Caught this one just in time!

Thank you God for such lovely colors!!

That, of course, was my workout for the day.

The best picture today is one, that maybeis a bit obscure and abstract.

We had an ice storm last night, and then this morning, everything was iced over.

Around noon though, the temperature rose, and everything started to drip and melt.

This picture captures the bubbles of air behind a sheet of ice, over the tree trunk, as water rushed down and it melted off all the branches.

It was a beautiful moment, perhaps better if it had been captured on film.  It was, however, reminiscent of spring for me, and perhaps that is why I liked it so much!

What do you think?

We also had beautiful ice patterns over frozen pine bushes

Another spring looking budding tree…

cute boy eating ice…

and strong boys showing off a very big fallen branch!

What’s your favorite thing about winter?

Meanwhile, my love was supposed to arrive today, but again, the snow played a part in his delay, and he is stuck in Oklahoma, and will only be arriving very late tomorrow.

Please pray for traveling mercies and no more delays!!

Neither did I, of course.

But alas, we had to go to Willik’s bass lessons in the evening.

Before going, I had to salt the driveway because some of the remaining snow was becoming ice.

When I went out, I spotted the sunset colors.

We live on a main road, with houses blocking the sunset’s view, but the colors were so beautiful I figured this was my only chance to at least capture a little color today.

This is what I got.  It doesn’t do justice to God’a amazing creativity and sense of color, but it’s close to what my eyes saw…

8″x10″ pen and colored pencils on bristol paper

I should have photographed my process, but by the time I thought of it, it was too late.

(approx. 5″x7″ watecolor on watercolor moleskine)

Mixed with this painting, comes a lesson.  Something about transience, and our inability to keep things the same.  I’m still learning and processing it.

This tree in our backyard went from this…

to this,

in about a week.

It turned yellow just as I was starting 30 Places, so in my mind, I made a mental note to paint this in the next month.  I had no idea how fast this…

…would happen.

It was a matter of a couple days.

I started sketching the tree when it had probably half of it’s leaves, but by the next morning, when I went to paint it, it had less than a quarter.

It was extremely fun and enjoyable to paint, even though it took me several days to actually get it done.

And as is often, when I approach something I haven’t done in a while, I feel a small trepidation.  Doubts about my inabilities.  But once I start to do it, as with this watercolor piece in my moleskine, I am amazed at how my skills in the medium come back to me, and I am thankful to God for my talent.