Friday, I went back to paint some more on the mural.  Every time I get started, it's just so exciting. I love seeing the results after a few hours of work.  

My friend Allison was kind enough to bring me some delicious homemade deviled eggs and a Chick Fil A salad for lunch while I was painting.   She said she was surprised at how big the mural is in person.   It really is much bigger when you're up close to it!

The first thing I did was spend a few hours filling in all of the letters with white, and outlining them in black.   The letters had grid lines on them, and I had to remove those to make it look better.  It took some time, but looked so good once it was finished!

I finally was able to start working on the Colonel's face, which I figured would be the most challenging part of the whole mural.  It was pretty challenging.   It took me a while to figure out exactl where to start to make sure his head would be centered inside of the oval.

Here is my initial outline:


Then, I tried working on the features.   When you are right up close to the mural, you cannot see what you're doing.  I had to climb down from the scaffolding over and over again to see whether the proportions were looking good or not.  Unfortunately, at this point, his nose and eyes were too big.  I had to keep going back and working on it to see if I could make changes to improve his looks.



I adjusted his eyes and nose some more, but still couldn't seem to get them just right. It would take several more adjustments before I was happy with him!      By the way, did i mention how hard it is to paint features on brick?   



I still wasn't happy with his eyes and nose at this point, but I moved onto his beard and collar.



At this point, a man from the Historical Society came and took my picture for his blog:


I continued working on the Colonel's face for a little while, then put up for the next day.  Total time spent: 6 hours.


I don't have any progress pictures from Saturday, unfortunately, because I forgot to bring my memory card for the camera!   So I just had to wait till we got done, then came back and took pictures of the results. 

James had a wonderful idea to add some yellow-gold to parts of the mural.   He spent his time Saturday helping me fix mistakes on the mural, adding the little green boxes on the corners, and painting all of the gold stripes.     I think that the yellow really goes well with the blue and gives it more contrast and vibrancy. 



With James pair of eyes to help guide me, I was able to fix some proportional issues with the face, and after a few hours, this is what he ended up looking like:



We got the whole mural finished, except for the top of the oval over the face- which we could not reach without adjusting the scaffolding (the rental people were closed by the time we got to this part).   I will have the scaffolding lifted Monday, then will finish the oval and the mural will be completely finished!



I can't wait to take a picture of it without the scaffolding in the way!


Total time spent Saturday: 5 hours.