Life Update

I've had several people checking out my blog lately, so I thought I'd better update a bit. So, last May my husband got orders to deploy. We moved out of our house, and then his orders got canceled. We had a fabulous summer, and I managed to finish two classes for my MFA while we were on the road. My fall semester started at the beginning of Sept. My third baby, Luke, was born on Halloween day (right at midterm). It was quite the whirlwind with getting settled, being pregnant, having a baby and then the holidays. Luke is now two months old, we've had some time to get things in order, and I'm ready to really get to work again (at least as much as possible with 3 kids :)
Here is some of the work I did last semester. The painting of the girl in a dress with flowers is a copy of a painting by Daniel Gerhartz called "Secret".

Daisy

Well, I am back in Annapolis. I've had the craziest two months of my life, but all is well and even better than when we left. My husband's orders to Afghanistan got canceled. We had already moved out of our house. We drove across the country to Utah, played with our families and made a marathon drive to come back for my husband to start work again. We had a great time house hunting, moving and figuring everything out. All the while I was trying to keep up with two summer term master's classes. I had my portable easel and a laptop all summer, so it all worked out. I didn't do as well on a couple of assignments, but in the end I'm really glad I did it.
Here is one of my last assignments for the class.

Christian- SOLD

Just a touch of Optimism

This is my last assignment for my classes this semester. I've had a really hard time focusing on painting. Nate got orders yesterday. He is going to be deployed to Afghanistan. He'll be away from us for 15 mo. He leaves really soon too- In about a month and a half. We're going to try and pack everything into storage by the end of this month and then we'll head to Utah. I'm going to move in with my parents.

This painting depicts my mood at the moment perfectly. I had painted a great flower before wilted and hung over like that, but i liked it better down- YOu can see where I wiped it out. I should have treated the background a little differently, but oh well.

You can tell I'm tired when I post something and don't put a title on it. Sometimes thinking of a title is more challenging than thinking of a painting. Any suggestions for any of my untitled work?

Self Portrait

Kind of struggled on this one. Oh well. you win some, you lose some. I think I'll have another shot at a self-portrait this summer for another class.

Unusual Suspect

Salt and Pepper

Red Lady

This is just the start of a pastel assignment, but I think the drawing turned out really neat, so I'm posting it here.

A Little Color

This painting was for another assignment. We were just supposed to have fun with color and use pure intense colors. I had so much fun with this. Hours went by- and I was just responding intuitively to what I was seeing. I think these are the moments that artists live for- when things just flow.

Savannah

Marisel