Beach Ballet – March 31, 2009

2.5″ x 3.5″ Gouache on Yes! Canvas Pad

The real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking new landscapes but in having new eyes.

–Marcel Proust

How have we felt when we return to our hometowns, childhood homes, old playgrounds, or high schools after years of absence? Suddenly each place isn’t as it once seemed because we’re looking through the eyes of someone older and changed. Where we once saw our high school through the eyes of students, we now look at it through the eyes of adults – in a much different way.

So it is with all areas of our lives: our jobs, homes, families, friends, or partners. Many of these people and places haven’t changed for a long time. Yet, we change every day. Instead of seeing our job as the same old job or our home as the same old home, we can start to look at them differently.

We don’t need to change things on the outside to feel better on the inside. We can change how we look at things from the inside out. We can start to see who and what are outside of us as if we were looking at them for the first time. Today the ho-hums in our lives can turn into ah-has just by changing the way we see them.

There may be many things in my life that haven’t changed, but I’m not one of them. Today I can see them all with new eyes.

–Amy E. Dean

Banana Quit – March 30, 2009

This is a 4″ x 6″ watercolor on Indian Village handmade paper.

“It is common sense to take a method and try it. If it fails, admit it frankly and try another. But above all, try something.”

– Franklin D. Roosevelt

I think this particularly makes sense for artists. At least for me! I love to try new things with my art. It makes life so fun!!!

Shoes… again – March 27, 2009

2.5″ x 3.5″ watercolor painting.

Choose your Love; Love your Choice.

-This is the slogan on my favorite coffee cup. I love that!

Shoes and such – March 26, 2009

2.5″ x 3.5″ Watercolor

Everyone has his own fingerprints. The white light streams down to be broken up by those human prisms into all the colors of the rainbow. Take your own color in the pattern and be just that.
–Charles R. Brown

We are often amazed at how different members of the same family seem to be. Contrasts are often great: one child might be loud and funny, one might be timid and quiet, and yet neither seems to take after the parents.

A family is like a vegetable garden. The vegetables respond to outside influences. The one exposed to more sunlight will grow differently than the one growing in a damp, shady place. Vegetables growing in crowded areas of the garden may not be as developed as those around them, but they might be tastier.

Although we may have common roots, outside experiences and friends mold us too, making each of us unique. We sometimes lose ourselves by comparisons and feel as if we don’t belong, but the variety of our family garden is what makes the world so interesting.

-Anonymous

Boots – March 25, 2009

Boots 2.5″ x 3.5″ Watercolor on Strathmore Textured

In wildness is the preservation of the world. – Henry David Thoreau

Nature confronts us with its beauty in a flower or a furry animal. The awesomeness of nature is in a lightning bolt or a majestic mountain. Every variety of tree has its own uniquely textured bark. Each annual ring in a tree trunk is a natural record of the growing conditions in each year it grew. These things remind us we are not in charge, and we are moved by the experience.
This “wildness” is everywhere around us, and we are renewed by it when we interact with it. At night, in the city, we look up and see the ancient moon. When we live with a pet, it reminds us we are creatures too. We are part of this larger whole. We don’t just appreciate nature — we are nature. When we open our eyes and learn to be a part of it, it renews and lifts our spirits.

– Anonymous

Green Train – March 24, 2009

4″ x 6″ watercolor postcard. In case you can’t tell, it’s a train.

“Passion, though a bad regulator, is a powerful spring.”

– Ralph Waldo Emerson

I really like that quote. I hope you’re all having a great day out there in cyber space.

Tulip Farm – March 23, 2009

8″ x 10″ Inktense pencils and watercolor on Yes! Canvas. I call this one “Tulip Farm”.

We are only human. . . paying attention to our growth

Trusting our partner has a lot to do with trusting ourselves. When we feel confused, unsure, or in conflict about our own direction. We may shift our attention outside ourselves. Even when we feel unsure about our self-worth, our negative feeling may crystallize as blame directed toward someone else. Looking outward in that negative way and avoiding responsibility for ourselves makes liars of us. When we do that we are not paying attention to our own growth, not looking at the truth. If we do not claim ownership of our part in a conflict, we will not be able to trust our partner either. We build trust when we are honest with ourselves and expose our truth and vulnerability to our mate.

Merle & Mavis Fossum

Boot Macro – March 20, 2009

2.5″ x 3.5″ watercolor

Love cures. It cures those who give it and it cures those who receive it.–Dr. Karl Menninger

Love is no mystery, but its results are magical in many ways. It’s generally accepted that many illnesses are psychosomatic. Because we often feel anxiously alone, lonely, fearful, and unloved, we express our need through our bodies. How sad so many of us are so hindered. But we can each be willing participants in a solution. The action called for is simple. All it requires is the decision to act with favor toward one another.
A look through loving eyes on a struggling person offers him or her the strength to try and try again and thus succeed. Lovingly moving the barriers to another’s achieving spirit will benefit all who share this journey.
Love multiplies the great and simple acts of goodness in the world. Each of us, with no more effort than a genuinely warm glance, can change the course of history today, tomorrow, always.

-Karen Casey

Fishing Boats – March 19, 2009

4″ x 6″ Fishing Boats – watercolor

“The future belongs to those who believe in the beauty of their dreams.”

– Eleanor Roosevelt

Koi – March 18, 2009

Koi – Watercolor and Acrylic 4″ x 6″

The natural flights of the human mind are not from pleasure to pleasure, but from hope to hope.–Samuel Johnson

A truly powerful force in the universe is that of optimism. Optimism lies at the root of our mental and physical health. Feelings of hope can stimulate the body’s immune system and inspire recovery from a critical illness.Optimism expresses itself in the persistence and resilience of living things. A child learning to walk repeatedly falls down and picks himself up until he stands erect. A decade after the eruption of Mt. St. Helens destroyed the local ecology, life reestablished itself on this volcano with amazing abundance and rapidity. And despite its hostile environment, a sole dandelion miraculously pushes itself up through a crack in the concrete. That dandelion is optimistic that it can and will survive.

In the long run, the forces of love and life always triumph over those of fear and death. No matter how challenging the obstacles or difficult the tests, there is always cause for optimism.

Joseph Bloch