Cat Scratch

"There's Just Something About Cats"

I scrapped my book cover painting. I had sent it to my great friend Barb, who is a wonderful watercolorist and my mentor, for critique, you can see her beautiful paintings at http://www.barbarasailor.blogspot.com/ . Before she could get back to me the more I looked, the less I liked. It now resides at the botom of the pile. I've decided to give it a rest for a couple of days and then start again. Grrrr! But, this gave me an opportunity to begin a painting of a picture that appeared in a newspaper in 2006. Barb and I decided to each paint the picture and trade it with each other. It is so great to have a friend who has the same watercolor passion that I do. We met on line after she made a comment concerning a painting I had submitted to a site we both paint once a quarter for http://www.watercolorpassion.com/ . I encourage you to check out this site for some great watercolor paintings. I live on the northeast coast of Brazil in Fortaleza, a city of 2 plus million. Since I live only 2 blocks from the ocean and the city lies behind me this Colorado ranch girl has no sense of so much teeming city life behind me. Oddly enough, watercolor is not popular here, which means I have yet to make acquaintance with fellow watercolor painters. For this reason my friendship with Barb is especially wonderful. Yesterday, I stepped outside my norm and introduced you to my son Pat. But now I am back on track. I mentioned that I love Chickens as well as my cats and posted a few "Chicken" paintings. Today, is Cat Day. I am terrible at doing faces, whether human or animal, you will notice that my cats are in silhouette with a couple of exceptions, so I didn't have to worry about their faces. I'm so clever. The following are figments of my imagination. A friend once told me that my cat paintings are "happy cats" and I believe he is right. This first picture is one of my first attempts at painting a cat. I have no idea how his nose got so big, it just happened, but I love it and he and his mate ended up, not only in this painting, but on several pieces of my pottery. I've titled this painting "Contented"

"Afternoon Snooze" "Dreaming of Summer" "At Peace"

You can click on the smaller images to enlarge them.

"Curiosity"

"Who Are Those Guys?"

I hope you have enjoyed seeing some of my Cat paintings. I apologize for the angle of the framed ones, I'm a painter, not a photographer. I saved an article yesterday on how to take pictures of your art for digital processing. Guess I'd better read it! And now for the Real Deal. Say "hellow" to L'il Orphan Annie, "Annie". She is the baby of the family of cats. Some one had dumped her off on my street. Probably heard I was this weird old cat lady who couldn't pass up a poor little stranded stray. She rode underneath my Blazer for over a mile to the gas station, where a good Samaritan helped me rescue her. Her little paw was bleeding. She was so little she barely filled up my cupped hand. I took her home, but it was too late for my vet. Next morning I took her in. He fixed her paw and put it in a cast. Well, having a sweet, playful little kitten around for 2 weeks was a time too long. When it came time to take her to the pet store where they had agreed to sell her to a good home, well you know, I couldn't. Dance with the Cats.

Water Alternatives

A Walk "Under" the Water

My son, Pat, and I are both connected to water, but in very different ways. I like to mix color with my water in little puddles on a pallet and he likes to dive right in the really huge puddles. He is an Underwater Welder and his work day is below the surface of oceans all over the world.

Meet my son Pat.

Some years ago he called me and said I thought you'd like to know that I'm thinking of going to school in Texas. I told him I thought that was nice. He said, "yah, Mom, I'm going to learn how to work underwater"! That certainly got my attention. Underwater? No, no I don't think that's a very good idea at all. I must live by the ocean, but I don't want to be in the ocean. I have a fear of water that has stayed with me since childhood. I must have done a pretty good job of not instilling my fear of water in my kids, because here is my youngest wanting to work underwater, of all things. Well, this was close to my worst nightmare. I didn't come right out and say "ARE YOU STUPID!", but I certainly was thinking it. I asked what kind of work will you do underwater. I was then beginning to envision the romance of the seas, hunting sunken pirate ships, finding fabulous treasures or maybe researching the bounty the sea had to offer. He pulled me out of my reverie saying, " I'm going to learn to weld underwater." Right, and tell me Pat, exactly how do you propose to light a flame underwater? That's what I'm going to school to learn!"

And learn he did! This and the following pictures were taken in the Gulf of Mexico. He does indeed weld underwater. Hurricane Katrina not only devastated on shore, but she also created havoc off shore, oil rigs and pipe lines must be repaired on the ocean floor. This has been keeping dives very busy.

It's imperative that all the equipment is in excellent working condition and that everything works perfectly on their hat. The divers have an air tank, called a "bail out" on their backs, for emergencies. They must have complete trust in their top side support. Air must be regulated and hoses kept free of encumbrances Pat started out as a "Tender", one who "tends" the divers. Eventually, he managed to log the number of required dives and was promoted.

