Thank you so much to everyone who wished me a Happy Birthday last month! I came down with a very nasty chest cold virus a few days before so my family party was canceled and rescheduled again for the following weekend and then canceled again because I was still too sick. So all of your wishes, virtual presents, PM's and posts really brightened up my day and meant so much!! *hugs you all* We finally had a bit of birthday party on Thanksgiving since everyone was together, and I had to stop my sister-in-law from putting candles on the pumpkin pie. lol Long story short - I got better, then got worse again, and finally ended up with bronchitis, which I'm just now getting over. I did get a couple of the artworks I'd hoped to finish before the end of the year done, but not everything I'd planned. There will however be Christmas art - I just can't say where... or when... ;-)

( Thank you too to everyone who contributed to the lovely cookie blizzard that has been prettily decorating my profile page! :DD )

These made me smile everytime I came on LJ. I've added that pic to my profile page so that I can enjoy them for a while longer!

And thank you and *hugs* to earth_magic and snottygrrl for the lovely Christmas cards! ♥ ♥ ♥

Lastly, a few photos I took this week...

( Flowers in my house and Christmas decorations... )

I'm going to be off-line for a few days after tonight, so I wish everyone Happy Holidays and a very Merry Christmas! Back on Sunday. :)

Finally I finished the next set of four of this series. Only 4 more letters to do!!

As I said with the last set back in March, my style has evolved over the length of time it has taken to complete this - I was just learning digital art when I started, just learning to use my tablet and Photoshop. But it's impossible now for me to work the way I did in the beginning - so there's no help for the change.

For anyone new to this, the explanation is with the first post, and a link to each of the previous sets of letters is under the cut below the art.

Title: S-V: The Gory, Spoilery Alphabetic Guide to Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince

Rating: G

Media used: Photoshop

Preview:




( S-V: The Gory, Spoilery Alphabetic Guide to Harry Potter and The Half-Blood Prince )

This was one of my entries in this year's Harry/Draco Fanart Fest on hd_fanart. Thank you to everyone who commented on this during the fest! Your comments were loved and much appreciated. Hopefully I will be able to reply to them soon. :)

Title: Keeper of the Dragon's Heart
Media: Photoshop
Rating: PG-13
Warnings: non-explicit Nudity
Notes: Thank you to la_dissonance for the gorgeous prompt. The art takes place just at the moment where the word "and" is in the last sentence. (Prompt is included under the cut.)

Preview:



( Keeper of the Dragon's Heart )

Just when you were sure Halloween was over... ;-) I am subjecting you to it once more this year because I am SLOW. :P

Title: Wanted: One Dragon Tamer

Rating: PG

Warnings: Fanon Draco, and I might have gotten carried away with the sparklies...

Notes: Illustration for "Easier Than You Think" by alaana_fair. Happy (late) Birthday, my dear!

At the annual Ministry Halloween party...

Preview:




( ...is Malfoy staring at me again? )

I'm not reposting this again, but if anyone would like to revisit The Pumpkin Juice Incident, you may do so by clicking the preview pic below. ^.^



And some awesome carved pumpkin art may be seen HERE!

Have a safe, fun and Happy Halloween! :D

Monday, Ken and I started our "stay-cation" by taking a little hike around a local lake. It was a beautiful afternoon, really the only one we had all week, and the fall colors were stunning:



( Pictures from the lake... )

We ended the evening by going to the symphany hall to see two silent films, with live organ accompaniment. Very fun, and the organist was truly awesome. :)

The middle of the week was too rainy to do much, but today, the sun peeked out for just a bit, so we took a picnic lunch to the park and drove through the winding roads to look at the trees.

( Pictures from the park... )

The monthly challenge at hp_fringeart for October was "Sunday Mornings." Since I've already drawn Harry and Draco on Sunday morning, I wanted to do something else. :)

Title: Fawkes and Socks on Sunday

Characters: A youngish Dumbledore, Fawkes

Rating: G

Notes: I think this might be Dumbledore just after he'd been made Headmaster of Hogwarts, relaxing in his office on a Sunday morning. His hair is just starting to turn gray. It contains some revised borrowed bits from my other artwork, namely the books, parchment and portraits.

