Silver Valley Riverbank

Side by side with the painting I posted yesterday, you can sure see my current color palette making a repeat appearance! I'm painting a lot with Winsor Violet, Phthalo Blue, Payne's Grey and Quinacridone Gold. The second reason that this painting is a lot like yesterday's is that they are both Peace River scenes, in fact, yesterday's is a western vista, while the one above is facing east.

Water is not always easy - I think you lose a lot when you're painting from a photograph in terms of trying to capture the depth and sheen of the surface. This time of year, it's the best I can do. We have had record amounts of snowfall and winter's only just begun! Today the sun rose at 9:33 a.m. and will set at 4:30 p.m. Short days, and frigid.

Yesterday we had sunshine, and at our house on the hill we were 20 degrees warmer than where my husband was working just ten miles away. The kids and I went outside and found a patch of ice in the yard that they were using for as slip sliding runway. I got some great photos of winter fun!