Catching Up

This is a demonstration showing how I would paint a mound of lavender, and also show white lavender growing in the middle of the purple mounds.  The page on the right is a demo of climbing roses. We had a couple of fantastic mornings out at the lavender farm.

The octagon cottage in Bay View  -  a demo showing how I would choose a starting point and move on with a continuous line drawing, showing only the part of the cottage that really interests me.

A beautiful day on Stephens Lane.  There is a nice garden at the top of the hill with huge white daisies against a very dark green background of evergreens.

On the first day of the first Bay View journal class of the season, we painted the bright flowers in the large pots in front of one of the halls on campus.

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The summer is moving along so quickly, and I am blogging so slowly.  Here I am, still in my jammies, sitting on the porch, catching up a little.  No classes today.  Everyone has gone to the beach. I have been here long enough to have switched from hot coffee to iced coffee.

Last weekend we went to Ann Arbor where the temperature was well over 100!!!  It hasn't been that hot up here, and it has been a perfect summer week  -  sand on the bathroom floor, bathing suits on the line, the kids playing card games on the porch after dinner, and our daughter here for the week from California.


We've been having a wonderful time with the California grandkids!  They have been here since the first part of June. One of them leaves tomorrow, and one will stay for awhile longer.

Next week I will be teaching three morning classes and four afternoon classes. While it is quiet here, I should get things together for next week's classes.  Who knows what might be going on over the weekend, and I don't want to miss anything.

Are you sketching?  Are you keeping cool?

Flowers in a Little Green Cup

Warm and Sunny

Just like summer!  It was a beautiful day to be outside.  We picked some little flowers and put them in a bright green cup, and painted them in our sketch books.  Then we made a bug catcher out of a plastic Coke bottle.  Then we just sat for awhile, very still, while a brown thrasher sang a few songs from his repertoire of 1,100 songs (so they say).

There has been a lot going on with the birds this weekend    -   the brown thrasher serenading,  a crow eating a mouse on the limb of a tree,  the starling father yelling at everyone, and a blue jay following all the other birds around as if he might miss something.  I think it was hoping for a taste of the mouse. Ick.

Right now it is 91 degrees.  That is very warm for Northern Michigan, and pretty much unheard of for this time of year.  Personally, I like this better than snow.  There is a nice breeze and the air smells like lilacs.  Also, it's too warm to clean out a closet and some drawers as I had planned  -  no one cleans closets in 90 degree weather!  I'm going to go back out on the porch and watch the bug catcher.

Blob and Smush

Blob and Smush Demo

I haven't been practicing what I preach; I haven't been letting my life inspire my art, and my art inspire my life.  I have been "grubbing" through things and painting walls, woodwork and trim.  That's about it.

This painting is a small demo done in class today.  Blob and smush (sounds like push) is all about softening the edges.  You "blob" on the color, and then "smush" it down by drawing a damp brush just under the color.  It keeps flowers from looking too much like "cut and paste"  I paint the bright color of the flowers first, soften the color down the paper a bit (smush), and then add some green  -  being careful not to let too much of the green run up into the red (a little red is okay to run into the green).

Now I think I'll go out into the world.  The sun is shining, but it is cold  -  41 degrees.  The grass is very green, the forsythia is blooming, and the Bay is very blue.  Nice. If I go out into the world, I should take my sketchbook  -  it hasn't been out in awhile.

Hope all is well with all of you.  Have you been painting?

Ice Cream Cones and Flowers

It Must be Summer

If we are eating ice cream cones at a little table on the street, and flowers are blooming in the yard  -  it must be summer, right?

This is quirky freaky weather and we are all lovin' it.  It was at least 80 degrees today, and normally we would be having a snow storm.  Even if we have cold weather and snow, it can't last long now.  Every freakishly warm day takes us that much closer to the real thing.

One of our adventures of the day was to run out of gas.  Now I know where "empty" really is on my gas gauge. We were more or less out in the middle of no-where, but with the help of some pretty big hills, we managed to limp/coast into a gas station on the southern-most edge of town.  No problem.  You know what I always  say  -  if you don't want a little adventure, you'd better just stay home.  We made it back, safe and sound, and cuddled up on the couch to eat crackers and cheese and watch Wallace and Gromet for the hundredth time.  Fun.

More Thumbnail Sketches

 Camellia Leaves

In class this week, we were doing thumbnail sketches, trying to pick up on what it is that attracts us to a subject.  I think we paint a subject  -  object or scene  -  not just for the subject itself, but because of something ABOUT the subject that attracts us.   It might be the shape, or the colors, or the way the light falls on it, or any number of reasons.  We have to recognize the reason and build on it.  

