Thursday-6pm

Pictures from painting night last night.

Here's Dagan's finished red and black Yin Yang picture.

Leah is still working on her four. Dagan and Leah did their first projects on small canvases--10" X 10" I think. We hang our unfinished pictures on little hooks in their bedroom inbetween the times we paint to get them out of the way. The symbols were pretty dark to see on black, so she is working at doing a lighter layer on the symbols (like on the green one). This isn't a good angle because you can actually see a couple others better, too, than it shows in this photo. I'll have to try for a better shot next time--sorry, Leah! I never know what they look like until I get home.

Dagan started on an abstract. Love the wild colors! He is not sure how to proceed. He can experiment and get wild and crazy--who cares! He and I are just using the inexpensive boards and if we don't like what we get as we are learning, we can always start over...

...which is exactly what I did yesterday. Clean slate! Decided to put on a new coat of darker grey undercoating over the whole thing.

I am just learning and I had started out with too light of an undercoating and used too dark and thick of paint too soon. I hadn't ordered the gesso or retarder until after we had started and that has made quite a difference for me in the scumbling and blending technique. I kind of lost control of my clouds--hehe! So, I am starting over on my dark, stormy sky. This next time I will plan more where the lighter clouds should be--sketch them in--and start there, instead of just starting in one corner and trying to work my way across--hehe!

Regardless, I am having a lot of fun learning this new medium and I was just tickled with the whole being able to start over thing!! I have been dabbling with watercolors for several years and starting over on the same sheet of paper just isn't the case with watercolors. (I have always been too heavy handed with the watercolor paints, too!) I want to try to start again with lighter thinner paint, using the gesso and retarder, and blend-blend-blend till I get the hang of it better. Who knows how many times I might start over--but I am learning every week and having a great time!

I finished season one of The Sopranos and Six Feet Under this week. Tony Soprano found out who tried to whack him, but wasn't able to exact his revenge yet. The funeral home family life has gotten significantly stranger within the one season?? Tonight--I am really looking forward to starting season two of Deadwood, my favorite of these three, so off I go! (The Sopranos would be my second favorite, so far.) Stay cool!