I Owe,I Owe, so Off to Blog I go!

In case you haven’t noticed, it has been a while since I have blogged. Well one of the protocols has caused me to develop neuropathy. They do not know if it will go away in 6 months or be permanent. It involves, numbness, tingling and pain all at the same time and has affected my hands and feet. Hubby and I have been stocking up on soft towels, and looking for some comfy socks.Most of the socks I have tried have a grain which irritates my feet. Also have started ANOTHER protocol which is oral tablets, two weeks on and two weeks off.  We go to get a blood draw tomorrow and see the oncologist a week from tomorrow. The main side effect of this protocol is abdominal pain. It is a lot milder than some of the other chemo treatments.

Even though I have had a lot of hand pain, I have tried to work through it and make some art. The first is a white charcoal on black paper. It is Ophelia from the Oasis, she is a black Lorikeet. The second one is a metal embossing of Sunny.

Ophelia

 

Sunny

Stay tuned!!!!

 

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Getting Somewhere

The CEA count went up to 850 – NOT GOOD – so we have changed the protocol again. In the meantime, the oncologist has referred us to TGen for gene studies and possible clinical trials. We will make that appointment as soon as the cat-scan is done. That appointment this Thursday. Except during the treatment week, I am feeling pretty good and have some energy, but stay tired most of the time. Once again, I have to to Thank all of you for the prayers, good intentions, and positive thoughts. Could not have made it this far without every one of you. This is what community is.

Still working the metal, here are a few of the new ones.

Blue & Gold Macaw in Pewter – Loki

Black Palm Cockatoo in Pewter

African Grey in Pewter

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Stay tuned, next week will post some Christmas cards with metal embossing on them. In the meantime, it is nap time,zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.

 

Once Again…..

Once again, I find myself looking at the calendar, realizing that it is July and wondering where the year went?!?!??!? What is up with time? it used to go by so SLOOOOOOW, now it is rushing by at the speed of light, and I am not even used to writing 2014 yet. Better get the Christmas decorations out quick, or I will miss it too!

There is a WIP in the works, believe it or not, here is the latest version of “Bathing Beauty”.  It is over due, as we just returned from some much needed R&R. We attended a family reunion in Angel Fire, NM. The weather was fabulous, we enjoyed the cool mountain air, visiting with family, the scent of pines, and daily afternoon rains. We missed a huge sandstorm, and came back to 109 degree temps with monsoon humidity.

Mean while back at the cat hair saga……have you ever tried to put a bandaid on your toe in a house full of cat fur? I got to try it last night, and let me tell you, after going through a whole box of bandaids, I finally got one on with only  one cat hair in it. Any of you cat owners out there…….buy stock in bandaids! As I type, one of the cats has decided to take up residence on my asdfjkkllill;’,mnbnvcttyuioop, oops……… Keyboard. Oh no, now there is long black cat hair all over my keyboard and stuck to the screen.  Cats 5 – Arlene 0.

Excuse me a moment….there goes the phone…..hello…..uh excuse me while I go to the back room, my parrots are all screaming, hello……..uh….excuse me while I get all of the cat fur out of my mouth…..OK, uh hello…..click……buzzzzzzzzzzzzz….Hmmmmmm guess it was a wrong number. Hello Charlie…..Hello Loki…..Hello……Birdie and Sunny. I am off the phone, you can all stop screaming now. Parrots 1,253 – Arlene 0    Ohhhhhhh sweet silence, so much better.  Oh no, here comes the cat again!

WIP – Triple Time Blues

Triple Time Blues

So, here is the first painting update! There is one fuzzy little parrot but………the rest is coming. BTW, we have some new faces here watching, so I will try hard not to splash paint on the newbies. Just remember next time to bring your raincoats or ponchos, plenty of snacks, and your sense of humor. There are five parrots, four cats and maybe a clown or two, and a cartoon character or two in the building. Yes, we have to endure, feathers, cat hair, and splashing water, but this is watercolor WIP, so what do you expect?!?!?!?!? Also, we could run out of chairs, so if you have a comfy chair you want to bring, please feel free to bring it. Cell phones are allowed as long as you put them on silence and just stick with texting and posting on Facebook or twitter. A couple of my friends would not come if they cannot bring their cell phones. Yeah….you know who you are! No food fights, the food might hit the painting, no rotten tomatoes allowed in the building! Other than that, relax, sit back, and enjoy!

Advertisement: I made that bold for those of you who would like to skip over it. Please check out my Kickstarter project, Watercolor Parrot Art, at :

https://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1030315317/watercolor-parrot-art

Meanwhile back to our regularly scheduled program: See you in a few days with a new update!!!

And The Winner is…..

Step away from the painting!

Nothing like the Oscars to see how the “Rich and Famous” live… The gowns were gorgeous and it looked to me like plastic surgery gone amok! Wonder how far the skin can stretch – check out the aging Hollywood stars….. Hey, not me, I earned every gray hair and wrinkle, LOL! It is hard to imagine not being able to laugh and smile because your skin might pop. AND those are character lines NOT wrinkles! Signs of a life lived to the full! Loki, my Blue and Gold Macaw slavedriver, thinks everyone should have white wrinkled skin on their faces, among Macaws, it is a sign of beauty! Charlie the Hahn’s Macaw agrees, but now the conures are not up with that…they prefer white wrinkled skin around the eyes. A lovely eye ring is a sign of beauty to them. Tinkerbelle the parrotlet, says “the color Blue” is beautiful to her.

