the blog of alicia weller

I make excellent soup of all kinds. Some are invented, and some are tweaked recipes that I find elsewhere.  One of the universal favorites is my beef stew which I have honed over the years. Although all beef stew has some similar ingredients this recipe is crafted by yours truly. It is really delicious. I don’t have a recipe per say, but after making it many times I have a similar process I can share. This is an art, not a science so don’t take the ingredients as hard and fast rules. Mine change regularly.

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In April of 2009 I visited Washington DC and luckily bumped into a great orchid exhibit (although I can’t remember which museum we were in). I wanted to do a few art pieces for xmas gifts and waited too long to let the oil paint dry so I decided to do some ink drawings of some of the orchid photos I have on hand.

Each received a light watercolor wash for color and the ink was applied on top. I have also included the photos that served as inspiration.

The Art

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This is a useful tip I discovered through experimentation some time ago. As I was answering someone’s question about how to do this in the WordPress.org support forums the other day as a much simpler solution than a second WP installation, it occurred to me that I should write this post. My impression is that it might not be a widely known tactic.
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I am finally done with the frog. Earlier versions are documented in this earlier post. It still doesn’t have a name though. This is one of those paintings that I just need to declare finished so I don’t work on it until the end of time. I added some spots, and then I got rid of them. I added a glaze in the background, and then I rubbed it out. The main difference is some added highlights and shadows…plus the tree that the frog is sitting on: that’s improved.

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This holiday season some lucky people will be getting a holiday card from Robert and I with a hand illustrated North Carolina flower on it. I really needed to decompress today. I feel like I am constantly working and it makes me agitated and irritated. So I decided to do some drawing because I don’t always feel like cleaning up paint. I drew the below flower freehand in pen and ink. When I am sketching before I paint, I tend to spend time on proportions with a ruler and light pencil, but I just didn’t have the patience today.

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The most recent thing I’ve been working on (aside from some touch ups) is a frog. It’s actually inspired by the earlier post I had with a photo of a frog. He’s a friendly little guy. This is the current progression. I’ve been documenting the stages. I will also post the final when I’m done.

Stage One

I painted the background and did an underpainting of the frog.

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Took a visit to New Orleans last week. Spent most of my time in the French Quarter, but also visited the Audubon Park and Audubon Zoo.

My only regret on this trip is that I noticed that there was an “endangered amphibians” exhibit at the zoo right before it closed which I wish I had seen. I love painting frogs. Ah well…there is plenty of other great reference photos for painting from this trip…including a couple neat frogs who lived in the reptile exhibit.

In the Quarter

Street Musicians

There has been an unfortunate misunderstanding in the WordPress community surrounding the GPL and theme and/or design licensing. I seek to clarify these questions because I see them a lot, but the answers are not usually complete. [Read more →]