A heart-warming project!

When my friend Marie Henninger saw that I had begun using doilies to make textures, she got an idea. She had a doily that her mother had made before she passed away. Marie thought that I should make many paintings with that doily. She would then give them to her family, and they all would have a remembrance of their mother, aunt, grandmother. Some of the 15 paintings that I made: It was a natural for me because I typically make 10 to 20 paintings at one time. Because there is so much time needed for drying between color layers, an "assembly line" approach has proven efficient: As you can see by these examples, each piece came out differently from the others. It was a great opportunity for me to experiment with subtle differences in the color layers - and some not so sublte differences:

Marie H was once a kindergarten teacher in the elementary school where I taught art. She taught both of my children.

The three-panel painting has received another color layer. I actually rub the paint over the surface and into the textures with my hand. I use paper towels to smooth the paint and cotton rags to remove the paint from various areas: