Happy 4th---and recent art ideas

The recent holiday, the 4th, was a long and busy one.  No art was done, all though each morning, after feeding the calf, (Lucy)  I did look for good plein-air spots.  I drew in my sketch book, did not paint, and in general hunted for nice places to take my friend from Dayton when she can run away to paint with me.  Its good practise, tho, to use your sketch book.    Family came to enjoy a B.B.Q---and  a lot of fun was had by all. I did work on a watercolor that I have been thinking about doing.  These flowers bloom each year along the road ways here, and I have been taking pictures of them I was told the name for these poppy-type flowers is "Cowboys eggs"  now, this may just be their nick-names.   They are very happy looking flowers, and do look like sunny-side up eggs.  The sun filters thru the petals with a lot of color when they are back-lit.  Here is a picture for you to see.

And this is the water-color I managed to get done.  I am doing this again, and hopefully planning the darks, and negative spaces better.  It was fun to do---I use a lot of water, and sometimes use a plexiglass board to paint on with my paper completely soaked.  This one was done on dry paper, stretched, then re-wet with a lot of water.   I need to get back into watercolor----but the pastels are just soooo much fun.   You can use them in so many ways, on so many different surfaces for so many different looks.  I guess you can watercolor, too.  I am also interested in Gouache painting.  Did I mention my horse is getting fat?? (Maybe I am , too!)