Today I will tell a story...

About how the Cheshire Cat learned to play the piano, and how I almost quit painting and an Internet miracle to top it off.

About 2 years ago I was going through some kind of quarter-life-crisis (if there is a thing like that, I think there has to be) and all kinds of crazy ideas about changing my career were passing by.

I was a stay at home Mom with a mediocre BS in Fine Art, I was painting for myself , but there was no way I could see this turning into a more or less serious occupation. My husband kept telling me that I should find some artistic group to hang out with, but it was very hard with a cranky 2 year old boy on hands all the time. So I turned to the Internet, once again. It has never failed me before:) It did not fail this time either. I found a site that had open gallery for Artists , just to show off the works and to leave comments. Started posting, getting feedback, and all of a sudden I felt that I am doing SOMETHING and people are seeing it. For all of you Artistic folk, you know how important that is! To know that your work is seen:) And then I joined a Mommy forum to talk about good kiddy books and organic diapers and ways to reward and punish your little bundle of joy/frustration...And then Julia came along:)

And not only did she come along, she started buying my works. She was my first serious collector, and eventually became a dear friend of mine. Julia had the most amazing ideas for custom pieces, and they sort of clicked with me. A Cheshire cat playing the piano?! Perfect, I can already see him. A family walking their cat in Central Park at night? OOOO...delicious:) And I would instantly get the picture in my head. She has excellent imagination and a very harmonious sense of color, which you can see the best in her knitted works. Here is my daughter Anna wearing of them and loving it:) And I must tell you she is a very picky girly girl (have no idea where she gets it from!)

This is how I see Julia :)) Actually this is a combination of how I see her and how she sees herself

To make a long story short, I did not become a nurse, or radiologist, or X ray technician. And the idea that I could seems ridiculous today, but I was seriously considering it;) Luckily for the unsuspecting future patients of mine, I think I am much better off with a paint brush in my hand

P.S. And for the grand finale an exclusive showing of a couple of pages in a book I did as a gift for Julia's son , the-always-beautifully-smiling little Gabi