our frozen treat

It’s the time of year — the approach of Bill’s birthday (also known as Halloween) — that we indulge in a couple of treats that, for some odd reason, we think of as autumnal. One is FROZEN Reece’s Peanut Butter Cups (hard to get that bright orange packaging with my muted, earthy palette — I cheated by adding a bit of Hansa Yellow medium). The other “seasonal” treat is mixing lightly salted dry roasted peanuts with candy corn.

one wee rose

While shopping in Tomball, I saw this tiny rose growing on a shrub near where we had parked our truck — so I pinched it to sketch later! 🤭 The actual colors were more pink but I painted it with my earthy granulating palette instead. The actual rose is smaller than the sketch, the bloom being only 3/4 of an inch.

Einstein

This poor sketch is of one of the coolest cats I’ve ever met — Einstein, the Scottish Fold who fathered my two rascals. Drawn from a photo taken by his owner, Marina Yurskaya of Kiss a ‘Fold Cattery, it really doesn’t capture what a truly magnificent cat he is.

My cats are Scottish Fold Straights, meaning that they have straight ears. Each litter can have either folds or straights, or both.

When we went to pick up Bardie as a kitten, Einstein had to “check me out” first, making sure his baby was going to a safe home. He’s such a good Daddy!

granulating palette, tweaked

In my previous sketch, I had trouble painting the plastic scrubber and red rock using my current palette made up of earthy, granulating watercolors. There are not many red pigments with granulating properties to choose from.

I had seen reviews in the past year of Schmincke “super granulating” watercolors. Most reviewers were not that impressed since most of these are convenience colors easily mixed from more common pigments. But when I saw Volcano Red, I definitely wanted to try it. It’s made from a single pigment (PR108) but it’s the prettiest cadmium red I’ve seen — more subtle than I remember from years ago.

I bought it in a set of three small tubes; the other two are Volcano Violet and Volcano Brown, both mixtures containing Volcano Red. Not sure either of them are worth buying again, but I think the red be will remaining in this and my regular palettes from now on.

I also wasn’t happy with Lunar Blue in this palette. Though lovely, it is a weaker paint that takes a lot of work to get much color. In the super granulating line, Schmincke has a Tundra Blue made from ultramarine blue (PB29) and a brown (PBr7). Instead of buying it, I mixed some ultramarine blue and raw umber in one of my pans, stirring well with a toothpick. A great, versatile blue that is still a bit earthy and more granulating than ultramarine blue by itself.

I also switched the burnt sienna out for the more vibrant transparent red oxide. The color swatch card in the upper left shows the previous colors.

everything . . . including the kitchen sink

When we converted this barn into a home, Bill filled the north (kitchen) wall with windows to let in lots of light. This wall and the south doors and windows once formed the central alley of the old pole barn. I had planned on filling this window ledge with tiny succulents. 

But the roof over the back patio blocked too much light from the plants, so they were moved to an outside container. And in their place? Some pinch pots our kids made when they were in school! One turned pot holds some rocks painted by three of our grandkids, and there are also two rocks our daughter brought me from Scotland. Over to the left side are Bill’s grandmother’s child-sized cast iron skillet and sad iron. The largest pot holds scrubbing tools.

I first painted the kitchen sink with the burnt sienna and raw sienna in my granulating palette. But it looked too dull, so I added a wash of transparent red oxide with a touch of Daniel Smith’s original quinacridone gold that’s no longer made. These two colors made a huge difference!

playing with the negative

I drew some old jewelry and watches here, just to practice painting a smooth background negative space. But #1: the color I picked was not enough contrast from the ink lines, and #2: the color I chose is a granulating blend of blue and black (Daniel Smith’s Lunar Blue) which jumps from blue to black in unexpected ways. More practice needed . . .

The watches belonged to Bill’s and my mothers, the pearls and small child’s ring were his grandmother’s, the man’s ring we think was his great-grandfather’s, and the brooches and ruby ring were my grandmother’s.

St. Joseph’s Church

We returned home from camping a few days ago, but I didn’t get around to finishing this last sketch until this morning.

The first couple of days camping the temperatures were in the upper 90s, too hot for a campfire. But Tuesday brought cooler temperatures and we planned to cook over a fire — just in time for the camp host to drop buy to say that a burn ban just went into effect! 

So we decided to drive into New Waverly to eat at the local diner. Across from the diner’s corner, I saw this lovely gothic-style church so I took photos to sketch from later. This is the third structure built on this site (in 1905); the congregation originated with a group of 40 Polish families who immigrated in 1867.