"An Easy Start"- Floral

12"x16" oil on Belgian linen mounted on archival panel

"No gift to your mother can ever equal her gift to you - life."

- anonymous

"An ounce of mother is worth a ton of priest."- Spanish proverb

"There's a lot more to being a woman than being a mother, but there's a hell of a lot more to being a mother than most people suspect." -Roseanne Barr

"Other things may change us, but we start and end with family." -Anthony Brandt

It's been a busy week, shipping out two paintings that were dry and ready to ship, framing up another one that's ready to deliver next. And of course, painting. "An Easy Start" is a little larger than most in my current series of florals (the Sunshine Series). It pictures what I imagine to be an 'easy start' to a day, flowers, and a cup of something hot, perhaps a lump or two of sugar if you prefer?

I also knew that with my time restraints this week from other appointments, that I might take a bit longer to finish this one. So instead of the Cremnitz white that I usually use, I did use Titanium white on this one. Some of the attendees at my demo last Saturday might recall that I usually use Cremnitz white in my work. It is a lead based paint that really has a wonderful consistency and sets up within a day or so, without the stickiness that some alkyd paints have, or runnyness that an alkyd medium might have. This painting, I knew I didn't want it drying too fast on me, so back to the Titanium white paint. Now it will probably take several weeks to dry to the touch on the surface.

Some of my blog readers might remember that last summer I did a little 'white paint experiment' testing out just about every type of white oil paint out there. They do vary by brand and by color name. Each has it's own particular qualities, thicknesses, opaqueness vs. transparency, & drying times. It's useful to know what you can expect out of the tube that you buy. As an artist, you'll find it so helpful to know your materials as well as you can.

*****I hope you enjoy your Mother's Day weekend- whether you are a mom, or are spending time with your mom....or honoring the memory of her, or even being a 'stand-in mom' of sorts to those you love. I think Roseanne Barr would agree, it's a lot more complicated than many would suspect!

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