THREE NEW POSTCARDS

Transition time: Van coming home for the fall and winter. He lives on his boat all summer and is here at home all winter. This has been our life for 38 years. A few of those years, I have spent some time on the boat, but for the most part I am home. Van being home, the fishing season (whether good or bad) over, the garden harvesting, the winter supplies in, the fish smoking, the fall color, and the tourist's departure all make for my favorite time of the year. And for the first time in months, I am anxious to get to the studio in the morning. It's about time.

VIOLA ON SUNDAY


I planned to paint in gouache on a black ground, but while looking for paper, I found some smooth paper that I think is Yupo and did this little painting of a viola. I gave it to Aimee at her birthday party Sunday night.

ZUCCHINI ON MONDAY (LABOR DAY)


A zucchini to go with the flower I did on Friday. I've had a bumper crop,the plants covered much of the time with my visquine a-frame. I splattered masking fluid for the spots on this before painting the dark.

GALLERY TODAY


I started this in June, worked on it some when the fireweed were blooming and finally finished today.... had planned to put on a brochure than never got done. I'll have it for next year.

ZUCCHINI FLOWER

The trip to town went well.... good weather both ways and while we were there. We got our winter supplies and visited Lee and Alyssa and came back sooner than planned.... I thought I'd have to fly home on Thursday to be home on Friday, but we were able come back on the boat on Thursday. I slept most of the way into Juneau and part of the way back and didn't do a bit of painting.

Yesterday, Friday, I helped lead a group of Elderhostel visitors on a walk on the Nagoonberry trail... or rather helped bring up the rear. It was a fun walk and I was able to answer most of the questions about the flora and a little more. I started a sketch while waiting for the group to come, but didn't have time to paint it.... maybe I"ll finish it and post another day. It was overcast and rained later in the day.

But today has been sunny and I spent much of the day in the garden.


Part of the time was spent painting this. Occasionally I'll try painting without drawing in pencil first. Maybe I'd get good at it some day if I did it more.

HEADING OUT OF TOWN FOR A FEW DAYS

I didn't have time to paint anything today. Have been getting ready to go to Juneau for a few days. We'll be going on the boat, a 7 hour ride, and and if it's not too rough I hope to do some painting on the way.


I sketched this on my walk Sunday and painted it after I got home. Its looking across the river near Sue and Lil's.

I'll be back here the end of the week.

OLD BOATS

It stopped raining this afternoon. I walked to the boat harbor at about 4:00 and set on our dock and did this of 2 old derelict boats in the slough. The one on the right is an east coast lobster boat that a local crab fisherman hauled from the east coast years ago and fished for years from. I can't remember where the other one came from.

WILLOW GALL

Another week of rain and I haven't been feeling very well, but determined to get out for a walk today. With brand new bear spray in my pocket, I headed towards the section line path to the beach, but after sloshing through the ditch which had running water in it and some more rain I decided to just go down to the river past Sue and Lil's cabin. Under the trees, I was able to do a sketch but not paint it before I started getting wet again.

I found this willow with a red gall on my walk and brought it home to paint. I did a more detailed rendering of the leaf with the gall on the right. Of course the sun came out and it was beautiful for about an hour after I got home. But it's been raining ever since.

I was surprised to find quite a few strawberries. I think I'll go back out tomorrow and pick some to bring home....also some nagoonberries.

BACK IN THE STUDIO

I don't think the rain has let up since Sunday. I didn't even go out in the garden today. This could go on for months.
I spent an enjoyable day in the studio; put the commissioned painting that I've been struggling with for several weeks away.... I need to go back to the scene when the sun is shining before continuing with photos.


I finished a couple of smaller things that I started in June or July (Yahoo!) and pulled out my gouache paints.

I painted this from a photo I took from the wetland trail in Juneau last year..... with gouache on 300# arches that I gessoed black.

BOLETUSES

I found these boletuses yesterday at the beach. I was planning to have them for lunch, but unfortunately for me, they were wormy.

I painted this in Fabriano paper book, about 7 x 9 inches.

MOUTH OF THE RIVER

I spent most of the day in the kitchen.... made bread, cookies and fixed up some greens from the garden in a favorite recipe that will keep me in meals for several days. Also watched the rain, until about 3:30 when I noticed it wasn't coming down anymore. Hopped on my bike and went to the beach. The tide was high, about an 18 footer. I walked down to the mouth of the river and looking north and painted this. I always have trouble with foregrounds. I had a little bit of white paint on my palette and kind of got the grass looking right.... only "kinda", the tide was going out and the shoreline kept changing. Love this smooth paper... Schoellershammer.

