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A day before the big storm, there was a brief time of sunshine. It lit up this germander, a drought tolerant shrub that looks great in spring and horrid in summer.
That evening, Jackson did not want to be put away. He decided to walk the other way and then attempt to catch his own dinner. I walked around the yard calling for him, and of course, he ignored me. However, I found him. Can you see his tail?
He was very intensely focused on some quail which feed around dusk, which is when we feed our cats.
Dude, I am watching you, and you are not going to catch a quail. 
He showed up at the front door looking for entry to the workshop where his dinner was waiting. Michael walked him over, and put him away for the night.
The next day was so intensely green and my leaning tree was in full bloom. (It’s a flowering pear, one of the earliest trees to bloom and one of the last to hold its color in the fall.)
Eventually I made it into the workshop (the cats’ safe place at night) to get a little painting done.
The first one is called Below Terminus Dam. I love this view in spite of it not having snow-covered peaks in the distance. Some years there are poppies on the distant hills; it is too soon to know this year because we are having a real winter.
This is the commissioned piece, now finished. (The right side looks darker because I am casting a shadow on it.)
This is the painting that was giving me trouble. I’ve decided that it is finished now.
This concludes today’s post about your Central California artist enjoying spring, her recalcitrant cat, her yard, and painting her favorite Tulare County scenes.
Thank you for visiting my blog today.
This is how they look in the afternoon light. I’ll wait until they are completely dry, then photograph them, because they are too big for the scanner.
Lupine comes in many colors, so I just mixed up a shade of bluish purple that looked good with the painting. The photo lupine color was too pink and it wasn’t believable to me.
This is the stage where I detail it to the nth degree, the style of painting that plein air painters usually don’t bother with. (They might be too tired of swatting bugs by them.)
Oh my, I really like this one! (Yep, I am allowed to like my own work.)
Before I go any further, my customer will need to let me know if this is the arrangement she has in mind.
