Almost two years since my last post. I’m the worst. Okay, maybe not THE worst, but I’m terrible at updating. Health issues have been interfering with my writing life. About a year ago, I was diagnosed with Hashimoto’s thyroiditis. Medication was supposed to make me feel better, but it hasn’t completely done the job. The suspicion is there’s something else going on. Cue the testing, testing, and more testing. One result came back positive for scleroderma. Hoping that is a false positive, and I have an appointment with a rheumatologist in June to get yet more testing in the search for why I’m always fatigued and have muscle/joint pain and/or weakness.

Anywho! The fingers don’t always cooperate with the typing, so writing time deteriorated. Needing some sort of creative outlet, I turned to painting. Back in high school (I graduated in the ancient year of 1990), I did oil painting, and I’m pretty sure I may have done watercolor and possibly acrylic work as art class assignments, though I’m not positive. I do know I haven’t picked up a brush for decades. For real. Like maybe the last time was 1992-ish? I had my oldest child in 1993, and I know I haven’t painted since before he was born.

February 3rd, I picked up a brush and tried an acrylic painting. This was the result (completed February 24th because I didn’t work on it every day):

After that single attempt, I decided to try watercolor on March 13th (completed in an hour or so).

I decided I liked watercolor, and during March, I was on a roll and tried to paint every day (didn’t always succeed—though some days I painted two). These were the results:

The second boat/mountain painting was because my oldest son wanted one, and the first one sold to a friend on Facebook. 😳 The pink trees was a commission for another friend who is donating it to one of the centers where she receives treatment (there are many pink ribbons in the trees if you look closely).

The last painting was done March 28th. My health put me in bed this last week, but I’m feeling better, so I’m hoping to paint again today. I also got Nuance Dragon dictation software, so I’m going to get back to writing as soon as my voice is working (sore throat for the past two weeks).

And that’s what I’ve been doing. Well, before I started painting, I was doing macrophotography with my cell phone (regular camera was too heavy). Here are some of my favorite pics:

And that’s what I’ve been doing lately, so you’re basically caught up with my life. If you want more frequent updates, I do better on Facebook. Just sayin’. 😉