Signs of Spring

Starting seeds indoors to use or plant in the ground lightens the cold weight of winter. 

Triple Curly Parsley

Buttercrunch Lettuce

Day 57 of Week 9 February 2026

This Sunday is the first of March 2026. Are you feeling giddy yet about Spring being three weeks away? 🥳

This last year I’ve been so pathetic keeping up with holidays, I feel that I must put effort into improving my concentration and awareness. I need to do away with the Oh I thought it was monster.

At present, I’m working on a pen, ink and watercolor from years ago. This one has been cut down to fit a 11x 14 inch pre-cut mat. I’m ordering the plexiglass from Dick Blick online. I’m anxious to see how the edges are trimmed. I like my watercolor ink drawings framed with Swiss clips. 

Oh! The 6 AM alarm I was keen on doing. On day one I changed my mind. Well, guess what on the dot hour I woke up to with no alarm on the next morning!? Yes indeed, it was 6 AM! 🤣 I didn’t go back to sleep. Now at almost 2 PM, my eyes are straining to stay open. 

Have a Wide Awake Weekend!

Browse flower wallpaper online

Make a birdhouse

Research state wildflowers

Design a You logo

Have homemade pizza

Read about art deco architecture

Sing to a dictionary

Baked cheesy puffs

Pen mark mishap 
Will make it part of the drawing

Winter Photograph: At the All You Can Eat Buffet

 

The Woe of It Is Real Butter

This is sad because I love real butter.

During a recent yearly check-up, I heard words about cutting down on fat consumption. Mentioning I use real butter, almost a pound or so a month, didn’t cross my mind. I cook with butter as well as use it on vegetables and toast. I don’t butter sandwiches.

For better health, I’m going back to using (less) butter every other month. Thus, I am changing my breakfast menu.  Yesterday I had an egg salad sandwich. Today was a hard boiled egg with parsley and relish on one slice of wheat bread. 

Tomorrow? Years ago I blogged about creating a breakfast muffin like the one called Glorious Morning, bran, shredded carrots, raisins, spices, seeds and more. It is a very moist muffin also called Morning Glory muffin. 

A muffin anchor for a breakfast menu doesn’t sound healthy. What does are meals based on fruit and vegetables. Overall, a variety of meals that include leftovers from dinner, can help me not miss those buttery eggs and toast. 

Winter Photograph: Leaf & Bird

 I believe the bird is a male house finch. The leaf might be an maple leaf.

Color Match

Why Oh Why is this what it is!?

Many of us have cut open a lotion container or a tube of toothpaste to get at that last smidgen of use.

I’m adding tartar sauce plastic jar. 

A spoon doesn’t fit into the opening. Using a butter knife takes multiple scrapes to get out even the smallest amount. I cut the top off at the container shoulders. What a mess!

In bowl is all that was hard to
 get to without cutting off the top

What about this week’s theme?

Thinking About Spring

 A bunch of laughing faces could go here to signify a theme for this week because that is what I’m liking, laughing, funny on Monday and the rest of the week. I believe we could all benefit by embracing the lighter side of life on purpose. 

This week I will not read bad news. I will search for laughter websites that are considerate of others and not into exploiting anyone for laughs.

Thus far this week, I’m engaging in creating my own laughs. It is hilarious that I’m typing here when I’m suppose to be doing the laundry I planned on doing, 🤣.

Later…

I got up and put in a load if clothes in the washer. It is now in the dryer with who knows how many minutes because I forgot to press Start on my phone timer. 

😂

See how easy laughter can be.

The Last Monday of February 2026

An Early Bird

What say y’all about this month 

sprinting into March?

I say, Whoa! 

Storing up ways to create slow weeks is a worthy endeavor. A problem with that, as I see it, is that I don’t like the best one. Getting up early.

If I rise early feeling spiffy, then that is all right. I go with it. But up at sunrise for me has lost its luster. There’s no good reason why that changed. 

Changing back to starting my day early feels reasonable to me. Today is a wash as 6 AM* was hours ago. I’m setting this Tuesday’s wake-up alarm for 6 AM. 

Are you an early riser?

Does starting the day early make the day feel longer for you?

* Day one of 6 AM alarm: 😂 Birds aren’t even up.I don’t like this idea of 6 AM at this time. Will try again in April.

