Howdy Folks!  

It’s been another season or two since I wrote a newsletter, but I do have an excuse.  I have been pretty busy lately helping my wife drag her elk and deer out of the field.  This year’s hunting season was a very unique one.  My daughter Trenna, whom I have used for many of my drawings and paintings over the years, got engaged in June, and even though she was “raised right”, decided to get married dead center in the middle of deer season!  As my good buddy Mike said… “Who in their right mind gets married during hunting season?”.   Her and her boyfriend Aaron, along with a million other people, thought it would be “cute” having their wedding on 11/11/11.  As a result, I lost out on a deer season and came up empty this fall, but I did get to help Em with hers.  She chose not to hunt the first season, and took a chance on putting in on the 2^nd season which was at the same time as her elk hunt.  As it turned out, she filled her elk tag opening day 15 minutes into the hunt and was able to go deer hunting the last three days.  This year we decided to buy land owner elk tags on a ranch just west of us.  Em and I have been putting in for 26 years, and for the past 10 and 11 years respectively, Em and I have not been drawn, so we decided that it was time to find another avenue to hunt elk.  It’s a terrible thing when politics enters the game and fish dept. but then it seems that there are very few areas in this great county where politics isn’t in bed with the system, Game and fish being no exception. 

The wedding of my daughter and Aaron Gilbert was a great night.  Not only did we enjoy the celebration but we also were able to have nearly our entire family together, affording us all a chance to cut a rug for the weekend.   My son Matt who lives on Euless Texas came and brought his girlfriend Stephanie, and our daughter JiJi came from North Carolina.   Her husband Mark is retired Air Force now working in Iraq, and she will be joining him in Rome, Italy for the holidays!!  Trenna also married a military man.  He was a marine that fought in the Iraq war, but has since done his time and is currently working on his teaching degree at UNM.   The entire crew plus three dogs will be here for yet another “Redneck Christmas” and as always, playing with our new weapons!!

This winter and spring I will be heading out into the world of the unknown… well not exactly but I haven’t been doing shows in Arizona for years, and was ask by a promoter to join a group of artists to do some shows in the Scottsdale area.  The Borgata is a beautiful spot, and from what I hear has NO WIND.  That being a factor was what sold me on doing a show there.  I will also be doing a couple shows in Gold Canyon, which is at the foothills of the Superstition Mountains east of Mesa.  I remember when there was nothing there but lizards, rattlesnakes and an occasional UFO.  I might be in Texas this spring for some “good ole boy shows” and a few Ya’lls!

I am currently working on a commission piece, a poster for a cattle drive that will take place in May in Jal, N.M., in the very south eastern part of the state.  It is a painting of longhorns which will be used to advertise a 100 mile cattle drive, taking place the first part of May.

This coming summer will be a “vacation of a lifetime”…. that’s what I keep hearing from all of my friends.  My wife Em bought an African Safari hunt back in February at a Safari Club auction down in Roswell N.M. and our good friends Barry and Lisa from Texas will be joining us there for two weeks.  It has been a life long dream to go to Africa for my wife and I, so off we go!  Her plan is to take in the local surroundings with Lisa and buy something with hair on it.  Barry and I plan on harvesting a lot of exotics.

I have been drawing and painting the past few months trying to catch up on small and medium size originals.  It’s seems that the popular sizes are my intermediate size pieces and this past year my inventory has been depleted.  I did a few photo sessions with the grand kids and also got some interesting shots of some other scenes and will be glued to the drawing board for the next few months trying to get stocked back up.  The internet sales have soared this past year which I attribute to the cost of gas across our country.  More and more of my customers are shopping online and since I added two more sites exclusively to my black and white drawings and my music art, as well as my main notevena site, sales have increased.  You can buy quality art with the click of a button!  By the way… I can now be followed on Twitter and Facebook as well, for all of you that want to hear from me daily.   Facebook has re-united me with some of my old high school buddies as well as customers and friends.  It’s a great source of communication and I also post all of my new originals and prints on Facebook the day they become available. 

By the way… check out my 1^st political statement.  Back in the renaissance, Baroque eras, artists would paint a political statement as per their feelings of what was going on at the time.  “Mr. President, We Need To Talk” is my statement of what is going on now. 

Merry Christmas… and  Happy New Year!

Coming For Kisses

Old School