The sun came out for about a minute intensifying the colors. I found some boletes, not yet found by worms or slugs, which I brought home and will add to my vegetable concoction.

NEMETH'S HOUSE

Its been raining all week so I haven't been doing any outside sketching, nor walking. But this morning, it wasn't raining for a while and a walked to the boat harbor. Seems like every time I go there the tide is out, which is good because it is quiet.

I drew this standing up, and painted it after I got home. The foreground is beach grass which obscures much of the house. Lots of dead humpback salmon on the beach.

BOOK WITH IRIS

Back in June, a woman asked me to make a little sketch book as a birthday present for her artist husband. She had seen one of mine and wanted one the same size and requested that I paint an iris on the first page. As with most things, I kept putting off making the book and even longer to paint the iris.... I thought maybe she would change her mind or I could change her mind about me painting in his sketch book. His birthday is tomorrow, and I was finally forced to paint the iris. I usually paint flowers from life, but the irises are all gone now. I found an old sketch.... from 20 years ago.... and copied it.



Here is the book. You can see the little painting inside and the painting I copied on the right.
I used several kinds of paper and the cover is made from an old navigation chart which I waxed. It's a coptic binding. The book is 4 1/2 by 6 1/2 inches.

The copied iris on the left. Both were drawn with pen before painting. I'm noticing now that the right petal looks too small on both of these, more so on the one I did today.

PAINTING POORLY

I painted this from the window upstairs in my kitchen this morning, and like the paintings I did yesterday and Sunday, don't like it. I didn't even bother to scan the previous two. I'm working on a large painting in my studio (a commissioned piece) and don't like how its going either. Maybe tomorrow will be better.

SATURDAY AFTERNOON

My usual half hour bike ride to the PO this afternoon got extended to about 2 hours. I felt some need to get a a little more exercise and rode to the lake behind the airport runway. It was quiet and pleasant and only one car came by.... Mary, who I was glad to see and she stopped and chatted. There were a few drops of rain, but not while I was painting. There is still some pink from the fireweed. The golden rods and asters are earlier and more abundant than I can remember ever seeing them before.

A WALK ON THE NEW PATH

There is a new place to walk in our little town..... the Nagoon Berry Loop, which is on part of the Nature Conservancy protected land. Three AmeriCorp workers have have been working on it all summer and are almost through. Its about 2 and a half miles, near the beach, first through a wooded area and wanders to the trail (now pretty much a road) to the Retoot area. The trail is aptly named. I picked and ate hand fulls of the juicy burgundy berries.

This is the 3rd time I've walked the trail in the last couple of weeks and enjoyed seeing some of the last wild flowers of the year... golden rods, aster, fireweed and the smaller meadow herb, yarrow, and Indian paint brush; and also a few boletes though unfortunately they were pretty wormy.

Since I wasn't walking with friends this time, I took my paints. I waited until I got in site of the water before sitting down and doing this of Pleasant Island and Chichikof Island in the distance. Seems I most often gravitate towards the water to sit and paint...... maybe because its easier?

A PENCIL DRAWING

Van came home today. He brought the boat up the river and when the tide was out, he cleaned the bottom some and changed a zinc. I biked down and took him some dinner a little before the sun went down.

It was getting pretty dark so I just had time for a pencil drawing.... a quick one. I do very few pencil drawings other than an outline before painting and found this kind of a challenge.... I paid more attention to the values (lightness and darkness) than I do when painting and I'm reminded that I would improve my painting by paying more attention to the values.

There are some interesting thoughts on sketching and drawing on Robert Genn's Painter's key here and Karin Jurick's DSFDF here.

MORNING WALKS

For years, mostly in the summer,I have joined friends walking from 4-corners to the end of the dock and back.... round trip is about 3 miles. This summer 2 friends (Annie and JoAnn) have been very diligent and have done the walk almost everyday at 9 AM. I and a few others aren't so consistent.... I've probably averaged a couple of times a week with them. This week, though, the walks are taking place elsewhere because dump trucks are going by every few minutes with loads of gravel for the "tank farm." A couple of days ago we walked on the new Nagoonberry Loop trail.... I also walked it on Sunday. Today, I went to 4-corners at 9 to meet the walkers, but they weren't there, so I walked the dock road by myself but only went as far as the boat harbor.... the trucks are obnoxious. I had heard that there have been a lot of Caspian terns hanging out at the harbor, but there was nothing moving but a few ravens. The tide was low. Maybe I'll go back and look when the tide is high. The smoke from the fires is still causing a haze, but there are real clouds now. There was just a little bit of rain yesterday morning and hopefully there will be more soon. It has been so dry. I used some white gouache with my watercolors this morning, better to depict the opaque atmosphere.

