After the 100 faces and beyond

I know it's been about two weeks since I finished .. hmmm maybe longer. I guess I learned that I work best when I make a commitment to painting in public way. I have been painting every day to some degree but not as purposeful as before. I may just have to do it again but for now I am focusing on some other things that I enjoy doing and that is redesigning clothes that exist. this is a little boys shirt that is so cute but I thought it could be for a little girl too. This is one of my little girls that I love to paint on a piece of denim that I then stitched onto the front of this cute shirt. The thread I used was pink embroidery thread so it's really sweet. I'm either going to try offering it for sale here or take it to the place I am now selling my artwear locally. We'll see. So if you're interested in this please email me as before. IT's adorable. Original art one of a kind. I think it will fit a new born baby as the size is 0-3 months. There is a close up also. I love to create these little girls and that's my molly girl in there too. I am also creating and hand stitching some other garments and my plan is to do at least one a week and I am thinking of posting some images of the progress. Thanks for stopping over and seeing what I'm up too .. i miss the posting so I'm glad to be back.

100 Faces in 100 days! I finally finished!

Well I didn't think it would feel as though the time flew by when I started this project. I am feeling a bit surprised by my own sadness at ending this project. I am exceedingly happy to have done it though and tonight I'll be at our local thrift store that raises money for animal shelters. They are having an art walk and I'll bring my faces with me. I do love talking about this project. I have some things in the works regarding this work. I haven't really had the time to focus on it but I will now. I may take a few days off from painting, to do some much needed organizing. I tend to focus solely on painting and nothing else. hahah ..

There was a person that said they were looking forward to my grand finale. .. and I wanted the paintings to be extra special but I'm a little spent on the thinking aspect of this project. I wanted my work to be extra special and so I painted the elephant to go with all the Africa stories that I wrote about and this little guy is just so cute and my mom loved her elephants and had several wood carved elephants in her home.

I am really just so happy to push myself to paint every single day and I want to paint more and bigger and different things besides faces and what not. I realized how much I love color too and how I can use it to make me feel really happy. Some of the paintings really gave me great satisfaction. Some I realized the frustration of not being able to get it just perfect and sometimes I just had to say enough!! It's enough... and then as the days went on I painted longer and more details.. sometimes I wanted to paint less.. I'm just really glad to have made this commitment and stuck with it.. WOO HOO .. . I want to celebrate so I am guessing it will be tonight at the art walk.. by my self and with anyone else that comes over. So .. about the second painting here. I realized that my love of painting faces is the eyes. It's hard to paint the eyes or a close up of an elephant because they are so big. I really wanted to paint eyes for the end and so I lamented a bit and decided to paint a cat face with big eyes. I like how it turned out. So it's kind of a celebration that I have two paintings instead of one. I started out day one with three faces and so i'm ending with two. I think i'll go jump for joy!!!! Thank you to all of you that came over and commented and wrote to me on facebook and purchased my art. I have really been awwed by the support. Maybe one day I'll have lots more commenters but i have appreciated those that have. I'm just happy ..Thank you .. for watching even if you never said a thing. :) Its good .. it's all good.

The elephant and the cat face are both about 10 3/4 x 13 1/2 the biggest I think so far. They are each for sale for $100. If you would like to purchase one of these please email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com. Thank you again .. it's been a wild ride and amazing. Oh and I'm not going to stop blogging .. I may do another project like this in the future. I will be making an announcement soon about what will happen with the portraits that are still available. Please do come back to my blog and see what I'm up too .. remember artists are people too and we need to make art and we need to make a living while we do it so please support artists by buying their work. It's important and it is valuable. We make the world a bit more interesting. Please help us do what we are meant to do. :)

Day 83 and White Squirrels

Today is day eighty three and that means that there are only 17 left to do !!!!!

