Happy 82nd Birthday, Grandma Chow!!

Happy 82nd Birthday to my Grandma Chow!!

The entire Chow Clan (minus Uncle Wes, who is on vacation) gathered at one of Grandma's favorite Chinese restaurants in Stockton tonight to celebrate. I think this is the first time so many of us have been together since our wedding, nearly 8 years ago. It was so nice to see some people that we hadn't seen in years, and I know that it made Grandma very happy. :)

Happy Birthday, Grandma!! We all love you so very much.

2013 San Francisco artMRKT

It's that time of the year again! I'm working at the SF artMRKT for the third year in a row. I'm helping out my friends, Jim and Cynde of Adler and Co. Gallery.

Big Bonus: I have one of my own oil paintings hanging (ie: for Sale!) this year!! VERY exciting!!

The artMRKT is at the Fort Mason Festival Pavillion this year, which is a fantastic venue. We're at booth 101, and will be here Thurs evening through Sunday evening.

"T @ MOMA"

Dick and I went to the SF MOMA Saturday morning for a couple of hours. We haven't been in at least a couple of years, and we wanted to see it again before it closes in a couple of weeks for expansion. It's not scheduled to reopen again until 2016.

While we were there, I was pursuing through some part of the permanent exhibit, and Dick was waiting for me at the end. There was a little counter/desk set up there where guests could draw, having been inspired by what they had just seen.

I came out to find Dick with pencil and paper in hand ready to sketch.

This was his sketch:


Richard Craddock, Jr.
"T @ MOMA"
2013
pencil on paper
7" x 5"

I know it's just a quickie sketch, that he did just for fun, but it makes me happy. :)
Of course, I made him sign and date it, too.

Happy Mother's Day

We went down to Milpitas today for the first BBQ of the year at the Chow House and to celebrate Mother's Day.

Dick and Spencer drank their cute little 8 oz. "Coronitas", and my sister and I had Pear Cider. :)

My Dad grilled the BBQ ribs and chicken that my Mom prepared, as well as the fresh asparagus that we brought. Mmmm.

Grandma Chan joined us as well. It was a very nice day of family togetherness.

Happy Mother's Day to all my Mom friends out there, but especially to my beautiful Mom - the most loving, warm, genuine, funny and supportive person I know.

I love you, Mom!

And remember, "MOM" upside down spells "WOW"!

Chinatown Painting: Session 4

I'm nearly done with my Chinatown painting. I think I'll be finished after one more session.

I got a lot done today. I started by putting more detail in the two main figures (which are Dick and Spencer, by the way).

I also worked out the color a bit more throughout the entire painting, reworking the various creams, reds and blues.

I added the Chinese characters on the banner, which I think pieced the whole thing together. I tried to not be too precise with the Chinese characters. I learned this tip when I did the lettering on the corner store of my Dolores Street painting. Dean explained to me then that if the lettering on a painting is too precise (compared with the looser style of the rest of the painting) then the lettering will stand out, and will automatically draw the eye of the viewer. So, my Chinese lettering isn't precise at all, and I tried to blur the edges a bit. Granted, I can't read Chinese at all, but I think it looks decent.

I may have mentioned it before, but the style of this painting is quite different from the last few that I've done. It's a bit more of an abstract. I'm trying concentrate more on blocks of color, rather than specific shapes. It's interesting to see how those various forms of color connect with each other once I step back and really take it all in together.

In this photo, you can see the original photo on which this painting is based. Hopefully, you can see that I tried to match the colors with the original.

Next session, I need to work on the figure in the foreground, and perhaps add a glaze to the banner and a few other places.

It's coming along. :)

Milipitas

I'm wondering if my parents have seen this yet....

Apparently, new freeway signs were put up in my hometown of Milpitas (Note the spelling!) within the last 48 hours.

Amusingly enough, I remember that the spine of our high school yearbook had the same typo on year (1986, I believe). Ever since then, I have jokingly called Milpitas, "Milipitas". "Oh, My lip-itas!" :)

So funny. I wonder how long it'll be before the sign is replaced.

update

A friend on Facebook just posted a photo of the spine of the 1986 "Milipitas High School" yearbook. (I got the year right!)

Follow-up articles on Saturday evening's incident of Helen Mirren in "The Audience"

As I mentioned in a blog post Saturday, we were fortunate enough to see Helen Mirren's performance in "The Audience" Saturday evening in London. I'm pretty amazed that the story about her yelling at the drummers outside the stage door during intermission has made the international news.

I came home to SF Monday afternoon to see this story about it in sfgate.com.

There's also this article and video about it in nbcnews.com.

It made the local news, too, of course. Here's an article from a UK newspaper.

Happy Kitty, Happy Home. :)

We had a very nice, smooth flight home from London. It's always nice to come home to a happy kitty. :)

Homeward Bound

We've boarded our flight, and are ready to head back home.

Our flight is scheduled to depart around 10:30am, and scheduled to arrive at SFO right around 1:30pm.

Unfortunately, that does not mean our flight will only be 3 hours. More like 11 hours. ;)

See you on the other side!