Shhh...

I have to admit that I hesitated to publish this post because I'm pretty sure I'm about to give away one of Pennsylvania's best kept secrets. This past weekend we attended a wedding in Gettysburg. We had made reservations at The Shining Dawn Bed and Breakfast in Hanover. Even though it wasn't right in Gettysburg, we thought it was funny that on their website they mention that the breakfasts are vegetarian, but "meat-atarins" can make special arrangements if they really want to have that bacon with breakfast. Now, there were other reasons too- the place looked really beautiful, but that comment was such a shoe-on-the-other-foot kind of thing that we couldn't resist booking a room. We're usually the ones making special meal arrangements. So anyhow, we arrived late Friday evening and were met at the door by the owners Helen and Bruce. They helped us with our things and gave us a little tour of the main level and then left us to enjoy the house (they live in an apartment on the top floor). Within a few minutes of walking in the door, I had left any stress behind and was completely in love with this place. Some people have talent for sports, some for art, Helen and Bruce are masters of calm.
Dan's parents arrived shorty after we did and had the same reaction. So here is a little tour for you...
Here is the foyer that took my breath away every time I entered. There was a meditation room complete with pillows and Tibetan singing bowls, a beautiful living room where we all spent lots of time reading the books from the zen-themed gift shop (where we later added significantly to our bill),

and my favorite place, the sun room.



The wedding was beautiful and Gettysburg was only a short drive away.

Dan's uncle had brought some presents for Dan that he'd found at a garage sale...



On Sunday morning I got up at 6, used the meditation room and then did some journaling in the sun room, enjoying the fountain, the tea station,

and the gorgeous stained glass windows that changed colors as the sun came up. There was a fridge in the sun room stocked with sodas (we aren't soda drinkers, but we still thought it was pretty cool) and a basket of complimentary snacks.

I spent the rest of the morning there until breakfast. And speaking of breakfast. Poached pears, pineapple parfait, German apple pancakes... need I say more?


The town of Hanover had some fun little shops, too. There was the Clark's outlet, a great bead shop, a coffee shop/tanning salon called The Bakery...odd combination, cute name, and a baker that seemed to enjoy giving out free samples! We were NEVER hungry on this trip. Then Dan spotted the penguins in the gift shop window. I could tell from across the street they'd be coming home with us. Here is a picture of the same shop from a book on Hanover history that we found in the reading room.


So we headed home on Sunday completely relaxed and loaded down with boxes of shoes, some medieval armor, and a bag of penguins. What more can you ask of a weekend road trip?

Happy Holidays!

The cards are mailed out, the shopping is done and Mother Nature has provided a beautiful winter wonderland in my back yard. Dan and I went for a quick walk when I got home from work on the 22nd to see all the ice on the trees. I love living up in the hills. It was raining on my way home, but I knew when I hit a certain elevation (about 2 miles from home) it would be snowing. Now on the 24th a light dusting of snow has covered all the ice on the trees.


Most of the presents are wrapped too, but we had a little problem this year. We did some rearranging of the livingroom furniture which meant the tree had to go in a place where we cannot barricade it from the animals. This is a problem because the cats like to eat the ribbons and the dog likes to unwrap and eat the presents. So I bought a little tree at Michaels and put it on a table in the studio. We've been able, so far, to keep everything safe in there. The cats can still get in there if they try hard enough, but they've been more interested in all the empty boxes lying around the house from Amazon deliveries.


I've done a few paintings, but I have to wait till after Christmas to post them!
I hope everyone has a safe and happy holiday!

