The winner of the giveaway is...

Congratulations to the winner of my first giveaway--jodyvanB.  Please contact me with your mailing address, so I can send your print to you.

My daughter and I used random.org to generate the winner which was a little silly I suppose.  We could have easily put the names in a hat or jar as there weren't that many of them.  But it was fun to do it in a high-tech way.

Jody visited my blog after we 'met' on Etsy.  I had been admiring her very beautiful watercolours and told her so. Have a look at her shop.  She's a wonderful painter.  I plan to own one of her originals or prints some day. I am really happy to be able to send her my Pansies print.

Thanks to everyone who participated.  It was so interesting to read how pansies held special significance to a number of you. For all of you who didn't win or didn't have time to enter, I will hold another giveaway to celebrate my Etsy shop opening which should happen in the next few weeks.

*  *  *  *  *

Well, yesterday was an interesting day.  I woke up to find out my PC would not open.  It got stuck in a forever cycling loop of 'startup repair'.  I thought it was a Windows problem but it looked more and more ominous as the day wore on and all of my attempts to repair the situation failed.  Mid-afternoon, I thought I had lost everything--all of my recent work on my prints on Photoshop, family photo files, documents, you name it.  Yes, I know I should have saved everything.  I had a backup up to October 1st of many things but not of my most recent scans and Photoshop work on my art.  I have a delivery to make to the arts and crafts show early next week.  I was also working on a compilation and CD artwork for the birthday party of a dear friend which was yesterday evening.  The timing could not have been worse.  When my husband heard the desperation in my voice on the phone (if we'd been on Skype he would have seen tears too), he asked his IT guy from work to come home with him at the end of the day.  At first the IT guy said that he thought everything was still there and it was just a Windows glitch, then he said my C drive was gone and I had lost everything on it and then, just towards the end of his visit, he said that he was seeing my files and thought he could save them. Talk about up and down emotions.  I do have my files.  They are now on another drive until the damaged one can be replaced.  He said I was very lucky.  Yes I was.  Now I can get back to work on producing more prints.  I'll post more photos over the weekend.

It is Thanksgiving weekend here in Canada.  Happy Thanksgiving to all.  My mom, dad and sister are visiting us from Ontario.  Here are my suggestions to you for this weekend:  surround yourself with family and friends, enjoy the beautiful autumn weather and back up all of your important files!

Pansies: My First Digital Print

I have been working so hard the past few days on trying to produce prints of my paintings.  My printer seems to be quite temperamental.  It has moments when it obstinately refuses to do anything. Occasionally, I can be that way too. Stubborn character aside, it is finally producing some very beautiful results.

I wanted to share my first digital print of a painting.  It's a painting that you haven't seen before.  The painting is of a pot of pansies, nemesia, diascia and euphorbia that I had on my back porch a summer ago.   The framed images you see in this post are of the print.  I feel that it looks very similar to my original watercolour image (seen below).

Pansies are one of the most cheerful garden flowers I know and they are a favourite of mine. They belong to the viola family.  I usually grow both pansies and violas. I love how despite their sweet appearance they are one of the hardiest flowers in the garden. They can brave chilly weather, even snow, at the start and end of the gardening season.

They have a really special childhood association for me. I spent most of my childhood in Toronto but we travelled frequently to the western outskirts of Montreal to visit my grandparents.  My mom's dad turned to gardening when he retired and he was a master at it.  He won all sorts of prizes from the local horticultural association for his beautiful roses. I would follow my grandmother around as she fed the birds and squirrels in the backyard and tended to the annuals. One of my favourite memories is of her letting me pick pansies from the garden to put in the beautiful silver and glass posy vase she owned.  

My grandmother and I were very close and I was very sad when she died.  I was twenty years old at the time. The memory of gathering pansies with her was so special to me that I tracked down an almost identical vase for myself years later from an antique dealer.

And, oh yes, one more thing.  My grandmother's name was Viola.

*  *  *  *  *

GIVEAWAY

To celebrate my progress and the production of my first print, I am going to give away one unframed Pansies print to one of my blog readers.  

All you need to do is add a comment on this post before midnight (Eastern time) this Friday, October 7th.  Please make sure that I have a link or your email address, so I can contact you if you are the winner.  I will post the name of the winner on Saturday afternoon.

Here's a little information for those of you who like to know about the technical side of things.  The image measures about 5½ inches across and 4¼ inches down.  It fits perfectly in a Ikea Ribba frame (in photo) or any frame with a 5 x 7 inch opening. The paper itself measures 8 x 10 inches. The print is on very beautiful cold press, natural white archival paper that is made in Italy. It has the feel, weight and look of watercolour paper. It is 100% cotton fiber and is acid and lignin free. It is printed with Epson Ultrachrome inks and a whole lot of love.

Brrrrr...

What a change in the weather.  So dramatic. So quick.  It was so rainy and cold on the weekend.  At one point, I actually thought I saw snowflakes but I think it was just my mind playing tricks on me.  It was the kind of weather that fits with being indoors and keeping cozy.

We are lucky to have two resident bakers. What lovely smells there were in our house this weekend.  Emma made a beautiful autumnal cake with a hint of maple syrup from a recipe in Nigella Lawson's book How to be a Domestic Goddess.  She decorated it with tiny ivory sugar pearls that we bought in Paris this summer.  (There was a whole section of sugar decorations at La grande épicerie de Paris!) It was so elegant and beautiful, it could have been a wedding cake.

Chloé made brownies.  Delicious, chewy, chocolatey brownies.  She left the butter out on purpose and doubled the vanilla just to see how they would turn out. I love how they are constantly experimenting.  I enjoy eating their experiments too. :)

I worked very hard this weekend on turning my paintings into digital prints.  I've actually succeeded in printing three of the images so far.  I am so happy that I am finally making progress.  My daughters were a such a great help.  Lucky me.

I woke up very, very early this morning and realized that I was manipulating images in Photoshop in my head while I was in bed, so I might as well get up and do it for real! I have a day of work at the computer ahead of me. Then I am going to frame the prints that I've done so far and will post photos here in the next day or so. My Etsy shop is closer to being a reality. I've even ordered mailing supplies. Stay tuned. I'm going to have a special giveaway here sometime during the next week to celebrate my progress.