Settled in the Maritimes of Canada, surrounded by the forest and Acadian Mountain Chain, I live a simple life of gratitude. This blog is a journal of my art, food, furkids, garden, home, my life and my thoughts. Thanks for reading!
Welcome to Thursday's Art Date, today our theme is Evening. Tweety Bird and Sylvester are enjoying a cozy evening by the fire as the spring peepers serenade them through the open window.
Spring peepers are the very first sign of spring in my opinion. When I hear them chirping away in the swamp nearby in the evening, I know spring has sprung!
I have an interesting parallel for the Evening theme. I chose the word "evening" from a movie and from a song. Firstly I love Jim Carey! Especially his dramatic work. In the movie The Truman Show, one of his catch phrases is "Good morning! Oh, in case I don't see you, good afternoon, good evening and goodnight!" This movie is so well done and very moving! (ink/graphite drawing)
On with the "Evening" theme! One of my favourite songs from the 80's is Bryan Adams' "Summer of '69". One of the lyrics in the song is "Spent my evenin's down at the drive-in...and that's when I met you, yeah!"...so I thought I'd draw a drive-in scene as two young lovers watched Jim Carey's movie The Mask.
Bryan Adams...a genuine Canadian rocker! 😊 Here he is in charcoals from his 1984 album release. I had such a crush on him 30-ish years ago! My how time flies!!
Dinners have been of the Italian cuisine lately...I'm hooked on that way of cooking!!! Above I have Spaghetti, 4-cheese pizza and lemon curd cheesecake.
I had a gallon of 2% milk that needed to be used so I made Ricotta cheese with it. Then I used it for my "Ricotta Night"! Shells stuffed with Ricotta and spinach, Ricotta bread and "Castagnoles" - sweet dough balls made with Ricotta. Loved Ricotta night!
I'm currently going through a bit of a transformation! I've been working very deeply on healing, self-care and self-love. It's a challenge. One of the things I do for self-care is be out in nature. I found a 6km hiking trail and I hiked it yesterday with Charlie my husky-gal...it was raining, but we didn't care. It was therapeutic!
Geese formation: more signs of spring! I found a small (9-page) book called The 7 Day Mental Diet. (I'll share the PDF here). It challenges you not to be negative for 7 days...of course, we all have negative thoughts, but the exercise is not to vocalize them or allow them to attach themselves to your thinking process. It's supposed to recondition your thought processes to more positive ones. When you notice a negative thought popping up, just notice it...observe it and replace it with a positive thought. This goes for complaining and judging as well. It's very hard to do! I had to restart a bunch of times! It's a little unsettling how many negative thoughts, ideas and patterns just pop right into my head and I run with them without thinking. Anyone else up for that challenge?
I'm linking up with these wonderful bloggers today, or at least trying (!!), please visit them for some really interesting posts! And why not join in on the link parties? You can meet some really nice people!! 😊
That's all for now folks! Please check out the link gadget below to see more "Evening" artwork!
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April 15th: Next Thursday's theme is Coils. Click on the link for ideas and inspiration! Remember it's all about creating. You can showcase your paintings, drawings, photography, sculpting, baking, poetry...whatever you like! 🎨
Thursday Art Date With Rain. Click on the link for a description of the art date as well as a list of upcoming themes.
Don't forget to add the URL link to your post (not your blog) to the link gadget below to share your wonderful creations! Please revisit to make sure you don't miss those who join in a little late! Also, if anyone adds a link that has nothing to do with the art date theme, it will be removed! The link gadget expires Friday at midnight (EST).
Welcome to Thursday's Art Date, today our theme is Doorways and Alleys. Sorry I haven't been around lately...my life is very slowly starting to balance out so I will catch up with you this weekend! I will also answer blog comments this weekend too if you asked me a question! (And Cathy I can't wait to check out your Looney Tunes this month!) 😊
I recently watched a tv movie version of Jack the Ripper. 1840's London is a great muse for this theme! Here is Bugs Bunny playing the roll of a Whitechapel-district "prossie". Bugs is sweet-talking someone in that alley...I hope it's not Jack the Ripper! 😲
The version of the story I watched was starring Michael Caine (here he is in charcoals). This was by far the BEST version of the story I've ever seen. If you can find it, it's worth the 3 hours. I love Michael Caine!
Here is the trailer - warning - it's realistic and creepy...so be forewarned!
