Temporary deviation from Bugs to Pugs

Not a bug. Not even bug-eyed.

My husband has a rather large family, so the last couple of years at Christmastime we've taken to drawing names and doing a gift exchange. This year in the gift exchange, I drew my youngest brother-in-law's name.

My in-laws have this Pug that they all just adore. I don't think Pugs are generally the most photogenic dogs, so when I heard they got a dog and what they picked, I honestly wasn't impressed. Until I saw him in person. Not only is he so much cuter than the bugged-out-eyes-pointing-in-two-different-directions-underbite-having Pugs of the World Wide Interwebs, but he has a GREAT personality too!

I thought a great gift idea would be a portrait of the fun loving Pug. I've wanted to try painting animals for so long. I LOVE animals, problem is, I have no idea how to paint fur. The closest I ever came was painting the wispy feathers on the neck of my Great Blue Heron. But it seemed like such a perfect gift- and what the hell do I know about shopping for teenage boys!? So I embraced the wispy-feathery technique and gave the Pug a shot. I knew I wouldn't exactly be going for photo-realism anyway, since the last few years that's just not been my style. So how hard could it be?

The subject matter posing- same head tilt. Awesome.

I'm pretty happy with the results (although could've easily spent another week tweaking it, cause that's just how I am), and luckily my brother in law-and the rest of the family-seemed to like it, too.

Christmas day...

I had a blast doing this painting and definitely hope to try some more pets in the future! :)