Trying to Remember How to Paint

Well, I painted this afternoon. I felt like its been forever since I painted. 
I made a 'box setup' to be able to light my still life items dramatically. I wanted to paint the inside of the box pretty dark and was looking for my acrylic paints. After hiding everything away when I put the house on the market,  I couldn't find them for awhile. Took a bunch of searching! Then I didn't have the right colors to make black, so the inside turned out a deep rust color. Here's the setup with a couple of 50 cent items from the thrift store and a little blue note pad book.
Then the next pic shows the setup box at the top, and two paintings (oil). The smaller one was just a warmup and turned out better than the second larger one (that I gave up on, its not finished). The larger one needs wiped off and sanded down better. The board was gessoed, but I must not have sanded it enough and there are alot of ridges showing.

Here's a closeup of the little 4 x 6 inch one, although it is a pretty dark painting, and there is a lot of glare.