Mouse of Spring

I have painted two new minis (I’ll post the other soon) for a show of tiny art. So excited that the largest size allowed is 4″ x 4″! So mine will look large 😀

With “Mouse of Winter” painted previously, I decided to paint a couple more mice to make up my three pieces for this multi-artist show. This spring mouse is surrounded by apple blossoms so sweet. Even when painting very small I like to use all my usual techniques such as adding thick paint and scratching back into the surface. I sure hope they dry in time!

Blooming at the Edge

I took photos of an apple tree in bloom by the ocean a while ago and finally decided it needed to be a painting. It seemed so fragile there in a way and yet obviously had been surviving in that location for a long time.

I live on one of the Gulf Islands off Canada’s West coast. After a recent winter storm, we were out of power for about a day. No big deal. We’re used to that. But then, our main (actually only) communications line hit the main power line (both crossing from one island to another) in the wind and ended up in the ocean. No phone land lines, no wifi and very little cell phone service with sporadic access to data …and most importantly – no 911 service. Five days later we got a temporary fix. Anyway, all that to say “Blooming at the Edge” is sometimes a more active struggle than you might think!

Blossom Bee

This sweet bumble bee and apple blossoms painting is another mini. The spring this year has been unusually cold and damp with sightings of pollinators being few and far between. Then recently we had a warmer, sunnier day and there they were – all different sizes and types of bees in the garden. It made me feel so good that I wanted to paint a celebratory bee painting. Hope you enjoy!

Apple Blossoms

Playing with twisting branch shapes and spring blooms, this was done from my imagination. It is a very freeing way to work! …And a bee because then you can smell the apple blossoms and hear the hummmm of activity when looking at the painting.

Here is Tom’s delightful haiku for this piece.

crooked branches trace
stark shapes across winter sky
where bees buzz in spring

The Old Crabapple

This one started as a few abstract squiggles and evolved into a memory of a tree from the farm I grew up on. An old gnarled tree, it was really tall for a crabapple. It was gloriously covered in blossoms in the spring and small hard fruit in the fall that my mother made mysteriously delicious jelly from.

Tom’s poem is just perfect for it.

Four-score and ten: my season’s span
from summer warmth to winter snows
from spring’s first bud to autumn’s fan
of drying leaves. My circle’s closed

by blossoms blousing in the breeze
which grow to apples in the heat
turned hard and tart by fall’s first sneeze
then frost like diamonds dusts my feet.

Four-score and ten: my season’s span
’til hence I go where I began.

Green Tea Doodles

take some time for tea and check out my doodles

apple blossoms