She has not strayed far from the one room adobe school where she did her first ranch scenes.  Now in her rustic adobe studio she paints her family at their various activities, including riding horses, tending cattle, fiddling and dancing. 

Ernie feels she has been most stingily influenced in her art by her people, the wise old pioneers, the homesteaders, the proud Spaniards, the mystical indians, fellow artist and the children