This painting took me around the block and back again! At first I didn't like the trees in the background, then the sky, then I took the red out of the barns, then I put it back in with more of a orange-red color, and then I added the cattle after I thought I was finished. And now it has turned out just as I wanted it too.
Today we have the first heavy snow fall of the year and I am painting a summer scene! Oh well, paint away.
This is a typical scene that you might see as you drive down any rural road in southern Iowa. A farm had need of many barns or "sheds"; hog shed, chicken coup, calf shed, grainery, amoung many others. The farthest rolling hill in the background is a corn field ready for the combine to harvest the grain.
I gathered some leaves for the grandsons to jump and play in and it turned ou to be a great afternoon. When the fun time was over I brought into the house three of the best leaves for me to begin some drawings. The contrast betwen the large yellow leaf and the purplish background work well together.
I can't avoid leaves! They are everywhere in our yard and I must mulch them and put them on the garden.
We took our grandson to a local pumpkin patch and there I discovered this lovely home and all these flowers. The flower beds had taken over everthing and were bursting from their bounderies and spilling out into the walks. SOLD 
I've been concentrating on barns for quite a while so I figured it was time for a white house.
Cold evenings are part of my childhood memories. Walking from the barn to the house on a well worn path. Walking up from the woods after checking all my muskrat traps. All the time keeping an eye on the setting sun to make it in before it got really cold after the sun finally set over the horizen.
This time of year the sunsets on the western horizon are an absolute blaze of orange, reds, and yellows. To try capture them is a challenge.
There are times in the winter when there is a sense of warmth and this painting conveys that feeling. There is no wind to bring cutting breezes and the tempurature has actually gotten above 32 degrees so many-a-times we can make it to the barn in just a flannel shirt. 