KATE'S BIRTHDAY AT PT. ADOLPHUS

What a wonderful day! Kate and Fritz invited me along with 7 other friends on their boat, the
Great Sea, to go whale watching at Pt. Adolphus.There was lots of humpback activity. We drifted, watching and listening to the whales and sea lions, ate cake and enjoyed the warm weather and friendship. We ended the afternoon with a stop at Pleasant Island where we walked on Long beach for about an hour.I had started this little drawing a few weeks ago. Finished it this morning before we left the dock.
We have been enveloped in a haze of smoke from forest fires in the interior and Yukon for a few days. Perhaps some is fog.
Glassy calm water made it easy to sketch and paint.

The Great Sea is a catamaran. I sketched this from the bow of the left hull looking across at the right bow. The following is the inspiration for the boats name.

"The sea is the source of water and the source of wind; for neither would blasts of wind arise in the clouds and blow out from within them, except for the great sea, nor would the streams of rivers nor the rain-water in the sky exist but for the sea ; but the great sea is the begetter of clouds and winds and rivers. "

Xenophenes

ACROSS THE RIVER

I went up a little north of the Salmon River Bridge this afternoon. There's been lots of action up that way this last week. The silvers are coming up as well as humpies and the fishermen are working on getting some of them.

I found a comfortable spot and spent longer than usual on this than on most of my little painting..... over 45 minutes. I always have trouble getting the bank on the river looking like what it is.... those clumps of vegetation always look kind of goofy. I'm not sure this reads right.... there's no water showing and the grass (on my side of the river) should be a darker value.

BEACH TREES, AGAIN

It was just too nice an evening to stay inside after dinner, so I rode my bike to the beach. The fireweed are still in bloom and just had to be painted again. I forgot to bring my cup for water and a paper towel. I put the water in one of the sections of my palette and I had a little packet of salt in my bag which I sprinkled on and the paint went every which way and wasn't even dry after the ride home. Not much control on this one.

KATHY'S GARDEN SHED

A second little painting of Kathy's garden shed today. Kathy has commissioned me to paint a large picture of the shed. This is pretty much the composition she wants. I will also put some ducks in front. Another warm sunny day

A BEAUTIFUL DAY

Today at noon, I was honored with a belated birthday party hosted by my friend, JoAnn, at the Gustavus Inn.... a garden party on the patio overlooking their beautiful garden. Another friend, Nadine, from Seattle,whose birthday is one year later than mine, came to town yesterday and we shared the honors. Wonderful food and friends. I am so lucky. This morning was overcast and wet, but soon after noon some blue sky started appearing. By the time I left the inn, there were no clouds at all.


JoAnn invited us all to pick flowers, but I choose to paint the garden instead. This is only a small section of it. The garden is full of vegetables which are served to guests as well as a glorious array of flowers.


Afterwards, I went to Kathy's house. She wants me to do a painting of her garden shed which I went to look at and did this quick sketch. I'll go back tomorrow and start something larger, as the weather is suppose to hold.

SOMETHING THAT BELONGS TO SOMEONE ELSE

Today was wet and rather dreary. I worked a couple of hours at the Community Chest and did some house cleaning and a few other things to avoid doing anything artistic including a lot of time on the computer and looked on Everyday Matters which posts a challenge to draw something specific every week. This weeks subject is to draw something that belongs to someone else.
Plenty of Van's things around, but a little pile of things have been gathering at the bottom of the stairs that my grand daughter Alyssa left when she went back to Juneau a couple of weeks ago.... little things that remind me of her every time I walk by the pile or find another thing to put in it...wish she was still here.

BIRTHDAY

For a change of scene on my birthday today, I went out to Bartlett Cove for lunch with my friends Annie, Kim and Aimee. After a delicious burger and sweet potatoes fries at the lodge, Aimee and I walked out the beach trail where I set on a rock and sketched and painted this. Then we walked back along the forest loop trail. Overcast and a little bit of rain.