Last fall I was staying with my son for a while as I transitioned from my home in SC to where I am now in the sunshine state. As we were doing things around the town that my son lives in NC, we were driving down the road where his cabin is and suddenly he was making a U turn and telling me he wanted to show me something. We pulled into the long drive of a persons home and he pointed to a tree. Knowing that I love nature he told me just to wait and they would appear. I said what am I looking for? He said they are white squirrels. I sat there skeptical for a minute and then sure enough, two white squirrels came scurrying around a tree and playing and then another came from the bushes to add to the fun.

I was amazed and delighted to see these beautiful little creatures that most people really don't like. I guess it's because they are always stealing the bird seed. Probably one of my most fun ways to feed the squirrels was a time when my family had purchased a small wooden throne that had a nail in front of a seat. The throne was small enough for a squirrel to sit in and the nail was for a dried corn cob which squirrels love to eat. I sat in front of the window many times watching the squirrels eat corn. Free entertainment I'd say .. i love nature and I love the white squirrels.

If you would like today's portrait of a squirrel it is painted on a repurposed file folder with calligraphy practice paper and wrapping paper and a scripture card all glued to the folder the cards main word "grace" can be seen i think on the arm of the squirrel. He does seem to emulate grace. the size is approx. 9.5 x 11.5. Please email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com if you are interested. See you tomorrow.

Day 82 Shambell

Today is day 82 and I did start this earlier and came back to it this evening. It's been a week that feels a bit like a fog because I've been so tired emotionally and physically. Today felt more normal than usual haha. This is good.

Tonight I decided to write about Shambell. I may have talked about her before when I talked about riding horses when we lived in Africa. I learned to ride at the British Consulates. My mom used to take my brother and I when we first started going. We always went with a guide and we always got to run the horses sometime and if we weren't careful they would run back to the stables on their way back when they knew it was time to go home. I always rode Shambell. She was a beautiful black stallion. I loved this horse. I loved her. When we left Africa I was just eleven years old. By the last year or so my brother and I would walk to the stables by ourselves and ride with the guide .. it was fairly inexpensive so I was often asking my mom for money to go horseback riding. It was incredibly fun. I always wanted to brush the horse when we got back. I was always grateful to the horse for letting me ride her. This is painted on a childhood storybook that was oddly enough Black Beauty, it's what got me thinking about Shambell. This experience always had me wishing for a horse as I was growing up. Sadly, there was never again any horseback riding in that way ever again after coming stateside. Except for one time when my uncle who had horses on his cattle farm rode with me on a horse to see if any babies had been born one morning. I had told him that I was comfortable riding a horse. When he saw there was a new calf he decided to stay and watch him for a bit and asked me if I wanted to ride the horse back to the stables. I excitedly said sure! He was something of a joker and decided to put me in my place and hit the horses rump and yelled "Get!!" and of course the horse took off and ran like a race horse all the way back to the stable. I held on for dear life and had to duck to get past a door threshold going into the barn. I was lucky I didn't hurt myself .. my Uncle thought it was funny .. No matter what, I've always loved horses.

If you would like to own this horse painting email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com. This painting is 7.5 x 11.5. See you tomorrow!!!

Day 79 and Feeling Transparent

Today is day 79 and I have been feeling rather transparent.. to tired to explain . .. just suffice it to say I am here . you can see me and sometimes i feel like you see right through me ..  ..                                                                                                                 If you would love to own this portrait just email me at www.iwilldream4ever@ao.com/See you tomorrow..

Day 76 Still having fun

Today is day seventy six and I just don't feel like thinking about anything really. Yesterday was a strange and stressful day and the best part of it was creating the portrait on the rusted denim and sitting there just mindlessly stitching away .. I do love the practice of stitching and as many of my stitching acquaintances and friends will tell you they find it addicting also.. so I am really enjoying the stitching aspect or adding it to the portraits. It really just reminds me of another project I hope to start after I finish this one. I have too many things that I want to do .. 

