They loved it! Lisa started crying almost immediately and Skip just kept saying ‘Wow’.

I called her on our way there, and said I wanted to call on Christmas Eve because I knew she’d be busy Christmas Day. She asked what we were doing, and I told her we were going over to visit friends for a little bit. :) Jon was driving and snickering quietly while I was talking to her. After I got off the phone with her, I called her Mom (who knew about it) and told her that we were on our way there. She said she’d meet us there.

Oh, the look on Skip’s face when he answered the door! And the look on Lisa’s face when she saw us. Too perfect. They had Jason open up the box, and I think she started to get an idea as soon as one flap was opened up.

We were there for about an hour, and both of them just kept looking at the painting. Lisa had it on her lap most of the time, and Skip was talking about that day.

I’m so glad they liked it. And it was worth dealing with the cold and snow just to see the look on their faces.

Well, I didn’t win with this piece, but what can ya do? I think the judges were not ‘realism’ people, due to the pieces they did pick. That’s always a gamble with shows.

I did, however, get a LOT of wonderful comments on this piece. One of the employees actually asked the organizer to have me come down and talk to her when I could. She raved about it, and said she stopped to look at it every time she went by it, said she just was enthralled with it. That felt good.

Keep an eye out for the next update. We’re actually planning on going up for Christmas now! I get to deliver it to her in person! :D Just hope nothing happens to not make it work out.

It’s done! I hit that point with brush in hand, paint on the brush, where I looked around the painting and said ‘Wow, I’m finished!’ I’ve come to loved that point, but feel a little remorse at it as well. This was one of my favorite pieces to work on, really only second to Memphis. There are a lot of little detail stuff here, so click on the image to see a bigger version of it.

Now I just need to keep it quiet until December.

The finished piece.

I’ve gotten more work done on Skip and Jason, and I’m quite pleased with how they’re coming out. Thank the gods for Jon, he’s a great help with some of my color work. People are not something I do much of, so it takes a little more work for me.

And no more ghost boy!

More work on the people.

Cruising right along here! Jon keeps calling Jason ‘ghost boy’ because there’s no color in the body yet. :)

Something not quite right about Skip, but I’ll figure it out. Going to work on Jason some first, then I’ll go back for adjustments on both of them.

Closeup of the people.

I finished the ducks, and wanted to give a closeup of them. I’m pleased at how they’ve turned out! Hard to not put a lot of detail in them, but I managed it.

A closeup on the ducks.

I’m seriously making good time on this. I’m planning on putting this in the art show I entered last year with Modern Old Memphis, and time is short. But it’s also just flowing out, which is good.

Got the people in (traced over from paper), and the sign and the start of the ducks. I had to call my friend to find out if they were ducks or geese, and had to kinda fib my way through why I wanted to know. She said ducks, so I’m going with mallards. Even if it isn’t accurate, it’ll be clear what they are because I can’t put a lot of detail in them with them being so far away.

And the sign. I love that sign.

Finally got the people in, as well as the ducks and sign.

So, yeah, I decided to do a little more work on the rocks before I got the people in there. Am I putting it off? A little :) This does make it look a lot better though, so it really worked out.

Some more work on the rocks.

Got a lot done in a few days. I think I still need to tweak that large rock a bit, but I’m generally pleased with how it’s come along. Now, people. This part scares me.

Foreground rocks and reflections are in.

Decided just to do all the grasses. In a groove on doing them, and it’ll be easier than trying to put them in behind the people later. Now, to do their reflections.

Foreground grasses finished up.