Westie Rescue Garden Roots

Westie to the Rescue

Painting

We have been away from computers for a bit.

My dad went into the hospital for a few days, we thought,

and ended up staying two weeks.

He is home now and very happy to be there.

One nice thing is that on Thanksgiving Day the hospital

cafeteria gave us a full on Thanksgiving Day Meal for free.

Sweet potatoes, squash and apples, turkey, mashed potatoes...

you get the picture. We thought that was very nice of them.
Then later we had a lovely Thanksgiving Day dinner
that my daughter cooked. I ended up not doing very much
in the kitchen this year.

I did get a few paintings done today.  One of my westie boy

who probably thinks we have been off on vacation every day

the last few weeks. Not.  Outside he usually is at a running pace

everywhere he goes. And I tend to be slower with wellies on.

So our westie boy is the scout.

More about paintings here.

White Flower Hedgerows

White flowers are cheery even on cloudy, drizzle days like today. Hedgerows here have a wide collection of shrubs and trees. So I just picked three, white field notes. Then I divided those up to put in small white milk vases...but first they had to go on the burlap for their portrait. The dogwood is obvious and now for the other two I will tell you shortly. The one looks like a viburnam. It is a tree about 15 feet tall and some varities grow to 30 feet. I need to be on a first name basis with these pretty things. The leaves are as gorgeous as the flowers. Here is a list of recommended viburnums here.

It's time to shear sheep. There will be lots of white wool around to wash and tie.

I'm connecting up with these fun friends:

White Wednesday, Ivy and Elephants, Savvy Southern Style

Westie Dogs Dancing Illustration

I hear the wind howling because Spring is coming. (We still have remnants of a kite high up in a tree.) Yesterday and today it sounds as if we live near a huge noisy refrigerator. It's the wind. There's some dancing going on inside though that warms hearts. Paper dancing. My westie boy jumps and darts, swings and bows going round and round. Did you know westies make good dancing companions?

Linking to Pink Saturday.

Girls Cotton and Linen Dresses with Lace

If there are pictures to inspire me

to sew and garden I believe these

are them from Vogue Magazine.

I love the country.

The fields of clover and wild flowers

the gentle breezes that fluff our hair

Cotton, linen, lace,

and family.......

L-O-V-E

Farmhouse Prairie Dresses - Gorgeous

I have some lacy tablecloths and curtains packed away.

Aren't these dresses beautiful?

I would love to put something together like these

Ralph Lauren haute couture dresses.

Snow Loving Westie

We had a sifting of snow tonight! Enough to put a white sprinkles of confection sugar on everything. Our westie boy was loving it. Running around trying to catch the flakes. It was dark so pictures were like white scratches against a dark background. This getting dark at 5pm is hard to get used to. Then again I try to remember that in Alaska as well as other places it gets dark at 3pm so how lucky we are to have a few more hours of daylight.

Our little westie modeled for this new small watercolor. He's left a present for the squirrels.

Hope everyone is enjoying their weekend.

Westie Dog Hero

I will tell you about our hero westie, Sir Salty, and his good deeds in a moment Right now I am enjoying these aster flowers on our white table. Every little piece of green stem is loaded with flowers like mini daisies. I love how you can put any color against white and it pops out.

If you are a westie owner you will know it's battle cry bark. It is different from a "Who goes there," bark. I was outside working Saturday and I heard it start like an alarm clock, it doesn't stop by itself. I smiled thinking it was probably a squirrel, a groundhog or some other furry sort and kept working. After a minute or two I thought he definitely needs me for something and I rounded the bend with my own eyes and ears alert. He was in front of the house and had his nose to the ground. A bunny rabbit or what? He was not looking up at me even though I was talking to him. He was seriously preoccupied. A few feet more and I saw it was a snake!! Then I was hollering, too. Together we made quite a racket. My husband thankfully realized my holler was important. He came running with a shovel.

Sir Salty the hero! We don't always wear boots outside, but you can guess I've put the tallest ones on I can find. I think I am ready for hip boots even though I'm not going fishing.

If you want to read about what to do if dogs get snake bites, it's here. This got me to thinking about the emergency medical symbol itself is a snake going around a rod.

Westie Dog Knits

Sir Salty earlier this summer taking a snooze and just bathed. His coat is on the 'longish side which makes him look like a beach boy. I have a little surprise for him coming up.




I got this cute as can be pattern from Kristin Nicholas who designs the brightest things for all of us to enjoy! If you've not been over to her blog now is the time to skip over and have a visit on her sheep farm. Maybe you want to knit this too? You might even beat me at finishing it. My mom says my knitting is like skewering sheisk-ka-bobs, too tight, but I will keep practicing. Practice makes perfect is my Mom's saying.

Cesar Westie Dog- Sweetheart

A very darling westie!

Watercolor Aceo Fever- Let it Snow

A wonderful NEW watercolor set has finally been opened and this is my first with it tonight. I actually was waiting up a bit to see if it was really going to sleet and ice rain tonight. In between 10 other projects (only slight miscalculation, it's more like 100 other projects) I opened the watercolor set. Watercolors are challenging as one cannot dream and paint--which means you must be fully awake. They are also so fresh looking.

Ice rain is a headache for us (for obvious reasons) because we are in a hilly area and some country roads do not have any shoulders here. So if someone ahead of you starts spinning out going uphill all of us behind are stuck. To back up a bit, we have to make it to the car first without injury! Then we move on to worry two.