So what happened yesterday? My dad likes to mow my lawn, I offer to do it but he has to bring the mower here because I don't have one. Since he's here he likes to mow it. Yesterday was the mowing day and he was bringing me a piece of furniture from my mom and dad's room from the old house .. we left the mower in the front yard because that piece still needed mowing, we went move the furniture, which took about ten minutes. He left the mower by the sidewalk. I noticed dad was a bit winded from moving and removing furniture and so I offered to mow that little piece and he said OK !!! so I went to do it and there was no mower .. someone had carted it off. I noticed that the neighbor was sitting in the front yard across the street and I said did you see someone take the mower? She said "Yes" I said "why didn't you say anything? " she said "i didn't know that he wasn't supposed to take it, I thought it was trash" .. I apologized and told her it wasn't her fault and asked her what the vehicle looked like and she described it and then I looked down the street to the left and saw a vehicle like it driving away from us and asked her if that was it? She said yes that's it.. so yep .. i ran into my house and got my phone and gave chase to this van and I saw it and it turned at a light and then the light turned red .. by the time the light was green .. it was gone .. no where to be seen. I had called the police while I was in the car and told them I would just meet the police back at the house.. and my dad left. HE was not happy but he blamed himself for this ... the mower was still hot. It was not by the curb it was by the sidewalk. I guess if you want to get rid of anything at all just set it outside .. people will take it without even asking for sure if you wanted to get rid of it. The good news is that someone spotted the van later in the day and gave me the license plate .. still haven't heard anything yet. The officer said he would call me either way. Who knows .. so that's the story .. in my everyday life.. what a day. 

If you would like to own today's portrait just email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com it is the price of the day. This one is about 71/2 x 10. See you tomorrow .. 

Day 75 Mending my heart with Stitches and Tears.

Today is day 75 and woohoooo .. it's not midnight and I'm still tired but .. it's not a torturous attempt to get the portrait done before the clock strikes twelve and I turn into a pumpkin again....

I have done stitching on faces before but I really want to try to combine two things here .. actually three. This is rusted denim that I have painted a portrait on and then I have stitched threads in sashiko style stitching. I really love how this looks .. and so this marks my three fourths of the way through. I have only twenty five days left to paint portraits. It's amazing really that I have gone so far .. and I have learned so much.

A note to my self..... I see you.... .. I hear your heart and I know that you are having a hard time saying goodbye to things.. that held the happiness and love of a mother .. the things that she surrounded herself with to make her happy.

What I notice is that my dad has built a new house with no sign of my mother. His words are there is nothing feminine. He misses my mother, he feels strange in the new house, there is something missing... no longer the touch of his wife. No longer the things surrounding them that she loved. Her energy is not there.. he misses the familiarity of his old home. The sunshine on the river water .. even though he didn't sit and gaze at it.. it was always out the window. I notice that it is never expected all these feelings that he struggles with. He didn't think this would happen. He thought it would make it easier..but he doesn't feel her presence in the new place .. not that things embodied her but that you saw her in the color of the pillows.. you saw her in the arrangement of the art. You saw her in the flower's that sat in every corner,  on tables and over doors and windows.. all of that is gone. I don't think we think about that.. I really don't know for sure what causes these attachments to things that I struggle with my self. We are selling a lot of things .. and I have a looming sense of fear that something will go away that I should have taken .. or that I should not sell.? Where does this come from? I don't know .. it's holding on .. .it's pain. All I can do is cry .. they are just things. They are just things ... I know she is in my heart.. Perhaps that's the mending in this portrait.. Mending my heart with stitches and tears.

I may not part with this portrait either .. but if you would love to own this one send me an email at iwilldream4ever@aol.com. Thanks for stopping over and I'll see you tomorrow.

Day 74 and I'm tired.

Today is day 74 .. and here it is again after midnight .. i'm tired.

