Landscape of Virginia

Working on a new painting today, I was able to visit a historic house in a part of town where you wouldn't think it would be located, but there in the woods was a very nicely designed house. It belongs to a couple at least one of whom (it maybe that both were) was once the Mayor of this city. I had the good fortune to meet both members of the house and a couple of grandchildren as I was set up painting in their front yard. The house is a beauty, it's been added on to with a nice southern exposure sun room which is very long and gets good light during the day. The front of the house reminded me of the Jeffersonian style with large columns and old red brick highlighted with white wood trim. It had a massive structure around the front entrance but it really wasn't that big of a porch once you stood on it, it just had strong presence when you were looking at it from the front yard or as you approached the house from the driveway. I only got a start on it, but I

Beginning with the summer break, the world opened up to be a pretty nice place mostly because many of my aches have gone away. I've had time to paint, draw, workout, go to many NA meetings and otherwise do whatever I wanted to with my day. I got to draw. That's had me reflecting upon the election material on the news. It's the people watching the candidate that I find interesting, watching them in the background of a photo or video on the news is really interesting to me. All the various 'listening' expressions and the excitement shown in the faces of those in attendance of a political rally of their choosing is so unique and a real feast of facial expressions. It's something that I have been enjoying this long long election season. It's also brought me a lot of new information about the way people dress now, that I have really incorporated into my caricatures features when I draw them. I need to study them once again to get these peopl