2010 Christmas Card

For the past several years I've been making the Christmas card that we send out to friends and family. Every year I do it a bit differently and every year, I get the a few people that ask "how did you do this?". So, here you go. The making of the 2010 Christmas Card....
Step one is coming up with an idea. This is the worst- absolute WORST- part of the process for me. Every year I say I'm going to do this in August and every year I'm starting to panic around Thanksgiving. It usually only takes me a few days to a week to decide what I want to do, but it's painful. Since 2001 I have been featuring the pets in the card so I've tried to stick with that tradition which makes it harder to keep things new. There are only so many different ways to depict the naughtiness of these critters at Christmas time. This year, I decided to base the design on the Demotivational posters from Despair.com. LOVE these. I wasn't sure how many people were familiar with these posters, but once I sketched out this idea, I had to run with it.
The next step is sketching. I do several rough sketches of my idea and then decide on one or two for reference shots. My models are very cooperative when there is food involved, so Dan and I had a pretty good time with this photo shoot.


After gathering photo reference, I start refining the sketch. In this case, I actually pieced together a sketch in Photoshop using the actual images I'd collected. Then I draw it out in the size I will be using for the final piece.


Here, Engine has ventured into the room and peace in the studio will be short lived. He's pretending he's more interested in the birds, but I know I have a matter of minutes, (seconds, maybe) before the drawing process becomes severely impeded.


Here I have created a sketch I am happy with and I'm transferring it to a piece of illustration board. I don't want to draw it again, so I just color the back with graphite and trace it onto the board. I hope it doesn't move at this stage. As you can see, this is not easy. Still not as hard as coming up with the idea in the first place, though.



The beginning of the final piece. It's hard to see the lines after the transfer so I go over everything one more time with pencil before starting the painting process.




After the pencil lines are drawn in, I paint an outline around everything.


Then we do a little color check...


and start painting. This is my favorite part.



When I'm happy with the finished painting, I scan it and bring it into Photoshop for some final touch-ups. The lights are airbrushed to create a glow and other details are adjusted.


I add the background and the text and save it as a JPEG file on a thumb drive. I bring it over to the local drugstore, print out 4x6 satin finish photos that are then glued onto blank cards, and there you have it! And I'm finished early this year! I'm REALLY happy with this year's design and I'm looking forward to having a little extra time before Christmas to do some more painting that doesn't revolve around a deadline. I will have prints available on my Etsy shop if you are interested!

November

November 2010 is having trouble deciding what kind of autumn it wants to portray. We had some snow last week and some frost early this morning, but Dan and I had lunch on the front porch in shorts and t-shirts this afternoon. I have no complaints. I love both types of weather. And I certainly can't criticize November- I can't seem to sit down and focus on one kind of art. I really want to do more painting, but last week I was spending all my time in the studio making jewelry. It's less scary than painting (for me). And certainly less scary than posting my paintings on the net. But I finally started working on this:


It's a house I saw on a walk Dan and I took last November. I've been thinking about painting it for a while. I have a ways to go, but I'm happy that I actually sat down and picked up a brush today. Bandit seemed very content to spend his morning under my table keeping my slippers warm.
And if November could settle down and start acting like late autumn, perhaps I could start spending more time in the studio.

Happy New Year!

So I guess it's finally over. I don't know how summer disappears so fast. To me, tonight is like a second New Year's Eve. Except I don't have the next day off, it's just the beginning of a new year. All my handmade calendars start in September- I start teaching again tomorrow. I'm excited, but it's never easy to let go of summer. I'm not going to bother saying much more about that since I know that no one wants to hear the whinings of someone who has just finished up a two month long vacation. So I'll leave you with the image above which I hope to have up for sale in print form in my Etsy shop soon, as well as a few images from summer 2010...


Dan and I got really into hunting for old furniture to paint for the bedroom. More posts on that soon (I think we went a little overboard), but these are a few treasures we brought back from the Madison-Bouckville weekend. We ended up finding more goodies at sales along the way than at the actual antique show. You can see what the weather was like through the glass door. It did that ALL DAY. It was a great day to come home, put on sweatshirts and make homemade granola while drinking hot tea!


And also, I have completely lost control of my vegetable garden. Again. But I grew red peppers this year which I am very proud of. Usually the peppers rot before they turn red. I used them tonight to make this recipe which was delicious! BUT, instead of Mancini fried peppers, I used my own peppers fried in a little canola oil with salt and pepper.


Hope you all have a wonderful 2010-2011 school year!