This portrait is painted on a piece of rusted and walnut dyed fabric. I am doing a class with Katrina Rodabaugh called Slow Fashion Style. This portrait is stitched onto a piece of rust dyed fabric as a way of combining my love of portraits and stitching. :) I have acquired all of my mom's fabric .. there is a lot. Right now we are doing a garage sale at my mom's house .. while my dad is starting to down size after moving to a new house. I want to keep everything .. I can't keep everything but I still want too .. this is a struggle .

This portrait is about 9 x 11 and .. will have more stitching then what is here .. if you would like to own this portrait just email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com.

Have a good day .. again I struggle .. but it will get better soon.. See you tomorrow..

Day 71

“I hope you will go out and let stories, that is life, happen to you, and that you will work with these stories... water them with your blood and tears and your laughter till they bloom, till you yourself burst into bloom.” 
― Clarissa Pinkola Estés, Women Who Run With the Wolves: Myths and Stories of the Wild Woman Archetype

This is my offering .. it is where I am today .. I think of this amazing woman when I see a wolf. I dreamed once of three white wolves. I waited all day to paint today.. to much going on .. this one turned out to my satisfaction and I thoroughly enjoyed painting. 

Now i am tired .. 

If you would love to own this beautiful wolf email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com. I even machine sewed a spiral into the paper.. first time I have done that .. 

See you tomorrow and have a wonderful rest of the day.. :) 

Day 64 and Sow

This is day sixty four and this is a sow. I am exhausted and I put off painting till the evening to get ready for the event I am doing tomorrow. I'm so tired now that I am having a very difficult time trying to stay awake .. So my pig sow here is finished to the point that I could no longer keep going. It's been a long week and seems to just be getting longer. I want to sleep right now but I'm here posting this blog so that I can put up my day's face.

The story of the sow pig is one that my mother told many times. When she was a little girl she was visiting her grandmother on her farm. . I think she and her siblings were all dressed to go to church and since they were with their grandma they wanted to go outside to play and for some reason they found that the watering hole that was nearby was a good place to hang out. Their mom told them not to get dirty. Can't imagine that it would be easy near a pig pen. But anyway they were out standing on the trough and it was kind of like a pool for the animals but too high for them to get into.  It had a fairly substantial ledge on it. I don't know if you know what a sow looks like but they are big mommies of the pigs .. they are very big so that they can feed all those babies. They have minds of their own. They are huge really. There is good reason to be fearful of a huge momma pig that is almost the size of a small car and they make loud scary grunting sounds. My mother's brother thought of a neat idea as they all stood there on that ledge overlooking the water. He simply yelled out "sow's coming" and the girls all jumped into the water. They were scared to death of the sow. Their brother, my uncle Justin laughed and laughed and the girls quickly got out when they saw that there was no sow .. but they were clearly wet and about to be in big trouble. My aunts and my mother always retold the story with a great deal of affection and boisterous laughter. It's one I will never forget.

If you would like to own today's portrait... email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com. It's $64. Painted on sewn papers and an enveolope. See you tomorrow .. i'm going to bed!!!!

Day 63 and Tiger

Today I decided to paint this tiger . I didnt' do the whole face just mostly the eyes. This was a bit challenging as I did it on a scrap of fabric from my mom's stash of samples that she had .. many of.

I have no objectivity at this point. I'm tired AND hungry .. this always causes me some consternation. So many emotional things going on in my life this past week. Losing my Godmother on Monday, The anniversary of my own mother's death on the 2nd and the anniversary of my mother's birthday yesterday. It's so much and tomorrow I will be attending my Godmother's funeral. So i'm having to really force these portraits the last few days. I think I prefer working on paper. Or at painting on cloth that has less texture. Tomorrow I will be trying to sell some work outside during a Saturday market nearby. Who knows if I will be ready for that and when I will get to posting an animal for that day. I guess I could paint it there... might be fun.

So thanks for the supportive words.. I appreciate them so much. If you would like to own this tiger please email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com. This tiger is $63. See you tomorrow.

