from around here…

middle image is from Kim Gordon’s book

My kids always have something to say about my art and they don’t hold back.  These are a couple of my recent favs:

“Now you’re not even painting the heads?!”  about a painting I had just started and hadn’t painted the head in yet

“I like it.  If I take my glasses off it sort of looks like they’re killing each other.”

This film fascinates me.  “A young family leaves their home on Kauai.   They nomadically trace continents to places where waves meet their edges, envoys of aloha. It is what they will learn, what they bring others, what they will pass on to their children in the hyper-expanded classroom, the lab of direct being; a legacy passed from a father to his family.”  I would love to see it when it is available.  You can follow their adventure on their website The Goodwin Project.

The Goodwin Project from Avocados and Coconuts on Vimeo.

Some images currently fueling my favorite color palette.

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I’ve taken over our dining room to enjoy the sunny day.  This is the result so far…

as in blue skies that have graced our recent days here.  I am still here and thankfully the sun has given me a much needed vitamin d infusion.   So back to painting and dreaming of a spring that feels within reach.  Have a beautiful weekend!

How was your weekend?  I have a love/hate relationship with Monday.  On one hand, the weekend is over, enough said.  On the other hand, the house is quiet and MINE for a whole six hours or so.

I added a few new paintings to the floodline, if you are interested and more will be going in as the week moves forward!

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I am so excited to announce that I will be hosting a ‘Girl Crush Art Workshop and Tea Party’ in my studio along with the lovely lady behind the amazing blog The Jealous Curator.   The idea for these workshops came out of a post she did for sfgirlbybay here and a  ‘post about how fun it would be to have an artsy “girl crush tea party”.  The day in my studio will be on Saturday, June 9th.

The why of it:

To walk away from our computers, and actually meet in person for a glorious, creative, pastry-filled day. To figure out a way to break through artist blocks. To get inspired, and recharged. To celebrate being women artists… and obviously, to have a reason to eat lots of pretty little cakes & tarts in the middle of the day!

The artists she has lined up are pretty amazing (Allyson Fox, Lisa Congdon and Samantha French)  and I feel pretty honored to be chosen as the Portland artist to host.

You can go here to sign up and see more about what we will be doing that day, I can’t wait.  I hope you can make i!

I just came across this artist working with soot on pinterest, which led me to this video on design milk.  You must watch.  Even though the method I use in my floodline series is very different, I find myself inspired to continue pushing my work, always a good thing.

We have snow in the forecast this weekend (though I always take that with a grain of salt around here).  It would be nice to have a light dusting so we can sit around with hot cocoa in front of the fire.  Other than looking with hopeful eyes to the sky, my goals for the weekend are:  a lovely breakfast with almond croissants and dark coffee, some time to finish up a couple of portraits, work on some new floodline pieces and watch this movie.  Do you have any exciting plans for the weekend?

image via

Sometimes I get pie for the family to have for dessert just so I can have a piece for breakfast the next day.

I’m having quite the love affair/obsession/fascination with creating these pieces.  Here are a few more…

I was just doing my daily look around the blog world and came upon one of my pieces (boy in the black bow tie) in Victoria’s house, which also happens to be featured in the current West Elm catalog!  Double yay!

How’s your Monday going so far?   I finally feel back up to speed after the holiday’s.  I plan to do an update in my floodline shop this week, so check back!

Happy New Year!  I took the last week or so to just completely unwind with no expectations on myself.  It felt good.  Now, I’m ready to look forward again and be inspired and make new work.  Here are a few pieces I just completed in my floodline series.

 a wonderful holiday!

via

I’m nearing my last few days of getting orders out before I can relax and enjoy the holidays!  Tonight I’m hosting a little dinner party for a group of moms I have been friends with since my daughter was just a baby, so ten years!  I am so grateful to be able to count this group of women as friends.  We have evolved over the years from a weekly playgroup for the kids to a book club.  We’ve seen each other through births and deaths.

So I thought I include my favorite holiday tradition for our party, Christmas crackers.  This year I decided to make my own and while more work, definitely worth it, I think.  You can find a ton of tutorials on the actual process. I watched a few on you tube and I bought supplies from here.  The fun part, though, is filling them.  I bought fun cocktail rings for each cracker and included the traditional crown and joke, as well.

My days lately are filled with a little bit of this

and a little bit of that