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Painter Judith Whittaker will be participating in the second annual "Stir of Artists" show to be held July 16th and 17th in the village of Bemus Point, New York. She will be exhibiting for show and sale a variety of new original acrylic works and prints of various sizes. There will be 30 fine artists and artisans representing the regions of Western New York and northwestern Pennsylvania. Participating artists include painters, photographers, fiber artists, woodworkers ,sculptors and other medias. The show will be from 11am untill 6pm, both days and is located in the town park setting of Bemus Point, NY. The village of Bemus has quaint shops, restaurants and is located along Lake Chautauqua. Stop by for an afternoon of art while enjoying the lakeside scenery. Parking and admission is free and the show will go on rain or shine.
Hope to see you there!

My younger son loves legos, doodling on graph paper, snowboarding, shovelling snow and fishing. In fact he must shovel every day in winter and drop a line in the water every warm day. He is what you would call a little obsessive/compulsive about these two things. It's a good thing we have a long driveway and a pond right near our house.

So this Mother's Day 2011 found us in Long Point State Park located on lake Chautauqua. We had subs, drinks, a blanket and of course the fishing poles with us. I am exceedingly happy with any food I don't have to cook myself. Whether it's Red Lobster restaurant or subs by the dock I'm easily pleased. It was perfect........ I had a thermos of coffee, my newspaper, my children and husband and a nice warm sunshine day for May in Western NY.

I took a picture of my usually perpetual motion son balancing quite still on the railing while he fished. He was pensive as he watched another fisherman. To tell you the truth I can't remember what all else we did that Mother's Day. You see I had, at the moment I took the picture, already in my head started painting it. I couldn't wait to get home and get the canvas out. I guess obsessions run in the family.

The prints for this painting are now available on my site.

Just wanted to announce two special promotions I have running.
For a limited time only:
1) Prints of "Morning Neighbors" painting is on sale. An 11"14" stretched canvas print can be bought for $45.00 plus tax &shipping to the first 5 buyers. Offer ends Sun. June 26. This product is a gallery stretched, ready to hang print. No framing needed. The sides are edged in black or white, your choice.

2) A summer sale is also in effect for the rest of my site. 25% off everything on my site untill August 30, 2011 for the first 15 buyers. This includes all prints and greeting cards. The discount code to be applied at checkout is RLZNHN.

Both sales start at 12:00pm on Friday June 24. Please tell your friends, Happy shopping and many thanks for viewing my site.

This is my morning routine- got my favorite coffee cup, my toast, my jelly and soaking up the sun coming thru my kitchen window. I have some little quirks- like never drinking coffee out of a styrofoam cup and an all around dislike of plastic dishes in general. I do love pottery and have to fight the urge to buy a coffee cup if it has a unique, handmade design. Second hand stores are my favorite place to get coffee cups. Somehow I think I'm rescuing them and bringing them home so they can serve their rightful purpose in my kitchen. I now have enough of them to have coffee with neighbors who live anywhere within a 20 square mile radius, at least that's what my husband says. So I don't know why every morning I gravitate towards this blue, kind of boring looking cup when I have such more interesting ones to choose from. I guess it's because the handle- it just works great. So note to all you potters out there- make sure it has a great handle. Hope your morning started out with sunshine on your counter.

This painting is not available on my site at this time. Haven't the resources yet to get a professional photo taken of it.

The farm across the road stands empty now.It was and has been a great source of enjoyment for me since the day we moved in 10 years ago. Don't get me wrong. I know really nothing about farms or farm animals. My husband is the knowledgeable one of all things farm related. I don't even like the smell of barns or the flies that constantly swarm around the animals.No, I just sit across the road on my front porch and contemplate the various animals that constantly watch me. I go over to the fence and talk to them and think that I am forging a strange kind of friendship. I'm sure they realize I am a casual observer and so they allow me to watch them, always with the fence barrier to protect us both from getting too close.

