I painted for a couple of hours today and this time I'm trying to inject more color into my work.  My last picture was critiqued as having too many mid tones, and I have to say that I agree with this assessment.   It looks flat and uninteresting.  I'm liking what I have done so far on the current project, we'll see how the finished article looks!

Well I finished my bridge over the river today.  I took the photograph while we were visiting family in England but I can't remember exactly where we were at the time.  I'm sure I made a note of the place at the time but I seem to have mislaid the note!

This picture is actually 11" x 11" square which is a change for me, but I had a frame and mat that I wanted to use, so I did the picture to fit.  Because of that it was a bit difficult to photograph and shows the mat at the top and bottom but not at the sides.

Update:  I have now found the note I made, and it seems that the location of this bridge is in Bourne, Lincolnshire.

This weekend I didn't get any painting done, but we did drive down to Plymouth to go to the gallery opening of the artist that I have taken a couple of weekend workshops with.  It was a bit of a rush because we were already committed to driving some friends to Manchester airport which is 20 miles in the other direction.  However, we managed it and were glad that we did.  Her art is wonderful and I think the gallery opening was quite successful.

Today I have been working on a piece that I started last week.  It's a river scene from a photo taken during a visit to England.  I may get it finished tomorrow and post it here then.

I competed this today.  I don't like it at all, I couldn't seem to get the effect I was looking for, not sure why, though it could be because I was using a light grey Sansfix paper which is totally different from anything I have used before and I didn't care for it.   Now I guess I can be accused of being a bad worker who blames her tools!!

The scene itself is from a photo taken over 25 years ago when my husband and I were first married.  It's in Derbyshire, England which was a favorite hiking area for us at that time.  In the actual photo I am crossing the stones with our dog Ria, and I did attempt to include us in the pastel painting but I didn't like it and went back and erased us.

Well, I finished my picture of the Luhan House in Taos, New Mexico.  I didn't take this photograph myself, so I have to assume that this is the driveway leading up to the house.  I really struggled with this one, the shadows gave me so much trouble. I completely erased the driveway twice and restarted, but I'm still not happy with the result.

I have spent most of this afternoon working on a picture taken in Taos, New Mexico of an adobe building.  It's quite a way from being finished and I'm struggling with it because it has lots of shadows.  However, I am persevering. 

Today I have ordered some more art supplies from Dick Blick my preferred source, mostly sanded paper and a few more pastels.  Sanded paper is wonderful to work on, it takes so many layers of pastel.

I just finished this one this morning.  It's one of the selected pictures for the April Landscape Challenge on Wet Canvas.  I was attracted to it because of the colors and I love doing water and reflections.  It's the River Wenatchee in Washington State.

It's a beautiful day outside, so I think I'll put my painting aside for today and get out in the yard and potter about in the dirt.