30 in 30 Day 23 and Library Sketches

My friend, Nancy, came over and got me this morning. We went into Jackson to the library and sat in the reading room sketching. It was quite a nice place to do this as the people mostly sat still.

She also took me out for an early birthday lunch. My birthday is actually next week, but we are leaving for Pensacola Beach on that day.

When I got home I had to go to therapy and then stopped at the grocery to pick up a few odds and ends. I am making spicy chorizo navy bean soup for dinner this evening and pizza (without real cheese) for tomorrow.

I did a quick close-up study of three pears from a photo that I found on Paint My Photo. I rather like the pears, but as usual my shadows leave a lot to be desired.

I guess I'll just have to try again tomorrow.

xoxo

Working in the Art Room

I did get the bathrooms cleaned (I am unable to do floors or bathtubs) yesterday and did pick up the art room and then I decided to take some time to play a bit. I opened up a folder of reference photos on the computer and began to sketch on a page in an old Chemistry notebook from the late 1980s when I was a student at MSU. As you will see some of the sketches ran into each other, but I really don't mind. It was such a wonderful feeling to be working in my room.

It would appear that scale is not a feature here and that I really like drawing birds.

While I was picking up, I rediscovered the "British Weather" book that I was altering and had retitled "Face It" and decided to try a page in it. I first added a bit of clear gesso and when it was dry I did a rough sketch and then used Neocolor IIs to add a bit of color.

It will be another busy day. I am hoping to spend a bit of time on the treadmill (I walked/ran 2 miles yesterday.) and then do a bit of art before getting help with a shower. The hubster is going to therapy with me and then we will do a bit of Christmas shopping before ending our afternoon at Klavon's for pizza. I cannot have any milk products, but have found their pizza with chicken, pineapple and mushrooms is really good even without cheese.

What about you? Are you getting your shopping done? Are you making handmade gifts? Cookies? Are you finding time for art? Do share.....

xoxo

Art Journal, Sketching and Flowers

I guess I have an admission - I am addicted to image transfer. The more I do, the more I want to do. It is such an easy way to add another dimension to a mixed media piece. I decided to add a bunny from a napkin to the left hand side of the page and some dictionary pages. After adding a bit of watercolor, I looked through a couple of magazines for images and found two that I liked, so I did image transfers using gel medium. This spread isn't done yet, but I am liking it so far.

Here is a close-up of the texture:

While looking for the newer pieces to take pix of to share today, I found a little sketch from Monday while the girls were here. When waiting for gesso to dry, I often find a way to begin another page. This time I sketched a banana and an apple and used a stencil to include a graphic to the page.

And while walking the yard I decided to take a photo of this part of the garden that always seems to me to be calling out a friendly greeting. I really should try to do a loose watercolor of these.

I have a haircut scheduled for late this morning and then when I return, the hubster and I are going shopping to find him some nice casual clothes. We both spend most of our time in messy work play so that our kickabout clothes are really kickabout. I am looking forward to helping him find a couple new things. Later today I will decide what I am taking on the trip to the far north and will get packed.

What are you up to today? Are you finding time for yourself? Are you willing to share what you are working on/playing with? I can't wait to see it.......

xoxo

Life and Family

I've been away up north in the UP visiting family for the past 10 days or so and although I've been reading your blogs, I haven't been commenting much. I took my iPad with me, but stayed with family and didn't really take the time.

Just before I left to go north, I went to the ophthalmologist because I'd been experiencing some fuzziness in my only sighted eye. He found that I am in the early stages of age-related macular degeneration. The doctor thinks the vision problems that I presented with are another iteration of my "aura without migraine" history. I was so shocked at the diagnosis that I didn't ask questions. I have since done much research and found that you don't usually go blind from this condition, but you do become legally blind. This means no driving, difficulty reading, inability to recognize faces, and problems seeing the world in color. The "good" news I found in the literature is that for most people who are diagnosed, their other eye takes on much of the sight and can be really helpful. However, I am only sighted in the affected eye. The other eye suffers from a combination of amblyopia (lazy eye) and farsightedness and is not correctable. I am determined not to let this diagnosis reduce the quality of my life until there is a noticeable difference in my vision.