If you're a Michael Caine fan and want a chuckle, these two comedians do impressive impersonations of him! (it's less than 2 minutes and really funny! Here's the link.)
A favourite movie of mine starring Michael Caine is The Prestige, set in the 19th century, also starring Hugh Jackman, Christian Bale and Scarlett Johanssen with a cameo by David Bowie. It's about magicians, illusion, rivalry and revenge. Oh it's good, I just watched it last night. It'll have you scratching your head and guessing until the very end! Here's the trailer.
I re-watched Hitchcock's Psycho recently and one of the scariest moments for me wasn't the actual shower scene...it was the few moments as the killer enters the doorway of the bathroom and you can see his/her shadow behind the shower curtain! I did this one of Janet Leigh in ink and graphite. Did you know that Jamie Lee Curtis is the daughter of Janet Leigh and Tony Curtis? Lots of talent in that family! This was a quick doodle, as was this one:
Anthony Perkins was excellent in this. Did you know that he did Psycho 2, Psycho 3 and Psycho 4 as well? They were all pretty good, but nothing like the first one!
Here's the official trailer of Hitchcock's masterpiece! Still gives me the chills when I watch it!
I spent some time this week canning salsa, pizza sauce and spaghetti sauce.
Some meals this week were baked Alfredo spaghetti with asparagus and garlic bread; and all-dressed pizza.
Marlene is doing much better, though it seems she has permanently lost her appetite! 😞 I still have to force-feed her twice a day with blended kidney formula food. It's challenging, she spits it out...otherwise, she seems almost back to normal.
Jack getting a tummy rub. It's extra special when Jack lies on his back. When we adopted him in 2015, he was fear-aggressive and it took us years to show him he could trust us without him trying to bite us. He still growls at me when I rub his tummy, but I know he won't bite me and he never does because as soon as I stop rubbing his tummy, he stops growling and looks at me as though to say "why did you stop???". He's my little angel! 😇
The squirrels have finally found the bird feeder area!
I guess this is what's considered a short post for me! That's all for now folks! Please check out the link gadget below to see more "Doorways and Alleys" artwork!
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April 8th: Next Thursday's theme is Evening. Click on the link for ideas and inspiration! Remember it's all about creating. You can showcase your paintings, drawings, photography, sculpting, baking, poetry...whatever you like! 🎨
Thursday Art Date With Rain. Click on the link for a description of the art date as well as a list of upcoming themes.
Don't forget to add the URL link to your post (not your blog) to the link gadget below to share your wonderful creations! Please revisit to make sure you don't miss those who join in a little late! Also, if anyone adds a link that has nothing to do with the art date theme, it will be removed! The link gadget expires Friday at midnight (EST).
Welcome to Thursday's Art Date, today our theme is Motion and Movement. I've been on the move like crazy lately...there is just so much to do now that winter seems to be over! Here is the Roadrunner (in ink and graphite) doing what he does best as the song goes... 🎶 "...'cause runnin' down the road's his idea of havin' fun! (beep beep!)" 🎶 😊
Here is a video titled "Wile E. Coyote's Best Moments for your viewing pleasure!
Movement...well, I tried a self-portrait with charcoals. My reference photo was taken last summer as the wind blew my hair. I thought I'd try to capture that motion!
And that's really all I had time for! It feels weird that I only did two pieces for this theme!!! Let's check out some food I made in the last week! By the way friends, let me know which cuisines you love and what your favourite dishes are - I love food inspiration! 😊
Pizza poutine: I'm a poutine-nut. I will try anything with fries, some kind of sauce and melted cheese. I'm trying to be creative with poutines lately. This was really delicious! On top of the fries, I layered 4 cheeses (Mozz, Parm, Cheddar, Goat), then poured hot homemade pizza sauce on top with a sprinkle of oregano. MMMM!
Cheese fondue poutine: Well, this one was a stretch lol...but it worked! We usually have some kind of cheese fondue each month, but this time I poured my Smoked Cheddar and Apple Cider Fondue over the fries and topped it with apples and the cubed bread. The bread was overkill, but the apples worked so well. Another poutine triumph!
Have you ever had/made a stromboli? It's basically a pizza rolled up and baked. You take your favourite pizza dough, roll it out into a rectangle, add your toppings, then roll it up and bake it at 400 F for about 20 minutes or so. It's so good. I brushed garlic butter on the dough and added Goat cheese, Mozzarella and fresh tomatoes with a little basil and oregano. Deliziosa! 😊
I made two so we'd have leftovers. The first night we had it with a spinach salad and some pasta with Balsamic vinegar/olive oil and Parm drizzled on top with fresh tomatoes.
