realized we were SICK! 
...and there was only one time and one place that both of us were together and could have been infected simultaneously...but I won't mention which major fast food chain is probably responsible other than to say we won't go there again!

So we slowly got over that, we lost over a full week to doing nothing...but being sick...and then because we had lost so much time and were still functioning on only a couple of cylinders we had so many fall chores and "getting ready for winter" chores that had to be done that I just didn't have time or energy for quite a while.

Late fall is of course harvest time, and thank goodness we had such an extended fall!

Some of the bounty from my garden this year...I canned about 2 bushels of tomatoes in total, some into Roasted Tomato pasta sauce and the rest into jars ready to be added to soups, stews etc. Those 2 little pie pumpkins were from a couple of volunteer plants that seeded themselves into the garden...they went into our Thanksgiving pumpkin pie, that we ate al fresco out on our back deck because the day was so warm.

And then we had to get through Halloween, I added a couple of new guys to my Halloween decor this year, these 2 make me smile every time I look at them and even though we are into the Christmas decorating I still haven't put them away! LOL

I was going through my bird photo uploads, there weren't really a lot of those either, I didn't feel like hiking much and not much of interest visited the yard this fall, at least that I noticed and got pictures of.  We did have a Yellow Bellied Sapsucker spend about a week with us and I was able to get some good shots of it one afternoon while it systematically drilled rows of holes in our crab apple tree

My birthday is in November, and I can only remember one other year when it was as warm as it was this year, a good 75% of the time it is snowing and miserable on my birthday but this year the weather was still warm and sunny...and I still had roses blooming in the garden!

Now how often do you have roses still blooming in the Ontario snow belt in November?

....and I guess the rest of my time in November was taken up with Christmas commissions, and again I was so far behind that I didn't even stop to take pictures of them until the last 2 that I just completed, and even then I only managed to get a few step by step shots of them.  When you're in the flow and working it is hard to remember to stop and take pictures.  Even though all have been delivered to their owners I will upload the photos I did take in a couple of posts yet to come....

See you soon!

Please leave a comment!

Daylily E-Packet

I had a wonderful time this past weekend down in London ON teaching my coloured pencil method to a great group of ladies.  The Trompe L'oeil lily is a fairly simple repetitive piece in that if you grasp the method for one petal, you can complete the rest the same way but at the same time it has the detail and realism that demands your attention and concentration....if you want it to turn out looking like mine!

Everyone did a fantastic job, even those who were absolute beginners to the media and I am looking forward to returning to Krafty Kennedys next spring with a new project. Special thanks to Barb and to Pam for organizing the seminar.

I have added the Daylily to my E-Packet page for anyone who might be interested in giving it a try.

Cheers!
J

Cherry Tango winner!

First thing I have to say Happy Anniversary to my husband, 33 years seems like a long time when you say it, but it truly has gone by in a flash and I wouldn't have wanted to have spent those years with anyone but You.
Love You Forever!

and a big Thank you to everyone who sent greetings along to us, all of your warm wishes made the day even more special for us!

...and now for the winner of Cherry Tango...

Not knowing what we were going to do with our day I thought I would get the business out of the way early so I have actually known who won since this morning.  I had seen "random number generators"  before on other blogs but hadn't really gone to look for one until this morning so I typed it into Google to see what I would get and....I had no idea that so many of them would show up! 

I picked one, plugged in the numbers and  #23 came up as the winner....isn't that a hoot!  now how did it possibly come up with the day of our wedding???
...maybe it had something to do with the random number generator I chose

23
Random numbers generated Sep 23 2011 at 8:53:29 by www.psychicscience.org 
Free educational resources for parapsychology, psychical research & mind magic.

(cut and paste from the page)

maybe they really are psychic and random numbers aren't so random after all? LOL  our day started off with a good laugh over that one!  hmmmm...mind magic???

#23 was a comment by Randy McCord - Congrats Randy!

Thank you to everyone who came to visit and left a comment, I hope that everyone will continue to drop in now and then to see what I am up to, there will be more give aways coming up!

Cheers!

J 

KIDS!!!!!!!

To find the post with the Cherry Tango original art give-away scroll down.
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If you have ever wondered if you are the only one that is going grey and tearing your hair out from the stresses of raising a family in todays world, I think that I have found proof that will reassure you that you are not alone... in fact, as many know it is not only the human race that has to deal with the demands of keeping a family fed, sheltered and out of harms way.

