Wow, your artwork is lovely and I'd like to commission a piece or two (pony pics like the one with the boy and pug)...
I DO know how much that hurts. I used to draw (started with stick drawings long before I was 10 yrs old), but art teachers and family ridiculed everything I did and I became very discouraged. I took a lot of joy in my drawings - often drew in my school notebooks and parents and family did keep me in drawing books/pads for years, so that I couldn't complain about.
I gave a lot of drawings away and had one I really liked. My mom even liked it and we were going to mat & frame it (it was a galloping pony). A school friend saw it and fell in love with it, so I gave it to her. We were in elementary school - think 6th grade. She kept it for a while - then I went to her house one day when we were in high school and she had drawn over my drawing - putting manure behind him, writing the word "s--t pile" behind & above it with an arrow towards it. It totally destroyed the picture (done in charcoal - one of the very few that my family DID like). I was incredibly hurt! It was years before I would give another drawing away. I was not an artist per say - didn't continue in that vein. Life came along - working, military, marriage, family, back into horses/ponies, making my own equipment. Every now and then I get an urge to draw - and can often do a pretty decent picture on the backs of the "place mats" in restaurants. Some of them are good - often I have had a waitress or waiter ask if they can keep it and if I will sign it. I do... That fixes my creative urge every so often!
I have one pic right now - did it in purple ink on a place mat. It had other markings and it was dirty, so I cut the horse out and taped it to my photo that sat on my desk at work. I will have to post a pic of it one of these days...
During one of our military moves we had about half of our household goods in storage while we were moving into another house. The storage unit was broken into and cleaned out. All of my artwork, art supplies, drawing & painting books, acrylics, pastels, charcoal, sewing books, sewing supplies, 2 sewing machines and family photos (plus lots of other stuff) was in that storage unit at that time. I have been trying to find some of the books to replace what I lost (some are out of print). Really put out that a pastel drawing of an arab horse head (done from one of the Walter Foster drawing books), done on crushed velvet (or velveteen?) - that I did when I was 9 yrs old under the direction of my artist aunt in OH - also was in that storage unit and is now gone. I had finally picked out the matting and frame I was going to have done with it - after carrying it around with me for more than 20 years just "by itself"... It had gone to both Korea and Germany with me and survived. I was more than a little ill when I discovered that out unit had been "taken" (it was one of many - turned out the cameras on the grounds were "fake", too...). All of our "stuff" was mostly personal - not sure anything would have gotten anything when re-sold - not even the sewing machines(?). Well maybe the original DVDs of Star Trek movies... and some of the first Disney DVDs that aren't available right now. Who knows?
I DO have several friends that would really appreciate the picture of the bird (BEAUTIFUL) and would frame it and hang it in an honorable spot in their homes!! I don't usually "do" birds, but I'd like that one too. The third pic is beautiful too, but isn't my style at this time. However, one of my daughters would appreciate that one!!! She's into theater arts and abstract and feathers & "flowing things" and I bet she'd love to have that one - especially since it's in colors she's very much into.
As to finding gifts for family - I GIVE UP! It's hard! Even though it's not as personalized, most of the time I do gift cards. I do TRY to base the gift card on the person - some to restaurants (and then pick one that I know that person likes but can't generally afford to go to), some to hardware stores, some to Amazon, some to Wal-Mart. For our oldest daughter, for her Bday this year, we gave her a gift card to the Outback and also a home made coupon for so many hours of "day care" for our grand daughters so her and her hubby could "get away" for a few hours. They loved it! Some of my other family said that that was a terrible gift - but again our daughter loved it. It sure beat some of the other stuff I might have gotten for her. One of my friends' is on disability and her hubby was laid off right before Christmas a few years ago. I knew that they would be tight money for a while - i had some extra that year and was able to get a gift card to her most often used feed store. It kept them in horse, dog/cat food & chicken scratch for 3 months after they sold the large horses (3 of her 4 arabs went to an auction - we won't talk about that - it sucked!).
