I will always prefer that you order wall art directly from my online Photo Gallery which is hosted by SmugMug.com who uses professional printers to print each of these, whether on paper, canvas or my new preference of “Float-mounted Metal Print.” I ordered each of these from my gallery.
There are 11 new ones ordered especially for the new local gallery that did not get established, plus about that many more I already had. You can see them online in two places:
Wall Art Images in a sub-gallery in my big Photo Gallery on SmugMug.
Or on this website at: Art Gallery at My House, but you have to scroll down past the floral accent pillows which I listed first with wall art second. Everything available is presented there on one page, while in the galleries there is a separate sub-gallery for each category.
The feature photo is one of the bigger images, a sunset from Cancun with Costa Rica on that horizon! 🙂 And below is one of the four Red-eyed Tree Frog photos available.
Red-eyed Tree Frog at Arenal Observatory Lodge, 20×16 inches, Metal, $100 USD or ¢55,000 CRC.
Sometimes it feels like no two bugs are alike here, but of course that is not true, but here is another one I cannot identify and don’t remember ever seeing before, photographed with my cell phone on the bathroom floor. The long antennae remind me of the Longhorn Beetle, but nothing else about him seems to match that ID. As I tweaked each photo a little different, he sort of looks a little different in each. As always in these blog galleries, click an image to see full-width and larger.
Unidentified Insect, Costa RicaUnidentified Insect, Costa RicaUnidentified Insect, Costa Rica
Why I Slacked Off Blogging . . .
For more than two weeks now I’ve put all my energy into preparing my many wall art photos and many more other photo products for a one morning art sale at my house on 24 June which I’ll tell you more about in the blog over the next few days. And much of my time has been spent in going to Alajuela to pick up packages of different items being shipped here for what was first going to be a new art gallery business in town and now for my one morning “Coffee & Art!” Plus I like to label every image with information on where photographed and of course a price tag.
In addition to that one morning of “Coffee and Art,” I’m accepting art shoppers by appointment and had 3 ladies come by today with lots of compliments and $40 in sales of little things, so it sort of began today, though I will not encourage such private showings until after the Saturday Morning Coffee in another week. 🙂 And I was encouraged that one of the ladies wanted a particular sloth image in a metal print (I don’t have now) and will order it from my online gallery which I’m hoping more people will do! 🙂
Tomorrow I will feature the wall art that I hung in my living room for the sale and hoping that it will be the big attraction, while the ladies today bought tote bags and greeting cards 🙂 , so it is difficult to predict what people will like or want to spend their money on! 🙂 Stay tuned for more information on my temporary Atenas Art Gallery in my casita!
My new ABOUT Page
When I went to my ABOUT page to add a link to my temporary art gallery, I found formatting errors and a repeated paragraph, possibly due to many “upgrades” or changes in the many WordPress softwares and I couldn’t correct some errors, so just deleted almost everything and started over with the newest WP Editor and put a more recent photo of myself which is what I really look like now. 🙂 That’s the page with all the personal information and probably not a lot of people go there, but it is now updated and the menu has a link to my new temporary art gallery in Atenas. 🙂 There seems to constantly be little things like this that I need to do! But hopefully slowing down again after the June 24 art show!
Finally! Rainy Season seems to have started with rains every afternoon for 4 days straight now, but oh so much later than usual and from what I’ve read, we may still have a drier rainy season than usual. It is amazing how much greener it gets here after even one rain! And how many more birds! Below are photos of 4 birds I managed to snap this week. I love the rainy season, my favorite time of year here! And most days it rains only 2 or 3 hours in the late afternoon or early evening.
I mentioned earlier about being very busy with several projects like changing doctors, renewing residency, and helping start the new “Artenas Galleria” that all have seemingly taken the leisure from my life – but not for much longer! 🙂 This morning I had my leisurely 30 minute walk to El Fogon restaurant for an Avocado Toast breakfast before grocery shopping at La Coope across the street. and the two shots in this post are from my morning walks in the garden over the last week+, with more photos coming! 🙂
My last Plumbago plant just keeps blooming, though I got rid of others because they crowd out other plants. 🙂
And the feature photo (at top online) is of one of the recently budded “Maracas” or “Shampoo Ginger” flowers that I will have even more of this year. They are coming just as the other Maraca plant (orange) in my front yard has its flowers dying out, so I have one of the Maraca plants blooming almost all of the time on one side of the house or the other! 🙂 I will share more flower shots later along with very few birds and butterflies the last week. We finally got a reasonably good rain yesterday afternoon, but this is starting out to be the driest “Rainy Season” in my 8.5 years here! And somewhere I read that much of the entire globe will be dryer this year, including Central America.
Though that sounds like me over the last few days and in the coming days, it is actually the name of a butterfly, Whirlabout, Polites vibex, and here are two photos of one recently in my garden.
Whirlabout, Atenas, Costa Rica
Whirlabout, Atenas, Costa Rica.
And what have I been so busy about? Well, several things . . .
Finally I have all my photos for the 5 nights in April 2023 at Maquenque Eco Lodge and Reserve including the sub-galleries I’ve already shared. This was another great photo trip to one of my favorite places in Costa Rica with photos of 62 bird species (6 lifers!), 10 butterflies and more than 30 species of other animals! Plus my usual “Nature as Art” photos of everything from flowers to weird leaves and beautiful landscapes. Just this one trip gallery will show you why I am so excited about being “Retired in Costa Rica!”the name of my blog and website. Enjoy the photos! Just click this image:
CLICK this image of this first page of the gallery to go to it.
One of my many breaks from sorting and processing photos from my Maquenque visit last week was to make a doctor visit in San Jose yesterday, then have my driver to take me to a hotel to greet friends who were in the Nashville Photography Club with me “way back when.” Charlie and Ellen, who now live in Cookeville, TN and their traveling friend Cynthia. They came early for an extra day in San Jose before their two-week nature tour of Costa Rica begins. We had lunch at our famous 19th Century National Theater and walked through the Central Mercado, a city park and the Metropolitan Cathedral. Here’s 3 cell phone shots of their stop in San Jose.
Charles, Ellen and Cynthia in front of the National Theater of Costa Rica.
“The Flutist” Statue in front of the National Theater in San Jose, Costa Rica.
Pope John Paul II statue at Metropolitan Cathedral in San Jose, Costa Rica by celebrated Costa Rican sculptor Jorge Jiménez Deredia who has a piece at the Vatican.
It is always nice to have visitors from the states to stop by either my home in Atenas or to let me greet them at the airport or at a stop on their tour. Now I get back to sorting and processing so many photos from the Maquenque Lodge & Reserve where it is looking like a new record on the number of bird species I photographed there, possibly 68! 🙂 More from Maquenque tomorrow!
Another fun and silly holiday from an article in the Washington Post — April 12 – National Grilled Cheese Day! And maybe I will make my favorite combination of Tomato Soup and Grilled Cheese Sandwich (just like Mom used to make)! 🙂
Half the fun of eating a grilled cheese is slowly pulling apart the halves to watch strings of the gooey cheese stretch and finally break. You may appreciate that cheesy reveal even more if you make it yourself. Ask an adult to help you master this lunchtime classic.