When I said it was the color of the camellia leaves that attracted me,  the class wanted to see how I would get that very dark, shiny green.  We experimented with a few different applications, such as mixing on the palette, mixing on the paper, a combination of  mixing on the paper and on the palette.  We tried different techniques for the highlights  -  lifting while the paint was still wet and painting around the highlight area, leaving the white of the paper.

Now I think I'll go play around a bit with some more thumbnail sketches.  I am intrigued by the very flat, horizontal bottom of an azalea plant I have.  I don't care for the color, and I'm not crazy about the floofy blossoms, but I really like the shape.  I had better get to it before Rudy the cat changes the shape of it.  Yesterday he ingested some of the leaves, and they seemed to give him super powers. He managed to open the basement door and almost opened the back doors into the garden (snow).  That's not possible for him without the use of the "azalea drug".  I googled it and it said it was mildly toxic and might make cats a little lethargic.  Rudy has re-written the book on all toxic plant ingestion. Yes, I put the plant where he can't get to it.  He's sleeping it off today.  He sleeps something off everyday.  How do you know when a cat is lethargic?

Rose

A Peach Colored Rose
and a squirrel story 
 

I finally got around to painting one of the roses.  It was fun, and I'm pleased with the way it turned out.  I may have done the whole bunch, but I was a little (a lot) distracted by the squirrel in the attic. I had recently watched an episode of the Hoarders in which a homeless person was living in the hoarders' stuff, and they didn't even know it.  I swear that squirrel was moving things around up there.  He found his way from the attic down to the enclosed back porch (several times) and sat in the rafters or right on the window sill and watched me in the kitchen.  I went out the front door and went around the house to open the porch doors.  His friends were frantic  -  they were hanging on the house here and there and weren't afraid of me at all.  I must admit, I was afraid of them!

I determined from the looks of HIM (?) that he wasn't pregnant or nursing, so we were not dealing with a nest.  This was an accidental break-in, so why wouldn't he just walk out one of the open doors???!!! He obviously didn't want to be here, and his friends didn't want him in here either, so just leave already.  I was hoping that he was going to go out, and his friends weren't going to come in  -  I don't know how squirrels reason.

When my husband came home, he lowered the attic steps (they come down into the back porch) to make it easier for the squirrel to come down and go out the back door!!!   I was in stitches  -  that was the funniest (most ridiculous?)  thing I had ever heard of.  I guess not so ridiculous after all  -  the squirrel left then. Not exactly down the stairs, but it obviously encouraged him to get the heck out of there.

It was pretty quiet when he left.  A nice kind of quiet.

HAPPY VALENTINES DAY!

Ellie's Flowers

 

Contour Drawing Demo

These flowers have been around for awhile  -  going on three weeks.  I salvaged a few for my classes to do a very quick contour drawing and a fast swoop of color.  It doesn't take much to get an impression of an object.   I wish I had timed myself, so I could tell you exactly what " very quick" and "fast swoop" really mean.  Wednesday's class wanted me to set the timer for ten minutes when they started theirs, and they were finished in much less time than that.

It is dark and gray here again!  That's okay  -  I have some class promotion to do, I have a play-date with a friend, and Youngest Granddaughter will be here late this afternoon.  Of course I also have some laundry, grocery shopping, errands . . . . . I don't think I'll do that stuff.

It's Friday  -  plan a date with your sketchbook.

Day Twenty One

A New Orchid Blossom in a New Sketchbook

I thought I should sketch the orchid blossom, because somewhere along the line I'll want to know when it started to bloom again.

Last year when I received it in February, I did a couple of watercolor sketches of it.  It bloomed until July!  I had never had an orchid like this, and I was very surprised that they bloom for months!  When it was finished, I cut the stalks back, and a new one grew  -  and here we go  -  it's blooming again.

This is a contour drawing (continuous line) done mostly while looking at the subject, not the paper.  Although I do check the paper once in awhile to make sure I'm making the right connections.  A contour sketch does take some concentration, and I must admit, I was thinking more about  the grocery run I had to make in a few minutes.  But I say any line is better than no line.

Day Eleven

The Last of the Red Hot Blossoms 

This has been on its way out for quite awhile, but this last blossom is really hanging on.  It's a great color  -  somewhere between red and "hot" coral.  I think it is a Kalanchoe Calandiva.  If the leaves stay nice, I may try to keep it going to see if it will blossom again.  It can live with my messy geraniums that I keep shuffling around.

A strange day today  -  it feels like a Saturday.  My husband took the day off, and Middle Granddaughter was here because there was no school. It is one of those things that throws off the days of the week  -  in a nice way.

Day eleven of blogging every day in November.  I have nothing exciting to say or show, but I am hanging in there.  I can tell from my stats that you are too.  Thank you for "listening".