Yesterday was warm and sunny, perfect weather. And busy. We had a gallery walk in the afternoon here..... 8 artists and crafters opened their studios and galleries. Lots of visitors and happily some sales.

MORNING AT THE BEACH

I rode my bike to the beach this morning. Low tide, windy and cool. The work is progressing on the new dock. Walked over to the trees out of the wind and looked north to paint this. It started raining a bit just as I was finishing, but I made it home without getting too wet.

RANDY'S HOUSE

I went over to Kim's and picked about 2 quarts of strawberries this afternoon. Nice view of Randy's house from where I parked the car. Lots of memories from years ago. This sketch needs some work.

ICELANDIC POPPY

I had very good intentions to paint outside this afternoon between rain showers. I rode to the PO on my bike, but didn't make it home before it rained. A few poppies are popping up in the garden. I use to have lots of them, then hardly any last year. I'm making an effort to let them volunteer wherever this year, a couple are in the carrot row. They are probably my favorite flower.... at least today.

CITY HALL

Another postcard that I started a couple of weeks ago. This is our city hall. Before incorporation, it was the Community Association building, and before that, the library. The building was originally a cabin a a church camp and moved to this location at the Salmon River Park.

THE SCHOOL

I did the drawing for this a couple of weeks ago while Alyssa played at the playground. It was yet another day without rain and after taking care of some things at the library, I sat down to finish it off in watercolor, but when the water hit the lines it was pretty much over..... I had forgotten I'd drawn with the bleeding brown ink... no way to get the right color of the building. 40% chance of rain tomorrow.... may be my last outside painting for a while.

VISIT WITH KIM

It's still not raining, though there was a little bit of dampness in the garden this morning. Today, I stopped and visited Kim Ney, a friend and potter, on my bike ride to the PO. I couldn't help but buy a couple of her beautiful little bowls. She sells her pottery in a little gazebo next to her home.


This is a sketch I did earlier this summer for her brochure.

Had a nice visit and enjoyed a bowl of strawberries from her garden and went out on her porch and painted a couple of postcards of her inspiring view.

A cruise ship passed by surprisingly fast while I painted.



Started this second one of the same view waiting for the other to dry.... neither dried very fast and neither what I had in mind.

BACK AGAIN

I can hardly believe the summer is half over! What a summer its been weather wise..... hardly any rain. Despite a very bad cold and laryngitis that lasted most of the last 2 weeks, I did have a wonderful time with my grand daughter, Alyssa, who stayed with me for 3 weeks and left on the llth. Hardly any painting or exercise for over 3 weeks...


but today I finally went out for a longer than usual bike ride and stopped at Laurie's, had a nice visit and painted a postcard of her house.

I painted this on July 6, a hot day at the beach with Alyssa. I left out all the kids wading in the water.... none tough enough to go in chilly Icy Strait.

ANOTHER BREAK

My 7 year old grand daughter came to visit a few days ago and will be here 3 weeks and my daily paintings just aren't happening. I'll do what I can, but now my painting and postings will be on the back burner.


I was cleaning up my folder of scans and found this that I did on a dentist trip to Juneau last month and hadn't posted.... on a walk with friends on the wetlands trail near the airport.

LATE AGAIN

I'll probably never get the habit of posting everyday. I do try though. My postcards drawn on Wednesday and Thursday didn't get painted until this morning.
YeeGads! I didn't rotate the scan.... I'll fix it later.
Petunias on the sunporch Wednesday evening.



No, I wasn't in Sitka. Thanks to effort by local music lovers (Thanks especially to Sandy and George) our little town is so lucky to have some of the musicians come here most every summer for a concert. They are always fabulous. You can read about the festival here.


Yesterday I stopped at the golf coarse on my way back from walking to the end of the dock from 4-corners with Annie and JoAnn. This is one of several old farm relics on the coarse.

And speaking of the dock.... yesterday ground breaking took place for the building of the new one. Rumor had it that Sarah Palin was coming.

ANOTHER MORNING AT THE BEACH

Down to the beach on my bike this morning and set on the nice new bench and just gazed at the calm waters of Icy Strait for a while before getting out my paper, as there were a few drops of rain. I watched a lone kayaker come from the river and cross my view. It surely must had been my neighbor Bonnie who was to begin a 3 week solo trip this morning down the coast to Sitka. She came over last night to put things in my freezer (she lives without electricity) and though she is a very experienced paddler and camper I became a bit worried when she said she didn't have any bear spray, so I gave her mine.... she will be camping in major brown bear country.



