Petals, paintings and Plein Air… Oh My!

Last Saturday, I had a wonderful time painting plein air at Eisenhower Rose Garden during the Petals at their Peak event. After a short rain shower in the early morning, the weather was absolutely perfect for sitting out with the beautiful blooms and painting into the afternoon. Who knew the weather would be breezy and in the 70’s in the middle of July?! We had cloud cover for most of the morning and then at the very end, the sun came out… just in time to add some brighter highlights to my painting!

While I didn’t do a timelapse video of this one, I did manage to take a few progress photos if you are interested in the process:

I brought my HIMI gouache set, the first time I’ve painted with it since arriving in town this month. The vibrant colors were perfect for the subject matter. I had to switch gears mentally, as I have been using watercolors exclusively this month (the easiest medium for camper living!) but after a bit, it was easy to adapt. I really can’t wait to get back to my acrylics and canvas soon, but this watercolor/gouache journey has been helping me revisit some painting fundamentals…always a good practice!

This was my first time using my plein air pack….a Swiss Army backpack that I’ve filled with everything I need for painting on the go. Along with some essentials like collapsible brushes and water vessels, my favorite items include a nearly weightless folding chair that fits in the backpack (I can’t believe how small this thing gets while staying comfortable), a folding easel and small tripod for taking video. The whole pack weighs less than 10 lbs and has everything I need for a day of watercolors anywhere I can hike to! Maybe once I get my youtube channel up and running, I will do a video going through my plein air pack with my reviews and recommendations for how to build one of your own.

The Petals at their Peak event was also a great time for me to meet some locals in my new town, and I had some great conversations while I painted. I really love this community so far and I can’t wait to meet more people. I have to give a special thanks to Samantha at the Dickinson County Arts Council for hosting this event and inviting me to come. It was such a pleasant day!!

To anyone visiting Abilene in the warmer months, I highly recommend stopping by Eisenhower Park to see the spectacular flowers and plants. Its quite impressive!! Here are a few of the photos that Johnny and I took while we were there. Plenty of inspiration for future paintings here as well!!

Other Stuff

There is a lot going on in our lives right now as we prepare to move into our new house next week. What a fun and wild ride this month has been!! Camper life has been an adventure and in some ways a challenge, but I’m thankful for every step of this journey and for the beautiful space that we’ve been able to stay in while we’ve been waiting for our house to be ready.

At the camper, I’ve continued to work on my PrairieLore paintings, as well as other watercolor projects inspired by the beautiful land that surrounds us here. I’ve been wrestling with a piece called “Heart Land” which is an anatomical heart with elements of the Midwest landscape worked into it, but I’m not happy with the proportions yet. I‘ll keep wrestling with it until I’m happy enough to offer it as a print.

In the meantime, I’ve posted several other new prints available to order in the shop, edited my MiniPrint cards to include some unique PrairieLore info, and soon I’ll be going through some older pieces and preparing them for printing. These are the prints I’ve posted just from the last ten days:

Next event on my calendar is that I’ll be teaching a painting class to a group of travelers from Abilene’s Sister City in Japan, Omitama. We’ll be painting a majestic buffalo in front of a brilliant Kansas sunset (seen below). I’m so excited about this opportunity to share the joy of creativity with people across the barriers of culture, language and distance (and happy to get back to teaching painting once again). The Sister City group will also get to meet some real buffalo at a ranch on the morning of our painting class, and later that evening, they will be riding a float in the Central Kansas Free Fair parade. What an exciting day for them learning about life in the Great Plains!

The fair kicks off this week and I’m so excited to experience this quintessential Abilene event for the first time. Of course, in the midst of all this we will be moving, so hopefully I’ll have a little time to enjoy the fair as well. As you know, moving is a difficult, expensive and exhausting process (not to mention the month spent in hotels and AirBnBs while waiting for our house), so if you’ve ever wanted to support a small business artist by purchasing some art or prints…this would be a GREAT time! Or order a commission, custom design work…get your special project on my calendar before it fills up. As soon as we get into our house on August 1st, I’ll be setting up my studio space and returning to regularly scheduled commissions.

Support artists and keep creating beautiful things!