Preview:




( Fawkes and Socks on Sunday )

Oops! I have some art that I posted in the last couple of months elsewhere and neglected to post here. The challenge for last month on hp_fringeart was Seasons, and dosandazalbra and vimessy did such wonderful and hilarious art with Snape and Lucius Malfoy, that I was inspired to put together a little Harry/Draco Seasons art montage myself. All the art in it was previously posted art, however some of it was older and several people commented that they had never seen one or more of the pieces. So here it is, with links to the original posts so if you missed any of them originally, you can see them full-size. :)

Title: Harry/Draco Seasons
Characters: Harry/Draco
Rating: PG-13
Media used: Photoshop
Warnings: boys kissing
Notes/comments: All photographs used in the artwork are mine, except for the background in "Spring" which was by dragon_charmer and was used with permission.

( Harry/Draco Seasons )


I had intended to participate more with azkatrazathome (what an awesome, fun idea!) but my father was back in the hospital that week and I only had time to do one very quick and very silly drawble...

Characters/Pairing: Lucius/Hairpiece
Rating: G
Squick warning: Er... bare Unicorn butt? ;-)


( Lucius Malfoy's Secret to Fabulous Hair )

October 6th was my 30th wedding anniversary. Ken sent this gorgeous arrangement to my office and then walked in with it himself. :D



( Pictures of the whole arrangement... )

I went for a walk today and took a few photos in the yard and garden. The fall colors are starting to appear. Yay! The flowers are winding down, but there were a few left. :)

( Pictures from my yard and garden... )


RL has been a real challenge lately, health-wise - I somehow hurt my neck the first week of August, which was excrutiatingly painful. I was sent home with a traction machine to use twice a day for a month and have been seeing a neuromuscular therapist, because the verdict was it was probably postural in origin - mostly because I spend hours at the computer and can't see it unless I lean forward close to the monitor. I am better but it's not really fixed yet. And in trying to figure any and all causes, we now have a new mattress, and I have new computer glasses. And while all that was going on, there was other stuff - like the car breaking down on our way out of town to visit our daughter, the computer breaking down, house repairs needing attention - I don't even want to give energy to it all by listing it - ha! So that's why I've been mostly absent here. For a while it was all I could do to be on the computer enough to get though my hours at work. But there will be art from me soon. :) I'm on vacation this coming week so I hope to get several in progress things finished up, catch up with friends here, as well as post some photos from this summer.

If I missed something you'd like me to see, please link me!

I did art that was printed on postcards for the H/D Meetup that was held last night in Azkatraz. I have permission to post it today for everyone (like me) who did not go to Azkatraz. :)

I had to do this fast, so I used line art from the last frame of my last year's World Cup art for the boys, and recolored and changed their clothes. That turned out to be a problem however, because Draco could not decide what he wanted to wear. *grin* After spending a looooong time on the internet looking at leather jackets, he finally decided to wear a slate blue cashmere jumper. ;-) The photograph background of the Golden Gate Bridge is also mine, taken on vacation last August in SF.

Title: I Left My Heart...

Rating: PG-13

Preview:



( I Left My Heart... )

Look what I found at Target yesterday. :D Clue is probably my all-time favorite board game - so how could I not buy it! *grin*



( Pictures of the contents.... )

Last Saturday, my sister-in-law and I went on our local Pond Society Tour of homes. It was so much fun!! We got to snoop around in other people's gorgeous backyards and oogle their ponds and gardens and KOI ... and take pictures! Hee - I took over 200. :DDD Having a pond with koi is one of my ultimate dreams. Now I'm all fired up and ready to go dig up the back yard. lol

There were 16 houses on the tour this year, and I've split the pictures between three posts, with around 30 images in each. ^.^

Previews: . . . . . .

( Part 1: Houses 1 - 5 )

Previews: . . . . . .

( Part 2: Houses 6 - 10 )

Previews: . . . . . .

( Part 3: Houses 11 - 16 )