Tuesday, June 24, 2014

Parade of Roses


Once again it's the glorious month of June, and the roses in my garden are out in full force. Here are a few photos.

The roses here grow up into my styrax obassia.
The tree's common name is fragrant snowbell, because of it heavenly scented hanging flowers. They were in bloom a month ago, when there were also peeping chickadee babies in the birdhouse. See the chickadee bottom right?
A new bush… the ubiquitous red knock-outs



Golden showers with a clematis "Etoille Violette" in the background.




a close-up of of the clematis "Etoile Violette."


The garage is covered with New Dawn roses for one glorious week in June.

They cascade over the front of the garage too.
One New Dawn with roses that came with the yard 20+ years ago.

A few New Dawns with Allium, spires of speedwell and self-seeding white feverfew, with a touch of catmint up front 
One more of the roses on the garage… such a fleeting pleasure. 

Please… don't forget to stop and smell the roses!!! Happy June.


Friday, June 20, 2014

RISD Weekend Watercolor Intensive, Summer 2014


I had a grand time with 13 fabulous students last weekend. They were all ready to spend a weekend learning more about watercolor. After a full day of exercises on Saturday, they painted their own pieces on Sunday. Here is one of the student paintings, a class portrait.

A painting of the class in action done by student, Susan Klare.
 Below are pictures of most of the students, with their work in progress.

Susan and  Whitney came for some artistic mom-daughter together time.
Ben (how did I miss getting a picture of Ben!) drove up from DC for the weekend.
Several of the students enjoyed Waterfires after class on Saturday evening.

Whitney is building up courage to add layers of paint.

Here is an early stage of Susan's class portrait.
Jane worked diligently on color swatches


Cheryl did a lovely scene of rocks, water and flowers.

Birch used resist techniques, and mixed red and green... complementary colors... to get his dark background.
Lowry originally hoped for an absolutely flat sky, but her delicate clouds turned out even better.


Lynn did a painting of her grandparent's farm.
Alessandra took a break from law school to do several paintings.

Anna, our best equipped student, added energy to the weekend.



















The students had a wide range of backgrounds... from total beginners, to people who had some experience with watercolor but wanted to learn more, to experienced artists who were looking to learn another media.

Ben experimented with wet-on-wet and Yupo paper, and Miyoung created textured backgrounds with salt. Anne did a floral still life from a blooming kalanchoe. Lois worked on letterforms with delicate colors that she later planned to layer, overpaint, and even stitch into art pieces.

We had a photographer spend a few hours with us, so pictures of the class will probably show up in future RISD CE catalogs.

Thanks to all of the students for your creativity and enthusiasm! It was an exciting and fun weekend for me!

Thursday, June 19, 2014

Enough of Winter

It's hard to remember winter, now that summer has hit RI. But I was almost afraid to admit that I was in sunny Florida in February, since it was such a tough winter here.

I had a great time with my husband and mom, visiting relatives and friends, watching the sun set over the Gulf, strolling through parks and botanical gardens in 77 degree weather. Now I'm enjoying the 77 degree weather here at home!

Here are a few pictures from the trip.
leaving Mom's in PA... yuck!
We met a pet turtle on the beach... Louie, I think
We saw orchids at Marie Selby Botanical gardens


...and bamboo




... and koi

I had a craving for a strawberry milkshake, and couldn't have been happier to find this great retro ice-cream shop in Bradenton.