pine cones and dried leaf

“If you start it, finish it. Don’t leave loose ends.” ~ unknown author.

Not exactly the most brilliant quotation, I admit, but for the purpose of this last post of 2015, it will do.

A year end means taking stock of projects that have been completed during the past several months. It also means coming to terms with some of the art that was put aside for weeks or even months and left unfinished.

So this last post is to clear some of the outstanding work or to make a promise to myself to finish subito pronto, the remaining incomplete art before moving on to bigger and hopefully better things.

sketch of juniper with berries

The art above was started and completed this past week.

On a beautiful sunny Christmas Day, we went for a walk in the neighbourhood and I found leaves and pine cones which normally would be buried under several feet of snow on December 25.

This has not been a normal year in eastern Canada as far as our weather is concerned.  We have had a balmy fall and people were in shorts and summer clothes on the very warm days leading up to December 25. Snow arrived four days after Christmas…very unusual. I brought these treasures home and was able to finish them a few days later.

The juniper pieces were found on the driveway as I was clearing it of snow during our first big snowstorm of the season.

Teacups - watercolour sketch

In the above watercolour sketch, some of my own teacups on the left were added to one belonging to my mother.

I remember those days in the late 1950s and 1960s when women called on each other in the afternoon for tea and cake. Women were so elegant back then. I will paint and post more teacups in the coming year.

In fact, you can help me with this.

Send me photos of your lovely teacups and I will paint them and publish them in 2016!

Find those especially prized teacups at the back of your cupboards or in your dining room hutch and forward the photos to me at louiseaprimeau@gmail.com.

The file should be between 300k and 3mb to give me the best resolution for drawing the teacup.

And now I must get these last three finished. I posted them on Instagram some time ago as WIP (works in progress) and they have remained untouched since then.

young love in pencil
WIP Ellen Burstyn in Prismacolor pencil
Dame Judi Dench - prismacolor pencil in sketchbook

As the year closes, I will feel some degree of satisfaction that all these loose ends will be tied and I will be ready for new challenges in the year ahead.

Send me those photos of teacups please!

And if you have a story to go with them, I would love to hear about it. I will paint them and feature the story in posts in 2016 without revealing your identity of course.

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!