When we first moved in, across the road from the Chautauqua Ostrich Farm, there was a veterinarian and his wife who raised championship horses. I mean real champions. She would travel all over the world to countries with exotic names and race them. They were beautiful, majestic and very calming to watch. Because he was a vet there was also a constant supply of other animals they would take in on a moments notice that I would occasssionally visit. The horses were beautiful, though, I never got personal enough to learn their names.

Then the vets moved and a couple who raised Alpacas and Llamas moved in. Once again I had championship animals across the road. Evelyn and Pete had their barns full of ribbons from all over the country won by their Alpacas. After my first initiation of getting spit on by one soon after we were introduced, we slowly became acquanted and I learned their names. Because they were champion bloodlines the names were as unique as their characters. Very social animals, they would move in groups with the little ones bouncing around the legs of their mamas just like children often do. They were amusing and comforting to watch from across the road.

Pete has passed on now and Evelyn has found a new, smaller farm some distance away to raise her Alpaca children. From across the road the door is slightly ajar but it is dark inside. The fields have stood empty long enough to get overgrown. The fences have been taken down. No champions to forge friendships with anymore. I wander over there from time to time, walk thru the barns and fields. The view is beautiful, but nothing looking back at me.


This is a repeat of an earlier post. I had trouble with the picture showing up in the right place. Hopefully this is corrected. This painting is not currently available on my site. Hopefully in the next few weeks.

Every morning, Monday thru Friday, 7:25 am, the cows and I are at the same crossroad. Most days I just drive by with a casual glance in their direction. That's because for most of the last few months it has been raining and so I keep to the warmth of my car. Ah but this day it was sunshine and has been sunshine for the last few days or so. Maybe it was because I was missing the morning routine of the across the road Alpacas who are now gone. Either way I have taken to stopping and talking to these cows. They have never been my favorite farm animal. I've always thought they were lacking in character or maybe they just moved too slow for me. Well, I thought, at least they wouldn't spit on me like the Alpacas if I got too close.

So I parked the car and wandered over being careful to stay across the fence, there are personal space bounderies even for cows you know. Actually I just didn't want to step in anything! And what I found was delightful. These two were the most curious ones. They even wanted to nuzzle my hands as I reached out to pet their heads. It was a very quick acnowledgement of my presence and then they went back to doing what they loved. Standing in the sunshine and eating grass. They didn't care why I was there.

I stood quietly with them soaking up the sun with my favorite blue coffee cup in hand. They had no real agenda for the day other than what they were doing. They asked nothing of me, they expected nothing from me. We just were quietly occupying the same space and enjoying the same sunshine moment. All things considered..... I have decided they make perfect morning companions.

This peice of artwork should be available on my site next week for prints and notecards. Check it out in the morning sometime, the cows and I will be waiting.

I love rural scenes, dogs, kids, landscapes and such so most of my work is comprised of this. You start out painting what you know and see everyday. But once in a while something different strikes your fancy and inspires you so you try to capture it. This young woman at my church is a dancer and, yes, the way she moves and interprets dance during worship is very inspiring. But what I always seem to watch is her face while she is dancing. Something about her expressive face keeps me captivated. So this painting "happened" when I actually was painting someone else. I started it just because I liked the upturned face of a woman I saw.. But as I kept painting, it became the "dancing girl" from church. ( I'll leave her name out for her privacy) And I just knew I had to make it her. So I like the way it came out. I don't know if she will as she didn't even know I was painting her. But I know God put her on my heart to paint. I pray that her worship dance continues on all her life.

This piece is not availble on my site at this time. Maybe later if permission is given by the dancer.

This is my first blog entry posted ever- a biggie for me but lame I know. So this painting I love because once again it obviously is not a portrait of me but absolutely I feel like this sometimes. It is an artistic rendering of an advertisement I saw for a dance company, I think. How I wish I could leap and dance like this! Any comments are sure appreciated.