It's pancake weather in Oregon...

I'm not much of a breakfast eater, but there's something about cold, snowy weather that had me craving pancakes yesterday.

Lavender Landscape

We had five inches of snow in southern Oregon yesterday. The weatherman says another storm is on its way...

Beat up by beets...

For more than a week I’ve been painting and drawing beets. It took a lot of attempts (more than four, less than ten!) to complete a painting I was willing to post. All the paintings had problems. These were the best of my efforts. I like the beets in the top painting the best, but prefer the foliage in the bottom rendering. I found painting the dark, dull beets and the complex foliage a challenge, so I welcome your suggestions and observations about them.


Now I’m going to peel them, quarter them, toss them with some olive oil and roast them in the oven. Tomorrow I’ll marinade them in a vinaigrette for a while and add them to the salad which will be part of my husband’s birthday dinner.

I am so done with these beets.

One year to go...

On January 20, 2009, George W. Bush's presidency will be history. Something to truly be thankful for.

More pears...

Graphite pears, nestled in a striped tea towel. Will I ever get tired of drawing and painting pears?

Odd, how the scanner picked up the cream color of the paper in the Handbook journal only in spots. Hmmm, actually the values in the scan look a lot more anemic than the actual drawing. The limitations of technology, I guess, or at least my technology.

A Poem

The Art of Benny Carter
Al Young

There are afternoons in jazz
when a leaf turns and falls
with so much barely noticed purity
that the not so secret meaning of
everything men and women have
tried to do beyond keeping afloat
becomes as clear as ocean air.

from The Oxford Anthology of African American Poetry, 2005

(Thanks for sharing this with me, Anne.)

EDM #153: Something in a plastic wrapper

I spent way too much time today hanging out with potatoes and plastic bags. This challenge was more difficult than I anticipated. I did several versions and finally decided I'd post the "best" painting IF my husband recognized what it was when he came home from work. (That's how low my art standards were by 5 p.m.) He walked in. I asked him what he was looking at. He responded, "potatoes in a plastic bag." Bingo! Here it is.

More potatoes, on their way to becoming soup.

(Pen with watercolor on Bristol)