I hope everyone enjoyed the Super Bowl...not being a football enthusiast I must say it was exciting to see Arizona lose respectfully since everyone thought it was going to be a blowout. I only watched the last quarter since I was working on trying to finish some paintings that were needing my attention. Between painting and running down to check out all the latest commercials I gave my foot a real workout!
I haven't been able to paint as much as I'd like to this week as I went to the Univ. of Chicago to see a specialist about my feet. 25 years ago I had bunion surgery by a doctor from hell. Doc said I was in bad shape and surgery using a bone from a cadaver (or mine which I said no thank you) might give me some hope. Nine months rehabilitation as all the bones in my feet have moved and lost functioning and muscles have shifted...so as you see I have been consumed...also the fall I had after this New Years seems to have given me torn muscle or something , and am having an MRI this week. One thing is if I have to be laid up in bed I can still draw which I suspect I'll be dong a lot of! Just say I prayer that it's not what the doc thinks on the sprain because we had planned to go on a dive trip to the Little Caymens with our son who just got certified. I love diving and it will be hard if I have to just sit on the boat...surgery will be after the trip.

I have a disease of not letting things go. Got sucked into trying to make that duck work. I am a fighter in that "I JUST KNOW I CAN MAKE IT WORK' ...and "I WILL FIND A WAY TO MAKE IT LOOK LIKE A DUCK"...I think the reference I am using is not helping me at all either.

I started trying to finish "JOY" of my granddaughter. Remember the background when I originally did it was not a focus of mine and I just threw in color...then it was brought to my attention that it actually was a focus in the painting...The flowers are actually Phlox..They consist of a grouping of tiny flowers formed in a round shape. I am not a flower person even though I love flowers. I have sold a couple but just not my forte'. So I painted out the other blobs and started new blobs...and yes, I know I need to keep refining them, but I have to be careful because I don't want the flowers to pop...I don't want the back ground to be too busy. I want the focus and brighter colors on her only... I am bothered a bit by the blue bricks..what do you think? maybe I should get lighter and grayer?? Just don't want them to be a focus...I wanted the back ground to be grayish so the warm colors in her popped...comments!!! I'm looking at it now and think that line of the bricks needs to be staighter even though the photo looks like that!? I'm looking at this photo and thinking "maybe I should make this more contemporary and paint out the back ground or darken it so you can barley see the background and have her suspended on just a board floating...as if her joy is what sustains her and put the splashes of color back in!!! I am thinking I could be very tempted with that idea..

I did clear a wall and got out my 73" x 6 yards roll of canvas and plan to cut a very large piece and hang it on the wall and start on the painting that's been in my head. I'll just treat this like I'm working on a mural. It'll be interesting to see where this goes as everytime I see the picture in my head it always comes out with it's own personality.