Monday with Mully- July 12

We brought her into our home, lavished her with love and this is how she rewards us or rather just me. She stole my keys from my purse and waved it in my face. We have to admit that she is a juvenile delinquent. A minute later she took my cell phone out of my purse. My new cell phone that now has dog slobber all over it. Hard to pick a contact with drool covering the names.

She will have to go back to the breeder. We can't have a dog that keeps stealing valuable things. Wait one moment, I have a brilliant idea - whenever I can't find anything, I'll blame it on the dog, Mully must of stolen it. I didn't lose it, it's Mully's fault.

Okay she can stay.

Advanced Rhinoplasty ( a big nose job)

I jumped into colour without thinking about the composition,

checking the position of the features or even making a conscious decision of what colour palette to. If you want to get a true representation, you have to take the time. When I saw the picture on the web, I noticed right away the nose was in the wrong place. That is such a beginner's mistake - noses should be in the middle of the face. Well, in portraits they're usually not.

In Mulligan's picture, if you hold a pencil beside the eye you can see the the nose

lines up past the eye. I couldn't move it over without having to repaint the whole face and I don't have time now. I am going to post it and then gesso it. I am pleased with the shadow. Shadows follow the form and I think I was successful in this. If you can be happy with one thing then the exercise was not a total failure.

This is the picture that I was sent as part of the exchange.

Can you look at this photo and not go Aww. Ironically this nose also gave me grief. It is closer to the eyes than I am used to.

This is the size of the nose, I am familiar with. This is a big nose. I think her nose is bigger than the puppy ( I don't know the dog's name).

I love painting white things because it gives you a chance to really observe the colour. Few things are actually white and you have to pay attention to the hues to get it right. I think it was a more successful portrait. I could keep on working on it and I really want to, it is hard to stop but I think that I will for now. Mr. G. put a an attachment on my bicycle so I can ride with Mulligan and I am going to try it out.

productive procrastination

I have things to do

There is always laundry and someone needs his baseball uniform cleaned because he really wants to play when it is 37 degrees and dripping humidity (definitely not a dry heat).

I have bills to pay.

I have six paintings to finish, one of which I don't even know what it is going to be.

In other words I shouldn't be working on a painting for fun.

I have entered a dog portrait exchange (http://windowstothewords.blogspot.com) and before I started on the exchangee I thought I would try the one I sent.

Why did I think that this would be fun- it is frustrating as usual. I did play around with the colours but now as I am posting it I notice from the picture that the background is wishy washy and the nose is in the wrong place. I can't touch it I have things to do. Put down the brush, go pay bills, go walk the dog. I hope G understands when he has to play in a dirty uniform, I am sure his team mates will be thrilled. After all art comes first - right?

Let the dead bury the dead

I have entered a show at the Mount Royal Cemetery, which is a beautiful place to be buried, in

the middle of the city on the top of a hill. If you have to go why not go in style.

The place is full of famous dead people, such as Mordecai Richler, the governess from the book the "King and I", Canada's last professional hangman and a whole bunch of famous politicians.

I would fit right in.

The condition's of the show are: maximum of 6 pictures which must fit on a board of 4' x 8' and one of them has to be of the cemetery.

Off we went last weekend to take pictures to inspire me. This one is the one I picked.

(Notice my husband has a hole in his elbow)

I told the painting it had to be horizontal and as many times as I repeated it - the painting insisted on being vertical.

Silly painting. (again notice the hole in the elbow very distracting)

I took some pictures of the under painting. I thought it was pretty good until I took a break and came back and then the voices started.

I should never look at my work.

It's been a long time coming

My dear one has pointed out that it has been a long time since I blogged and I guess it is true since the last one showed a lot of snow on the ground and now we have a lot of weeds in our grass. He is proud of the weeds because it shows that we don't use pesticide and we have a lot of variety in our lives. I don't think that variety in your weeds proves that you are exciting, it just means you don't know how to weed or are too lazy to do it.

It is hard to know where to start - a lot has happened and yet nothing has. So lets not start at the very beginning but continue as if I have never missed a week.

July 1 is our moving day. It is estimated that 290,000 homes move in Montreal alone, on this day. It is a tradition from about 300 years ago. The law was passed so farming tenants wouldn't be forced from their homes in the dead of winter and this evolved into moving day being May 1st. Later it was mandated to July 1 so that students wouldn't be have to transfer to a new school in the middle of the school year and so no one can enjoy Canada day. It is a legal holiday so movers charge a lot and you can't even get one unless you book way, way in advance. A lot of animals are abandoned - that part is really shameful. These pictures were taken while I was driving or actually while the car was driving - I was the passenger. That is real bird poop on the car windows. That's just disgusting.

Today was really hot and instead of going to a beach or relaxing in the before mentioned weed infested back yard, we decided to go to the gay village and see the art show there. The street is blocked off to cars and artists show their stuff. I think I am going to try to enter next year. It can be a crap shoot. Today was almost too hot and it could rain so you waste your money renting a tent, but you never know. We spoke to one artist and she said it was worth it. This artist came from Toronto so she had more expenses like eating out. The village has a lot of great restaurants - it is easy to to spend a lot and fun to people watch. The dog on the bottom left is the gorgeous Mulligan. Here is another picture of her - because well I just like pictures of her. I told you it was hot - look how long a dog's tongue can go.

This one I just didn't understand