Trying to Catch Up

Wow, I am having the hardest time catching up! As I mentioned before, I ended up getting really sick with severe bronchitis, and finally after 3 weeks, I am finally getting better. I am just trying to get my strength back while fighting this flare, and it has really put me behind on things - especially my blog. I have only painted just a few things during this time, and am so ready to get back into my studio! Since my last post, my girls have both started school - now my baby is in kindergarten! sniff..sniff... They have also started gymnastics. I decided it was time after I tried to show them a straight somersault, and I swear I heard every bone in my body crack! I just laid there for a while doing a system check - o.k. my toes move, now my legs move, etc. To sum it up - it's best to leave that stuff to the professionals to teach my girls. I officially think I am too old.
This is a picture of the girls on their first day of school. They looked so cute! Although, I'm not sure how much longer they are going to let me dress them alike. They let me occasionally, but it is getting fewer and farther between. The only thing different about what they were wearing, is that Ashlyn absolutely refuses to wear bows anymore. "First graders do NOT wear bows, Mommy!"

Here are a few paintings that I did manage to finish over the last couple of weeks. I have to explain how my very creative daughter had a part in the "Bird on a Tree" painting. The girls had been down at my parents for a few days. Both of them are extremely creative, and good little artists in their own right. They both are fully aware of how I am always on the lookout for something to put in my art. They love to help me look through old books for pages for backgrounds and looking at different ephemera. Well, while they were all supposed to be getting ready to leave to come back home, and Ashlyn slipped off and collected several pieces of the prettiest thin bark pieces for me to use in my art. She put them in a little gift sack and wrote my name on it. She managed to get in their car with it, and make it all the way home without anyone noticing her precious little gift. Everyone was just amazed when she presented it to me that she for one, was so sneaky about it, but mainly that she put that much creative thought into finding me something that I could use in my paintings. I was just so touched and amazed that she did this. So, the first painting I did after that, I incorporated into the bird painting. She is very pleased and just tickled pink that I used something that she found in my painting!