Queen Lucy in Red - Completed

I managed to finish this painting yesterday as part of my experiment to see if I can paint while the kiddies are up and playing. I'm happy with the painting, although the photo is not good as today is very glarey and as some of the paint is still wet it has picked this up. Oil on canvas 12" x 12".

In terms of painting during the day while my children are around, I am in two minds. I found the actual painting process to be very fragmented as I couldn't let myself drift off in that trance-like state where you just paint and lose track of time and space. Instead I was constantly checking that they were both okay and happy and I guess I was scared of going into that state so I was vigilantly guarding against it. I do think that the mummy gene would over-ride that anyway and I probably didn't have to be so vigilant. What I mean is that once you have children, you always have your ear out to what is going on. The only time I have a fantastic deep sleep is when I can have a sleep during the day in the weekend when my husband is looking after them. That is the only time I truly let myself go. It is the same with painting. When I paint at night, they are asleep and the monitor is on and my husband is home and would hear if anything went on. I also like spending quality time with my babies during the day and playing with them.

On the other hand though, I did manage to get quite a number of hours of painting done even if it was broken into 10 minutes at a time. I guess the outcome is that it isn't as pleasant an experience but it's nice to see that painting her this morning and it wouldn't be here if I hadn't painted during the day.

Another reason why I painted yesterday was that my husband had his knee surgery and it helped me keep my mind off it because even though he has been through this before, I still worry. The surgery went well, but they had to do a more intensive procedure than planned once they got inside and so instead of just being restricted for a couple of days, he is on crutches for 6 weeks and has been told not to go into work. As we have employees and are building several houses at the moment, we are working out how that will work. He has plenty of work he can do from home in terms of drawing plans for the next houses we build and finding the next project, but we have to ensure everything keeps on track. At least we build for ourselves as we keep and then rent out, so we don't have to worry about clients or getting it finished for selling.