Peaceful Start to the Day

One of my favorite times of the day is the early morning peace I share with God and my journal.  Oh yeah, and my green coffee cup!

Simply Tubes

a lesson from Joanne Sharpe's "Paint Simply" class

Dentist Swag

The only good thing about going to the dentist is the swag you get.  And the swag is more interesting when you draw it.

Art Time

By now, you've seen my green "morning coffee cup" several times.  That isn't the only time of day that I find time for drawing.  In the late afternoon I video chat with my sister across the country and we work on projects while we chat.  This pewter beer stein sits on my desk and holds the tools I reach for often. 

Simply Stems

This is another lesson from Joanne Sharpe's "Painting Simply" class.  Eventually, these are supposed to have backgrounds added to them.  I'm a fan of white space, though, so I might not be able to bring myself to do that.  I like them just the way they are!

Paint Simply

These are more lessons from Joanne Sharpe's "Paint Simply" class.

Still Learning To See

Learning to see is the most important part of drawing.  I'm always learning.

Through the Windows

Drawing things I see through my windows reminds me of how things change through the seasons.

Keeping Track

A journal is great for keeping track of information for future reference.  A major reason I consolidated journals is so that I can find this kind of information later.  Next Halloween I'll be able to look back and know how much candy to buy!

Bay Day!

Our local department store is called The Hudson's Bay.  Bay Day is their semi-annual sale.  These are some really fast sketches of my purchases.  I bought more clothes that day than in the last two years!  Definitely done for awhile. 

Still Swatching

In Joanne Sharpe's class we made a swatch book from watercolor paper, mixing all of the colors in our 6-color palette.  These are just in my journal, as a record of doing the class and using up some paint.  Just playing!

More Furniture

Bound: 15 Beautiful Bookbinding Projects

This new book from Kyle Books contains more than 15 beautiful bookbinding projects; it is filled with beautiful photographs and writing.  Rachel Hazell writes with reverence about her love of paper, ink, books, the process of bookbinding and the world around her in her homes in Edinburgh and the small Hebridean island of Iona off the west coast of Scotland.

After exploring "the pure joy of making books", Hazell covers the tools and materials necessary for bookbinding.  Techniques are taught next:  checking paper grain direction, folding, cutting, tearing, measuring, piercing holes, sewing, and gluing. 

This book contains two unique sections that I especially appreciate.  The first is the technique section entitled "inkery", where Hazell shows how to make unique patterns to decorate your books with.  The second is a diagram section in the back that includes a conversion table for paper sizes and weights.  (Paper sizes and weights are expressed differently in the US, Canada and Europe because of the various measurement systems.)

The 15 projects include something for all skill levels.  If you are a brand new bookbinder, you can make a book by folding a single sheet of paper.  If you are experienced, you can make a hard cover book with the classic kettle stitch.  In between are classics like concertina (accordion) books and a five-hole pamphlet book.  But there are many less common book structures included here too.  This great combination of projects makes the book both a classic reference and an inspiration for any bookbinder.

I tried the concertina book first - folding the perfect accordion is always a challenge, and Hazell's instructions and photographs are very clear.  I'm looking forward to trying some of the books I haven't made before, as well as decorating covers with her inkery ideas. 

I'll be happy to give this book some of my precious shelf space - thanks to Hachette for sending it!  

Continuous Line Drawing is Very Meditative

Daunted By Page 1?

When faced with the beginning of a new journal, many artists report "fear of the blank page" in spades.  Liz Steel, whose sketchbooks I admire, always paints her palette on the first page.  It works for me, so here is page 1 of my current journal.

What Day is It?

Urban Sketching

A house in the neighbourhood

An Afternoon at Artist Trading Card Swap

Voting Day and Planning A New Journal

Experiments from a Class

I'm taking an on-line class with Joanne Sharpe:  Whimsical Watercolors:  "PAINT SIMPLY".  You can watch the trailer here.



My journal is a perfect place to do the class experiments.

Practice, Practice, Practice

Will I ever get that cup right?  It is actually short and fat not tall and thin.

How good would this drawing get if I did it every day instead of scrolling through Instagram?

Fall Colour

Fall colour appeared out every window in October!

In the News

Sometimes I draw what is in the news.  An old picture of Donald Trump and his father appeared when a tax scandal surfaced.

We Vow to Turn Off the Telephone

In early October we were getting a lot of civic election telephone calls.

October Journal Pages

Journal pages at the beginning of the month had a calligraphy flavor - hot on the heels of the Westcoast Odyssey of Letters.  At the conference I received a handout of a Button exemplar (above) and I took a seminar on Bunglalow lettering.

Journal Covers

7" x 7" Journal Cover

I took advantage of a sunny day recently to spray a large sheet of watercolour paper with watercolour ink.  I used a piece of it to make my current journal, shown above.  I still have some left to use in the future.

I'm always on the lookout for fun ways to decorate paper, and last month's Westcoast Calligraphy Society meeting provided some new inspiration.  Someone shared an idea that she learned at the recent Seattletters Conference.  Eager to try this out, I spent last Saturday "auditioning" colours:

I did these on cardstock with some Artist Loft watercolours (that perform a little more like gouache than watercolour), and some Laurentian metallic watercolours.

 I'll buy some large sheets of Canson Mi Teintes paper to do the final version.

 Each one has four layers.

I took some "in progress" pictures.  First, I wrote Roman Capitals with a 1/2" flat brush, covering the cardstock.  I let this first layer dry, rotated the paper 90 degrees and then wrote in a different colour.  Below, you can see the first two layers of the green sample.  The first layer was a metallic green, the second layer bronze.

The third layer is white:

The final layer was black:

Inktober is a Wrap!

W

What on earth am I going to do for November?