poetryandart

Recently I read a book about Princess Louise - the daughter of Queen Victoria of England.  It was a biography and a very detailed account of her life.  I found her life of quite a bit of interest in that she was interested in art and poetry as I am.  She also was a sculptor and she had done a sculpture of her mother Victoria and placed it in Canada as far as I remember.  Anyway, the book detailed her life quite extensively.  She appears to have had a miserable childhood, and was more than a little depressed.  She then became an adult and got married and lived some of the time in Scotland and some of the time in England. She loved to work in her garden in her Scottish yard and plant and pick flowers.  She was quite a sensitive soul - but she also had a great sense of humor.  She was at a flea market at one time and picked up a tea pot and a nearby policeman said you have to put that down madam, with which she replied "quite right, officer", and went on her way.  A nearby sta

We are having 100 degree weather right now, its going to be in the higher 90s and 100 plus weather for at least a week here on the Northwest of the USA.  That makes it very difficult for the fire fighters that are battling fires in California and other places in the West making extreme heat all the more hazardous. Here this weekend we have hydroplane races and an Art Walk in the Park and I really don't know how people can stand to be out on the water or anywhere outside with these temperatures.  I took Candy for a walk early while it is still relatively "cool" if you call 79 degrees cool.  And while in the park I took this picture of the river that is just behind our house about a block.  I watched a man set up his umbrella atop his boat which is anchored in so he doesn't drift. I always thought (coming from London UK) that umbrellas were for rain -- but no, here where I live now they are to keep from getting sunburned.

MORE PLAY DOUGH ART Today is Friday the 13th...I am not superstitious, but if I was, I would be hiding under the table today. Ha! I have been making some more play dough art -- and having a lot of fun doing it as I hope you can see from this picture: In the background is a C for my name in gold - to the right is a strawberry ice-cream cone with a cherry on top.  To the left of the C is a wedding cake a three tier one, and to the front of that is 3 golden pancakes with strawberries on top and to the right of the pancakes is a pink and blue clock set at 10 minutes to 2.  In the middle is a blueberry pie-yum. When my children were young I made teddy bears out of play dough with a cookie cutter in the shape of a teddy bear, and I let them make them with me, they couldn't hurt themselves with play dough.  We colored them with acrylic paints, and then I put a hole (we did) on the top of the head, where we could string ribbon through when they were finished to be hung.  Af

SUMMER IS DEFINITELY HERE We have 108 degrees here today in the eastern part of our state where I live and its TOO hot... even for my dog who just lays around all day, until the evening when it starts to cool off.  I can not keep the grass green in the front yard no matter how I water -- its like I told someone "it dries out while I am watering it".  Whew... its going to be in the 90s-100s all week.  Now that is a HOT SPOT that comes free as oppose to my new LG phone where the hot spot does not. Anyway, it is definitely summer now here in the northern hemisphere.. and so I thought I would post my "SUMMER FARMLAND" painting -- it is oil on canvas that I did several years ago now, probably about ten years ago as an estimate.  It has bright colors and taken from the inspiration of the farmland that we have around here in the summer. SUMMER FARMLAND Oil on Canvas I have posted this painting on Pixels.com under Cheryl Godden gallery page where you can

  Just posted this on a website called Pixels for print making.  I painted this a few years ago.  I had a lot of fun painting it -- this one seem to come easy for me to paint.  They are not all like that unfortunately, I wish they were.  Some are hard work! This is oil on canvas.  A study in flowers mainly.  Painting is my most fun/interesting thing to do and I either cant find enough time or enough ideas to paint.  It helps if I have a blank canvas sitting here staring at me to give me the inspiration and the umph to paint.  I have been painting for about forty years now and I still feel like I have just started because there is so much to learn about the art.  But I will keep on practicing sort of like a doctor practices, you are always learning.

 GOT A NEW DIGITAL PHONE Ok, so I just did the "get a new phone" thing... you know -- a cell phone. I thought it was time to upgrade since I had had this one for ten years, and found out that it would not "talk" to my computer!  I was well used to this one... knew where all the buttons were without looking or asking anyone. And then--boom--my usual Internet connection was not available and that's when I found out that my ancient (ten years old) cell phone would not be nice to my computer and talk to it.  So off to the cell phone retail store I went to talk about a new phone that WOULD talk to my laptop and be friendly. It turns out that the phone that I was getting was not in the store and so had to be ordered, but before you leave the store you have to pay a fee to cover something or other to go with the order.  Not sure what.  Anyway, I paid it -- told that my phone was on order because they didn't have one in the store, and that it would come

 CANDY AND CHEWY (How I named my dog) Candy is her name.  I called her Candy because she looked like caramels - could pass for a tootsie roll or cotton candy because of her tail.  Candy likes to "drop-roll-and spin" especially when she is playing with her friend Chewy.  And then she likes to run figure eights around him when we take them to the baseball field.  We go for walks up on the dike by the river and she meets a lot of dogs up there - some big ones, some small ones: all kinds and sizes.  It helps her to see she is not the only dog in the world. When she gets bored she likes to play with an old shoe or blanket or scratch the sheets on my bed like she is burying something to find later.  Mostly she likes to walk and play with Chewy who lives next door.  She is only nine months old, so everything to her is brand new.  She has to stop and smell every flower, every blade of grass and picks up things like pine cones to bring home. She is very kind and swe

Yesterday I started a new account with Pixels.com and put three of my paintings on there for prints and sales.  I listed: Lady in Blue Oil on canvas and: Windmill days Oil on Canvas on pixels.com and also I listed Aylesbury Bridge a landscape from my mother's childhood Kent.   I hope this will be a new outlet for my paintings...  you can buy prints on shirts, bags, mugs, books, all kinds of things.  Take a look when you have time its very exciting to be able to print your things on stuff you will use probably on a daily basis.  The prices seem to be very reasonable.  Try it! I found this site by looking at another site called Quora where you answer questions and someone had mentioned this site for artists.  I dont go to Ebay because it is glutted with paintings, at least last time I looked anyway.  I needed to find a niche that was more for me -- less for Ebay.. ha! If you like my windmill days painting