Just Cluckin' Around

I wanted to take a break between commissions,

 and what better way to do it than celebrate spring by painting a couple of my hens!

Just a quick practice piece to loosen up...

"Just Cluckin' Around"

11" x 13"

Oil on canvas paper

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Commissions welcome!

In honor of Valentine's Day

 I painted this for a submission to one of the art groups I am involved with. The subject for February was something red, in celebration of Valentine's Day.

"Abandoned Hearts"

 I had fun doing this painting. I imagined a couple of young, in-love kids.... carving their initials in a heart on the tree.  I imagined their life together; getting married, buying their first pick up truck (an old beater but in good running condition), raising a family...... Possibly the young children were permitted to ride in the back of the truck, but eventually the growing family needed a bigger car. The old truck was parked down at the back of the property by the tiny stream.

 Years later, the parents pass away, and the now adult children are called upon to disperse of the family holdings. As they walk around the property, they come across the old relic, and maybe for the first time, see on the tree the carved declaration of their parents young love for each other.... 

Sweet memories are made of things like this.

"Abandoned Hearts"

8" x 10"

Oil on stretched canvas

This painting is available

If interested you can reach me by email listed on my sidebar.

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My Favorite Things #3, An Original Oil painting by Rebecca Jennings

This spinning wheel was a gift to me from my husband just months before he died. I loved the smooth wood of the wheel and the paddle. The spinner would sit at the right side and work the paddle with their feet to make the wheel go at a smooth, steady speed. The wool would be fed carefully onto the wheel, go full circle and, at the practiced touch of the spinner's hands, come out the other side as yarn to be knitted into warm clothes or woven into blankets. 

This wheel is now in the possession of my eldest daughter who has become a fiber artist in her own right. This painting is a gift to her. 

"Afternoon Reflections"

 12" x 12" 

Oil on stretched canvas

(Private Collection)

Some of my paintings are for sale. If you see something you would like or have  a painting in mind you would like done, please contact me by email or Facebook messenger. I do commissions of various subjects. 

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Comments are welcome!

My Favorite things #2 - Childhood Memories

A detailed image of this painting.....

Oh, the memories of iced-up windows, with beautiful frosted patterns and glittering ice crystals....... I can still remember the feel of it! We were most fortunate, back in the days of single-paned windows. When it was bitter cold outside yet toasty warm inside, it was said that Jack Frost would pay a visit during the night and leave behind his handy-work.......   Few in our times have the opportunity to experience such deliciousness!

"A Visit from Jack Frost"

10" x 8"

Oil on canvas panel

(Private Collection - Not for sale)

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Clown Box

I have a story to tell....

To my credit or to my shame, it is a true story.

Daughter #2 (I have 4 daughters) and I needed to run in to town last Saturday early evening, for some nessessities for my son who had been released from the hospital only a week previous. While travelng from one store to the other we passed a small antique shop that I had been into a couple times since returning to Pennsylvania. Imagine my surprise to note that even though the shop was closed, some things were still outside...... and one of those things I recognized as a painting on a box that I had done many years ago for a man who did clown performances for children and for various organizations.

 I told her "I did that painting back there!!" as we went by.

A million thoughts flew through my head as my daughter asked, "Do you want me to drive around the block?" "Well, YES!!!" How did the box get into the hands of this antique dealer? what happened to the man I had painted it for? Was he still living? What about the clown suit and paraphernalia he had carried in it? I envisioned his passing, and an auction at the time, dispersing his belongings.

We pulled into the parking place near the old shop and went to look at it. I was estatic! Not that it was much of a painting, but that I reconnected with a part of my painting past. Cars came and went as we stood looking at it and wondering what to do.

The box was a bit dirty and the screws that held the rusty hinge attaching the lid were falling out. Yes, my name was on it as the artist and the date  '91!

Back side

We found a phone number on the sign that sat there as well. No answer. Had he closed down and just left these things outside??  Not like him to do that. Well, you certainly wouldn't leave your 'children' outside after dark would you? all weekend? to fend for themselves? what if it rained? Or someone bad came along and snatched them (it)?

I did the only thing I could think to do, and with honorable intentions, too!

I said, "Open the trunk".

Daughter, gasping, "Mom! Are you STEALING that????"

"No, dear, just borrowing, till Monday morning, keeping it from harm....."

Long story short my grown kids, upon hearing this, about coughed their cookies, and wondered if I'd lost it totally.

I went back Monday am 5 min. BEFORE the shop opened, and tenatively, and humbly told the shop owner my story, explaining that I had painted it in '91  ("you painted that??") and asked if he knew what had become of the man I had painted it for, which he did not. Anyways he let me buy the box with my painting on it for $25, chuckling about the situation.

Now it's not much, but it will have a place in MY home till my kids have to decide what to do with it. One thing I am sure of..... this story will be talked about at my passing, and much laughter to go with it.

Shall we dance?

"1/4 Mile"

This was a scene in my early years in the small town we grew up in, of the guys drag-racing their hopped-up old cars.  It was a quarter mile from a certain driveway to the bridge just before the hill. They would then try to skedattle before the town cop came along. I had fun painting this one as my brother took part in many of these races.

"1/4 Mile"

8" x 10" Oil on canvas

Beautiful Spring ... and back to Painting!

I was able to get out on the first day of trout season here in Pennsylvania and snap some photos of the crowded creeks while the fishermen were taking their first catch of the season. One guy even called out to me to hurry and take a picture before his buddy fell in! Gave me a smile!

"First Day - Trout Season"

12 x 16 Oil on canvas

This was the scene at Sugar Creek on Sleepy Hollow road near Franklin. There were about 7-8 fishing in this one spot but I thought 3 were enough to tell my story. I tried to use what I have been learning over the last 1 1/2 yrs; to create distance or depth, to move the viewer into and through the painting, and to have a surprise near the end. It doesn't nessessarily follow in every painting, however I tried to do that with this particular one. The fisherman sitting on the log looks discouraged as he looks on downstream at the farther man with a large catch. The first fisherman is just concentrating on the business at hand.

I am dedicating this painting to my brother who passed on 12 years ago today. He was an avid fisherman, and fly-tyer. He used to get feathers from my chickens to use in his craft. I miss him and will never forget what he meant to all our family.