Ladies and gentlemen, my amazing, beautiful, talented, and compassionate mother, Karen Maria Lozada!

They don’t make ’em like her anymore.

(I can’t show you today’s sketch since I went and wrote notes for my book all over it, and my book is absolutely classified – haven’t told a soul a thing. Will you forgive me for offering instead a late look at this sketch from last week?)

Sketch from a mass held in recognition of la Virgen de Quinche, a feast day of Mary which is especially beloved by Ecuadorians. This is a very special evening mass for the Hispanic community here in Newark. Painstaking effort is put into arranging a shrine of dolls and flowers and carrying the central doll of la Virgen into the building on the shoulders of four individuals, and in addition to me and the other core group of musicians of this cathedral, an authentic mariachi band performed during the mass.

創建 2022-11-13:

創建 2022-11-06:

Still only able to work in one spot, but there’s always another perspective to find.

I messed up today – tripped up a little on “lo bello que es tu amor” and sang “en la pan” (shoulda been “en el pan”). Como yo dijo a mi familia musica, siempre estoy tratando mi mejor. Estoy apriendo, no estoy completida.

Have I mentioned I’m writing a book?

From the late night mass for Dia de los Muertos – and/or “All Saint’s Day” – at St. Patrick’s Pro-Cathedral of beautiful Newark, New Jersey. Can you please try to imagine how much it meant to me to add four photographs of my own Lozadas and Liebeskinds to the ofrenda of our beloved dead, placed at the alter with candles, there to stay for a whole month? I sang my heart to the world for all listening, in Spanish and English, and I listened with my hands onto the last page of this sketchbook.

Please understand – my perspective is the same with all of these recent church sketches because I am on duty singing. I am at a designated position in the upper narthex, sketching madly whenever I am able to share my hands and eyes with both drawing and singing.

They called me angel, said I gave them chills, but what more am I really than a bird in the rafters! God gave me my voice, and there’s much I have yet to learn.

Me ama esta mujer. Todos que la conoce se ama. Que Luchadora, que regala, que ama.

Estudio de cincos minutos, hecho hoy, durante nuestra misa.

I love this woman. Everyone who knows her does. What a fighter, what a gift, what love.

It’s a five-minute study, made today, during our mass.