Making the Most of October

Making the most of a season requires taking in all the parts that make you happy, inspire, and/or thrill you. Create rituals like going to a special location in the woods or a favorite diner or both. 

October Suggestions:

• Embrace pumpkins ~ Hunt for the best ones, make pumpkin pie or cheesecake, cook roast pumpkin soup, wear a pumpkin tee shirt, paint a field of pumpkins, carve a pumpkin, decorate with pumpkins, attend a pumpkin chuckin’ event
• Watch Scary Movies ~ Both Hocus Pocus films are #1 because they are fun without much gross stuff. 
• Read Scary Books ~ Stephen King reigns here as Salem’s Lot, is the scariest book I’ve ever read. I have yet to watch the entire movie without leaving the room. 
• Nature ~ Be outdoors as much as possible being a leaf peeper hiker walker person. Bring along a thermos of hit mocha. Have picnics outdoors. Plein air paint.

More Paint From a Photo Considerations

Adirondack Mountains 
a Vermont view

Update 28 September 2025: I just realized that the above mountains may actually be the Green Mountains up in Lincoln, Vermont and not the Adirondack Mountains. A photo posted on the 24th are the same location. I will check my folders for time and dates.

Below Snake Mountain

The Green Mountains
Addison Vermont View

The search continues for a photograph to paint for a blog series this year. Painting them all is a thought. Asking myself what am I looking for, my answer is clearly that I will know when I see it. 

In this selection, my heart goes wide viewing the first picture. The chicory tucked in the maple leaves has a cute kitten vibe. 

The last photo feels to me like taking in a big breath of crisp autumn air on a frosty morning.

As a painting, out of all the images posted thus far, The Green Mountains, is my favorite.

Possible Photographs to Paint From

Paint from photos I'm 

Thinking about for composition

Digitial photographs under Copyright

Adirondack Mountains 
Sorry, I think they are the Green Mountains. 

New Haven River
2024 runner up

Ripton Vermont
Robert Frost Interpretative Trail

New Haven River
Lincoln Vermont

Milkweed
Addison Vermont

Art In Autumn

Middlebury River
Acrylic detail

Last year I posted about the painting process, from a photograph, for the larger painting above, Middlebury River. 

This year I will do the same. Starting next Wednesday, 1 October 2025, I will begin the new series with posting the winning photo sketched. I am searching photo folders for a few images to consider. There are more pictures of fall than the other three seasons combined. 

A canvas is on my easel at the ready.