His work has given him the opportunity to see much of the world. He has worked off the coasts of Africa, India. Thailand and the coast of Mexico. He will soon be going to Trinidad. Flying to his work has given him the opportunity to stay over and visit London, Paris, Johannesburg, cities in Ghana etc. They work under contract for a certain length of time from a couple of weeks up to 90 days offshore. They work from an incredibly huge barge, which is like a small city. He's said that some of the barges actually have a restaurant on them. From what he has told me, they eat very well and read a lot of books. Since I read a lot as well as paint he has suggested some great authors to me that I might not have otherwise read. Wilbur Smith is one of those authors. His novels take place mostly in Africa and are excellent reads. For the past Christmas he gave me books by Smith. A thrilling gift! The Courtney series, the Ballentine series and the Egyptian series and a lot of stand alone books. Obviously I am quite proud of him and his accomplishments. I try not to worry, but hey, I'm a Mom, it's my job to worry a little bit. Especially since his job is waaaay below the surface of the seas. In October he was sent to work in Boston Harbor, just in time for the early winter snows and freezing weather there. The divers used wet suits that had hot water circulating through them. He was also there for the World Series, but had to watch it on t.v. As you can tell my knowledge of working underwater is very limited, but it has been perhaps somewhat informative and certainly outside my norm of Brasil and my watercolor paintings. I have encouraged him to begin his own Blog along with some of his diver friends. I think it would be very interesting from such a personal point of view. Working underwater in construction is not an every day job, nor is it one of those of jobs where you can sit on the sidewalk bleachers during lunch hour and watch the men at work. Till tomorrow, dance with the moon.

Relax it's Sunday

"My Little Red Hen"

It's so quiet on Sundays here. Very little traffic, no vendors on our street. In fact it's so quiet you can almost hear the ocean. We can hear it at night around 2 in the morning. Then 2 o'clock comes on a Sunday afternoon and we get serenaded. The band at the military complex a block behind us cranks up and we listen to American "oldies but goodies" 'til around 6 p.m. It is a walk down nostalgia lane. I really have no reason to miss home. Two blocks down on our street there is a McDonalds and one block from there on the Beira Mar there is a new Pizza Hut. One block down and one block over is Blockbuster Video. All the comforts of home!! There is even a Texaco convenience store and gas station one block down from us. Texaco is an interesting word in Portuguese. It is pronounced Tah-schock-o. Took me awhile to get my head around that one. I spent the afternoon completing the book jacket commission I've been working on. I will submit a picture of it tomorrow and hope for the best. Not only do I love cats, but I also love chickens. We raised 3 red hens and one giant beautiful rooster in our back yard. They loved Swiss Chard and every time one of us would go out to tend the garden or pick vegetables for dinner they would line up at their fence and "cluck" like mad for their daily dose of Swiss Chard. The next year we planted a row especially for them. They returned our kindness in their kind, big beautiful brown eggs.

I didn't think it would be cost

effective to bring chickens with me to Brasil, besides they really weren't "house broken"! Cats remain my favorite animal. They are incredibly independent and two of my cats are downright snotty! But I put up with them. I got tired of the supermarket always being out of the food they like and the cat litter I buy, so I called a pet store not too far away. They not only deliver the food and litter, but they also have a pet grooming business attached to their store as well as a vet. One day when the owner delivered the food he saw my cats and remarked how beautiful and long their hair was. I laughed and said it was so hot I was tempted to have them shaved, thinking that was a joke. He said that he has many customers who have their long haired cats shaved. So the next day he came and picked up all five cats. They all got shampooed, claws trimmed and 3 of them got shaved. They came back smelling soooo good and all had little bows on them. And Goldie, Murphy and Gabbie strutted around for days showing off their new short haired summer coats. An interesting side note; the total bill for all that came to 68 U.S. dollars!

"Feeding the Chickens"

I apologize for the empty space at the end of each one of my posts. I'm not sure why it is like that. I haven't found any explanation for it yet. Bear with me and if you want to see the previous post, just continue to scroll down. This is a new experience for me and I'm learning as I go. May all your Sundays be filled with an afternoon dance.

Saturday Projects

Washing Clothes, Cleaning House, Defrosting the Refrigerator. . .Nah ! I'd rather paint and then, go back to my really good read. I mentioned earlier that I was going to begin a painting that is totally outside my box. It is a composite picture. But as it became time to begin painting, courage when down the drain. So I reproduced one of the elements and painted it. Reproducing from brain to paper sometimes poses problems for me. It is somewhat incomplete and I didn't reach the richness of the colors I wanted, but courage is building.