Day 62 and the Blue Heron

Day 62 and it seems that life is just happening left and right here and so it's been a challenge to continue in the midst of all of it. I'm grateful always to those that stop and leave me a note. Encouragement is always a great thing when your tempted to stop .. i mean some days ... I knew that at some point there would be the days that I just didn't want to paint.. and there are some days when I just get to it and the process just seems to take over and I don't even think about what I'm doing .. i just get in the flow of things and it works out .. I like this one today of the blue heron. I tried to think of something that my mom would like .. because today is the day she was born. Yep .. she died six days before her 78th birthday and so today she would have been 79. I just don't still know where a year has gone. I don't know how it's possible. But it has and a lot has been going on this week ..

My mom loved the herons because at her home in Florida there was always a blue Heron sitting on the back deck overlooking the river. She loved the water and loved to sit and look at the river and the birds and sometimes a manatee or dolphin would come near the house. I guess I got some of my love of nature from her.

This is painted on some anniversary cards that she and my dad got for their 50th wedding anniversary. Sewn together and painted on with acrylic paint. If you would like to own this heron please send me an email to iwilldream4ever@aol.com. See you tomorrow.

Turtles

Today is day 61.. I'm still kind of tired but glad to have my art to keep me going and focused on something good and fullfilling.

I painted the turtle because it always reminds me that it is ok to slow down and take care of my self. To retreat into the shell for a just a time until the danger or whatever is lurking has passed. There was a post on my blog a few years ago .. I think called It's been a turtle week.. I had seen a series of turtles about three in a row. I like to think about the messages that nature can bring me. I love how the Native American Indians interpret the symbols of nature. I know for me when the turtles showed up in my life I realized how much I loved nature and it caused me to go outside and really look at the nature that was around me there where I lived. I loved doing that. I even saw a tiny turtle.. things I have never EVER seen there. This really gave me so much happiness. I enjoyed looking at them and letting them be themselves and just feeling so honored to be able to witness their magnificence. I know that I will always love nature.

If you would like to own this turtle painting. Email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com. Today's painting is $61. See you tomorrow.

Day 53 and Sea Horses

Today all I could think about was how much I love nature and creatures. I find that after writing so much about the time that I lived in Africa as a child, I realize that I have had a love of nature from childhood. We often went to the beach in the early years of living there and later we would go to a place we called the TTU. I'm sure it stands for something but I don't know what that is. The TTU was like a hotel in my child mind. This was a change from staying on the beach camping, where there was always sand in your shoes, to being in a place where you could swim, ski or just sit outside and enjoy the view. Here we could go back to a room after playing hard and shower, get dressed and go somewhere else to have breakfast, lunch or dinner. We went here often too. My mom and dad loved to water ski. I never found it something I wanted to try. My sister was afraid of the water unless we were swimming at the beach. Sometimes my mom would take us on the boat to watch her ski. As we got older this wasn't something we enjoyed very much. One day we bored out of our minds so we asked if we could swim to the beach at the TTU.. it was in the bay we were skiing in. So the boat goes as close as it could and off we jump into the water and swim over the beach. We would play there but there wasn't the long distance of shallow water so it wasn't as much fun. The deep dropped off ... one day my sister and I were playing here in this water and we didn't always look at what was around us but somehow we found ourselves looking at little tiny sea horses! We were so excited we ran up to the tables where were sitting and found some paper cups so we could catch this wonderfully magic creature. Their little tails were wound up into a spiral and they would swim around and move their tails. They were amazing to watch. I don't think I have ever seen them since then. It was a magical memory that I'm so grateful to remember. The beginning of my love of nature.

If you would love to own this beautifully magical creature, email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com. This is painted on a cover to a catalog and piece of wrapping paper and an envelope all sewn together. It is about 8x10 in size and is painted in acrylic.. have you noticed the added use of color? I love it!! See you tomorrow .. i'll be back.