The second night we had it with fries.
Comfort meal: Potatoes gratin with spinach salad.
Spaghetti with garlic bread!
I went cake-baking-crazy one day! I made a lemon sponge cake with lemon buttercream frosting. And I had more of those nice strawberries, so I made another strawberry shortcake.
Now let's digest with some pet photos! :) Here's the apple of my eye...Jack. He was giving me his opinion about food as I snapped this photo! 😊
Oscar and Charlie - best friends. 😊
That's all for now folks! Please check out the link gadget below to see more "Motion and Movement" artwork!
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April 1st (NO foolin'!!!): Next Thursday's theme is Doorways and Alleys. Click on the link for ideas and inspiration! Remember it's all about creating. You can showcase your paintings, drawings, photography, sculpting, baking, poetry...whatever you like! 🎨
Thursday Art Date With Rain. Click on the link for a description of the art date as well as a list of upcoming themes.
Don't forget to add the URL link to your post (not your blog) to the link gadget below to share your wonderful creations! Please revisit to make sure you don't miss those who join in a little late! Also, if anyone adds a link that has nothing to do with the art date theme, it will be removed! The link gadget expires Friday at midnight (EST).
Welcome to Thursday's Art Date, today our theme is Diagonal. Tweety Bird put on his snazziest rain gear to go for a walk in the rain. 😊 His plaid pattern is filled with diagonal lines, as is the rain falling!
Here is my charcoal Sylvester Stallone from the movie Copland. Have you seen it? It's spectacular. Sly gained a lot of weight for this role by "eating a steady diet of giant pancakes served at a local pancake house." (IMDB) He played a bit of a deadbeat sheriff who eventually has to confront the mob. It's set in the 1970's and has such a great plot. It's also starring Robert De Niro, Harvey Keitel, Robert Patrick and Michael Rapaport.
Ray Liotta is also in Copland. I love this guy...he's an amazing actor. Did you know that he cries in most of his movies? I don't know if this is trivia or not, but I've noticed it! He's good at it too! 😊 But boy, was he hard to draw!!! The reason I chose to draw these two portraits this week is because there is a scene in the movie where Ray's character talks about the "Diagonal Rule" of perpetual motion for chasing criminals in cars..."Red light, don't fight, make a right." This always stuck with me!
I highly recommend this movie if you like drama thrillers with suspense. Above is the official trailer.
On the food front, I don't have much to share this week, but there will be plenty for next week's post!! I've been eating a lot of leftovers and salads...and lots of Blueberry Muffins too!
I have given up (for now) on my bird cam because it's eating up batteries SO FAST...it only lasts a week. Each trail cam takes 8 batteries, so it's not quite in the budget now! Here is a photo of some Evening Grosbeaks at the feeder barrel. They LOVE sunflower seeds!
And here is a neat shot of them in the Birch trees!
I brought Marlene back to the vet last week...she has advanced kidney failure. 😢 There is not much to do for her except keep her on the renal diet and give her probiotics. She is responding well and I'm enjoying every moment. It's not too grim...at least I don't think so. My late pug Winston was diagnosed with kidney failure back in 2004 and I was told he had about 3 weeks to live. I changed his diet and gave him probiotics and he lived until 2011, so my chin is up for Marlene!
On the way home, I stopped by one of the local farms to take photos of the deer. They are so pretty...this is a cabbage farm and they are cleaning it up for the farmers!
I never see any bucks! Deer always remind me a bit of Marlene, I think she has deer ears! 😊
That's all for now folks! Please check out the link gadget below to see more "Diagonal" artwork!
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Jack, cleaning Oscar's ears!
March 25th: Next Thursday's theme is Motion and Movement. Click on the link for ideas and inspiration! Remember it's all about creating. You can showcase your paintings, drawings, photography, sculpting, baking, poetry...whatever you like! 🎨
Thursday Art Date With Rain. Click on the link for a description of the art date as well as a list of upcoming themes.
Don't forget to add the URL link to your post (not your blog) to the link gadget below to share your wonderful creations! Please revisit to make sure you don't miss those who join in a little late! Also, if anyone adds a link that has nothing to do with the art date theme, it will be removed! The link gadget expires Friday at midnight (EST).
