SUNSHINE!

gouache 3x5 1/2"

Friday was the sunniest day I can remember in a long time. And the first time I've painted outside the house this year. I drove down to the beach at about 2 and painted this from the car ....the Beartrack Mountains. I took a long walk on the beach and took lots of pictures of trees and the sky as the sun set and disappeared behind Chichikof Island at about 4 in a blaze of color.

Some years in the past I've been able to paint outside in January.... not this year. Maybe its just that I'm more susceptible to the cold (age can do that) but for the last month, just getting to the car has required walking on ice, and except for the paved one, most roads and paths have been sheets of ice.

With the days getting longer (about 8 hours now) I'm vowing to get out more. The snow is gone in a lot of places and hopefully we it won't get really, really cold.

Hard to believe how fast time flies. In a little over a month, we will be heading for Florida.

TWO LITTLE GOUACHE PAINTINGS

I needed to do something in color yesterday. Working on the monochromatic gouache studies has been getting monotonous.... just like the monochromatic landscape outside lately. I did these 2 little paintings from photos. Both were done on a manila colored paper.



This is Shelikof beach of Kruzof Island.... I did a larger watercolor of this last year but the bottom half of that painting got cropped.... I didn't nail the water coming in on the beach here either.


This is from a photo I took in Glacier Bay in October when Van and I were up there fishing. I think near the mouth of Geike. I'm not happy with the rocks.

SOME TREES

I've done several monochromatic gouache paintings in the last couple of weeks as I follow the 2010 Gouache Corner Challenge Thread on Wet Canvas. This is one I did today.



These are some trees I see from my window..... there are some behind them on the right that I left off. We had over a foot of snow this week and now its raining and there's starting to be some bare ground out there.

DOW AND TAO

I haven't quite gotten rid of this cold. Maybe it's flu. I've been painting everyday though, mostly working on gouache with great help from a Wet Canvas challenge here.



Another tea cup with my favorite tea. I've been studying this book, by Arthur Dow, in particular the part about Notan.

TEA AND BOOKS AND W,X,Y AND Z

Nursing this cold for the last few days. I've finished 3 books since Christmas (The 13th Tale was the best), written often in my green journal, and drank many cups of tea. I should have included my laptop here too. Feeling better today, but not great. Tomorrow, I'm spending in the studio regardless of how I feel.

Goofy looking ellipse.

And here's the rest of the alphabet:

A START FOR 2010 AND T, U, and V

For the last few weeks in the overwhelming month of December, I was contemplating whether or not to keep on with this blog. Though I've done some sketching last month, I've hardly put a thing here (though the scanner not working was a good excuse for a while.) I had just about decided to give it a break and not make any sort of resolve to try to paint every day this year. Having 2 blogs and trying to put something here every day in addition to getting other art done and on a blog, and, not to forget, my non-artist life.....life takes energy and time and I become stressed when I don't do what I've committed myself to do.

For the last few days, nursing a feverish cold, I've gone back and forth on the matter, writing and deleting these last few days. Tomorrow is Sunday, another day of renewal, so its time to stop the anguishing and decide and put it down in writing:

I will draw or paint every day for the rest of 2010. And the small watercolor sketches will be posted here.

and I'll get more larger work done this year... and delve more into some other media... and get more serious with my gallery next summer.... and its way past time that I have a show in Juneau so I will make an effort to arrange one.


So, maybe there won't be as much here. I hope to be be putting more art on the other blog this year.... guess I never should have named this one "Watercolor Postcards" because that limits what I can put here. I hope my few followers will look at both blogs.


Notice I said "rest of 2010." On January 1st I hardly felt like getting out of bed.



But today the fever is gone, I'm feeling better, and got the last 2 oranges and painted them here.


And here are T, U, and V of Alyssa's alphabet book.

PQR and S

MN and O

JK and L

GH and I

DE and F

The scanner is working, but I'm not... I've been playing with my granddaughter Alyssa who is visiting through Christmas and keeping me happily busy. I will continue with the ABC's I did for her a few years ago until the holidays are over.

ABC's

I'm having trouble with my scanner. The same thing happened before, but darned if I can remember how I fixed it.... have spent too much time already. I have an old scanner that I may have to drag out but for now found some things in my photos to put on here.

Quite a few years ago, in one of those times when I just wasn't motivated to paint anything, I decided to do a little ABC book, doing one letter each day.... This was long before my granddaughter was born 8 years ago. I think I'd gotten to E. Anyway, when she was a couple of years old, I returned to the project and finished it. Most of the paintings have special meaning for her. I made her a copy and will some day sew the originals into a book which will be hers....the letters are on double pages front and back.

So for lack of anything newly scanned to put here, I'll put the pages here a few at a time.

YET ANOTHER VIEW OUT MY WINDOW

As I come to the end of the year, my resolve to paint my little watercolors has almost disappears. I've been spending much of the few daylight hours in the studio and not getting out to walk much.... and wouldn't be stopping to paint if I was with temperatures in the 20s. Feeling a bit guilty and did another little painting out the window a couple of days ago.


This is smaller than most of my postcards... 2 x 3 1/2 inches and I started with a layer of gouache, with light blue at the top and some red at the bottom which doesn't show up in the scan.

INK DRAWING

Having used just about every throw away drawing pen and thrown away lots of expensive technical pens, and cursed them many times for not writing or for leaking, I decided to splurge and buy a good fountain pen. I got a Sailor 1911 while in California and love it. I've been doing a good bit of sketching with it, but I only have non waterproof ink and haven't been painting what I've drawn until yesterday.... just so I'd have something to put here.