To back up even further to cats and snow, which is the reason I did this painting. Our tom cat is so heavy that he falls through the snow. The others tip toe right across the top of the crusted snow. He needs snow shoes. He doesn't care as we're around he just wants to snuggle and rub his head against us. My son named him Happy and I had named him India at first because I thought he was a she, but that is another story.

ACEO Westie Dog Painting Oil Miniatures

Miniature affordable original oil paintings are what we all want. Myself included. I've painted some to sell to other westie lovers, and I believe there are a good number of westie doggy boys and girls out there who all have wonderful parents that care for them.

These originals are painted on canvas that is stretched over a small wooden frame and looks just like the larger oils with the painting going around all edges for added appeal. Small and beautiful. Kind of like the real thing! By that I mean the real westie dog who:

Always have a smile for us

Never say they are bored
Set at our feet like they are connected to us

Cheer like crazy when we come home...and so on

The holidays are not that far away and with that in mind I am now offering these small aceo size paintings. Do you belong to a westie club? Let me know.

Westie Dog Voted Best Model of the Year

Hopefully you've not eaten too much Easter candy by now. Our west highland white terrier, Sir Salty, has been voted BEST Model of the Year, by me. He wasn't always fond of sitting still for the camera. No, too wiggly. Sometimes he couldn't control his emotions and would jump to my face for the speediest kiss... which by the way would be only two feet away. Get a cat involved, see gray paw in foreground, and he is super competitive. He can outsit the cat even though squirrels are scampering about. Add some lambs to the photo shoot and he turns into a total show off. Stop by tomorrow for more cute pictures.

Happy Easter Weekend!

Westie Paintings and Art Prints

Capturing the westie spirit is easy to do when you have a puppy (once a puppy always called a puppy) as a shadow. Ironically, once we get outside he is never a shadow he is always ahead of me continually turning around adjusting where he is going so that he is in a straight line ahead of me.

This painting is titled "Meadow Music" and puppy has dropped his ball and is listening to the crickets sing their songs. I've made some prints of this one and will offer them on ebay.

Growing and Feeding Topiary

Let the snow fall. We will garden indoors with an outdoor attitude! We garden in our imagination, in our waking hours and in our sleep. We garden on paper and canvas, we garden on cupcakes! It is a passion. Even our westie dog has caught the gardening fever.

Topiary standards are little living green works of whimsy. They are fairly easy to grown and maintain. If you don't have a green thumb you could always have a moss covered topiary form instead. I like the real living plant myself.

I would love to have a stainless steel covered table like the one above for gardening. Wood tables are okay, but I guess it European-ish to have one like this. Even in the kitchen. Say like the kitchen in Julia and Julia where Julia Child's in this stainless steel kitchen in Paris. Cook like a pro and garden like a pro.

My yew shrubs that I bought last year are extremely hardy and still in their pots outside. I have not yet figured out how I want to shape them. They are a wonderful deep forest green. The mercedes and bentley's of hedges and garden topiaries.

The title of this painting is "I Heart Gardening" and is for sale on ebay now.

Westie Dog's Valentine Day & Pink Roses

How do you celebrate Valentine's Day? Do you dine in or dine out? Roses? Chocolates? Dinner? This little westie family is celebrating it together. That is how traditions are made.

For the colors of this painting I went with pink and green. Classic color combinations. A person can't go wrong with these two colors. They can be soft and romantic or bold and bright depending on how deep or dark you choose the colors to be.

Siamese Cats and Westie Dogs

Our not so shabby looking westie boy, Sir Salty. Snow or frost running is always on the daily agenda and he is wondering what is taking me so long to catch up. He has that look, "Don't tell me you're going back in the house now?

Two of our siamese cats getting some sun and waiting for spring like the rest of us. They are watching our westie run all around on the hill and thinking "He is crazy. It's much better to be a spectator today and move very little, but then that is what they say in the summer, too.

Halloween Spiderman Hat Westie Dog

Spiders on halloween help you see in the dark. Our westie doesn't need any help seeing, but the huge spider was a little scary. He was a real trooper and didn't mind wearing this for a short time. I did give him a pinch of peanut butter as a treat.

Elsewhere around town First Lady Michelle was dressed as a catwoman. And the first dog? Was he dressed up?

Hawaiian Flowers-Tropical Bouquets

Floral designers are so inventive. This bouquet has a palm frond woven to look like a sail to me it looked like the Hokulea outrigger. At the tip of the frond it is tied with rafia. I thought this was beautiful and to me the palm fronds lying flat rather depicted the ocean.

I talked a bit to the florist that provides the flowers and she said that the arrangements are changed once a week. Believe me they still look good after a week. She had the flowers and leaves from the previous week in her basket and I was thinking, "She is not going to throw those away: Is she?"

Bamboo is used sparingly in each arrangement in most bouquets. Below is our favorite purple (burgundy, maroon) foliage in the form of ti leaves. There are so many different types of heliconias. I found a tropical flower blog in North Queensland (maybe I can find a Hawaiian heliconia blog soon) and it has many pictures depicting the different varieties and colors. Scroll to the bottom of the first page and there is a fast slide show of many rare ones with their proper names. I found it very helpful.

The reds of the anthuriums and heliconias are a rich red and look striking against the ti leaves. I saw orange bird of paradise flowers against the red (purple) ti leaves at one place.

Pussy willows in Waikiki? Yes, here is proof. This little arrangement made a nice contrast against the dark wood. So simple yet stylish.

My Westie Dog and Toy Frog Video