Show Date Moved

Tiger Lilly Kitty City, originally uploaded by Melsky.

I completed six paintings for my show so far, but I've decided to move the date up to Monday because I'm doing a web page for the shows.

I'm exhausted today. I've had a cold and it makes me really tired.

I found out why my tomatoes have big holes in them. They are being eaten by squirrels! I thought those holes were to big for bugs to be eating. I went out there today and surprised a squirrel in the act of taking a big bite! I did not know that they ate tomatoes but I have seen the evidence.

I'm having an art show!

Roses and Fish, originally uploaded by Melsky.

I decided to have an art show. My show is called September Stream of Consciousness and it will be an online show. The art will all be 8x10 watercolor paintings with pencil and ink. The show will open this Friday, September 20. Artwork will be for sale in my etsy store.

The paintings all will start out as pencil drawings. They will then be colored in with watercolor, and finished off with black ink pen outlining.

This painting, Fish and Roses, is the first one. The rest will be unveiled at the show opening.

I'm having a good time creating the paintings. It's very good to have a deadline to work under. It's fun to create a series of paintings in similar style and materials.

I hope you will join me on Friday.

Melsky's Guide to Fantastic and Healthy Smoothies

smoothie ingredients, originally uploaded by Melsky.

I was born and raised in California, and I grew up eating smoothies.

What is a smoothie anyway? In many restaurants they are merely a fruit milkshake, no healthier than having an ice cream sundae with strawberry topping. To me a smoothie is a healthy food, made from yogurt, milk, frozen fruit and sweetener. They are an important part of my diet. I love starting summer mornings with a delicious sweet and creamy treat that is healthy and low in calories.

Here's how I make smoothies.

First of all, it's important to have a good blender. I bought this one about eight years ago and it's still going strong.

I gather together all my ingredients. I use milk and plain yogurt, either non-fat or low fat. I use frozen fruit, which I usually buy frozen. I use flavorings like cinnamon and vanilla, and I use a sweetener, usually splenda. In this case, I'll be making one of my favorites which is a peach and cinnamon flavor.

I don't have set amounts of ingredients that I use. I just eyeball them. First add the frozen fruit, then a few serving spoons full of yogurt, then the milk, sweetener and flavoring. Blend! You may need to add a little more milk if your smoothie is hard to blend.

For this smoothie I used the following (amounts are approximate)

3/4 cup frozen peaches – 50 calories
½ cup nonfat yogurt – 55 calories
1 cup 1% milk – 110 calories

That adds up to just 215 calories!

Some people use ice in their smoothies, I do not. If you use ice make sure that you have a very powerful blender.

Sometimes I add cereal to my smoothie. After it's done I pour it into a bowl instead of a glass and I top it with grape nuts and eat it with a spoon.

Another thing I add sometimes is bran or psyllium to get extra fiber. It's pretty hard to tell if psyllium fiber is added. The bran definitely adds texture to it and takes away from the creamy deliciousness of it. I usually only do this if I will be eating it with cereal, in which case I don't notice the bran at all.

Many people add dates to smoothies; in fact my parents did this. I don't like dates in general and I don't like the texture they give smoothies but if you like dates that is something to try.

There are a wide variety of fruit combinations to use in smoothies. Almost any type of berry makes a great one, especially strawberries. You can get bags of blends of fruits, usually tropical blend or a mix of berries.

I find that a little vanilla, the same bottled kind that is used for baking, really enhances my smoothies. On some fruits like peaches and pumpkin, cinnamon adds a great flavor.

Pumpkin smoothies are unexpectedly good. I freeze canned pumpkin in plastic bags. Just make sure to freeze it in small enough chunks that it can be blended. Pumpkin pie spice is great with this, or just use cinnamon.

I’ve been meaning to try this with butternut squash too.

Bananas are one fruit that you never find frozen, but it’s quite easy to freeze them yourself. Just peel them, break into chunks, pop them into a plastic bag and freeze. This is good to do with over-ripe bananas. I frequently freeze and use in smoothies bananas that I would never eat by themselves. Bananas are great with tropical fruits or strawberries.

Smoothies are quick to make in the morning when you have all of the ingredients on hand. You can even have one on the way to work, just put it in a travel mug. That is a lot healthier than stopping for a donut.

They are not just for breakfast either. Sometimes I like to eat one as a desert.

If you have any great smoothie recipes, hints or suggestions please leave them in the comments, I would love to hear about them.

Summer Fragments

Summer Fragments, originally uploaded by Melsky.

This is a paining I finished last night. It's 11x14 and done with watercolor, acrylic and ink on watercolor paper.

I started this painting when I was doing the Art on the Porches festival. For some reason I had the idea to do a painting with a woman's face, a guitar and a cat. The painting was going to be kind of serious and somber and have darker colors in it.

The cat and the guitar turned out good but the woman's face turned out horrible. I wish I had taken a before picture of this painting! When I took it out and started working on it again I painted over the woman's face with green and white. Do you see the part in the middle with yellow paint and copper colored stripes with the sunflower in the bottom part? That was part of her hair.

I like how it ended up but of course it's not somber at all. I can never seem to paint things that don't look happy and bursting with good cheer.

Anyway I put it on etsy:

Summer Fragments painting on Etsy.

Flowing By

Flowing By, originally uploaded by Melsky.

This is a new mixed media painting I just finished. It has acrylic paint, ink, pencil, postage stamps, and a picture of my cat Oliver and a water tower in Syracuse. I put it on my livejournal and it sold right away!

I have had a lot of business on Etsy lately - including this latest one I have had four sales in the past week. I'm working on some more paintings now too.

I have clear envelopes and stiff acid free paperboard backing for my paintings now and they look so nice and professional when I send them out.

I'm going to California a week from tomorrow. Kind of excited about it, kind of numb. Mostly I want to get it over with so I can settle down and get a job. I'm not really a traveller and I don't want to go to California really. I am going because I need to see my family and I need to get some stuff that I have had in storage in the Mojave desert for a long time.

Lots of new things up on Etsy

These are signs on wood that I did for my craft fair. Only one of the new things I did just for the fair sold! But at least I have lots of stuff now. I am moving into another direction and I don't think I will keep doing these so if you were thinking of buying one of my welcome signs now would be a good time.

It's the strangest thing, one of the pictures comes out sideways when I load it on blogger but it is normal on my computer and on Etsy. So I'm not just being careless but I also am busy today and don't have time to mess with it.

I've been working a lot on my exercise. I set a personal speed record walking downtown. 38 minutes to walk 2.9 miles on a warm day. I've also been taking yoga and pilates classes and working out in the gym and on cardio equipment. I'm trying to eat better too. That is the hard part. I have come up with some good recipes though. I am working on writing a blog entry about my favorite invention, breakfast ice cream. Actually it's a smoothie that is so thick you eat it with a spoon. So very good.

Melsky Art on etsy

My first craft fair in a long time

I did the Art on the Porches festival yesterday. I recorded a little synopsis of how it went. You can listen to my story on the player at the bottom of this post.

record yours