karenalma

[karenalma]

Creative Vibes

Today is Matt’s birthday and all he wants for his birthday is for people to blog, so I’m posting something today in his honor. After all, WordPress changed my life back when I was a stay-at-home mom looking for a creative outlet, so it’s the least I can do. I’m behind on announcing that a painting of mine was selected for the Western Federation of Watercolor Societies show in Arizona in April.…

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Sabbatical Reflection

I’ve written about my 4th work anniversary at Automattic, 1st sabbatical, and 6th work anniversary. But I’ve long since passed my 10th work anniversary (approaching my 12th!) and my 2nd sabbatical and haven’t yet written about it, so I’ll remedy that today. Automatticians can take a sabbatical every five years, 3 months of paid time off. So, as my second sabbatical approached, I had the idea of…

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Memories

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Inspiration

My youngest kiddo is always game for me to take his picture. He’s not always game to just give me a regular old smile. Hence, I have piles of pictures of really interesting faces to practice portrait painting with. 10×14 Watercolor on Arches cold press paper Here are a few studies from my sketchbook over the past year: More to come!

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#watercolours #watercolor #watercoloring #watercolors #watercolor painting #watercolorart #watercolorpainting #watercolour #watercolourpainting #traditional art #watercolour art #watercolor portrait #portraits #portrait #arches #watercolor artist

[karenalma]

Gratitude

The past eight weeks have been a poignant chapter in my life, marked by a bittersweet return to work from a four-week leave of absence. The necessity of my leave arose from my mother’s ten-plus-year battle with Alzheimer’s, a fight she bravely and peacefully concluded on October 14. I wanted to take some time to reflect on my personal experiences during my leave and express gratitude for the…

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Resistance

Some of you may know that I’m an artist. When I’m not working, I’m painting. I picked up The War of Art the other day because I was talking to someone about procrastination and fear of success holding people back from putting their work out into the public eye. Somehow, the conversation led us to Seth Godin’s blog where he, that very day, blogged about resistance. I had the book on my shelf from…

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[karenalma]

Remember to leave out your 95 Reese’s for Martin Luther tonight

[karenalma]

My cat keeps taking over my desk. She thinks I need her tail in the wet paint on the palette.

#cats of tumblr #watercolor #watercoloring #watercolors #watercolor painting #watercolorart #watercolorpainting #watercolour #watercolourpainting #traditional art #watercolour art #cats #my cats #my cat is annoying

[karenalma]

A while back, I found this picture of my son. It was taken while hiking at The New Wave in Page, Arizona. I knew I needed to paint it. It’s SO him. And at the same time looks like an ad for western wear.

I did a sketch at first and sometimes I think I should have just settled for that because every time I tried to take it to a larger sheet of paper, it really did not work out.

Here’s the sketch:

I love the rocks.

After I got a ton of inspiration for getting past some rough spots on my most recent attempt at my painting group. I love those peeps. Seriously, the New Mexico Watercolor Society is the best.

This is still unfinished. (I think I always say that.) still have some tiny details I want to work on, but I love it!

#watercolor #watercoloring #watercolors #watercolor painting #watercolorart #watercolorpainting #watercolour #watercolourpainting #traditional art #watercolour art #western wear #cowboy #cowboy hat #cowboy boots #yes this is what my son wears while hiking #he says it’s exactly how people hiked in the 1880s so what’s so weird about it #figure sketch #figure painting #acuarela #Arizona

[karenalma]

The news is true: We're paying for Google Domains customers to transfer to WordPress.com! Oh, and we've got some added benefits, too:

⭐ free SSL installation & privacy protection ⭐ unlimited transfers ⭐ lightning-fast DNS speeds ⭐ free year of domain registration ⭐ same or lower price on all TLDs

This offer is for the first 1 million domains, so act fast! No hosting plan necessary. bit.ly/wpdomains

[karenalma]

Pretty cool

Hey, Google Domains customers: We’re paying for you to transfer domains to WordPress.com —that includes an extra year of registration. This offer is for the first million domains, so act fast! Start your transfer now: https://bit.ly/3O9JZFS

[karenalma]

Portrait practice

I’ve been working with three colors and an infinite amount of patience to get the kind of portrait consistency I want. For this latest batch (I have about 8 sketched queued up), I’m laying down a light shadow wash first. Then going in with more flesh tones. Then I’m doing the eyes because it starts getting a bit creepy to have empty eyes staring at me for too long. Then I mess with more washes to bring out the skin more and onward from there. I’m also trying very hard to lose edges here and there, this is one of the challenges my watercolor teacher has thrown down for me. In general, I have to remind myself to stop before I go too far. Probably an hour on any one portrait is enough before I start making dumb mistakes.

#watercolor #watercoloring #watercolors #watercolor painting #watercolorart #watercolorpainting #watercolour #watercolourpainting #traditional art #watercolour art #portrait #watercolor portrait

[karenalma]

Painting in my backyard

It’s SUPER hot right now, but for a few hours in the morning there’s a perfect shady spot for a morning painting and coffee session.

I love my little butterfly garden in the lower right. It’s so lush (most of the color is on the house facing side) and while we don’t see many cool butterflies we do get lots of hummingbirds. Here’s some of the stuff I have:

#watercolor flowers #flowers #backyard #architecture #watercolor #watercolor painting #watercolors #watercoloring #watercolorpainting #watercolour #watercolorart #watercolourpainting #traditional art #watercolour art

[karenalma]

This cat will stare at you till you fill his bowl to the brim. He will not drink from the bowl if it’s under 3/4 full. His WUT face is impressive. He’s not amused.

#cat pics 4 the soul #cat updates #chama the cat #ginger cat #wut #like wut #cats #catstagram #my cat is cute #my cats #cats of tumblr

[karenalma]

This is a pretty huge deal! For context, WordPress.com is another Automattic product where you can create a more professional looking site, shop, or blog (though, how professional is entirely up to you of course 😏). And previously, the ability to accept payments beyond simple donations required a paid plan.

Now, folks even on the free plan can accept payments for a variety of things, like gated content, subscriptions, products, services, and more! The first heading in the post sums it up perfectly, "Starting from scratch, not starting from zero."

[karenalma]

This kitty.

#cat updates #cats pics #cat pictures #cat pics 4 the soul #cats of tumblr #baking dish #cat in a baking dish #why did I leave a baking dish here? #goofy cat

[karenalma]

The desert is waking up! I love cactus blooming season ❤️

#cactus #high desert #the desert is legit pretty #new mexico #cactus flower #prickly pear #cholla