Absinthe, Art and Challenges

I'm very excited.  I was able to do a lot if painting over the weekend.  Am close to finishing, "Diana" my oil painting on the 36"X11" wooden panel.  Just need to fix her left hand when the paint dries.  And then I completed a small piece, "Paul,"  a sepia toned oil on wooden panel in three hours (with a few touch ups later in the day) as I left it on my new easel and kept examining it for flaws.
I painted 13 hours on Diana on Saturday with a few breaks to get on Facebook, Blogger and Tumblr.
I like Tumbler because it has so much art to check.  I got the idea from artist, Tim Speaker, of the Art Bomb, who makes posts from his art studio on it.  I love keeping up with his work, because he's one of my favorite artists to collect.  I have a piece of his in my bedroom and love it.
Then I have to start thinking out going larger for two juried shows I'm trying to get into. My son gave me a gift card to Michael's for my birthday do I went planning to get small things like paint.  But they had a clearance section of open back frames on sale for ridiculously low prices and they weren't damaged.  Just the last of their style. I found a gold 18X24, regularly priced at $99.99 for $20.00, a 16X20 gold  frame with carved accents, regularly $49.99  for $10.00 and an 11X14 blue wood frame regularly 39.99 for $6.00.  They also had canvases on sale so I bought three canvases to fit them.  And I'm ready to start the next two paintings.  Can't today because I'm watching my three-year old granddaughter, Deven today.  We're painting on wooden pocket books for her doll today along with a bird feeder for my porch.
I searched for ideas for my large pieces and came up with an image of a past boyfriend, Danny Johns from England, whose photo I took as he overlooked the Reedy River downtown.  It will give me a chance to do some figurative work as well as a cityscape in the background. It's a whole different color palette so I can get out of that rut.  It's moody winter picture because he came to stay with me in November,  and more subtle an some in tone so I won't be painting in my more jewel tone colors.
Then last night, just as I fell to sleep, I thought about all the Absinthe drinker paintings I love from the turn of the century by in Paris by Van Gogh, Degas, Vuillard, Picasso, Lautrec.  So very many and I've always wanted one.  So I'll paint my own from when we had a writer's meeting at my house and I introduced my friends and writing support system, Brian, Becky and Chris to Absinthe.  We did the whole sugar and water ritual to achieve the louche and it was a pivotal meeting.  This attempt will me quite a challenge since I'm used to painting one figure instead of four and I haven't done many paintings of interiors with all the detail requires.  So it will be a lot of fun.  Plus painting glass bottles and glasses is a challenge in its own right.  
I can't wait to start tomorrow although I'll be interrupted to go watch Deven while her mom goes to an appointment.