Author Archives: Elizabeth Gaye MacDonald

BUSY Busy busy Summer!

02 Thursday Sep 2010

Posted by in Plein Air, Watercolour

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I can’t believe it’s September!  I must ask forgiveness of everyone who’s stopped by in the last two months.  So I will post just a sample of what I’ve been up to this summer.  Last summer a friend of mine and I started the Windsor & Essex County Plein Air Society.  We made a pledge to ourselves that we would get out and paint every week.  We’ve succeeded!  I took to Facebook with our group and started to invite people, and there are now 9 of us who get together every week!

OH!!  I also designed a logo, watermark for all my work.  I was looking at the wordpress logo,and suddenly I realized that subconsciously I chose my blog name with all words starting with P for a reason.  DUH… the simplicity of the WordPress logo inspired me.  What would PPP  look like in a circle.  I like it, I hope you do too.  I’m thinking of getting a sign for my van window.

Sheldon MacDonald Winner of the Windsor Chartwell Senior Star Competition

26 Saturday Jun 2010

Posted by in Photography, Portrait

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It is such a rare event that I get a photograph of my husband when he is NOT making an unintentional silly face, that even though this photo is a tad out of focus I have to put it up for Sunday Stills. You see I could not be more proud of him. He’s been competing in the Chartwell Senior Star contest for four years now. The first year he came in 2nd. This year he WON! Now all I can say is that you have to be 65+ to enter the contest. If I told you his age he would not be very pleased. Let’s just say he’s in better shape then many 1/2 his age.

We’ve had such a busy month. Sheldon was in two singing contests. The Windsor Bluesfest Idol, and the Chartwell Senior Stars. The Bluesfest he and his daughter made it to the 2nd round. We are very proud of them both.

But we are very excited about the Senior Star contest. Now that he has won the regional contest, Chartwell will send a video of him singing to Toronto to be judged with contestants from all across Canada. From those they will choose ten to go to the finals in Toronto. We hope he makes it to the finals. There are some very nice prizes. 1st prize is $5000.!! Last year the Prime Minister of Canada was in the audience! So wish him luck.

Here’s a video of him singing in the Windsor Bluesfest.

Bluesfest video’s

18 Friday Jun 2010

Posted by in Event

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To the contestants of the Bluesfest. Please send an email to me with the following information.

Which venue you sang at. The Vic, or the Tecumseh Road house. Your name, contestant number, and the titles of your songs. Due to the length of time it takes to upload a video to you tube it maybe some time before I can upload all the video’s. I am going to make a master DVD of all the contestants that I have recorded. I will make this available for a small fee to cover my costs.

Phenomenal performances everyone!

Plein Air Paintings 2009

25 Tuesday May 2010

Posted by in Plein Air, Watercolour

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I’ve been so busy posting my photo’s that I’ve neglected my paintings. So, I’ve decided to remedy that by posting them on a Tuesday. Here’s some painted last year. If you are interested in purchasing something let me know. As precious as they are to me I will sell them, after all I do need art supplies!

So, I bet you are wondering what is a Plein Air Painting? En plein air is a French expression which means “in the open air”, and is particularly used to describe the act of painting outdoors. There is no greater joy for me then to combine painting and the great outdoors.

Willistead Garden

Willistead garden

I would consider this more of a sketch than an actual watercolour. It was done in a small Dick Blick sketch book that I don’t even think they make anymore. It was a gift from my dear friend Margaret Dawson. The two of us are dedicated to meeting every Friday to paint. Stay tuned for more work.

Privacy and Internet Invasive Widgets

25 Tuesday May 2010

Posted by in Uncategorized

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Lately I’ve seen some of my dear friends using an application that tracks their visitors. The problem with this is that whoever has provided the software is also tracking your visitors. I know that our every move is tracked anyway, but actually seeing my city on your page, and where I got your link from is a bit disturbing. I hope that my visitors will see this and abandon these practices on their pages.
Elizabeth

The True Morels vs the False Morels

24 Monday May 2010

Posted by in Botony, Macro Monday, Nikon D90, Photography, ViewNX

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Ascomycetes – Morchella – The true Morels vs the False Morels


If I told you where these were,  I would have to shoot you! They are a spring mushroom, and highly prized. We also encountered some false Morels, which are poison. I’m grateful that I have my Dad’s mushroom books to help me identify them.

Morchella The True Morels

Gyromitra, Helvella, and Related Species of the False Morels

Gyromitra, Helvella, and Related Species of the False Morels

Gromitra Brunnea Underwood

Cap large 5-15 cm broad, often saddled-shaped, lobed, often veined, chocolate-brown, white beneath, Flesh brittle, white. Stalk large, 16 – 15 cm long, 2-5 cm broad, Slightly larger base, somewhat ribbed to smooth, white, nearly hollow to cottony inside. Spores 28 – 30 x 12 – 15 elliptical, finely warted.
Single or several under hardwood forests in eastern North America in early Sp. Causes severe illness from high levels of MMH. (Group V toxins). G. fastigiata (Krombh.) Rehm (394B) is similar but looks as though it might be a darker brown formm of southern Helvella gigas; however it also contains Group V toxins. It is occasionally found at low elevation in western North America.

This mushroom is identical to the one depicted in 394B

Macro Monday challenge

Archives – 2007 Road Trip

23 Sunday May 2010

Posted by in Landscape, Photography

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I could not believe that I had no recent landscape photos with my new camera. I had to pull from archives this week due to time constraints. But, I include two of my favorite landscape photos. Both of these were taken on a road trip to Nova Scotia in 2007. It was the best trip ever!

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2007 Road trip Nova Scotia

Dogwood sketch

07 Friday May 2010

Posted by in Botony

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Dogwood sketch

Dogwood sketch, originally uploaded by photographerpainterprintmaker.

Another rainy day. Friday, my fellow artist Margaret and I head out to do some Plein Air painting. When the weather does not co-operate we paint in the studio. We either work on unfinished paintings or pull out our photographs.

Two weeks ago we were scouting places to paint. I gave my camera a great workout at Wilistead Park. Here is a drawing from one of my photographs from that day.