New Starts

This canvas is 16 X 20 and I really felt the calling to paint a garden scene again. I like to do one every so often. This one will majorly morph but I started it out with Cleomes, then I have plans for purple Liatris. The various colored background gives it so much interest behind the flowers. It will also have various mediums and marks too. I love doing these paintings and they are not fast to do. It takes much research and thought behind it.
I have so many quilt tops, quilts in progress, quilt material that I would not need to buy anything for the rest of my life. My Mother quilted and I quilted and that is where I acquired all these wonderful items. I have made a pact with myself to get working on these a little at a time and not buy anything extra.

This quilt is my own design and I love needlework and applique so this has both. I decided not to use a hoop to quilt so I can just fold it up and take it easily where ever I go. I found a cute piece of fabric in my stash made by Riley Blake Designs for the backing. Then I decided it would make a great mask too.

I am not being picky about the quilting because I haven’t quilted for a while and if I am too picky it will take too long to get it finished.
This is our resident turtle that goes between retention ponds. I am always surprised when I see him come out of the water making his way to the other pond. He looks like a pretty good size and we can’t see the rest of his body in the water when he is popping his head up. We always wonder what makes him go back and forth. One is much more shallow, maybe one has better food. He moves pretty fast for a turtle.
These next pictures are the flowers that are blooming right now. This daylily is so big and pretty. It is so smooth and buttery.
I say this every year, this is my favorite. It is named Betsy Ross and starts blooming during the Fourth of July. I think the red is just fabulous!
The balloon flowers always amaze me and they bloom around the fourth of July too. The star shaped blooms are perfect for this time of year.
These coneflowers have the most beautiful color. Just vivid!

Another thing I have started working on is sorting all the loose pictures I have before digital. They need documentation and then we have old pictures from Tom’s family and mine too. This is a large project also. Something to do a little at a time.

Hope your fourth was fun, we had quite the fireworks all around us. Our heads were spinning back and forth plus we watched the Macy’s fireworks on tv which had to be spectacular over New York!