Yesterday I planted flowers on my sunny deck. Like my mother, I love red geraniums. Grew up with them. For contrast, I tucked in white Bacopa, yellow Bidens and lavender Alyssum.

White flowers glow as dusk falls. Flowers cheer me up.

By removing spent flowers and fertilizing, the plants bloom into December. It pains me to dig up flowering plants to make way for winter holiday decorations. The south-facing deck creates a warm micro-climate with walls on three sides.

This quick oil painting is by artist Marylane Barfield. My mother's cousin, Marylane was visiting our lakeside home in Michigan. At 16, I watched Marylane arrange Mom's red geraniums and a white rose on a table. Fascinated, I watched her paint it in three hours.

Marylane is the first woman and first American to be elected president of the Royal British Society of Fine Artists.

Marylane lives in England with her British husband, Lawrence Barfield, a doctor of archeology. Lawrence is an expert on the Iceman, a prehistoric, mummified man found on the border between Austria and Italy.

The oil painting is a little blurry because I was standing on the bed that made me unstable.

[en.wikipedia.org]