USA! Hockey Gold!

 USA MEN’s Hockey Team 

Won Gold!

Tears of Joy!

There is something about hockey, I believe, especially in New England, that flows in the deep like no other sport. 

Even my old holy rollie Bible hugging grandmother could turn into a fire breathing monster during a hockey game. 

A Tale of Two Tissue Boxes

This morning I have an idea that makes me laugh. Mentality, how thinking has moods like the phases of the Moon, tidal schedules, low and high pressure systems, aging.

Especially fun to explore is the why we didn’t think of that sooner.

Tissue. I used one box of tissue at a time. On the sofa, the box is on the coffee table. In the recliner, I move the box to the side table. 

Why? I buy two boxes of tissue at a time. I have no fear of two boxes being opened at the same time. Common sense says one box belongs on the coffee table and the other belongs on the side table. Two boxes. Two places. 

No more getting up to go over and grab the tissue box adds a feeling of luxury to my life. If I had half a dozen reading glasses stationed around my home, then I’d be near delirious with happiness.

About the painting process

The approach is to finish paintings within a similar time constriction of what taking a class requires. Help completing artwork is what I need. I set out with this painting believing I can finish it in one or two sessions. 

The process has revealed to me the obstinate side of the subject itself. Thinking the colors command is wrong. The scale is the true master of that landscape. Scale and color should be in harmony with the image my mind sees. Thus far, they are in conflict as I find myself falling deeper into adding details to support my brain’s image. 

This is a painting from a photograph that will be a larger painting. So, I eliminated the conflict, stopped and signed the painting. There may be tweaking, as the majority of artwork has, but for now, it is finished. 

On the Shores of Lake Champlain
11x14 inch acrylic 2026
M.Flannery

Winter Photograph: The Ugh About It

 

From the inside of winter

Day 50 of Week 8 February 2026

All y’all, know this day, I have nothing interesting to post about. I look around the room for ideas. Nothing. No subjects jiggle my imagination.

Have an Interesting Weekend

Draw a snow shovel

Bake ginger cookies

Browse weather stations online

Listen to a movie score

Take a nap

Practice tree ID by leaf shapes

Buy new spiffy socks

Have a coffee milkshake

A look around the room

Mixing, Storing & Stirring

The story of the two figures on the bench along the shores of Lake Champlain is told mainly by the colors. Think of a book printed in a language you can read. Composition is the language of art, and color is the particular dialect. 

As I’m thinking about my struggle mixing blues, I ask myself why I didn’t write the formula down. So, when I mix an acrylic color I want, I will record it on a piece of canvas with labels using a laundry pen. 

Storing unused acrylics in a sealed palette using a storage container is going well. The one I have isn’t the one I was looking for in the plastic cabinet cave, but it turns out to be better. It has the 4 side clip down system for a good seal. To help keep the paint moist, I put a soaked paper towel in the water section. 

Acrylic paint storage

Adjusting saturation on the digital image
helps balance the color shades

Brighter saturation

Note: The tea diffuser is quick and simple for ground coffee. However, it leaves tiny bits through into the cup. Oh well. Looking for a small single cup filter diffuser thing. 

So much for slowing down in February

A Foggy February Morning
7:45 AM EDT

Here’s the thing, posting every day in January set me up so that every morning I feel that I should be blogging something. 

So, here I am almost every day posting in February. It is a way of talking to folks. That’s weird considering an entire day can go by without me hearing my own voice unless I make a comment  about what’s on the television. 😎

Early this morning it was very foggy out. Warmer, sunny and windy, today also has a thick Spring vibe. After my yearly medical check in I made a few stops feeling good to be out and about. Most of my errands’ making is a drudge with me arriving home exhausted. Not today. If my bad knee was better, then I might go for a walk just to look at mud and windy trees.

Weather is a mood maker. Of course being told I’m not diabetic lifts my spirits. The weather, however, puts me at a hang gliding elevation only achievable on a thermal of Spring.

How is your day going? 

Inquiry, Waiting Birds & the Next Thing I Know

 Searching brings up the blogger I’ve been looking for. The problem is the blog is deleted from Blogger. If a name changes, then Blogger posts a page it has been removed without a link to the new blog address. Does anyone know where Kathy of the Hummingbird Woodland  Studio is? Email or comment, please. 

