She's got a ticket to ri-ide...

Meet our new car: Betty White. (Manuel doesn't call her anything...)



What she lacks in power-steering, she makes up for in the ability to drive me to the grocery store and back up the hill so i don't have to climb any more mountains with potatoes and milk jugs!! Ain't she a Beaut!!

Oh and it's a manual transmission. I can drive those now - even with shifting with my left hand!

Hmm....

So this is an actual picture that Michelle captured of an actual face I was apparently making. I have no words... but the resemblance is astonishing!

Paintings for NZ Art Show

This has pretty much been the state of our living room for the past week, as I scrambled to get my paintings done for the show (in time to have them matted and framed too!). This, however, is NOTHING compared to what our living room used to look like when I had to make a model for my Scenic Design classes at ECU. (Shannon, Laura, Tara, and Michelle can all attest to that!)

Here is my most recent Fantail painting. I started using some new ink that I found on sale at the French Art shop in Welly for more saturated and intense background colours.


This guy I started pretty much a year ago and then abandoned...then dug out again to finish for the show. His name is Yellow.

And this last one is the first one I did, also about a year ago. He's been hanging on my wall, but I took him down and out of his cheap Salvation Army frame to get all gussied up and re-framed for the show. Sure hope I sell a couple of these!

July already? Wait! I wasn't done yet......

Well I'll just start by saying, no, I didn't fully complete my June list. I know this news may be shocking to most of you - as you know how stellar I am with time management and prioritizing....but it's true. I did complete some though!! Let's have a look, shall we :)

1. Finish my "alligator chair".
2. Paint my deck furniture. Okay, now these first 2 did not happen because I did not have access to the workshop that I was counting on. In the place of these 2 art projects, I worked on 2 more instead! One was to complete 3 paintings for the NZ Art Show, and the other is a commissioned project that is taking up our entire spare room right now. Pictures of both to come in my next post!

3. Finish the book Blue Like Jazz. yikes! i tried so hard to finish before July - almost there!!

4. Actually take my daily vitamins on a daily basis.

5. Update my blog once per week. - nope. well, at least I updated once!!

6. Complete my NZ taxes and send them in. Somehow I totally forgot this was on my list! haha - note to self: refer back to goal list during the month...

7. Plan a "Christmas in July" party. Somehow "plan a 4th of July party" got in the way... pictures of that to come too!

8. Organize and book shipment of some parcels from home via ship. Although this isn't entirely complete yet, plans are well under way and everything will hopefully be complete by the end of the day – Thanks to my very special helpers at home – Mom and Dad :)

9. Have a date with Manuel at a restaurant in wellington that we haven't tried yet. We went to St. John's Restaurant at the waterfront. When our food arrived I definitely had food envy! Manuel had ordered “the Trio” of Pistachio and spinach lamb cutlets on garlic mash, Wild Hare Wellington on a mushroom tart, and Wagyu tenderloin carpaccio with diced beetroot and wasabi mayo. And I got the catch of the day! Big mistake. I mean, it was good, but not as good as Manuel's looked!

10. This one is probably most important on the list: reconnect with all my great friends!

Okay now for my July list, which will include the unfinished June things as well :)

Finish commissioned piece (mentioned above - more details to come)
Finish reading Blue Like Jazz (this time for real!)
New Zealand taxes
Christmas in July Party plans
Make a website for artwork. www.nicoleday.com coming soon! :)
Read Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain, and complete the exercises
Run 5K