Day 52 Emu

I had to laugh when I titled this Day 52 Emu... just cause it rhymes a bit. I mu Emu we all mu.

I have no story about an Emu. I really just loved this face. They do look a bit like an Ostrich. The Emu is from another country that I have unfortunately never been too.

I know they were in Africa but I don't recall ever having any chance to see any up close. We did however have an Ostrich egg lamp. I am suspecting that my mother bought it at the market where she really wasn't supposed to go shopping. My mother had a very adventurous spirit. She was either very fearless or naive to the dangers she could encounter. I don't think that she ever felt that any person was unapproachable if she just had the right words or a big enough smile. Her favorite thing to do was take us down a road we'd never been. Often we were traveling by car to some destination. I think I inherited my mothers sense of time which means we both didn't have a very good one. If we were on a vacation driving and she was the driver it didn't really matter to her how we got there or how long it would take. She always wanted to veer off the highways and onto back roads. The scary sentence we dreaded was, "lets just see where this goes." Off we would go and sometimes we could end up on a road that wasn't really even a road, but someones driveway. All her passengers/children were usually URGING her to stop or turn around because we were sure we were going to be shot by the property owners. Well that never happened but we did often come upon some interesting places. It was this spirit that we objected too that also took us to many wonderful and incredible places. I am approaching the first anniversary of my mother's passing, so I'm grateful really to be doing this processing, this remembering. This REmemoring of my life with her.

If you would love to own this cute face of an EMU .. email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com. Have a wonderful day and I'll see you tomorrow. :) Oh and this face is sewn wrapping paper and a map and a calendar. The size is about 8 1/2 x 9 and painted with acrylic paint. The map was from South Dakota. That place is another story on another day. haha.

Day 45 and rainy day Sundays..

Today is day fourty five, I'm tired. I've been house and dog sitting all week and last night I stayed up to see my sister and her husband arrive home in the wee hours. I love my sister. Consequently, today I need a nap and so when I'm tired.. things just sort of creep into my head .. it's raining so my thoughts are dripping with stories from long ago.. and i feel sadness. Today I miss my mother.

I remember that when I was younger I didn't seem to know to keep my hair brushed. I liked it long and still have it long today. I got tangles a lot. I think we had a terrible bout of the Hong Kong flu and my bed head equaled nappy tangled hair. On this day I'm thinking of the weather was nice and the sun was out. My mother got a brush and some combs and decided to tackle the task of untangling the jungle on top my head. She told us to come with her outside and we sat on the steps off the kitchen outside in the sun. I know that there were times when the comb hurt my head or she pulled just a little too hard but I don't remember that so much, but I do remember the sun shining on my shoulders and feeling the warmth of the sun. It felt good kind of like a bath of light. The sun just seemed to kill any bad sickness that was left from the flu. I remember how good the comb felt on my scalp. I think the tangle removal took hours and the massage from the combing and even just the feeling of having my hair touched was soothing and loving.  It's a pleasant sleepy time, rainy day, memory and I think I fell asleep a few times just typing this out ..haha so I got a nap and I am grateful for the memory...

If you would like this portrait today that is painted on pages from a book of my mom's and two airline tickets that she kept and I sewed together, just email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com and you can have her for just $45. This is about 8 x 10 inches. I should call this luscious lips .. lol .. i do love the lips lol. Have a sleepy time love feeling day ... see you tomorrow.

Day 43 Still more Grandbabies

This is another grandchild that belongs to my son. This little guy just celebrated his fifth birthday. This was when he was a baby. He was laying on a blanket and the light was so nice that day. Sometimes the dark and light makes a portrait look nearly abstract. He is a sweet boy that is very active. I learned as a young mother that very active meant very busy.. sometimes too busy. I think it's natural for boys to be very active!! He is in the middle .. between two siblings. I can't remember if it was this little one or his brother that told me, when I showed him my painting of the day, that it was detailed and creepy. This made me laugh. I love their honesty. I could see why he thought it was. Children have a way of saying things that can amaze and delight me.
I love all the babies that have arrived in my life. I feel very blessed.

