Last night, Tom and I had the great pleasure of hearing his high school friend, musician Piers Faccini play at the Flynn Theater in Burlington. His music, a unique blend of celtic, west african and eastern influences, is amazing. Not to mention the fact that he is just a thouroughly nice guy. If the chance to hear him (touring with Ben Harper- also fantastic) comes along, be sure not to miss it. You can check out both his music AND his paintings(!!) at his website: www.piersfaccini.com

The snowflakes are now available for viewing at: http://www.robertssnow.com. Take a look! There are some great ones out there and all proceeds go to Dana Farber Cancer Institute. Unfortunately, this year's auction will be bitter-sweet, as Robert Mercer, for whom the project is named, succumbed to cancer in August.

Here's the backside of the snowflake. I have finished and am just about ready to pack it up and put it in the mail.

For the third year, I am participating in an online auction called Robert's Snow for Cancer's Cure. This is an online auction organized by children's book author/illustrator Grace Lin (www.gracelin.com) after her husband was diagnosed with cancer. The proceeds of this auction of beautifully illustrated snowflakes made by children's book illustrators go to Dana Farber Cancer Institute. You can find out more at: http://www.jimmyfund.org/eve/event/roberts-snow/default.html
This is the front of my snowflake.

Spring is here and we are raising chickens for their eggs. We have four adorable chicks. Believe it or not, you can order the chicks online and they arrive in the mail. I got a phone call from the post office at 6:45 am and went to pick them up right away. They were only two days old. We had split an order of chicks with two other families since there is a 25 chick minimum.
Here's a photo of Edie and the Black Australorp chick, and one of me with a chick roosting on my shoulder.

This is a thumbnail image for a promotional piece. The size will be about 1" square, which required me to strip all unnecessary detail.

There's something so charming and interesting about the art of children. Edie who is four is interested in drawing animals and rainbows, while Thomas, who is six, is interested in things with engines and wheels. Here are a couple of examples of their art. Edie's is a quiet scene of ducks in a pond. Thomas' is accompanied by his invented spelling describing the scene as: The monster truck went off the jump.

So, I have had a little free time and have gotten out the sewing machine. This is a dress I made for Edie's doll out of old fabric that my friend's mother had once intended to make into curtains.

Happy Spring!? Today is the 12th of April and it is snowing again! I am thinking ahead to warmer days and working on a May Day invitation for my friend. Though I do love snow, I hope it will all be gone by then. Here are a couple of gnomes that I came up with:

Edie went to a party on Sunday where there was a face painter. Here she is modeling her dog face.

Today, Edie and I got to go visit my friend Tiny's baby goats, Luna and Prank. They were born at about breakfast time this morning. It is amazing to me that they can walk around and have a full coat of fur at birth. Thomas was bald until he was about one, I think.

I was sorting through all of the art that my kids bring home from school and I found this. It's just a doodle that I did at the end of the day when they were a little younger. Maybe a little glimpse of parenthood at the witching hour.

On my most recent project, I've decided to do something new with color. I discovered a way of working using only a warm and a cool shade of each primary color (6 colors total- cerulean blue and french ultramarine, etc...), supplemented by a couple of extra colors that aren't mixable.
Theoretically, mixing only the same temperature primaries together will produce clean bright secondary and tertiary colors. So far I have been able to mix just about every color that I have wanted and a black that has far more depth than anything I had previously used. I found the information on the Daniel Smith website: http://danielsmith.com/
Choose the learn tab, and you will find all kinds of useful information.

The frustrations of planting a pumpkin.

Here's a recent sketch from a reader. Can you guess what the story might be?

I am working on a project that needs to be done in pen and ink and watercolor. This is my old style, and now I know why I switched. I much prefer the warmth of pencil line.

I am trying to infuse a little personality into the mice I have been drawing. Here's a little spot I finished for my trip.

Darn, I wish I knew what the future will look like. It would make this job a whole lot easier.

Color version of homepage. Unfortunate scanner shadow-must eliminate...