Dr. Mary is going to paint today! She is in her painting costume! I hope she doesn’t blend in with the walls and accidentally get painted over!
We were up and going at 7:00 am today because the portable alarm clock (the one with four feet and fur) decided to go off. To turn the alarm off, we have to put the alarm outside.
Mary made coffee, and we did some office work before jumping in the shower. We waited for our insurance man, Brian Payne, to drop by. Brian is a long-time family friend assisting me in replacing my health insurance plan, which is folding at the end of the year.
Brain gave us some sage advice.
After Brian finally escaped, we geared up to chauffeur Mary to her top-secret watercolor class at the Tustin Senior Citizens Center. I suspect they’re creating masterpieces in there that are too scandalous for the general public!
Below is some exciting and useful information about watercolors in general:
1. Watercolors are made from ground pigments and held together with a gum binder that’s water-soluble, of course. The pigments used in watercolor paint can be either natural or synthetic.
2. Watercolor dries a lot lighter than when it is applied. In other words, the color you apply to the canvas won’t be the same color you’ll get once the paint has dried out. The final dried color is about two times lighter than the original color applied to the canvas.
3. Watercolors are safe and practically non-toxic. However, you should still avoid getting it on your hands.
4. Watercolor has been used for many millennia – cave paintings done in paleolithic Europe were done in watercolor. It gained a surge of popularity during the Renaissance when it became appreciated is a proper art medium.
5. Watercolors can be transparent or opaque. Transparent watercolors let the light into the canvas and reflect it back, creating a sort of glowing effect. Opaque watercolors, on the other hand, don’t let the light in as much and instead make it bounce off the pigment, which creates a sort of dull and weathered effect.
6. Watercolor paint comes in tubes or pans. With tubes, you just squirt the paint out and go from there. Pans are square blocks of paint in a plastic or metal box. Generally speaking, tube paints are much easier to mix; they’re also cheaper and are better for creating large washes. As a result, most artists prefer to use tube paints.
7. Fugitive watercolors fade very quickly. Most of the watercolor paints available now are non-fugitive, meaning the color won’t fade as quickly and will last much longer.
8. The same watercolor by different manufacturers may not look the same. If you want to use a particular color, buy your paints from a single manufacturer to ensure consistency.
9. As it is water-based, watercolor paint can be pretty unpredictable. When painting with watercolors, you must learn how to control the paint. Of course, you could let the paint do its own thing and incorporate this into your painting.
Painting number two is pretty impressive! Mary is exceptionally talented.
“The object of art is not to reproduce reality, but to create a reality of the same intensity.” Alberto Giacometti.
While Mary was being creative, I returned home and did a load of washing, reorganized my closet, put my many shirts back into order, and got the steaks ready for dinner!
After picking her up, we went by the post office to drop off some goodies for Mary’s grandkids and then to Michaels to get a brush and picture frames. We are searching for a place to show Mary’s artwork; perhaps upstairs in her loft?
We went to Michael’s to get the current artwork framed.
By the time we got home, we were hungry. Mary went to the garden and picked a mess of green beans. She then did a side dish of zoodles. I prepared two steaks for the air fryer.
Through trial and error and changing the setting several time, I learned to make perfect air-fried steaks. This evening, I used a lean top sirloin, and I recommend making sure your steaks are at least 1 inch thick. Thinner steaks cook too fast without getting a chance to brown. I put a little oil (not WD-40 or motor oil) on the steaks to help them brown better. Adding a dry rub to leaner steaks like this sirloin or chops helps with overall color.
After 10 minutes at 400 degrees, they were perfect!
They came out perfect.
Our timing was perfect, the zoodles and greenbeans were also ready to go!
Did I say perfect??
Some drippings were at the bottom of the air fryer, but they cleaned up quickly.
Are we having fun yet? Yes, we are!!
We visited Jeff for a while before coming home and crashing! It’s been a busy day!
Look out, she is cooking again!