I drove to St. Ignace to spend two nights with my Mom, who also suffers from macular degeneration (she is 87 and is coping quite well). We played a lot of cribbage, watched the Tigers baseball games, and visited my sister Mags who has MS and is wasting away (I am blown away by her positive attitude and feel I have much to learn from her) and my sister, Molly.


I then drove to Marquette to visit my sister, Anne, who used to live just two hours away and is now about 7 hours north. We had a great visit. I love her condo and the community where she lives. One of the days I was with her, we drove to Michigamee to visit my blog friend, Joan, of The Retirement Chronicles. What a great visit that was. We clicked right away. I can't wait to go visit her again.


I have just a little bit of art to share with you and then I have to jump on my horse and get to my daughter's house to get her third grader to school and bring Miss 4 out here. I am getting my hair cut and my first pedicure of the season this morning, so Papa will take Miss 4 to afternoon preschool later.

I will be visiting you later today and hope to really catch up with you. Until then, I hope you are doing well and that you are finding time for yourself and your creativity.

xoxo

Yard Pix, Sketches, Nature Journal, Pastel Journey

I had a really busy day yesterday, but mostly devoted to one kind of art or another. In the late morning I went out to the north yard and sat on the bridge to try to capture the Adirondack chairs sitting under the trees. I am still having a really hard time with these chairs and think I'd better do more practice with them. At any rate, despite the fact that the wind was just about blowing be away and the wind chill was putting a serious cold in my hands, this is what I accomplished.

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By the time I got indoors, I needed some serious warming up, so I reheated some turkey vegetable soup I'd made the day before. Yummy!!

I still love my Debbie Mumm dishes.

It was a beautiful day despite the wind, so once I'd warmed up, I put a hoodie back on and headed out with the camera. I've been impatiently awaiting the arrival of the lady slippers, but realize that it really isn't time for them yet. I do have their greenery already.

And while I was walking around the horseradish that the hubster planted smiled and waved just begging to have its picture taken, so I obliged.

And then I couldn't ignore the shade garden full of lilies of the valley, Jacob's ladder, and hostas. And they are lucky enough to have a natural frame of a weathered fence and a pile of bricks.

All this communing with nature, reminded me that I wanted to start a journal with a nature theme and try my hand at some botanical sketching - nothing formal, but I am drawn to things that don't move when you try to sketch them. I had a lovely book written in German with a leaf image on the front that seemed to be a good candidate. I wanted to know its title to see if it would fit with the theme, but every translation software that I tried just gave me back what I entered. Does anyone know what this says?

The title doesn't appear on the front cover and I love the leaf pattern.

Here is the first page of the "Nature Journal". I think it is a spent dandelion, but it wasn't identified by a name just a number. I found it on Wet Canvas.

And, finally, I tried my hand at another pastel in my Merrill Reader, but this time I used Portfolio oil pastels. I am quite pleased with this one and will try my hand at the Mungyo soft pastels on the next one with the hope of doing a better job than on the flowers that were my first entry in this book. I need to get some fixative so I can turn the page and not have these two get two familiar with each other. I think I will just buy some hair spray as Phil suggested.

I do love pears.

Another busy day today. I am on my way to my daughter's house to get Miss P to school and then I have my exercise class. I am hoping to spend some time with art after that, and then I am going to go to the Zumba class again - two left feet notwithstanding.

