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A Few Studies

Just practicing some flowers…

An orchid…

This started off with random splatters of paint - then I added a little definition here and there. Just a little sketch to tell myself - “KEEP IT LOOSE!”

Just a little sketch of a daisey.

and playing around with the spiral of a rose….nothing serious!

Cherry Blossoms

The magnificent old cherry trees at the University of Washington were in full bloom. I spent the day with Seattle Urban Sketchers sketching the peaceful, light pink glow.

Fort Casey Camping Trip Feb. 2024

We hadn’t been camping in February yet - so we packed up the rig and headed to Fort Casey State Park on Whidbey Island, WA. We enjoyed watching the ferry to Pt Townsend come and go and we lucked out with some sunshine!

View from the trailer - the Pt Townsend ferry is coming in.

The light house at Ft Casey

Masking Fluid Marker - Don't leave home without it!

I discovered this amazing tool - Molotow masking liquid pump marker! It really works! Just shake it up, pump the masking fluid through the tip by pressing down a few times, and bam! Spring flowers are masked off so you can slap on some nice contrasting background! I’ve been using it for several months and it hasn’t even hinted at drying up and clogging the tip! (got it on amazon)

Looking for Fall Color

Here and there I see hints of fall. A little gold in the birches…

You can’t tell in the photo and the original looks okay without close inspection, but I had one of those art supply disasters that make you want to cuss. I used masking fluid for the tree trunks and branches so I could have fun with the background. Unfortunately, I was also using some inexpensive, hotpress paper I had lying around. So, I ended up with quite a mess because the paper surface was pulled up when I removed the masking fluid. I decided to continue to play with the sketch and the rough paper ended up working well with panting the birch bark. That is one of those nice things about sketching - you have the freedom to “play” your way out of a problem…sometimes it works!

A pumpkin patch…

Where is fall showing itself around you? How do you respond to the changing seasons? Does it make you want to paint or write poetry? Please comment below!

Oregon Coast 2023

We love the Oregon coast. The beach is sandy and wide, perfect for long walks and playing fetch with Poppy! As usual, the weather was mostly cloudy, foggy, and damp.

Our next day provided a beautiful sunset with soft color diffused in a little mist.

One day we walked to the bay side of the park and watched the tide rise into the marshy shore. I love mixing carbazole violet with burnt sienna for that wet sand look. Payne’s grey for the clouds threatening rain.

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Poppy and Bill relaxing at camp.

Mossy shore pines in the campground.

The super blue moon hanging like a lantern in the shore pines.

Our campsite was nestled into the undulating trunks and branches of the pine forest.

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We went down the coast to see Twin Rocks. When we arrived there were no rocks! They were completely hidden by fog. So we sat, waiting, and after about half an hour they appeared…and disappeared- a couple of times!

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We had another soft, misty sunset. The air was so moist that I couldn’t layer my watercolors at all - everything stayed wet and color soaked through the paper. But the effect was much like the atmosphere - undefined and dreamy.

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Finally, the day we were leaving, we had a clear blue sky and sunshine!

Path through the shore grass. Peacock blue sky and carbozole violet/burnt sienna for the sand.

Blue ocean. Peacock blue for the sky, indanthrone blue in the water.

Have you sketched in watercolor at the beach? What did you find most difficult to deal with? Moisture? Wind? Sand? Something else?

Fall Classes Starting Soon!

Fall is just around the corner, time to sign up for classes in nature sketching and acrylic painting with Kathleen!

Kathleen is such a kind and generous teacher. She is both skilled and supportive, very validating of her students. If you take a class from her, you'll love it!

Register today!

Alaska - Summer Solstice

Summer Solstice

We planned our trip so that we could witness the summer solstice from the Arctic Circle and experience the midnight sun for ourselves.

We set up camp near Fairbanks, left the trailer there, then set out for the arctic circle along the infamous Dalton Hwy. The highway lived up to its reputation! Dusty

Summer Observations

August is a nice time to check in on the various shrubs and vines in the area. You often can find a few blossoms, early berries, and even beautiful, juicy ripe berries all on one plant! I noticed a set of deep pink honeysuckle flowers as well as a few of their bright red berries intertwined with the ubiquitous (and invasive - but still delicious!) Himalayan blackberries.

I did loose, light pencil sketches, then added watercolor on site - but when I returned to the studio, I thought a little ink would be appropriate. Well - I managed to get too outline-y and flattened everything out. Grrr… So I threw in a few random marks in an attempt to loosen the sketches up and scanned them. Every sketch is a chance to learn something! One of the things I learned from these two sketches is ….. It’s probably not a good idea to work on things like this while on hold on the phone! :-)

Off to Alaska

I didn’t really have a clear idea of what I wanted to accomplish with my sketchbook on this epic adventure. Somehow just document the trip visually. I started out with watercolor pencils, which I found unsatisfying, mainly due to the colors I had with me. I much prefer to dip my brush into my watercolor palette and have a little conversation with the colors.

This set of sketches was done as we traveled I-5 in WA, Hwy 97, known as the Cariboo Hwy, through British Columbia to Dawson Creek, then picking up the Alaska Hwy heading west across BC, into Yukon, then finally reaching Tok, AK, just across the border.

First wildlife sighting: a bighorn sheep grazing in the ditch along the highway.

The scenery along the Cariboo Hwy was beautiful and we enjoyed camping at Crooked River Prov. Pk on Bear Lake - but the mosquitos were really bad!

We were very excited when a bear crossed the highway! We started seeing more and more smoke from wild fires in the area. At our campsite in Beatton Prov. Pk. a juvenile eagle kept us company and wild rose was everywhere!

Wildfire smoke got worse traveling west and we saw another bear! The forests transitioned from the massive, abundant evergreens we are familiar with in the pacific northwest to small, skinny, scraggly spruce mixed in with a lot of birch and aspen - we had entered the boreal forest!.

As we headed deeper into the boreal forest of Yukon, the highway suffered more and more from frost heaves that cause the pavement to buckle and break into potholes.

After two days of arduous driving over frost heaves, potholes, and gravel roads, we arrived in Tok, AK.

Other posts in this series:

Sketching in Edmonds

Sketching in a town gives you an opportunity to pause for a few minutes and take in the past, as well as the present of a community.

“The Log Cabin” was built as a guesthouse in 1930 and is currently the visitor’s center for Edmonds.

All around town there are vintage streetlamps with hanging baskets of flowers.

Juxtapositions are always fun to look for. I really liked the modern Graphite Building with the vintage streetlamp on the corner.

The new Edmonds Waterfront Center offers a minimalist backdrop to the 15 foot welcoming figure ‘Our Heritage is a Gift’, carved from a 500 year old log, and dedicated to mothers.