AND the winner is….YOU….. my dear blog reader, you get to see the finished painting! Hang on Loki, I am finishing up my blog, you want what……OK Charlie, I am coming….yes Sunny….Ok Tink……Um just a minute Birdie…..

Tea For “Too” or “Too” Much Drama?

Red Vented Cockatoo

Yeah! We had rain in Arizona yesterday! A little bit of hail too, but we survived one of our two or three rainfalls this year. We didn’t even melt….though some of my friends refused to get out of the car fearing they would melt…..just DID not happen. LOL, we still don’t quite know what to do when it rains here. Most Arizonans think rain is the signal to go out and DRIVE. Doesn’t matter where, just get out there and fill up those streets with traffic, so that anyone who really needs to get somewhere can NOT do so! Also we seem to think it is time to shop. We had to go run a couple of errands, and after finally realizing that the rain was not going to stop, we went to the grocery store….I think everyone in Arizona was in that store! SO while waiting to go to the store, I got some more work done on the Red Vented Cockatoo. For those of you who don’t have parrots, a lot of parrot people call cockatoos, “Toos”, I probably have told you that since I did the “Too” Much painting as a WIP on this blog, but you know I forget things, so you will have to deal with some repetition! Oh yes, I forget things, so you will have to deal with some repetition.

BTW, how are you guys liking the background? This one has been rattling around in my head for a while, so thought to try it out with this painting. Comments are appreciated. If I forget to get back to you right away, don’t worry, I will eventually remember to check for comments!

SO since the RV “Too” is native to the Philippines, I need to go research native trees of the Philippines to get ideas for the branch. See ya soon with the final!

Conspiracy Theory

A few weeks of having parrots in my house convinced me of the following human/animal relationships: Dogs have “friends”, cats have “staff”and parrots have “slaves”. Some of my friends thought I was getting paranoid because I told them that parrots were getting on our computers when we were not home and that they really run the world.  AHA!!! I now have confirmation. Joey Bird(a celebrity Blue and Gold Macaw) let it slip on her Facebook page. She has made several comments regarding the superior intelligence of parrots, BUT now she has gone far enough that I have been able to put the puzzle pieces together. https://www.facebook.com/joeybirdy  If you will check out our conversation under “How did the NSA hack our e-mails” you can see how it went. At this point, I am not revealing the name of my parrot (caught in the act of ruling the world from a computer) because I do not want her to get in trouble with the “Parrots Rule The World Organization”. But as a concerned human, you should really know what your flock is up to!

Speaking of Flocks, my flock has been after me to finish this painting. It gets a little difficult completing a watercolor when brushes get chewed up, paper gets turned into nesting material, and you just can’t find a pencil with any wood left on it……but they tell me that it is the price you pay for being part of a parrot flock! Here is the latest update on the Red Vented Cockatoo! Why do I feel like I am talking to the tail??

Half a Bubble Off

WIP#2

Today, I was lost in thought……. must be related to the forgetfulness thing, LOL! Anyway, just started thinking about the saying “he is a half a bubble off”, and suddenly realized…I are one. Yup, like when you are young, you feel young, and don’t get it when old people say they are a young person trapped in an old body…. Then one day, you wake up old, and get it…  you are one. Well, I woke up today and realized that I am a half a bubble off from the rest of the world and finally realized it…. but I have to say it is a good thing when you are here. The rest of the world just doesn’t quite get you, BUT….hey it is OK. It means you are creative, march to the tune of your own drummer, and pretty much don’t get a lot of what is going on in the world. And that can be a really good thing. It allows you to have a sense of humor about yourself and be OK with being different. But not too different…just a half a bubble off, LOL! It is nice when you find things that allow you to be like the rest of the world too! I finally found a Starbucks drink that I like since I don’t drink coffee…. now I can meet my friends at Starbucks, have a drink that doesn’t have a thousand calories. Of course that would not be possible without Starbucks cooperation in finally coming up with a drink which uses stevia to offset those high fructose sugar calories! SO there must be someone else out there who doesn’t like coffee and can’t drink a truckload of sugar, LOL! That is what keeps me from being a whole bubble off.

SO what do bubbles and Red Vented Cockatoos have in common? I don’t know, but needed something to get back to the subject of the “Work in Progress”.  Am loving working on the negative painting. Also love finding the color in a white bird. The joy and challenge of painting.

Here is the latest! Enjoy!

Anyone else out there getting old?!??!?!?

Sketch

Or is it just me? Sometimes it feels like it, but there are so many sayings about getting older, that I have to have SOME company out there. I would show you what I am working on ….IF I could find it! Seems like I spend half of my life looking for stuff I have “LOST”. The other half of the time, I am trying to remember what I came into the room to do. By the time I backtrack all of my steps and do all of the stuff that I forget to do before getting there, I have even forgotten that I forgot……….hmmmmm……yup…..Ok, what am I forgetting???? Oh yes, I just found my drawing. A GREAT BIG and I mean BIG “Thank you” goes out to Dr. Todd Driggers. He let it casually drop that he had a Red Vented Cockatoo in his office… Of course as much as I love to paint endangered species, I started jumping up and down, saying, can I come see it, pretty please, pretty please? His office staff graciously accommodated us(well I HAD to take a friend, after all how many times do you get to see a Red Vented Cockatoo?) and let us go crazy taking photos. Now that I am caught up from Kickstarter and my commissions, thought I would take the time to try this little beauty. Oh, almost forgot to put the photo in!

Now if I could just figure out which side is left, and which side is right, we would be in business. Oh well, I would just probably forget anyway!

Update on the Update of the Update….

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OK, the raffle tickets for Chula are now REALLY available! Please check it out!