Thanks And Giving

Roger left for San Diego to visit family on the Wednesday before Thanksgiving. I was invited but the dogs would have to be outside during our Thanksgiving day events and knowing our kids, I'd be out there with them so I opted to stay home. Actually it turned out to be a good decision. They would have been up and over the back yard wall to see the dogs walking in the park.

Our friends Paul and Diane from Quebec. We met them a couple of years ago when we were in Florida and this year we decided to all get together here in California on Lake Havasu. Paul cooked the turkey and Diane sides then decorated a beautiful table for our Thanksgiving dinner.

Thankful for great friends, great food, lots of laughs and good conversation.

We all contributed to the dinner. Paul cooked the turkey and Diane made cranberry sauce. Betty made a frenchstyle green bean casserole while Bob made glazed sweet potatoes and gravy. I made stuffing and mashed potatoes. It was a feast!!

A few days have gone by, Roger returned and had a fantastic time with his daughter and grandson. Nothing like connecting with family. 

I've been having trouble with my Chromebook here and can't seem to get it to load photos from my camera. It's been really windy for a couple of days here and people have been on their computers a lot so I'm hoping that's the issue. I bought extra space from Google to store my pics so it's not that. Hmmm. 

And where did this come from? I've been clearing cache and cookies, deleting photos and adding them to Google Drive. I have never been a computer person, it's so out of my realm, but yikes, I guess I may be becoming one now. 

This is the first draft of the piece I'm working on for a client. It's on a 12' x 12" canvas that I gessoed with gray gesso. It adds strength to the canvas and gives me a neutral background to work off.

Then starts the reworking. The eyes are off so they need to be remeasured and I'm thinking the snout may be a bit too long for the angle of the dogs head. I also blocked in some color. Not necessarily the correct color for the dog bt it gives me a base. Right about now I'm thinking ,"Will this really work.?"

This is when the years of painting, studying, drawing come into play. I forget what I'm doing technically and just rely on my inner instinct and knowledge. 

I then place the eyes. This gives me reference for everything else, mouth, snout, ears. 

Today I'm feeling good about the progress. (Yes, there have been days that the canvas goes in the forget about it pile and I restart the whole process.)  

Today's selection of music in the coach is Hair Nation on Sirius radio. Yes, another not known fact, I LOVE hard rock and hair bands. Roger and I switch it  every other day or so. He likes classic rewind and I go Hair Nation or 80's channel. 

So I'll close for today. Success in figuring out what was going on with my photos and the blog, success in working on the 12' x 12" commission piece and success in having my health and talent to do all these things. Some down days but I think all have those and I'm thankful to even have those days. 

My biggest thanks today is for all of you that follow along on this adventure and keep me going. I'll do an update on CiCiBlue soon. Her sewer bay door is almost completed then we need to get onto our insurance carrier to see if the awnings will be covered. One over the door will be but not sure about the slide toppers over the slide outs. The crazy winds here are doing a number on them. Poor girl is old and needs a spa day for sure so we will see. 

Have a great day!!! Thinking of you all.

Warmly,

Sheila