Painting in Karen's Garden

 

Painted at the End of the Season

I painted this back on September 1st.  I needed something to post.  I could say I have been neglectful because I am saving myself for "Blogging Everyday in November".  Yeah, I'm gonna say that.

My creativity seems a little sluggish, but we all need a break now and then, so we can come back ready to go.  I played Mom to the two local granddaughters for a few days, I bought a "new" car (halleluiah!), I have gone through many boxes of Christmas decorations and pared it all down to one medium sized tote, I have done a pretty good job of putting the garden to bed, and I even got the leaves raked up and out to the curb for the pick-up  -  that was accidental, but still  .  .  .  .


I am finally getting into my autumn nesting mode and I have to go with it before it fades.  It's the only time anything gets cleaned and grubbed out around here.

How is your autumn nesting going?

Flowers from Joanne

Workshop Demo

This watercolor sketch is of a small part of a huge, beautiful bouquet given to me by friend Joanne during the book binding/journal painting workshop.  That was a week ago, and the flowers are still going strong.  Except for the lily that Rudy the cat got a little too friendly with  -  it has shredded petals and he has an orange-stained face.  Looks good on him.  Ooops  -  maybe not so cute! A quick call to the vet  -  they say he's okay.

Last night we had a freeze warning.  I had intended to go out and cut the flowers in the cutting garden, but I forgot all about them.  From the window this morning, they look okay.  I did bring the geranium pots into the porch.  I just hate to see the flowers get zapped while they are still blooming.

Okay, I'm babbling.  Gotta go finish up a painting that is everything I tell my students not to do. Rules are made to be broken.  Sometimes a painting just happens.

Painting with Isabelle

Late Summer Flowers in my Sketchbook

Just a quick little sketch while sitting on the porch painting with Youngest Granddaughter a few days ago.  She did some bright and colorful things to cut out and decorate the porch walls.

It still feels like summer here.  It is fabulous!!!

As my classes slow down and I fill my life with other fun and creative things, I'm thinking maybe this year I'll avoid the annual autumn-crash-and-burn.  I have a list of goals for the winter, a couple of deadlines, classes and workshops lined up, a volunteer thing I do (tiny  -  I need to ramp it up), and the life drawing group I go to once a week.  Speaking of life drawing  -  can I show that stuff on this blog?   Yes, of course, I know I can  -  this is the Internet  -  I can do anything.

It's Thursday  -  spaghetti night at the Carey's.  Then I am off to paint with friend Karen.

Cosmos

A Little Bouquet of Cosmos, Asters, and Ageratum

Because I carry my sketchbook around with me I use it to store information like most people use their electronic devices. There is no "delete" in my sketchbook, so I glued some Aquarius II watercolor paper over some information that I didn't need anymore.  I hope I didn't need anymore.

The drawing on the left was done with a Pentel Sign pen, which is water soluble. The one on the right was drawn with a sepia Prismacolor colored pencil, which is not water soluble, and then I painted over the pencil with watercolor.

Someone in class today had a Tombow brush pen.  Now, of course, I think I have to have one of those. It was sepia and had a brush pen at one end and a regular pointy nib at the other.  She was doing some absolutely beautiful drawings with it.  Oh, wait.  Maybe it was her talent and not the pen that was making that magic.   Anyway, Beverly, if you're reading this, those were wonderful drawings!

White Geranium

White Geranium Demonstration

This is a journal page done in last week's Watercolor Sketchbook Journal class.  It was to done to show how to make the white blossoms stand out by painting a simple background color.  The petals were also kept simple with just a few shadows.

Yesterday's quirky weather changed my plans for the afternoon drawing class.  We had to find a warm place (it wasn't!) and do indoor-type drawing. The weather prediction was for 71 degrees  -  and it was that warm  in nearby areas.  It was 53 degrees here all day!!!  We should be getting used to the low fifties, but come on  -  don't promise us seventies and then roll in the fog off the Bay that drops the temp by twenty degrees.  Who's responsible for that anyway?     The morning watercolor class stuck it out and did some great paintings.  They had no choice  -  there was nowhere to go  -  we were committed.

Here in the USA we have the Fourth of July weekend coming up!  What are your plans?   How about doing a grid of small squares in your sketchbook and recording a few of the long weekend's happenings? Only a couple of minutes of commitment at a time makes it easier to tackle.

Pansies

 

A Demonstration Page from Our Bookbinding Workshop

This was done during a sunnier, warmer week.  This week I was doing two watercolor classes and four afternoons of outdoor journaling.  It poured rain continuously!  The participants of the outdoor class were really good sports.  We met on the porch of one of the buildings in Bay View and we worked on techniques and painted things like flower pots, watering cans, color mixing, and did manage to get in a couple of Bay View scenes between storms.