Here it is.... another view from my window. I first drew the scene and then just used water to bleed the ink and put some more lines in after it dried.

I've been looking at Noodler Ink to order, which from what I've read is waterproof when it reacts with the cellulose in paper and will not harm the pen.

I finally finished a commissioned painting that I've been working on (mostly avoiding) for months. You can see it by clicking HERE

POSTCARDS FOR ABIGAIL

A writer friend Abigail, called today. She had been inspired to write a poem after seeing one of my older postcards that I had displayed in my gallery. Most of them are not for sale as I consider them my journal, and she had asked to have a copy of it and another one that spoke to her. I said I'd scan it and send to her. And since the scans are right on my desk top and I haven't had a paintbrush in my hand today since I'm getting ready to go to Juneau for a couple of days, I'm putting them here. They were done in January 2006, before I started blogging.


This is pretty much how its been looking off and on since I got home from California, though its been raining more often.


My note on back: "1-9-06 I walked at the duck pond and these 7 swans were there. sketched in the cold and painted when I got home." It must have been warmer than usual, because the pond is usually frozen in January.

SUNFLOWER ON A DREARY DAY

Stormy and wet outside today. This was drawn and painted quickly from a photo taken in Florida, using my new fountain pen and trying out some new gouache colors on a background made from saran wrap over a watercolor wash.

INERTIA

Since coming home, I've been in the studio everyday trying to get something started. I've taken 100s of photos in the last few months, mostly as possible paintings and for the past few days have been going through them, cropping and stitching and drawing little thumb nails trying to find the perfect composition and one that inspires me here and now. There's that distance from being outside painting or using my camera, immersed in my surroundings, to now being in the studio with just an image to copy. I'm missing that exhilarating feeling of being outside painting..... the weather is now making that just too difficult for wimps like me. It has always seemed more honest to paint from life, and I've always felt a little guilty using photos..... so here I go again, agonizing on what to paint and hearing myself making all kind of excuses not to start something.

This is usually the time of year I set up a large still life or finish one that I had started in the summer with a vase of flowers... not a flower in the house and very little fruit, though I've been looking hard at my houseplants. Last year when I hit this wall, I did some of the DSFDF painting challenges.... there was something about another persons photo that made me approach the painting differently; maybe just the challenge and novelty got me going. Well, its really just comes down to putting some paint on the big white paper, and I will...... from past experience, once I get started, I'll be on a roll.



I have done a few little studies from the photos. This is one of them and most likely the one that I will go farther with....this is just part of a panoramic view.

MY TRAVEL JOURNAL

First excuses, excuses... I had every intention of putting some of my pictures on here while traveling, but forgot the USB connector thing to my camera. And since coming home, same old, same old, just too busy.


I made this little journal especially for this trip, and it worked very well..... I have something on almost every page and will fill up the spaces with some photos or tickets or something.... and it is small enough to put in my purse... 6 x 4 1/2 inches.


I used magnet strips for the wrap around closure and made a little pocket (copied from a moleskine) attached the back cover.

I painted these 2 pages while visiting my friend Louise in Eastern Washington. She has an orchard of organic Boscs, and pears are always a fixture in her home.

And vases of flowers are always around too.

In Californina, from the Berkeley Rose Garden where I watched the sun go down over San Francisco Bay and quickly painted one evening.



and another visited to the Rose Garden one morning, stopped by rain and a wet walk back to Cedar St.



And this at the UC Berkeley Botanical Garden.... by far the most beautiful garden I've ever visited. I'm a bit reluctant to put this painting here as I was in a hurry and it doesn't have the depth it should have, but it was such a beautiful place to be and the colors are kind of right.... I was up on a hill above the path and Asian garden. I'll be putting some photos on my other blog.

I did a few other little paintings and drawings, but its time to move on and get in the present. Hope everyone in the USA is having a great Thanksgiving Day.

BLOGGING ON THE TRAIN

I'm loving my little Sierra Wireless AT&T Connection while down here in the lower 48. Here I am on the train in Oregon, plugged into 120 Volts and surfing with 3G all the way, except for a while in a tunnel. Wish it would work this well at home.... only 2G there. I left Seattle this morning and will be in Davis California tomorrow morning at 6:50 if we're on time.

In Seattle, I visited friends, went to see the art at The Best of the Northwest fall art show at the Seattle Center, ate some delicious meals and walked miles (the most enjoyable around Green Lake).

I've done one little drawing today of the clock tower while stopped at Portland, but kind of hard to put it on here now, so I found a page done while on a train in Manitoba in 2006 which looks somewhat like what I've seen today:

TRAVELING

Once again I haven't been painting much... getting ready to leave before my trip and now into my little vacation. I flew to Juneau on Friday, spent the weekend with Lee and Alyssa. Got some things done in Juneau on Friday and good times with Alyssa and Lee. I flew to Eastern Washington yesterday where I am visiting my friend Louise in the Yakima valley amongst pear and apple orchards.

2 years ago, I visited here and did some little paintings..... one I did of Louise's orchard of organic bosc pears is here. I'm here a week or so later this year and the leaves and much of the color are gone and its a lot cooler. I've done a few little paintings inside but will have to take some photos of them later.

I took some pears when I left in 2007 and painted these after I got home:







The blue back ground is the technique with stamping that I had just learned in the workshop with Anne Bagby.

I'll be off to Seattle tomorrow for a few days then leaving on Amtrak for California on Saturday.