I’ve had several gift ideas to give Bill, one of which was to replace his feather pillow. The man is very particular about having a good feather pillow! Unfortunately, the one I ordered will not arrive until after Christmas — so I’ll give him a sketch of it.
(He doesn’t do internet so I’m safe posting it ahead of time.)
I taped the edges of this Hahnemuhle Agave watercolor paper but the paper tore as I pulled it up. Lovely paper to paint on but it doesn’t like tape.
Sometimes just a simple sketch is all that’s needed . . .
Over a week ago I developed an eye infection around my left eye that soon spread to my right eye as well. In spite of antibiotics and topical ointment, it has stubbornly hung on — but now is finally clearing up!
Quickly drawn in continuous contour line using a Pentel Falcon fountain pen with a splash of watercolor in a Traveler’s Notebook blank notebook, passport size.
My Christmas gift has arrived! Meet our new family member, Buttercup, a 4 year old Welsh Pembroke Corgi ❣️
Butters has retired from breeding and is ready for new adventures here at “the farm”. Our cats are quietly keeping their options open but since she isn’t barking or chasing them, they are tentatively accepting her. Our daughter and son-in-law’s dog Bradley is VERY interested in playing with her but we’ll take it slow for now. She was just spayed last week and needs to heal.
After returning from our short camping trip, we were busy with unloading the camper, laundry, making a grocery list, etc — finishing my sketches and posting them could wait. 😁
We were just a bit north of Houston but I managed to find a couple of red leaves — maybe dogwood? Not sure, but I love drawing autumn leaves! And the camper must’ve missed our regular trips; as soon as we set up camp, the plumbing broke down! We drove into Huntsville for repair parts, passing the Sam Houston statue on the way. Usually he is brilliantly white in the sunshine but this time had lots of shadow on him.
The first time we camped here at Cagle there were great masses of American Beautyberry, which is great for keeping mosquitoes away. The shrubs didn’t look so good this time, probably hurt by the summer drought.
I like to collect Pocket Palettes in different colors, then fill them with special mixes of paints. (Easy to identify each one at a glance!)
Art Toolkit is offering two sizes of limited edition GREEN palettes this Christmas season — I just had to get one for camping in local forests! Small enough to clip to any sketchbook with my favorite green pigments plus other basic colors to paint foreground, background, trees, grasses, lakes, and rocks! Maybe even an alligator?
Cancer treatment interrupted our camping this year but we are finally going for a few days next week to one of our favorite campgrounds in Sam Houston National Forest. I hope sketching the forest doesn’t intimidate me after all this time.
Traveler’s Company USA is again offering their collaboration limited edition green Pocket Palette but the quote on it includes “good coffee” in the phrase — and I hate the taste of coffee! So I never got that particular palette. 😂
As I was recently reading all the Hercule Poirot mysteries, the following quote especially made me laugh:
“. . . there are three things that cannot be hurried — le bon Dieu, Nature, and old people.” — Hercule Poirot, Mystery of the Blue Train
So after jotting it down in my journal, what better way to illustrate it than by sketching leaves from our last camping trip — over a year ago! Better late than never. I’m glad I remembered to take a picture of them
We have been doing a lot of puppy-sitting with our daughter and son-in-law’s dog, Bradley. He brings in tiny pebbles, grass, twigs, and leaves stuck in his coat or between his toe pads. Yesterday this gnarly leaf was stuck in his tail.
I had this small notebook open, ready to draw. I picked the leaf up from the floor next to Bradley and sat down to draw, using my Kaweco Liliput fountain pen filled with De Atramentis Document brown ink. Then added watercolor. . . . . Then realized that I had grabbed the notebook upside down! 😂