I hope you have a great day and that I will see you again tomorrow.

xoxo

Tiger Lily and Altered Book

I began to add the darks to the middle parts of the tiger lily petals and wasn't at all pleased with how they looked, but left them alone to dry without fussing. The next day when I checked on it, I was tempted to trash it, but instead I began to work with other media in order to "save" it. I used some Caran d'Ache Neocolor IIs on the petals and then removed the masking fluid on the stamens. All was not as I had hoped for, so I brought in the big guns. I played with my oil pastels and my stencils and then declared it done. I am not sure if it will stay in this form or if it will be broken into smaller parts for inclusion into other mixed media pieces. My girl tribe, all of whom spent the night with us on Saturday, had only positive input. I suppose I've taught them well in that respect.

It has a bit of a shine on it from the wax crayons.

While the girls were here, I got out some paper and my Portfolio oil pastels and my Neocolor II wax crayons and let them play. They wanted me to work with them, so I got some magazines to cut out more collage things for my altered book. This got them cutting too and they came up with some very nice art.

Miss 4 is again using the theme of roads - as in the road from her Mom's house to Nana's house. It is apparent this is an important, repeating idea from the use of the words "important facts" that she found in my container of collage elements.

When I explained to Miss 9 that the theme of my altered book was eating natural foods, she decided to do a mixed media piece on the same topic. I am so impressed with her art.

Yesterday I decided it was time to paste the back pages in my altered book together in preparation of the cutting of the niche. My problem is that I haven't the foggiest notion what is going to "live" in said niche. It is time to make the rounds of the dollar store and the second hand stores to see what "grabs" me.

While I was going through the closet of mixed media "stuff" I happened upon some old post cards that my Mom had given me a couple of years ago. I couldn't help sketching a couple of them that I found particularly fun. I did these on Saturday morning before the girls arrived.

I have my exercise class this morning and then I am going to try the Zumba class this evening. I hope I like it and that I don't show off my "two left feet" too well.

What about you? What are you doing today? Does it involve art in some way? Will you make time outside of your normal routine for yourself? I hope so, as you certainly deserve it. I can't wait to see what you've been up to lately.

xoxo

Busy, busy day and some sketches

I drove into town to run errands before my cleaning appointment at the dentist. I arrived a bit early and spent some time helping the dentist with issues with his iPad. I then sat in the waiting room sketching from a very nice book that was on the end table.

The hygienist was behind and didn't appear to be in a hurry to catch (lots of visiting with the current patient), so I chose to reschedule. I went to my daughter's house to visit and spent a couple of hours there. I checked at the pharmacy regarding the Evista the gyn prescribed for osteoporosis only to find that a three month supply was in excess of $450 - not going to happen. He will not be in the office until Friday, at which time I will call and request some product that has a generic.

My son called while I was at the daughter's house to see if I wanted to hang out with Miss Z while he ran some errands. I opted to take her to my house so he transferred her car seat and home we drove. Once here, she and Papa and I played outdoors for awhile and I took her in the stroller to the neighbor's house to visit. We then remembered that our taxes were ready for us to sign, so we loaded her up and took her into Leslie with us.

I have a big headache and a light show so I am going to take some medicine and lie down for a bit.

The hubster has salmon and a vegetable planned for dinner and that sounds quite lovely.

I hope you are having a great day and that you are finding time for yourself.

xoxo

A Bit of Art and Vacation Pix

I've missed you, but am totally relaxed and taking each moment as it comes, which is the only way to be when you are on vacation. I am on the Gulf of Mexico on Santa Rosa Island - Pensacola Beach to be exact. It is beautiful and the condo we are staying in is exceptionally appointed.

I did a sketch of a lovely shell that resides in a bowl under the TV shelf. It is not my best, but I decided to share it anyway.

I am planning to do more sketching and perhaps a watercolor or two while I am here, but for now I am acting like a lazy feline, lying about and doing as I please. I am, however, making a visit to the workout room first thing in the morning during the week (I take weekends off) and doing my morning jog. I am also walking the beach at least twice a day, so hopefully I will not turn into a fat cat while on vacation.

