So here we are back in Pittsburgh… we’re happy to be home again, but we’re not exactly sad that we missed the sub-zero weather. Portugal was a beautiful place – lots of mountains, lots of fruit trees, lots of ocean, and some of the nicest people!  I hope you enjoy a few of our favorite vacation pics. Our overseas trips have inspired me to create a series of paintings, one from each country we’ve visited. It will be really hard to choose just one subject! Currently, I’m painting a small seascape. One day, we were walking on the beach between…

It looks like we picked the perfect time to travel to escape from the Pittsburgh cold and snow! Though the weather forecast here says today may be our last sunny day on this trip, it’s so much warmer and quite beautiful here. I don’t understand a word of Portuguese, but the language sounds beautiful to my ears. Nearly everyone we have interacted with does understand and speak English, so we’ve been very fortunate. Tom and I spent two days in Sintra, a romantic old world town just north of Lisbon. Last night and this morning we spent time in Nazaré, a beach…

I don’t know about you, but I sure do hate to say goodbye to the lights and the sparkle of the Holiday Season. Tom and I have been driving around Pittsburgh this week, enjoying the last of the lights before midwinter takes over. Twelve years ago was the winter that I froze during the Holiday Market in that year’s Polar Vortex. I remember calling Tom from the Market and with chattering teeth, informing him that we were going to Florida the very moment that it was over! I had to get warm, and we were going no matter what! Well,…