Featured Artwork and December Desktop Calendar: Waiting on Christmas Night

December 4, 2021 Bernadette

Waiting on Christmas Night, pastel, 10″ x 12″, 2021© Bernadette E. Kazmarski

Mewsette often sits in the window and waits for me, but years ago, when I had the candles in the window for the holidays, she was always the one who was waiting for me when I came home after vendor shows or holiday activities. I put together years of photos of her to create this new painting.

I took a bunch of photos of her at the window when I had my holiday decorations up over several years from 2009 to 2013, and shared them on my website, The Creative Cat, like these—and I’m sure you’ll recognize the first one.

black cat with candle — Mewsette watches the street.

three black cats at window — Waiting at the Window

After that year I quit with the candles because my fosters and my cats had too much fun, all I did was put them back in place, even though I had them taped to the windowsill. Because the conditions were challenging, many photos were blurry or didn’t turn out at all, but still had features I liked. I had all those photos, and knew I wanted to do something with them for the holidays. I debated having the whole window, or just Mewsette and the candle, maybe some other things in the background, a different curtain, I had a decade to think it over, and a lot of photos to look at.

I always loved this one best, her expression, the drape of the curtains, taken on Christmas night in 2010, hence the title. I’ve wanted to paint this for years, but I also wanted some other features in the painting. I have two front windows and the dining room window had the colored lights in the windowbox right under where she sat. In those photos, when I got the holiday lights right in the photo, you couldn’t see Mewsette in the window. So I had to put a bunch of photos together because the shots were so difficult, at night, and in some Mewsette was clear, in others the candle or the lights. So I made a composite of photos that I like. Here’s one of the photos of the lights under the dining room window.

In other photos I had lights inside. I only tried having a tree inside once, but I often brought in branches from my spruces and decorated over my doorways and windows, and that appeared in some of the photos too. So I put all this together and created this one image that had all the things I liked about Mewsette watching for me out the window.

Here is a closeup of her face with the candle highlights and shadows.

Coming around to today, I am happy to have painted two new original cat paintings and one original nature painting this year, but I had big dreams for catching up on all the artwork I’ve wanted to do over the years. December was coming around and I knew I really wanted a new feline holiday image. I pulled all the materials together and over two weeks didn’t manage to put the image together and get it done. December 1 came along, and, just like in 2017 when I decided I had to paint Allegro Moderato after waiting so many years even though it was already October 2, I did the same this year, except that she had to wait until December 3, yesterday. But it’s exciting when a painting has been waiting so long and I finally get to paint it, it’s as if the painting is as ready as me and it just comes out of my hands like magic. I had also planned a nature image and yesterday was gung-ho to get to it, but I will wait for January for that one; I have many winter nature images to choose from.

I had also wanted a new image for my holiday open house this month, and I’m so happy to have something new for my post card and promotions. I’ve already sent the image off to print holiday cards too, and I’m especially happy to have a new feline holiday card to offer!

Where to find this artwork

A New Member Thank You

Register for an account on Portraits of Animals and get a free matted print of “Waiting on Christmas Night” or choose from several other sketches, paintings or photos of cats and other subjects.

The New Member print is a signed digital print of my pastel painting “Waiting on Christmas Night”. Prints are made in archival inks on Epson Velvet paper. This print is 8 x 11 and matted to fit an 11 x 14 frame.

This print is only available as a new member gift during this month while it’s the featured artwork and desktop calendar, so make sure you sign up before the end of the month!

This month’s desktop calendar

I’ve worked this image into a desktop calendar for you to enjoy and use for the entire month.

If these sizes don’t work for your device, or if you have problems, please let me know. Often I can troubleshoot the reason an image won’t download or won’t load on your device, but if I just can’t figure it out I can just email it to you and hope that works.

How to download and use your desktop calendar

Click on one of the images below that matches the dimensions of your monitor to open the image in a new page.
For desktop computers and laptops, right-click on that image and on a desktop computer choose “save as desktop wallpaper” or “save as background” or whichever option your operating system gives you to be able to do this. You may also simply save it to your hard drive and set it as your background from there.
For mobile devices, download the image to your gallery then choose it as your wallpaper—this is slightly different on all devices.

Horizontal and HD monitors and screens

Desktop calendar 2560 x 1440 for HD and wide screens.

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Square monitors and screens

Desktop calendar, 600 x 800 for iPad, Kindle and other readers.

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Small Mobile Devices and Tablets

Click here to subscribe to The Creative Cat on your Kindle.

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Cell Phones and Smartphones

Desktop calendar, 330 x 700 for cell phones.

Take a look at other featured artwork and desktop calendar posts.

Each month I feature a piece of feline artwork from the archives to the present day, discuss its history and process, and set it up as a free downloadable desktop calendar for just about every electronic device available.

Click here to see daily sketches, click here to see daily photographs

click here to see other artwork featured on The Creative Cat

or visit Feline Artwork on my main website.

If you are interested in a print of this image, check Portraits of Animals to see if I have it available already. If you don’t find it there, visit Ordering Custom Artwork for more information on a custom greeting card, print or other item.

Gifts featuring cats you know! Visit Portraits of Animals

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Copyright

All images and text used on this site are copyrighted to Bernadette E. Kazmarski unless otherwise noted and may not be used without my written permission, although links to your site are more than welcome and are shared. Please ask if you are interested in using and image or story in a print or internet publication. If you are interested in purchasing a print of an image or a product including it, check my animal and nature website Portraits of Animals to see if I have it available already. If you don’t find it there, visit Ordering Custom Artwork for more information on a custom greeting card, print or other item.