I wanted to share with you a selection of photos I've taken while I've been here. I've not seen a good sunset yet - too cloudy, but do have one clear sky photo to share. The thing is as the sun got closer to the horizon, so did the clouds obscuring it - go figure.

Surfers - believe it or not!

I hope to see you again while I am away. I am reading your blogs and enjoying your art tremendously. I am also really enjoying the books you are making in A.R.T. I haven't been good about leaving comments. I am truly being a lazy feline.

xoxo

Today's Sketches

I began the day with a 30-second sketch that was such a difficult pose I was pretty sure that when I shared it, you would have a very difficult time trying to figure out exactly what it was I was trying to portray. To help you with that I put a copy of the Posemaniacs pose next to my sketch. I just realized that for the most part these 30-second sketches are actually blind contours. I don't have much time to look at what I am producing. At any rate, for what it is worth, here is today's:

Some of the poses are from such a very different perspective that it is more of a challenge than usual.

Nancy commented yesterday that she would have to go to Posemaniacs and try a 90 second pose and I responded that you could only do a 30 second pose there and that I was using a timer to do my longer poses. When you click on the 30 second choice in the right hand column, it brings up a window with 10 seconds, 15 seconds, 30 seconds, 45 seconds, 60 seconds and 90 seconds, but all but the 30 second choice is grayed out. Imagine my surprise when I tried clicking on one of the other choices to see that I didn't need to time myself after all. Each of the choices are clickable. What fun - I am going to have to try some of the other choices.

Here is my 90 second attempt:

While it is not very good - way too skinny, I am pretty sure you are able to visualize the original pose from which this is sketched.

It is very cold here today, but I need to get out a bit today. I still haven't driven to the grocery store to pick up the essentials that are being depleted or are totally gone - milk, lettuces, apples, nuts, snack bars......

Miss Z is coming to spend the night again today. She is becoming a lot more challenging as she is getting into more and more things that I don't want her into, but what a fun child. I am going to get errands done today and do the treadmill before she gets here and still hope to find some time to get more art done today. I think I may try to sketch that pose I tried for the 30 second challenge today, but without a time limit to see what I can do.

Meanwhile, I am waiting patiently for the mail today and hoping that my surprise is in it so I can formally announce the giveaway. I'm beginning to feel as though I am teasing you by mentioning it and then not coming up with the goods, but trust me it will definitely be worth the anticipation.

I hope you find time today to stay warm and get to spend some creative time for yourself.

xoxo

Polish Woman Update and A Lovely Christmas Card

I decided to act on the advice given yesterday about adding a bit of shading to the sketch of the Polish woman and I knew exactly what I wanted it to look like (think JD Hillberry). Well the mental image and the actual sketch have a huge gap between them and unfortunately when you use charcoal for the darkest darks (pupils, inside of mouth and nostril) you can't erase it and you'd better not accidentally touch it when you are wiping the regular pencil parts - it smears terribly.

So here she is today. Is she better in any way? Or have a ruined her completely?

I finally finished the December swap item I was working on for the Watercolour Pencil Buddies group and will put it in tomorrow's post. And speaking of post, I was thrilled to receive this year's card from Vivian Swift. It's really cute.

Since today was the first time this week I had to chance to get on the treadmill, I stayed on for an hour and jogged for 1.5 miles and then walked uphill for the remaining 1.5 miles. It was a really good workout. I am still sitting here in short shorts and a t-shirt and am beginning to chill off. I think I'd best get in the shower and put on some warmer clothes.

We've decided that we are celebrating Christmas with our immediate family on my baby's birthday (I can't believe he will be 30 on the 21st). Both my kids have that day off. I am planning shaved ham, iced shrimp, cheesy potatoes and a big salad. I think my daughter is bringing a green bean casserole. I think I can have all my ducks in a row by then. 

I hope your preparations for the holidays are going smoothly and that you are remembering to make some time for yourself.

xoxo

Girls, girls, girls

We've had a busy couple of days. We had Miss P and Miss M overnight on Friday and Miss Z and Miss K overnight on Saturday. Loads of fun, but I have a bit of a sore back today and I slept more hours than usual last night.

