Happy New Year

I want to wish everyone a wonderful New Year. I hope it is a great year in the world as far as world peace and economic prosperity. I hope everyone enjoys their family and friends and they experience good health. And I hope that you continue on the path of learning to see and appreciate the beauty in the world.


I have thought long and hard about the past year and the up and coming 2010. I have not made any New Year's resolutions as I hardly ever keep them. Why is that? Last year I made about five or six resolutions all with the greatest intentions on improving my life and the only one I kept was starting this blog!!! (I also had intentions on starting a website.) But if I was to make any resolutions they would be:
1. Loose weight.
2. Get fit.
3. Start my own website.
4. Sketch more often. (Last year I had said I would sketch every day. That lasted about 10 days.)
5. Organize all the stuff in my life.
And of coarse continue to paint and to improve my technique and style. Maybe I could just set these up as goals, not resolutions.


In looking back at 2009 I feel that I have developed as artist in many ways. I had a very busy year and I actually kept up with everything. (Well almost.) I was in approximately 20 art shows. I plan on doing less outdoor art shows this year and more indoor shows. I feel that I have improved my teaching skills and am getting ready to start a busy semester at the end of this month. I have worked primarily in watercolor and have really enjoyed it but I still keep trying new things. I spent alot of time working with Masa paper and feel that my paintings are improving. I posted Magnolias IV because I think it was one of the best paintings that I completed last year. I was sad to see it get sold. Right now I'm working on A Yellow Rose Garden. It has so much more to it and I'm being more daring in what I try to do on the Masa paper. I just hope everything goes well with it. One thing that I've learned from my teacher Rieneke Leenders is that watercolor is so much more forgiving than I thought it was. If I do something that does not work out so well there are ways of changing it so that you do not have to give up on the painting. And that is wonderful!

Santa's Stocking

Santa's Stocking was a very good show. It is always alot of fun.

I have to say goodbye to my Magnolias IV and two other paintings that I sold. I will really miss my Magnolias IV. It was a fun painting to do. It was my third painting that I did on Masa paper and I really like the textures and colors of the painting. I think it will enjoy it's new home.

Masa Paper

I really love to try new things in my art work. This is one of the things I love about watercolor. There are endless possibilities.

The Magnolias IV was done on Masa paper. I was first introduced to this paper a couple months ago and I have been experimenting with it ever since. It has been alot of fun.

Masa paper is similar to Rice paper. (I only know this from being told as I have never tried Rice paper. At least not yet.) The procedure for using it is as follows:
1. First you cut the Masa paper to the size of a regular piece of watercolor paper. You do not need to use good watercolor paper. Then you mark the smooth surface of the Masa paper in the corner with a pencil.
2. You crumple up the Masa paper and soak it in water.
3. In the meantime you wet the watercolor paper and spread Elmers type glue on it. (You can even use school glue.)
4. You carefully take the Masa paper out of the water and squeeze it very gently. If you squeeze it too much you will destroy the quality of the paper.
5. You then place the Masa paper on the watercolor paper with the pencil mark down and roll it with a brayer from the center out.
6. You can begin laying colors down in a very loose way at this time. Then you need to let it dry and you can draw your subject on the paper and start painting it.

The Masa paper has little crinkles in it and the paint adheres to them to form a wonderful pattern.