Full steam....

I am a morning person.

I love waking at 4 or 5 AM and beginning my day early. I love to eat my breakfast while I read the online news, check emails, scout Facebook for more news and events, and the various model horse sales sites and forums.

I gave up coffee back before Christmas..cold turkey. Yep..sure did. Of course I switched to green and herbal teas ....there are so many glorious flavors of teas. Fruit flavors and spice flavors...and mixtures of fruit and spice.

The only time I miss coffee is when I smell it brewing....sigh.

Completed this afternoon is a nice Rose Reiner sculpted by the talented Sarah Rose.

Reiner is very impressive in person...and his face is full of personality.

I still need to take a few more photos of Reiners face...he still has wet paint so that will have to wait a few days.

Another wonderful sculpture just completed is a Sarah Minkiewicz Fandango resin. I love this little sculpture! I also had the honor to paint Fandangos match Kotillian....both wonderful sculptures..full of fire and personality.

And last but not least is the fantastic Boreas resin. Boreas is sculpted by the talented Karen Gerhardt and is almost completed...I only need to paint his eyes.

My sales item "Royal Poet" is completed...he is the little Callahan resin sculpted by the talented Adalee Hude. I only need to get his final photos so I can post those here and on my web page....and he is going to a show with me this month. He will go up for sale after the show so stay tuned!

Have a wonderful day everyone!
Sandra Hottinger
C.S.Richmond Studios

Working through the aftershocks...

I began prepping my next sales item Monday afternoon and I worked through about 7:30 PM....I heard a muffled shot gun like sound at about 6:30 PM and thought nothing of it since squirrel hunting season is still in ....altho it was a tad dark at that time.

 The next morning the news reported another aftershock of 3.2 centered near Mineral Virginia. There have been over 60 aftershocks now....and besides the big quake back in August 2011 this aftershock is the only one I've heard...no shaking just sound. The sound that the quake and the aftershock makes amazes me....the August quake made a sound like twenty heavy freight locomotives going down our road at once...amazing.

I'm sure that if I had not chosen the career path I took I would have went to school to study being a meteorologist...

Another crazy sound was after the hurricane went through here the trees were weakened by the 62 MPH constant winds and the heavy rain. About a week after the hurricane, on a warm calm night, we were awakened shortly after midnight by a loud popping echoing sound in the nearby woods down behind our house. Since our house windows were open we could hear the sound well.

If you have ever watched the nature shows on the sounds the icebergs or ice flows make ...the deep echoing cracking sound they make...you know the sound we heard. The sound went on for about 30 minutes...

There are houses behind us and apparently our neighbors in those woods were awakened my the sound as well....we saw flashlights moving around those houses. I'm sure that our neighbors were worried that a tree was going to fall into their homes.

Finally there was one last pop-echo and the tree crashed to the ground. No harm done except to the tree itself.

The photo above is of my next sales item, a Mr. Shadow resin by the talented Nicole Hatch, and a Lirico resin sculpted by the talented Sarah Minkiewicz.

Mr. Shadow will be painted to the same colors I used to paint the commissioned B. Eberl Kladruber. I have a TB race horse photo I used to paint the dappled grey colors onto the Kladruber and I'll be using the same race horse photo as my guide to paint Mr. Shadow. I will have to begin thinking of a title for Mr. Shadow...

On the commission front I've almost completed six commissions and my Callahan sales item is still waiting completion. Those six commissions will all be completed at about the same time...so I'm betting I will have a full day of taking/editing photos once those are done.

Time to paint! Have a wonderful day everyone!
Sandra Hottinger
C.S.Richmond Studios