On Friday, I got Miss M around noon and then picked up Miss P from school at 3:30. I took the girls to the Henrietta Branch of the Jackson District Library for a Christmas party at 5. It was also the end of the silent auction and I was able to score a hand knitted neckpiece and 3 hand knitted children's hats. The girls each made two different crafts and Santa paid a visit. We had a great time.

Here they are enjoying the back yard.

On Saturday, Miss Z and Miss K arrived around 5 pm and after dinner of rice and chicken in gravy (provided by the live in epicure, Papa), we got Miss Z to bed and watched Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer with Katie. Papa provided popcorn for the event. Here is my attempt at a sketch of Katie on the couch watching the movie.

I was following Dan Kent's advice about drawing people from  the side instead of head on.

As seems to be true of all siblings, the little ones always want to be in on what the older ones are doing, especially if that includes electronics and the younger one is still a baby.

Miss K is trying to ignore Miss Z and Miss Z is hamming it up for the camera, as usual.

And finally, I have for you the best of the sketches that were produced this weekend. This is Miss K's rendition of Tigger in several positions. She got the idea from the book Drawn to Life by Walt Stanchfield.

I must say, I should take advantage of my relationship to Miss K and get her to teach me some of her insights for sketching realistically.

As for today, I am not going to have time for the treadmill, but will be doing plenty of running anyway. As soon as I get cleaned up I am headed for Sam's for salmon, chicken, cereal, baby food, tissues, nuts, dried cherries, wine, and water. After that I have to stop at Meijer's for the rest of the groceries. I will come home and get things put away and then am picking up Miss P after school at 3:30. She and I are going to make the rounds of the second hand stores looking for snowpants, mittens and the like for when the girls are here and want to play outdoors.

I'd better get this body moving.

I hope you are not too busy today and that you can make time for yourself.

xoxo

A Real Post on My Repaired Computer

Shortly after I posted my little blurb this afternoon, the computer shop called to tell me that my computer was ready and that they were able to retrieve all my data. Hallelujah!

Now I can show you some of the art I've done in between reading some really good books.

First of all, I thought you might to see what my computer looked while in kernel panic.

Scary, scary!!!

Here are a couple of sketches I've completed in the past week:

While I don't think any of them are particularly special, it does me good to be able to share them and my little girls think they are super - they are so nice and are my biggest fans.

The rest of this week is going to be very busy, but I am hoping to spend some time in the art room and make some progress on both the farm scene and the Adirondack chairs. Hopefully I will have something to show next time I get a chance to post.

xoxo

In Chelsea, Around the Yard, and In the Art Room

After our anniversary dinner on Friday - a wickedly sinful seafood linguine dish - I took some street pix and was able to do a quick sketch. It isn't much; I never know how much or how little to include. I haven't added color as the paper in my journal won't take color and I am into wc right now.

Yesterday after dinner, the hubster came in and told me there was a tree frog on the side of his workshop, so I went out with the camera. Ugh, it was overwhelmingly hot and muggy, but I stayed out to get a couple of pictures and then came back indoors and sketched a couple of things from the yard.

He was green and bumpy and was eating something black. I could only see part of the body and two legs of his meal.

And it should come as no surprise that one of the things I took a quick pic of was an Adirondack chair sitting in the side garden. I had to try to draw it again.

I found a wonderful watercolor artist through a Facebook group called Sketchbookers Society. Her name is Brenda Swenson. She has a lovely blog and I found a tutorial on negative painting with watercolors. I tried my best to follow along with it, but as usual I've overworked it and I think the background needs to be darker, but I really had fun with this one and am anxious to try again.

Today I am planning to do some art with a friend after I first pay my penance to the treadmill for an hour. I hope to have some fun to report tomorrow and mayhaps even have some art to show.

xoxo