Well, after some careful thought and number crunching I've come to accept the fact that I can't afford to move back to Florida, not unless I could earn as much painting as I do cleaning and it doesn't look like that'll ever happen. I couldn't afford to take my things with me and to get there with no job prospects would be pretty foolish.  So the new plan is to try and move back to Narberth, the little town I was living (and happy) in before I moved to the Germantown area.  I've talked about Narberth before, the perfect little town with everything you could possibly need within a four block area......grocery, pharmacy, bank, hardware, train station, movie theater, restaurants, bars, laundry, coffee shop, specialty shops, etc etc.  And now that I'm collecting social security I'll be better able to afford the pricey rents (the reason I left there)......ha :-) at least that's the current plan but if you follow this blog you know that could change on a dime ......damn ADHD.

Meanwhile there are two new paintings on ebay.

No painting today.  I spent the morning making another free website on Weebly just for my ACEO paintings http://aceopaintings.net .  You can get to my eBay auctions from it and also buy prints. I started to add a 'store' page on the site but after I had posted 5 products I was informed I had to upgrade and pay if I wanted to add more so I removed it for now and just ask people to contact me if they want to purchase a print.  I'll upgrade the site to add the store once I get some work under my belt, the bank account is pretty low right now with all the missed work from the snow.

I've been wanting to turn some of my ACEO images into small note cards to sell but hadn't been able to find a small size that I thought would be small enough ..... imperfections start to show if the image is enlarged too much.  I think I finally found some that might work and also not break the bank at
this site.  Just some simple matte finish white cards that measure 3 1/2 x 4 7/8 and they're $9.37 for a box of 50!

And a box of 50 envelopes is $10.93.....perfect.  I think $20 for 50 cards/envelopes beats $1+ a piece printers charge, and I'm sure I won't be using $30 worth of ink.

Now all I would need is the confidence to print them myself.  This will be my project for this week.

Ut-O..........looks like I'd better keep looking!   I just found 50 cards for $4.50 HERE
And a box of 250 HERE for $17.97

Ok......I think I've reached my limit.....more snow tomorrow, that's three separate snow events in one week!  I'm starting to check out apartments back in Florida.  Here's three places I've found so far with really reasonable rents:
http://www.lexingtonclubatverobeach.com/
http://www.indianrunstuart.com/
http://www.sandsatstlucie.com/
The Sands has two bedroom/two baths starting at $599

The Lexington has two bedroom/one baths starting at $660 which is what I'm paying here for a two room efficiency!

And The Crossings at Indian Run Apartments has one bedrooms starting at $581, two bedrooms at $681. 

I'm leaning towards the Lexington so far I think.

No work again today because of road conditions......did you hear about the multi, multi car
accident /pile up on the PA turnpike?  Thank goodness no one was seriously hurt.
So.......I did a lot of snow shoveling in the parking area this morning,

(we're running out of places to put the snow) and then settled in to some painting.

Two more paintings done :-)

Roads looked a bit dicey this morning so I pushed a job to tomorrow and finished off another ACEO card for ebay, this one Degas inspired.

Then I went out and cleared some of the new snow off the parking area so my car won't slip around when it all freezes tonight.
Got an errand to run and then more painting.

I landed on this Pinterest page yesterday while looking for examples of canvas murals and felt so inspired to immerse myself in art.  While scrolling through the gorgeous work I was reminded of what a fantastic superior artist Pascal Amblard is (look for his panels).......he is simply amazing, not to mention adorably cute. I first learned about him when I use to lurk on the fauxforum.com site.

Wow, I wonder what else I've missed!  How bloody convenient, I just saw these.

I love doing smaller hanging 'murals' and I adore painting screens.....

ready made canvas screens, who knew!   It use to be such a hassle looking for old screens to redo or buying those hollow core bifold doors to paint.  Its about time someone thought to do this.

Speaking of hanging murals, I've decide to try and get back in the game.  I just spent all day on Weebly.com building a quick and simple website for children's canvas murals, I'm sure I'll go back and make changes, I always do ;-) but I wanted to get it up quickly, and quickly means some tidying up will be needed.....maybe even a facelift (template change), I really want a more sophisticated look.  I'm only charging $15 a square foot plus the cost of the canvas and shipping. I'd be thrilled if I could just do a few of these a month and give up the cleaning jobs. Its getting harder and harder to go out and clean up after other people, its not how I want to spend my time.  So with crossed fingers......

Let me just say........I'M SO OVER WINTER!!...... and there's more snow predicted for this coming week...sigh.  I'm already having to pay this months rent in installments because of the work I missed from the snow we've had the last few weeks and frigid temperatures playing havoc with my car's ability to start in the morning.  Not only did I loose income but I also had to put out for a new battery.
Some don't seem to mind the weather though, this neighborhood hawk spent the night in the tree outside my window.....it was 12 degrees with minus 0 wind chills.  This picture is just before he/she left in the morning.

As you can see in the side bars I got some paintings done today for ebay and will most likely do the same tomorrow.
I want to share with you where I got 75 5"x7" ACEO matte kits (matte, backing, clear bag) for $10 plus $8 and change for shipping.  Of course there are other offerings/sizes you can find HERE too.
I have to say too that they arrived quickly and so carefully packaged.