When my family moved to a new neighborhood in Indiana when I was 12, there was another family who moved in close to our house, and they were from New York. During my teenage years, I became friends with their son who was the same age as me, and every year they would go vacation in Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. In my mind, it seemed like such a far off place to me, all the way on the east coast. And I wondered – “why would someone go vacation on a beach in the mid Atlantic?”. I was accustomed to visiting my family on the gulf coast of Florida.

Many years later, I found myself living in the mid Atlantic and going to Rehoboth Beach! I love Delaware beaches, as well as the experience of driving across the Delmarva peninsula to reach them.

This painting is of a sunny day at Rehoboth Beach, full of sun, sand, water and relaxation!

The pour over is an excellent way of making coffee for those that like to do things by hand (such as yours truly), given the process of pouring the water at just the right speed over the coffee grinds! I make myself one of these just about every single morning.

I’ve read that a glass vessel is great for heat-retention, compared to a ceramic one. I can attest that a ceramic one does cool off faster, since I have one, but in most cases it’s not enough that I even notice. If you were to buy one, I’d probably recommend glass first, ceramic second, and plastic last (can the heat cause chemicals in the plastic to leach out? I don’t know for sure, but probably).

Anyways, I recently finished this pour-over coffee painting. It’s of a pour-over display that I saw at a coffee shop. The gold-colored vessel stood out to me, as did the reflections on the stainless steel mug. I took some artistic liberty with the mug and didn’t paint in a realistic fashion, but rather wanted to capture the cool color palette and shapes from the reflections.

Happy Valentines Day from my family to yours!

This is a recently commissioned pencil portrait drawing on archival, heavyweight paper that measures 12″ x 19″:

You wouldn’t know this from just looking at the photo (as I found out yesterday when I delivered it, to my surprise!), but my client was adopted by his family in Lovettsville, VA, when he was orphaned in Ethiopia and living on the streets of Addis Ababa, at 12 years old.

I also found out he was a Peace Corps Volunteer (as I was) in Samoa! However, he was forced to leave after several months there, with a 24-hour notice, due to the covid situation. We got to talking about many things…our experiences as Peace Corps Volunteers, making a difference in your local community, wherever that is in the world, returning to Ethiopia one day to do humanitarian work there, race relations, art, and more.

Two of the four people in the photo are his siblings. One is his sister-in-law and the other is an old childhood friend. He’s gifting the drawing to his brother/sister-in-law as a belated wedding gift!

As always, I’m appreciative to be able to share my artistic gifts to create special pieces of art for others.

It’s been a very cold winter, and while I am glad the winter is finally cold again after so many years of more temperate winters, I am still looking forward to the warmer spring!

This oil painting is of a narrow winding park in my neighborhood, through which a creek runs through.

At certain times of the year, you can observe great blue herons flying along the treetops or wading in the water. The forest is full of the sound of birds singing, all throughout the year. Occasionally you will see ducks enjoying a relaxing float down the creek. Wild blackberry bushes grow at spots along here. I’ve seen wild turkeys here, snakes wiggling their way through the water, and toads hanging out on the forest floor. There are thousands of tadpoles each spring. I’ve also seen many deer, and red foxes. An owl hoots it’s tune, which can be heard from several blocks away, at what seems like random times throughout the day. I’ve seen a cooper’s hawk in the trees, and eagles soaring above.

The value of the diverse beauty of these landscapes is immeasurable and cannot be measured in terms of dollars. Yet, land is often seen in terms of its dollar-generating potential. So forests are clear-cut and wetlands are drained. The landscape around where I live has changed considerably in the past 10 years. Many forests and wild fields have been cut, flattened, and paved over to make way for homogenous energy-draining data centers. A beautiful forest near my neighborhood was recently clear-cut for a mega-church and a data center. Another was cut down for a gas station (of which there was already a gas station a quarter mile away). My heart sinks when I pass by these places and see what has happened. Am I the only one? Does anybody else feel saddened when they see these things? I imagine so, but also know that many call this “progress”. I’m not so sure.

Some recommended books relating to these topics, that I’ve read, include Charles Eisenstein’s “Climate – A New Story”, and “Sacred Economics”, as well as Douglas Tallamy’s “Nature’s Best Hope”.

In spite of the tearing down of nature, of which I am inevitably a part of, since it is baked into the economic system that we inhabit, I am still appreciative of this patch of forest nearby. It provides a wonderful backdrop of imagination and exploration for my kids to play in, throughout all four seasons.