June 22

It is a rainy day, yesterday a nice day  after two day of rain that soaked into the earth and all the weeds, plants and grass  grew 6 inches. It is amazing. I have to weed and mow but I have fresh good food to eat. A friend said weeds are plants that are in the wrong place. My lawn has more dandelions then grass and I don’t care but I pull them out of the vegetable garden. 

I ran into an artist  friend older then myself  and she said “I doesn’t paint anymore. I did my best paintings when I was in my seventies. She said I like where I live, I like my house and I like walking around it and enjoying the place.” Are we all content with our place! Are we content with our work, with our age with our home with our state of being? Older people like my self look back on their lives, a continuation of waves that constantly move seemingly forward with their crests and troughs and one thinks, have i learned anything, have I changed, am I satisfied  with my life, am I content and happy. I was lucky to be born  with a calm disposition, and a creative nature that has giving me the awareness to observe and appreciate. I don’t know if I learned from my mistakes, or doing things the wrong way. That part is the trough and part of life that is constantly changing. There are times of challenging situations and time of everything going great. They are connected, like the yang, yin of the Chinese circle, or two sides of a coin. I can’t say I did my best paintings in my seventies. I will say it has been cyclic, times when I saw differently. If one is to judge ones work, through every period, I made good and not so good paintings.  It is interesting to look back and see what sparked a change. Always painting is exciting for me, in the moment, challenging, working toward a finished picture that I have an idea of what it will look like. If each step is done correctly, or corrected as it happens, usually the painting will be successful, no different then living life itself. The really good paintings lift me to the crest and when I don’t succeed I say I did it before  and I can do it again.

Now I have hundreds of paintings stored in this house. Some I am very attached to. I look at them everyday hanging on my walls. I enjoyed painting each one but now they are a burden, stored in closets, under beds, against the walls. I almost died this winter and my children would have had to deal  with the paintings. They say there is a solution  to every problem. I don’t know what the answer is. I have read to visualize the goal, and the way to the goal will  fall into place. I would like my paintings on other peoples walls. Believe this has happened, right!  I have never been good at  visualization or changing the negative  beliefs about selling my art. I know I have mentioned this before. Other artists have the same problem. Does anyone have an idea?

some spring paintings from the past

two Iris 16 x 20

spring bouquet  sold

roses and lupine   sold

lilacs in bloom 24 x 36   sold

house with the yellow trim16 x 20   sold

flower garden      sold

The flowering of spring Thursday june 17
Today is a perfect day, light breeze, sunshine, intense color, and the right temperature.
June has been a great month of fine weather and the abundance of growth and flowering, of fireflies in the evening, of frog songs of birds songs of the smell of lilacs and fields of lupins swaying in the breeze. My flower gardens are at the height of flowering and I spend a lot of time getting pleasure from looking at everything. The vegetable garden is doing well also and I am eating green already. I have spent a lot of time outside weeding and planting, walking the dog, and I have also been painting some. My strength and energy is much better. I am tired my days end and fall asleep as soon as I get into bed.
There was a good turnout for my reception at Tidemark, very few people have been in since and no sales but I didn't do anything to promote it. It is up to the end of June. I always have paintings at Tidemark along with about eight other artists.  It is the only gallery I am in right now.  Doug has been up  mowing and weedwacking. I can't keep up with outside work. It is always overgrown but is more beautiful to me then some well kept gardens. People around here are always mowing their lawns which are huge and need riding mowers. I am not into lawns, I like the fields and wildflowers.  The  fields are where the fireflies hang out in the evening.
Below are this years gardens.

June show at Tidemark Gallery

Some paintings in the June Tidemark Gallery show in Waldoboro.  Ever month I put different paintings in the gallery six to ten paintings, watercolors and acrylics, according to size and space.

Corners #2  16 x 20

Corners #1  16 x 20

Yellow Triangle  30 x 20

Yellow Triangles  10 x 30

Sacred Geometry #6  20 x 16

Yellow Triangle Blue Square 16 x20

Coastal Islands  14 x 18 

Low Clouds Over Marsh  18 x 24

Road scene Spring  12 x 16

Snow Bank  14 x 21

Vacant House  16 x 20

Shore Dock  14 x 18

River Scene  16 x 20

Sun on Outcrop 11 x14

Trees Beside the Shore  9 x 12

Building Clouds  16 x 20

Cove Shore Spring  18 x 24

Dog in the Field  12 x 16

Rocky Shore  9 x 12

West Side of the Island  24 x 36