Evolution of a Birthday Gift

Mike's birthday was actually a few months ago, but I forgot I had taken these pictures. He works in the power industry, hence the man working on power lines.

My Obama figurine used to reference the size of this painting: a petite 3"x3".

Dave Matthews

Completed in 2003
16"x22"

Oil

I was a big Dave Matthews fan. Can you tell? Not to brag, but this might be some of the best arm hair I've ever painted.

The original picture is from a Rolling Stone magazine. It's kind of funny putting the two pictures side by side. The more I look at them, the more different they look. Maybe I should just call my picture "Man in a Top Hat".

Courtesy of Rolling Stone

Photoshop Fun

Although I use Photoshop quite a bit, I'm not very skilled at it. Luckily, there are some pretty informative tutorials out there. Like this one, that shows you how to delete people.... a handy skill!

I took my niece this weekend to get her ballerina pictures taken. Although I really liked the way this picture turned out, I didn't really like the other little girl that infiltrated the scene. So with some minor effort... ta-da! She's gone. The paint job is a little rough around the edges, but hey, it'll do. I'm learning...

Our First Garden

I should start out by saying that I have a weak green thumb. This year we decided that we wanted a real vegetable garden. In the past we've had mediocre success planting potted plants- tomatoes, peppers, and herbs. Some years we would have an abundance of peppers, some years we'd harvest only a handful of tomatoes, and one year we got maybe one tomato but managed to attract some monster caterpillars, which coincidentally I saw on display at the Smithsonian that year. (Or something similar at least.)

Despite our not-so-great success, this year we decided we were ready to graduate to a real garden! Not holding back at all, we also decided that a raised bed constructed out of stone would also suit our needs best. Silly us. What a pain it was to haul 132 bricks from Lowe's to the backyard of our townhouse. So this is what we've been doing the past three weekends. Finally finished up yesterday!

We started seedlings in late March/early April, which according to everything I've read, is late. 

But still it is so satisfying to see something grow from a seed.

Planning out our first bed.

Starting construction. Because our yard has a slight slope, we had to dig out 

some soil on the side closest to the deck.

 

Completion of the sunny side. Hoping to grow tomatoes, hot peppers, spring onions, basil, 

and cilantro over here.

Completion of the shady side. On this side we planted some kale, spinach, and mint. 

Also threw in some flowers for color. We'll see how those do in the partial shade.

View from the top.

 Despite the advice from far more experienced gardeners than I, I decided to go ahead 

and plant our tiny tomato seedlings outside. The weather was fantastic this past week, 

so I thought what the heck. If they don't do well, worst case I'll dig them up and replace

them. Meatball has already ran through the garden twice...

Girl in Blue

 

 Completed 2001

16"x20"

Oil

This painting is hanging at my parent's house, so I was proud of myself when I remembered to snap a picture of it over the Easter weekend for the sole purpose of posting it here. 

I'll be the first to admit that this is not an original work by me. I know I copied it from another artist... but who, I can't remember. I tried Googling, and found nothing. I even tried TinEye but it came up with zero results. I'll have to keep looking...

Eye of the Tiger

Completed 1998

8"x10"

Oil

One of my most favorite paintings from the 90's. In 1998 I was still in my awkward freshman/sophomore years of high school!