It is a little too quiet here now.  The California grandkids are heading down to the Detroit airport today.  It was a wonderful visit!  The month went by all too quickly. It's so hard to see them leave. 

Moving on.  The sun is shining today.  I'm anxious to get out in the garden and see how much damage all the rain has done   -    and the deer.  I have put out repellent things and sprayed liquid fence which has probably washed away by now.  

I have a painting I should be working on, and with this sunshine, it looks like a good day to set up a little temporary studio on the back porch.  Here I go.

Take your sketchbooks someplace this weekend!

Orange Orange Orange

Ink and Colored Pencil on Strathmore Drawing Paper in my 
Hand Bound Sketchbook

I'm done.  Colored pencil is just too labor intensive for me.  Every time I use acrylics or colored pencil, I remember what it is about watercolor that I love so much  - you swoop through with a brush load of color and there, you've got it. It's the swooping.

I happen to be a pretty big fan of orange, and I have never come across orange geraniums or petunias until this year.  The Calendula is actually my favorite shade of orange, but I'm pretty crazy about the others too.

Starting on the left, I worked my way across the page doing a contour (continuous line) drawing.  I really don't know the techniques of working with colored pencils, but since this is my journal sketchbook - no masterpieces allowed - I'm not worried about technique.  

There's a long weekend coming up.  I hope you find time to have some fun with your sketchbook. 

Crocus

 My first Flower Sketch of the Season

It was nice and sunny and warm, and I found this crocus blooming in the yard.  As I began my sketch, the sun started to go behind a cloud, and the crocus slowly closed.  I didn't know they did that!  So this was a very fast contour drawing and a quick splash of color. 

A couple of days ago I played around with the fonts on my blog, and today the ones I had applied are gone.  Okay.  I'm not going to play with that anymore.  The next time I look they may be back.  I just don't care.

This is the last page of this sketchbook.  The next one is a different shape  -  more square  -  and I am kind of anxious to try it out.  A new season, a new sketchbook.  Fun.

Petunias

Watercolor Petunias

Here it is November and I am painting petunias.  This was a painting I had started as a demo in a summer class.

I started a new eight-week session today that will actually run into January because of Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Years.  We are going to be paying close attention to composition and enjoy the process that takes us to a finished painting.  We are going to do a lot of thumbnail sketches and value studies, and take our time to get things just the way we want them before we ever touch brush to paper.  This is hard for those of us who are into instant gratification (ME?).  You  notice I said "enjoy the process" - it is actually fun to plan, draw, and work out a color scheme.  I often rush into a painting and miss out on the fun of doing the preliminary steps.


The painting above was started on location, with little planning, except the negative shapes. When I got to a certain point, I really didn't know how to finish it.  When I pulled it out again, I played a lot with the lights and darks and shadow colors and it began to come together.  Not the best way for me to come up with a finished painting, but that is the way I work on location and in my sketchbooks.  I save the "enjoyable process" for winter painting in the studio.

Three days into "blog everyday for a month".  So far so good  -  on my end anyway  -  I'm having fun.

Sunflowers

Color Mixing

Last week's classes painted sunflowers, paying special attention to color mixing.  We used quinacridone red, ultramarine blue, and new gamboge (yellow). For the top row of blossoms, we mixed the brown for the centers by first mixing the primaries on the palette and then dropping in a little purple after the brown center had been painted . The next one was brown mixed on the palette, and the third was mixed on the paper.  As always, we found the color mixed on the paper to be much more interesting and less muddy.  Mixing on the paper gives you less control, but the results are more pleasing. Well, that's my opinion.  The centers of the flowers in the small painting, bottom right, were done by letting the colors mix on the paper.

This week I am doing a bookbinding workshop  -  "team teaching" with my friend Cathy.  The sketchbooks were finished today in record time, and they are all absolutely beautiful!  Tomorrow we will unveil them (they are under heavy weight over night) and begin to paint. I LOVE MY JOB!

The End of the Season?

The Last Page in this Sketchbook

A break from cloud painting

This sketchbook started out with a sketch from friend Karen's front porch.  This last sketch was painted a few evenings ago in her garden.

Now the dilemma  - I have two sketchbooks made up and ready to go.  Which one do I pick up next?

I class today we painted sunflowers.  What we were really working on was the composition  -  not doing the whole vase of flowers, but working out small thumbnail sketches using a viewfinder, and then doing a small painting.   The class came up with some beautiful color mixes for the brown centers.  It is hard to just "let go" and let the paint mix itself, but the results are always more interesting than mixing on the palette.

Tomorrow's class will be doing the same thing, and I will post my demo.

Are you walking around with your sketchbooks, picking up on some of the late summer colors?