I'm going to call this my Snow Day project.
Yeah, we had a snow day. I know my friends in the North make fun of us for letting school out when there's an inch of white (almost) covering the ground. I do know that I wouldn't want to drive a bus filled with kids on icy roads, but come to think of it... I wouldn't want to drive a school bus... period...
I wonder how I'll feel next year when the schools have a snow day and it won't affect me... Hmmm...
Thanks to Lela at Paint and Draw Together for choosing such a lovely image for her Challenge #65 - Narcissus in a Vase. I love seeing all the pieces done by different artists. All exactly the same, yet each completely different.
As soon as I saw this one, I knew I wanted to paint it. I love daffodils, and spring is such a loooooooong time away!
Because I'm never sure, I Googled the difference between narcissus and daffodil and jonquil. They seem kind of interchangeable so I'm not sure it's worth remembering, but here's what I learned. Both of them fit in the genus of narcissus. The jonquils have tube-like leaves, while the daffodils have flat leaves. Also, jonquils have several in a bunch rather than one on a stem.
Original Oil Painting - 11"x 14
[GIFT}
Why plant sunflowers?
My dad planted two long rows of sunflowers last summer. He thought he'd harvest them for the birds.
They were absolutely gorgeous, and his plan worked.. sort of. He didn't have to have to worry about doing the work of cutting them down and drying them to save the seeds. The birds decided to save him the trouble. They helped themselves to the seeds before he ever got around to harvesting them.
The thing I loved about painting this was that I never opened a tube of green paint. I had a huge blob of blue paint left over from the little boys shirt in the last painting. And I had another huge blob of yellow that I'd squirted out to use up an old tube to use for the flowers. I mixed those two and a little ochre to make all the greens. (I love using things up!)
I had the hardest time with the actual petals. I just haven't had that much practice with yellows to know just what to do without some trial and error. Actually, I was pretty heavy on the "error" side for a while. Each petal looked like a banana; they were all just too pretty. It's hard for me to add that muddy, shady color that has to be there.
Who doesn't love sunflowers! I love them!
[SOLD]
