Day 34-Storm Part Two

Storms on the river are often exciting. The winds can shriek down the Savannah. You can watch the storms blowing in from the west.

Last nite's started with a Thundercall:Red Alert status. Winds torrential rains lightening thunder hail. We were off to a good start with a power outage about 6:30.

Thundercall:Red Alert

The sky changed from angry threatening clouds to soft grey as soon as the storm started. Temps fell almost 20 degrees in minutes. The pool was filled so at least two inches of rain. Wild winds. No hail. Quivery dogs from the thunder and lightening. 

So what did I do?? I journaled it...the lettering was handpainted with a round brush and watercolors and the outlining was done with this really neat set of Pentel Fountain pens I got at Binders...7 different colors for $14....I LOVE them.  Anyway they bled when I decided to paint the background a very watered down yellow but I like the effect which is watery and rainy.  All the writing was done with the Pentel Fountain pens too...I am just sad they are NOT refillable...guess they can't be perfect right?!

The watercolor of the river was painted with a washed sky of watery indigo as was the river...the trees were painted with new gamboge, sap and Pthalo green and a little indigo.

Storm From the West

Reposting so u can see before the storm. The skies change so quickly it's hard to paint them from nature. 

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Day 13! Cactus?

Washi tape fun!!
Did you know you can't paint over washi tape?? Not with Watercolor! But still fun taping alot! One of the reasons I was taping was that my 8 year old wc moleskine was beginning to come apart at the seams.  NOT good.

A double page spread in my watercolor moleskine. A strange cactus my mom gave me a start of years ago. Do you know what kind it is?

 Each of the little branching pieces can form a new plant. Easy to grow. Lots of thorns on each of those branches!  OUCH!!   Use a newspaper to wrap the cactus when you want to transplant to a bigger pot. Hold the newspaper and DON'T touch 

Rarely needs watering.  I water it MAYBE once a month...in the summer it stays out on the backporch. Rarely gets direct sunlight or fertilizer either but it seems to thrive.

Bytw that is my grandmother's McCoy pot.

Oh NO!! Turns out this is a Euphorbia trigona...A Cathedral Cactus or African Milk Tree...and NO I am NOT Xing Cactus out! http://www.plantstogrow.com/zPhotoDisplay.asp?plantID=93... 

Day TeN: Skyscapes

I have been on Instagram a lot lately and follow a British artist that paints skyscapes plein aire...all of a sudden it occurred to me that I should be painting them from plein aire and never have to leave home...after all I live in the land of huge skies. I dont even have to go outdoors to paint them...all I have to do is look out the triple sliding glass doors and there are huge skies out all of them.  An invitation to paint skies from life and not photos if ever there was one!

 This is what I painted out my back door.

I think the clouds got a little dark...and I could have painted more blue into the water but #1 is done, right??? But I do think I will add more blue to the river.

Watercolor in my moleskine.

This is the actual view out the back windows. I did edit a LITTLE!! No rails, no birdfeeders and NO pots!!

And here's where I sat by the windows and painted...nice and cool...no sweat involved.  Did I say I hate to sweat???

Day NiNE - Edisto Dreamin

Around this time every year I am ready to be at the beach but since taxes are so high on the beach house that has to now wait till off season...hopefully September. At least the weather is still nice in the Low Country in September, right?

Edisto Dreamin

Yes I know abalones are a western shell and I think so are the murex shells but shells remind me of the beach and the beach reminds me of Edisto!! The beach there is littered with fossil sharks teeth so that's definitely Edisto!!

I wanted to write something on this painting but I thought it turned out so well I left it alone.  This is watercolor in my wc moleskine.

Tom

I drew my friend Tom Needham last night while he was busy applying masking fluid.  I do think it looks alot like him!!

 This is watercolor and pitt pen in my wc moleskine.  The name Tom was done with my Pentel brush pen.  I LOVE that pen!!!

Day NiNe?! Inspector Morse

Oops its just day eight...if I change the title the hotlinks already posted will not work.

Love the old BBC Series Inspector Morse and the new version Endeavour. I drew a double page spread while I was watching last nite's episode.

This is loosely based on the opening of last night's Endeavour.

This is painted with mostly transparent colors.  Quinacridone Sienna for the rusty colors and mixed with cobalt for some of the greys.  The other greys were made with cerulean and ochre. WC in my moleskine.

Morse's famous Jaguar MK2 sedan. Used to date a guy at UGA that had a burgundy version. A sweet car with burled walnut leather interior.

The red is Daniel Smith Pyrrole Red.

Lately my iPhone is not defaulting to normal. Everytime I take a pic with it I have to correct the color. Annoying. No idea why.

I do like this off color version.

DaY FiVe: TeaPoTs

DaY FiVe. Another blog post. I am ShOcKeD are you?!

I have quite a collection of teapots. This is the newest one. I have given myself permission to buy more because they are great props for painting. Sooner or later this set will be in a big watercolor. If I stay home long enough to do it!!!

Too MaNy GLaSSeS!!

I have around 17 pairs of glasses but only wear the red ones and one other pair. They usually are bought in a three pack.   And you can't try them on before you buy them...OPPS!!

Moleskine, WC

People especially 20-30 something's ask me why I have so many. Some are too heavy and some have union jacks on them. Who knew. You couldn't tell in the package. Some are boring. Some too small. Some itch. I am allergic to the $2 ones even though they are cute. A few are scratched. I could go on.  

I took this photo to show how many I have yesterday then decided it would be a good sketch.   Try drawing 14-15 pairs if glasses. Took quite a while!!!

Today is my sweet one and only grandson's birthday.  Henry is TwO!! HaPPy BiRThDaY, HeNrY!!

Caran D'Arches  and Inktense on Watercolor paper!!

Roses and Labs

Three days of journaling.  Don't know if I can keep this up. Probably because I get carried away. I painted all these since 2 today. 

I bought some sweetheart roses at BiLo and decided to paint them. I did not like this much at first so I painted more paintings. It is growing on me the more I look at it.

#2. I decided to try using only transparent watercolors not semitransparent. Only thing I like about this is the leaves. Oh and the background.   Maybe it will improve by morning?

#3.  I tried painting a single rose on good #140 Kilamanjaro to see of that would help. Yawn!!

Added a background and some leaves to have some negative painting to hopefully improve it. I really do like the colors in the background...and the spatters.  Not sure I did but I had fun splashing around paint. 

The roses weren't going well so I drew a contour drawing of my lab Honey. Botched first attempt and drew the small one which I liked better. And this is my favorite of the four drawings.

Morning Tea and the Camera

Journaling day #3...how long till its a habit?

Every morning I have constant comment tea and an English muffin plus yogurt lately. Today I drew it minus the muffin- who wants a cold muffin?

Washi tape...isn't that a fun one?? Best of all I got if for .75 in the sales section at Michaels...SCORE!! :)

The pale washed out Version #1

From now on I will never say it's finished unless I try to take a pic first. This was what I saw first. Washed out. Added more vermilion to the cup and it was much improved!!

Winsor Newton in my Wc moleskine

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