Mon Cheri Amour 14" x 11" Oil Painting on Linen Panel
The story behind the painting:
She stood at the edge of the harbor, holding a single red rose.
The ship was waiting.
Beyond the sails and the gathering mist was a vast ocean—and somewhere beyond that ocean horizon was the destination he was sailing to.
She looked at her beloved and placed a single red rose in his hand along with two red cherries.
“Mon Cheri Amour,” she whispered. “Take these with you. The red rose is a symbol of my love for you and the two red cherries connected together is our unbreakable bond."
He held the rose close.
For a moment, neither of them spoke.
He reached his head down and kissed her.
There are some goodbyes for which words are too small.
She did not know when she would see him again. But love does not always ask for certainty. Sometimes it asks only that we believe in what we have been given.
So she watched as he boarded the ship, carrying her rose and her two cherries—small offerings filled with the sweetness, passion, and promise of their love.
And as the ship slowly disappeared beyond the horizon, she held one hope in her heart:
Come back to me, my beloved.
The Story Behind the Painting
This is the story that came to me while I was painting Mon Chéri Amour.
I imagined a woman giving her beloved a single red rose before he sailed away. The rose became a symbol of romantic love, passion, and devotion. And the two cherries appeared almost as if they belonged there—rich red jewels resting in the darkness, another small offering from her to him.
I wanted the painting to hold that feeling of love that exists between light and shadow—the sweetness of tenderness, the depth of passion, and the uncertainty of saying goodbye.
Because romantic love is one of God’s beautiful gifts to us because God doesn't just give love - He is love. Agape love. Mon Cheri Amour love.
It can be tender. It can be consuming. It can make us brave enough to wait, to hope, and to believe that what we hold in our hearts is worth protecting.
As I painted, Mon Chéri Amour became more than a rose in a glass vase.
It became a moment suspended in time—a woman giving everything she could give before her beloved disappeared across the sea.
The rose.
The cherries.
The darkness.
The hope.
The love.
God's gift to us.
That is what this painting is about.
Mon Chéri Amour—French for “my darling love,” - the masculine form of the tender name a woman might give to the man she loves.
Mon Cheri Amour 14" x 11" Oil Painting on Linen Panel
The story behind the painting:
She stood at the edge of the harbor, holding a single red rose.
The ship was waiting.
Beyond the sails and the gathering mist was a vast ocean—and somewhere beyond that ocean horizon was the destination he was sailing to.
She looked at her beloved and placed a single red rose in his hand along with two red cherries.
“Mon Cheri Amour,” she whispered. “Take these with you. The red rose is a symbol of my love for you and the two red cherries connected together is our unbreakable bond."
He held the rose close.
For a moment, neither of them spoke.
He reached his head down and kissed her.
There are some goodbyes for which words are too small.
She did not know when she would see him again. But love does not always ask for certainty. Sometimes it asks only that we believe in what we have been given.
So she watched as he boarded the ship, carrying her rose and her two cherries—small offerings filled with the sweetness, passion, and promise of their love.
And as the ship slowly disappeared beyond the horizon, she held one hope in her heart:
Come back to me, my beloved.
The Story Behind the Painting
This is the story that came to me while I was painting Mon Chéri Amour.
I imagined a woman giving her beloved a single red rose before he sailed away. The rose became a symbol of romantic love, passion, and devotion. And the two cherries appeared almost as if they belonged there—rich red jewels resting in the darkness, another small offering from her to him.
I wanted the painting to hold that feeling of love that exists between light and shadow—the sweetness of tenderness, the depth of passion, and the uncertainty of saying goodbye.
Because romantic love is one of God’s beautiful gifts to us because God doesn't just give love - He is love. Agape love. Mon Cheri Amour love.
It can be tender. It can be consuming. It can make us brave enough to wait, to hope, and to believe that what we hold in our hearts is worth protecting.
As I painted, Mon Chéri Amour became more than a rose in a glass vase.
It became a moment suspended in time—a woman giving everything she could give before her beloved disappeared across the sea.
The rose.
The cherries.
The darkness.
The hope.
The love.
God's gift to us.
That is what this painting is about.
Mon Chéri Amour—French for “my darling love,” - the masculine form of the tender name a woman might give to the man she loves.
A love deep enough to cross an ocean.