3 short weeks ago I posted this photo on my Nature page of a male Northern Cardinal that I had taken in my back yard. At the time, "Mr C" had been coming steadily to our sunflower feeder for about a week numerous times during the day, stuffing his beak with seeds and flying off again...Cardinals mate for life, but all we saw was the male no lady Cardinal around, so although we had seen females around previously we didn't know if this was an unattached male or if something had happened to his mate.  After another week or so of this behaviour, we again observed a female cardinal at the feeder, sometimes with the male but usually the 2 of them were a tag team of red coming and going all day long.

Hmmmm.....this behaviour made me think that they had a nest somewhere and when "Mrs C" was absent she was sittin' and he was busy carrying seeds back to the nest to feed her. Once the 2 of them showed up together and started stuffing seeds greedily into their beaks and quickly flying off I knew they had a baby cardinal stashed somewhere.

Moving forward a couple more weeks and now we have the whole family coming to the feeder, there isn't just one baby cardinal (which is all they have had in the past) they have 3 babies this year!!! They are noisy and fussy and demanding and they sit in the apple tree and chirp and flap their wings and open their mouths wide for the seeds that Daddy and Mummy Cardinal can hardly split open and feed fast enough!

...so go back up and take a look at the Daddy on August 26th.....isn't he a beauty, so red and proud!
...and here is a shot that I took of the daddy today:

 (((sigh))) Can you believe it!  Poor fellow, his beautiful crest is completely gone and he is going grey, and not just on top of his head! LOL!

and here is a photo of the Momma with the 3 babies in the apple tree, the mother is the one on the left side of the 2 sitting together on the branch. Observe that the babies are as big as her but a lot fatter and fluffier! Momma is looking a little ragged but she hasn't lost her crest like her mate.

and here is a shot of one of babies closeup, no idea whether a he or a she, they all pretty much look the same right now! very pretty colouring they have, almost a peach colour with grey and touches of olive.
I am very pleased to have been able to help this family to get this far, I hope the babies stick around at least for the winter, we have only ever had one pair over the winter in all the years of feeding the birds.

So, there you go, if you ever wondered.......8-)

J

Cherry Tango!

Cherry Tango is finished and photographed, my notes are finished and ready to go!

If you are a Coloured Pencil artist (or would like to try coloured pencils) and would like a free copy of the instructional packet for Cherry Tango then mosey on over to my E-Packets page for more information on how to get your copy.

(I have a few days of family commitments coming up so if I don't get back to you right away be patient please)

Not finished yet!

If you would like to be entered into a draw to *win* this original artwork then all you have to do is leave a comment right here on my blog any time between now and September 23rd, 2011 which just happens to be the 33rd anniversary of my being married to my best friend and the best man in the world . 

On the 23rd I will plug the total number of comments into a random number generator to find the winner.  

Cherry Tango will come signed, dated and matted ready to be framed!

Good Luck, and I look forward to your comments :-)

J



..and to whoever the lucky winner is, I will need an email address to contact you, if your profile doesn't show your contact info just keep checking back here after the 23rd to see if you have won.

you don't have to be a blogger to leave a comment...just click on comments below and a window will pop up for you, check anonymous but please leave your name and remember to come back after the 23rd to see if you have won. 

on the river today....

Remember I mentioned a week or so ago that we had seen a Great White Egret do a fly by when we were out in the canoe?  We both thought that he was just passing through and we would never see it here again as it just isn't a "known location" for such birds. Well, today Sandy was walking back over the Mitchell dam and there was the Egret sitting on a log in the river!  It eventually flew away but I thought well, I just might give the "Orange devil" a break from taunting me and my camera (see my last post) and go see if it was still around and to my delight there he was below the dam having lunch!

Great Egret

  

I ended up sitting there for an hour or so watching him catching little fish after little fish...he must have been getting a full belly by the time I left, but he was still at it although I saw at least 20 little "somethings" going down the hatch. 

Immature Green Heron

There were 2 immature Green Herons also fishing in the same area and Kingfishers bopping around but not landing anywhere convenient for me of course!  I estimate at least 5 pairs of Kingfishers on the river above the dam...still hoping for a few good shots of them this year.

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The "Cherries" are finished but I haven't had time to write up the notes with all of these distracting photography opportunities this week, hope to get at it this evening and will post again soon!

Cheers!

J