Next Step in Watercolor of Give Thanks

I am hoping I numbered these right so that this is the next step! While I am doing this posting I am working on a new peony painting but with grey skies it has been impossible to take pictures. This often happens to me in the winter so we might not have a step by step on that one.
In this step you can see I began to solve the background. Remember I do not like to leave this up in the air and make mistakes. If I knew photoshop I could check this out there but I just have to rely on my instinct at this point. I would much rather have taken it in a photo to see if it was working but instead I am taking a terrible chance and hoping it will look ok. These are curtains I have in my studio so I just drew them from life and waited for the time of day that I took this picture to try to make the shadows be right. It is here that I lost my beautiful peanut. I did not realize that the dark area would run behind it and there was some erasing there or something as the edge bled over and it just was gone. It took work to get it back so that it was a nice peanut but not the beautiful one I originally had. I am still very unsure of the background here as to what to do next and the deadline is looming...stay tuned! ha!

Small Paintings

I have decided to do some smaller fast paintings just to get out of the rut I am in and to have a little fun. One is watercolor on a deep cradle claybord textured and is 6"x8". I really enjoyed it and will show it from the side so you can see the depth and then the front.
The second piece of two swans is acrylic on canvas and is only 5"x7" which is really getting small for me but was alot of fun. You know I love to work full sheet watercolors so I usually am 30"x28" alot of the time so these were a challenge and I do not have alot of small brushes for this sort of thing. I did enjoy them both though and think I will continue to try a few new things every once in awhile just for fun.

I think that at some point I might fiddle with them both a little as I do like detail but my intention initially was to do the painting and not go back in. That will be hard for me but I am not detailing like I usually do so that is good for me.