I feel so very old missing favorite blogs. 🥴🥺

Pushing back the sheers is often accompanied by the swoosh of birds I scare away. As I put out the bird seed, I hear more of them than I see waiting to fly back in. 

Waiting

As the day goes on, one project turns into another. Taking up rugs and stuff to vacuum, makes me want to escape out the door to do errands instead.  So, here I am blogging. 😂

To start, I was going to take out a sealed storage container to use for acrylic paint. Thinking which one will be good, I see the rug needs attention. Next thing I know, rug rolled up, another lifted away and things are covering the sofa. The vacuuming will be next. After that is done, I will get the container and paint. 

Watching versus Reading

After last night’s sleep out, I made sure to be awake tonight. As I type, it is 10:20 PM EDT, 16 February 2026. There is nothing on television I care to watch until after the eleven o’clock news. I do like to view some of the Olympics.  

Watching. 

 YouTube and Instagram has been interesting in two aspects. Daydreaming, hinging on things I see that interests me, varies more when watching Instagram than YouTube. The other is observing, how passing from one interest to another flows as I view both.   

A big picture emerges that I watch too much television. 

Reading. I never feel that way when I read books. I don’t recall ever in my life thinking or saying that I do too much reading. 

Yay for books!

My Bookshelf

 

Art on a Monday

With the TV off, I fell asleep for the entire evening. Waking after 11 PM, I was surprised it isn’t morning. I missed all the Sunday night PBS shows. What to do!?

Putter? Watch YouTube? Snack? All three are good. Near 2 AM, I want to change up and do the sketch on this week’s new painting from an old photograph. The funny thing is, I don’t remember where the photo is. 

Back tracking, ( a few times), I find the hard copy folder of printed out photographs it was with. I went through them 2 or 3 times making sure it isn’t stuck to another paper. I give up. 

Sitting there clearing my frustration out, I see a white piece of paper sticking out of my catchall basket on the bottom shelf of a side table. I pull it out.

TaDaaaah! It is the photo I’ve been looking for!

🥳😂

Lake Champlain

Photographs of people. I do not take or post identifying photos of individuals without their permission unless the person is a public figure or celebrity. Even then, if they are on their free time, it is highly likely I will not take a photo. 

I will post pictures of people when the subject is a crowd, a gathering, an event. Even then, I will edit features, change colors, blur numbers and such. 

My people photos are figure studies like the one posted above. 

Note, I also ask owners for permission to take pictures of their dog. 

About the scene. Space is the celebrity in the landscape. An 11 x 14 inch canvas is not the ideal size suited for the painting’s story. I have images of the area to use. The canvas will be the study for a larger artwork. 

18 February update
in progress

Missing Bloggers

Strange. There are bloggers over the years that disappear, slow down or just stop blogging. Years ago, I stopped cleaning out the dormant blogs I follow because of mishaps losing a blog or two. Some of the blogs I read moved to places that require a sign in to leave a comment. Add that to Gmail doesn’t save my emails anymore, a few favorite blogs are very difficult to find once lost. 

Senior years living on the lake, is one such blogger that despite many tries, search engines won’t give up showing me senior living facilities search results. 

So, if I read your blog and haven’t commented in a long time, say hello, please.

Thank you 

Moving Out From Under Shadows

Winter Shadows

 What will this week bring us in the news is becoming more predictable that something will shake our core. The issues are so big, it is easy to feel powerless. How we hold on is amazing. 

Ways that help me is to look at an issue from both sides. Considering both views without the emotional bias, can be very difficult. Being informed through multiple sources eases the difficulty. Instead of turning away from the news, lean into it, learn from it and support decisions with facts. 

An old subject like this is worth repeating. Decluttering emotions is as important as organizing stuff.

🌹🪻🌸🌺🌷🌻

In the beginning of a week, I think of what I want to do, how to organize the days ahead. My to do list is much longer than my done list. This week, instead of the olde list of many, a single theme will be interesting. 

I found a folder of photos I printed out to paint from going back to the early 2000s.  One of them inspires me to make this week ‘s theme, Art. Whether paint, pencil or using glue, daily creating is a must. The week feels brighter already. 

What theme do you like for your week?