So it's evolving into what it is. I am learning so much about this whole portrait painting process. It's all really good so far. Some days I can't be objective about the work. But I have been getting feedback from the buyers of the portraits. Which is validating.

Now time to relax and enjoy the rest of the day .. or evening as it seems to be .. where did all the time go? Thank you for stopping over. I always like to hear comments if your so inclined. If you would like to have this sweet child on your wall . just email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com. See you tomorrow.

Day 42 And riding horses.

Today is day forty two and I am grateful to be painting and sewing together a portrait. Kind of like stitching a new way for my self. Or putting all the pieces together.

I don't always notice how I think of the stories I wish to tell .. it's probably the influence of things I read or see or hear.. I guess that's what most people do.

Either way it matters not .. these eyes and this face reminds me of a memory of riding horses.

While living in Africa,  I remember taking riding lessons. I think this was one of my favorite things about living there. We lived a few blocks away from a horse stable, where my mom would often take us to go riding. I don't recall my sister coming, but my brother and my mom would usually go with me. I would always ask to ride Shambell. She was a big black stallion. I loved her. My brother would ride Knockifa I have to say that their names may not have been spelled this way. But I write them today in the way that I remember them. We would also go riding with a guide. The stables were crudely built but the horses seemed well taken care of. We would ride for an hour, traversing around the beautiful countryside. We could run and jump streams or sticks. It was so much fun. Every single birthday from that time on I would have the cake placed in front of me with the instructions to blow out the candles and make a wish and a horse was always my wish. Until I grew out of making wishes. I loved the horses. I loved their big soulful eyes. I loved how it felt to ride and glide along in rythym with the horses movements and it was magical. I knew the horses saw me and understood me. I just knew. I had many happy rides on Shambell. I know that wishes can come true at any time in life. I don't want a horse anymore. I lost interest when trying to horseback ride in the states. I never found another place that let you ride the way we did in Africa.I recall telling my father recently that I wished for a horse when I was a child. He said he was glad he didn't know. I know that horses are expensive to take care of. Its ok. I still have my memories. I hope that I don't forget them. I hope I don't ever forget .. and I am grateful to remember. That is this face ..thinking of horses.

If you would love to have this face email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com. See you tomorrow.

Day 40 and Jim

This portrait is day 40 almost half way.!!! Woo hoo.. I love that I am letting myself create as I can and let it be what it is .. That part is always a challenge.

Practicing is always impactful I get excited just thinking about continuing with the practice of daily painting.

Today's face reminds me of a friend of mine that I never met. Someone who's name was Jim. Someone who reached out to me when my life was a fast moving train headed for a jumbled up mess of a derailment. He was the steady voice of reason when nothing made sense in my life. He would always tell me that I could not see in other's what wasn't in me. It's kind of like the opposite of another statement that I have also heard before. Which is if you see it (typically a character defect) then you own it. When you are mad at someone's behavior that you see it is because you see the reflection of yourself in that person. The same can be true about love. I don't know if these things are the absolute truth or not. But I can tell you a story about meeting a man that I never met in person, and how it impacted my life.

