Merry Christmas and Family Update

It is a very different holiday this year.  I am just home from babysitting the grand kids.....(legs of the twin girls all set for the holidays!)

Lilia and Bindley (taken in Mexico in October)

Nina Kate

                                       Sophie Jane.....

I am truly blessed!  Little grandson (below with his beautiful mother) is in Idaho and I hope to see him this spring!

I love these young families!

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I had been home a week Saturday, when Mom had a stroke and fell.  We have been up at the hospital the last few days.  Now she is in rehab and may get to come home with a day pass for Christmas.

This is my first morning at home, I will try to get to yoga, visit Mom, and then head to my part-time job  [.Below my brother, a nurse, is adjusting Mom's sensor lines, earlier this week]

Hope to post again soon, we have a trip to San Francisco coming up to celebrate a 95th birthday of an aunt!

A struggle but fun!

I've been painting with watercolor,

struggling to stay loose, have a good composition (always hard for me) and trying to capture the beautiful blooms of the amaryllis!

 The beautiful colors of the paints and how they "flow" with water makes doing this very delightful for me.  Before beginning this painting, on 140 lb. cold-pressed paper, I used a white parafin candle to make marks on the white paper....nothing I could see with the naked eye, but this is a "resist" which will not take the paint.
So, as I paint, these strokes emerge to add an element of their own to my work.
Looking at the painting above, I could see I had done it again,  placed two objects barely touching...."the kiss of death" to a good composition.   SO, I have now added some more green blades coming up infront of the turquoise pot.  making the amaryllis come forward in the painting. ....I'm getting there!

It helps to see these together on the computer screen, more needed adjustments may be seen then (now?).

Today is a Christmas potluck luncheon at my mom's church.  We will go and enjoy the great food and fun!

I have to run to the store and get ingredients for Texas Caviar to take along.  Having just read an article about how healthy it is to eat beans, (they fight fat! Yeah!) this recipe seems like a good choice!

So, the version I am using is from this blogger's recipe except I will use black beans rather than black-eyed peas. [and I may use yellow corn instead of white, even add some avocado if I find one that is ripe!]  I will make it again for New Year's with the black-eyed peas.

Not that I'm catching up.....or anything.....

I'm not much of a blogger lately.  It all started when Blogger made changes which have been hard for me to work with.  Then we changed to a different camera and I haven't made that transition well either.

Last week, I took an even different gadget, my new iPad, along to my daughter's where I was to babysit 4 grandchildren while their parents had brief break in the Caribbean.  

So, I have lots of photos now on the iPad, but haven't been able to publish the blog posts from it...[.I'm still learning, and "yes" I do have the book  iPad for Dummies for Seniors!]

It was an intense week, and almost fun....I'm just not used to being "on" all the time...but do LOVE those grandkids!

At 18 months the twins are amazing! Nina Kate is on top of everything and never misses a beat. Here she is checking out the ornaments on the tree which her mom had just decorated before I was to leave.

Sophie Jane is a real brunette beauty and quite willing to be laid back and to let Nina be the boss...[I would post photos of Sophie, too, but have still to transer them to this computer.]

Once I got home, I was delighted to see that our amaryllis is bursting with color! Now I am doing some watercolor paintings of it. [photos to come, I hope!]

And I was also able to get our tree set up.  This year we have a quiet "empty nest" Christmas, but I don't think that will be too bad after all the "excitement" I have had recently!

May you all have a wonderful season and a time of blessings in the coming year!