I decided to use my Print Shop to reproduce this image and in Photo enhancement I used Colorization to see what it looks like in different colors or just plain negative. I think it's fun to alter a paining with out a lot of effort.

Now if I could just pick up my brush and click a button on my forehead. . .Anyway, I thought you might like to see how this looks after being altered through Print Shop. This is not how I would choose to paint it. I did several different ones but for some reason this is the only one that I could import into this. Actually, I'm better known as "computer illiterate". I find the most incredible things on the computer, mostly by accident. Then I never could find them again until my son explained some very rudimentary rules of saving things. His comment was - Duh!!

Just got back from taking a break. We went down to Beira Mar (the beach street) to have these incredibly good Italian ice cream cones. Double dip, of curse (misspelling intended). Very fattening, they wouldn't be good otherwise, now would they?

I should explain "we". My son's fiancee and her 9 yr. old daughter, Melissa, live with me while my son is offshore working as an underwater welder. For the time being he is based out of Louisiana and has been working primarily in the Gulf of Mexico. "We", also includes my 5 cats, but I don't allow them walks on the beach nor double dip ice cream cones. There is a saying that "thousands of years ago Cats were worshiped as Gods. Cats have never forgotten that." I believe it's true. Anyone owning a cat has surely experienced that God like attitude that cats have.

"Crocks and Cans"

I am also working on a commission piece, a jacket design for a Christian Book. This is exciting and very challenging for me. The book has been completed and is now being edited, so I am under a

bit of time constraint. If, at some point, I am allowed, I will post it.

"Coffee and the Word"

I painted Coffee and the Word last year for my dear sister in law, Natalie, who lives in Colorado and still haven't gotten it to her. I think it would be good if she came here to get it. Yes I do!

TGIF

Friday Night - Beach Night Evenings on the beach are the best. The weather is usually always balmy with a light breeze. Even when it rains we just squeeze closer over the big umbrella that covers our table. We go to our favorite kiosk "Satéhut" which is just down our street two blocks. There is a huge wide promenade along the beach with kiosk's along the way. Ice cold beer, or a Brasilian drink, Caipringa. It is made with pure sugar cane alcohol, fresh squeezed limes and lots of lime slices and sugar. They are very good, but two is the limit. They are potent. While we sit and listen to music and converse, vendors come to our table to sell anything and everything from cigarette to hammocks. We have made friends with a lot of the vendors, so they will stop to chat. Francisco sells carved wood items. He was excited because he and his wife were expecting. When the baby was born he couldn't wait to tell us and show us pictures of the baby. His wife is deaf, which poses some problems when he is working. They have to make arrangements for afamily member to be there when Francisco is working. Vendors on the beach ar some of the hardest working people I know of. From around 9 or 10 in the morning they are walking the beach. If you have walked any distance in the sun and hot sand then you know how hard it can be. They are carrying their wares in huge bags, leather flip flops, "flips", clothing, food, and people like Francisco who carrys a huge bag full of carved wood and they are still working at night. I have much empathy for how hard they work. And it seems they always have a smile for you. Francisco

"Daniel"

"Our collection of Flips"

Hope you enjoy your Friday night. I will leave you with a painting of "Jake's Room

"Jake's Room"

Wednesday, Soup Day

Growing up , Wednesday was always Soup Day. Didn't matter what the weather was like, except for Chile. It always had to be a cold snowy day or dark rainy day for Chile

"Soups On"

Several years ago I started a series I call "Blue Horse" for greeting cards. I decided Blue Horse needed a friend, and about a year ago I added Butch(the barn cat).

"Blue Horse and Butch (the barn cat) Getting Acquainted"

"Blue Horse and Butch (the barn cat) A Little to the Left, Please"

I don't seem to have any firm nitch where my art is concerned. But, I guess that is okay. In the long run what really matters to me at this time in my life is that I have paper, paint, brushes and a great passion to put them to use. I like to make little boxes out of water color paper to give away to friends or family members. Below are a couple of them.

Just Another Day in Paradise

"You Touched Me...and I Grew"

I submitted these little purple flowers to http://www.watercolorpassion.com/ where every quarter Maury Kettel who started the site over 10 years ago and manages it posts a subject for painting. I submitted my first painting over a year ago. If you like watercolor art it is a fun site to peruse. If you are a watercolor artist you can join in by simply submitting your painting of the subject for that quarter. There are so many wonderful sites to inspire you as an artist, or teach you new techniques and to challenge you to work outside the box. I have also met artists who have become wonderful friends.

"Sleeping Cat"

I love cats. I have 5 house kitties. I used to feed all the stray cats in our neighborhood and one winter a mother racoon and 4 of her babies discovered the cat food, and I couldn't turn them away. They were voracious eaters and kept me broke buying the food.