The rain stopped and I painted the view across Icy Strait..... the little speck between the 2 other boats (a fish charter boat and a zodiac) is Bonnie.


West towards the passes was a hugh cruise ship.... a few pass by every day in the summer on their way in and out of Glacier Bay..... little cities on the horizons.

A sunny afternoon.... unexpected.

PETUNIAS AND LOBELIA

The rain has begun... a steady drizzle all day. I worked at the Community Chest in the morning and on a woodblock print in the afternoon. Almost forgot to paint a postcard. It was warm on my sun porch at 8pm and I went out and did this quick sketch of petunias and lobelia.

SATURDAY AND SUNDAY POSTCARDS AND SCETCHERCISE

Yesterday, I opened my gallery for the first time this year .... also mowed the lawn and worked in the garden a little..... there had finally been some rain Friday night. I was planning to go out and paint yesterday evening, started out a couple of times and it started sprinkling before I got to my bike both times, but it never did much. I painted these nasturtiums that need to be put in the garden but are still on the sun porch on a piece of hemp watercolor paper.... I don't recommend the paper.



I painted this at the beach this morning. There are 2 large clumps of these Northern Lady's slipper plants near the Yellow one that I sketched on Friday. Another overcast day, but no more rain.

I'm making an effort to combine my walking and biking with my daily paintings.. I read about the Sketchercise internet group on Katherine Tyrrell's blog Making a Mark, and applied to join it, as it seemed to be a small group where I could share what I love to do. I was very disappointed when I was not accepted to the group and also a bit perplexed.... acceptance was decided by what appeared on this blog and mine "missed the exercise element." Granted, I haven't been combining the 2 very much in the last month or so, but I have been walking and riding my bike for many miles every week as I always do when weather permits, and while in Cedar Key for most of 2 months, I walked practically every day for at least an hour, and on many of those days walked to where I painted and brought home plants which I painted.... not every thing I've sketched is on this blog. I've taken my sketchbook and used it walking, hiking, biking, and kayaking for years.

Anyway, Katherine started another Sketchercise group on Flickr for wannabees which I joined. I don't know how Flickr groups work and have to put in some time to figure out how to post pictures. I do often get lazy and don't want to walk or ride my bike, especially when its raining or snowing, so hopefully this group will help me get out there and exercise more often.

3 NEW PAINTINGS

I'm back to daily painting! At least for 3 days.


Wednesday, I rode my bike to the beach and sat in the bench that appeared this spring west of the dock. About a dozen eagles were hanging out on the tide flats as well as some crows, at least 2 of which were in the trees behind me, squalking while I sketched. This is one of 2 little postcards.... the other had birds but they didn't look much like birds, so you only get to see this one. It was overcast, but the sun came out later in the day.

Yesterday, after a busy day working on my gallery and some studio painting, I had about an hour before I had to start getting ready to go to a dinner party and biked to the beach again, thinking I'd do another painting of the same as Wednesday, but in the sun and with the tide in. But the wind was blowing too hard to sit on the bench and I decided to walk over to see if the lady slipper was open and it was..... earlier than usual this year, I think.
I didn't count the blossoms, but there were a lot more than what I had time to draw and paint in 20 minutes. Could have painted a little longer as I got home faster than I did getting there with the wind on my back.

Overcast today, finally a little rain last night, the first in almost 2 weeks. I decided to put some time in on the garden. I've been putting off transplanting my cabbages and brocolli from the A-frame until it started raining. The ground is still dry as a bone, but did it anyway. It will probably get seriously wet tomorrow..... just in time for the farmers market and rhubarb festival tomorrow.

I worked in the studio this afternoon on this rhubarb..... had thought I might do some little rhubarb paintings and take to sell tomorrow at the market, but couldn't do anything fast.



This took most of the afternoon having started it yesterday, and its still not done. I tried to do a quick sketch yesterday, but the leaves wilt so fast. I took some photos, one of which I did this from. Its about 14 inches wide, too big for the scanner and cropped some..... should be on my other blog, and maybe will be when it's finished.

NEW RESOLVES

Time keeps passing and I haven't posted here for almost a month. And as you might have guessed, I haven't been doing my daily paintings either. Other things took priority for a while and then inertia set in.... enough said. I'm ready to start anew.

We've had gorgeous weather for most of the time since coming home from Florida. This is a larger picture that I painted last month down at the beach..... I paint this view just about every year.