Last night I saw a question on a social media site by a new mom asking her contacts or friend's to tell their experience with raising children. Her question made me think of Jim. I remember while in an emotionally painful time in my life I was floundering in a sea of negative fearful perceptions. My trust recently shattered like a mirror dropped on marble floor. I feel fortunate that there were a few people then that offered me compassion and time when I needed it most. Cut to the core, I could only seek out this man and tell him my story with fear and in a hurry. What happened really isn't important at this point because don't we all have some kind of story of our own? What is important is that he spent time listening to my story. He heard all my pain, all my hurt, all my experience with those and never left. He always heard everything I had to say. I had a LOT to say. He knew that I had a mountain of hurt. I would talk and talk and talk and as an hour would pass he would thoughtfully drop hints that he needed to get a drink of water soon .. or say . going to have to go soon. I talked until I was exhausted.. when it came time for him to go .. I would ask if he would be back tomorrow? He said he would, I asked if he was going to leave now. ? He said I will sign off when you sign off. This is the clue about where I met him. Yes he was online. He would always wait till I left. He never left first. In my hurt I never saw his thoughtfulness or consideration but gradually I was able to trust him. So you could say that I came to him with a huge cavern in my heart and unable to trust anything. He did so much just to listen. Finally, I didn't worry that he might not come back .. i trusted that he would listen and I slowly began to believe this idea that I couldn't see anything in other people that was not in me. I began to feel gratitude for his time and for his consistent compassionate voice. His way was unlike any other person I had ever known. He was always appropriate and kind. Finally, I could express my gratitude to him often. I felt after a long time that he always had kindness and care and truly had my best interest at heart. I felt that I could tell this man, who I never met that I loved him. No one else did what he could do.. at a time when I desperately needed it. I had big love in my heart for his kindness .. i could feel this love in my body, like feeling a pillow on my chest .. like a hug from a loving person. I told him that I loved him. And he said to me .. you love the reflection of yourself that you see in me. Remember, you cannot see in other's what is not inside of you. It seems strange to say this but I felt an amazing thing happen at that moment. I felt for just a moment that I could feel this big love for my self. It was a wonderously fabulous feeling. I felt as though so much came together at that time. I could see the breaking of long held views against ideas of loving yourself as if to love yourself would mean you were vain or selfish. That to love your self somehow meant you were conceited or loved to look in a mirror. But it was none of those things. It was believing that there was something inherently good and loveable about my self. That I had some value that was worth spending time with, or working hard for. I was worth believing in. Now if you ask yourself if you love yourself and your first thought is that it feels strange or uncomfortable try to see the goodness in other's. Think of the one person you love the most and why, and imagine that those qualities are in yourself. I think this is what the verse in the bible means when it that says for us to love our neighbors as our selves. This is the kind of love you want to have or you cannot love other's. Makes sense to me that if you do not like yourself you are likely to feel the same about other's. So .. this face today may seem intense in some ways.. that's what Jim was like for me. An intense lesson in how to love yourself and the importance of it. It's good to have a reminder of it. When you love yourself you can love others. You can have compassion for people when they are angry because they are just showing you how they feel about themselves. You can respond with compassion to them. So the question from the young mother.. about the best experiences of parenting a child made me want to tell her to teach her children to love them selves. This is to me the most important thing to teach them. The rest will unfold in its own way.

Thank you for following my journey and for reading if you do .. or even just looking at my portraits. I do so appreciate it. If you would like to own today's portrait I am calling Jim. Please email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com. It's $40 today. Thank you .. see you tomorrow.

Day 39

Today is day thirty nine .. meaning there are sixty one day's to go. I can hardly believe it.. Today I got started back to the earlier time.

Interesting to note that I can't think with noise.

I am house and dog sitting. Which requires me to relocate my paints and routine to continue what I am doing. A challenge but a few perks as well. A pool to swim in during the noon day sun. Always pleasant. Nice to see if I can manage the changes and still honor the commitment. So far so good.

But I am off here today ... i suppose this will become like a road map of my time.

Every day isn't a story of the past ..

Some days are just stories of the present.

With gratitude in the eyes.. inspite of life, I am in gratitude. There is still something to look forward too.

If you would like to have today's portrait. IT's day #39 and $39. Email me at iwilldream4ever@aol.com. I have to say that the photo's of these portraits really do not give them justice. The excitement for me is in the details. Which reminds me .. last night while Skyping with my son and to wish my grandson a happy birthday, the eldest grandson who is six had an opinion of the face I painted yesterday. My son laughed and I laughed. HE told me that yesterday's face was creepy and detailed. I love it... see you tomorrow.