I'd paint more but have this national conference to run next week.

Ugh! What a time to turn 50 and start to explore new ground!

Work has been mixed-blessing slow but I have this conference coming up next week which has been keeping me busy. Still, in the early morning hours after David heads to work, I managed to squeeze in an hour and try a couple of “lessons” from these books I have managed to accumulate over the recent past. A couple are from the Goodwill and two were from a visit to David's home country, England, and reminded me I was dishonest here in my post the other day and apologize sincerely.

You see, I actually did try my hand at painting as an adult once. David and I were visiting his family in Reading, England (BERKS), and spending time with his lovely sister Sally and her family. I managed to let slip that I had always wanted to learn to paint. Coincidentally, her daughter, Kym, was studying art, so we all went to Kew Gardens, took tons of photos, and came back and painted.

I sucked, I mean, REALLY REALLY BAD, but enjoyed the collaborative atmosphere of being huddled around her dining room table with watercolor paints, brushes, cans of water and paper strewn about. Sally is an amazing artist, paints fabulous huge murals and such, and if I could paint just 1/10th as well as her… After that joyous day, we went shopping in town and I picked up a starter paint kit and a few books on watercolor painting. Unfortunately, as often happens when I go on one of these creative tangents, when I got home, I unpacked this stuff, stowed it up in a closet and forgot about it. For like five years. Seriously... It's been five years since that first fledgeling attempt at painting. So, can you forgive my lapse in memory?

In the first photo above this post, you can see the books I've accumulated and have been working from. The second is something I did from one of the books that uses watercolor pencils. It was a lovely scene, and kind of sweet. I'm showing this one because the trial paintings I did using the traditional watercolors are ugly looking. I think I am using way too much water and paint and they look like globs of ugly color.