Not much time for drawing this week but I did manage this little doodle, so from me to you I wish each and every one of you a very happy Christmas filled with, peace, joy and love.
Thanks for taking the time to stop by. take care and have fun x
Hi there how are you?
This week I have mostly been drawing frogs.
I was sitting here looking at my sketchbook thinking “I don’t know what to draw” unfortunately that is not a good way to learn to draw, so I drew frogs.
Looking through images of frogs on the inter-webs I found a little frog called a strawberry poison dart frog, very pretty and also extremely deadly.
It doesn’t happen often but sometimes I get that brain freeze that stops me in my tracks and keeps me staring at the white page.
There are ways around this;
sometimes I just slap paint all over the page and eureka no white page.
Using different tools, pens coloured pencils etc. can also work,
and sometimes I just need to kick myself up the backside and draw frogs hehehe.
Thanks for taking the time to stop by today. Till next time, have fun x
Hi there, how are you?
Last week we ventured out on to the horseshoe pass. It’s a pass between two sets of mountains near Llangollen in Wales.
My parents used to take us up there when we were kids to pick whinberries (bilberries) but I haven’t been there for years. There are no berries at the moment; it’s the wrong time of year.
You can walk for miles and see nothing but roaming hills, mounds of slate and sheep that wander over the heather. It’s a great place to get away from it all.
We challenged ourselves to draw a landscape in 15 minutes, this is the best I could muster, it’s only about 2”x3” I thought I would have a better chance of finishing something small. These are some of the hills in the distance.
Once home I tried to paint from one of my photos, this was painted in one colour, perylene green trying to work out the tones.
Did I mention the sheep? They had all been shorn recently so it was interesting to see their actual shape, they’re such a different shape with wool, see above for sheep sketches. Have to say most of my photos were of the backside of a sheep as they walked away from us.
This is the one that got away; she escaped the shearer’s clippers hehehe. I hope she doesn’t’ get too hot in this weather!
It’s world watercolour month as from the 1st July, this is where we all paint lots of lovely watercolours and share our stuff. If you’re not sure what it’s all about hears the link to doodlewashe’s site to tell you all about it and if you feel like donating, it’s for a good cause.
I’ll post my first seven up together next week to spare your in boxes or you can catch me on instagram if you want to see as they go up.
Thanks for taking the time to stop by today. Till next time, have fun x
Hi there, how are you?
The sun is shining, the flowers are out and so are the bees.
Word of warning there will be drawings of insecty things, if that’s not your thing or it creeps you out (to be fair some of them creep me out!) this post may not be for you. Come back next week and I’ll try and draw something a little prettier.
So, I’ve been drawing bees. I’ve drawn them before here and here.so I didn’t think it would be much of a problem, boy was I wrong! The first bees I drew are not shown because of their suckiness, back to bee drawing school for me!
Above are two sketchbook pages drawn over a few days of any bees I could find on the internet.
A day or so later I took a biro and a small sketchbook, and drew some bees from memory, actually not too bad, the tiny bees are as big as my little finger nail, they’re kind of cute.
Bees (bumble bees) are like little fluff balls, hair every where. To see what is going on under the fluff I decided to draw some wasps, thinking of them as sort of naked bees as you do?
Drawing them was fun, I put my sketchbook away till the next day, opened it up to check how they turned out (they always look different with fresh eyes) Eeep! They look slightly more realistic than I was expecting and I don’t know about you but they definitely creep me out!
If I trick myself into not noticing the insectyness of them they are graphically speaking quite beautiful and I really like the shapes they make with their bodies.
Phew, the end of the insect post, well done, you made it to the end hehehe!
Thanks for taking the time to stop by today. Till next time, have fun x
Hi there, how are you?
Every year the birds come and nest in the huge sycamore tree on the other side of our fence. All of the little birds, blue tits, robins, sparrows, blackbirds even pigeons nested early this year.
The bigger birds crows and magpies normally keep to the small patch of woods not too far away, this year however there seems to be an abundance of magpies, and they’re every where!
Usually the little birds gang together to mob the magpies or crows and chase them away because they will eat almost anything, including bird eggs and chicks.
The magpies have decided to move into the sycamore. Lucky the little birds have finished and fledged so, meet the new neighbours.
I have taken a few photos throughout the week and decided to try and draw from them.
Magpies are black and white I know but as the sun catches their wings the feathers become iridescent and flash blue or turquoise.
Most of these have been drawn on a white background and I wanted to paint them sitting in the tree. This should really have been painted on watercolour paper but since I had already drawn the magpies in my sketchbook I just carried on adding colour (I need to use backgrounds more often because I really do need the practice)
It’s very exciting watching the wildlife in my own back yard..
Thanks for taking the time to stop by today. Till next time, have fun x
Hello folks, how are you?
Over the last week or so we’ve had beautiful glorious sunshine. The kind of weather that makes you want to sit and just enjoy the garden. I’ve taken my sketchbook out with me and spent the time drawing some of the flowers as they started to bloom.
The orange Japonica quince and the furry quince have been amazing and are just coming to an end but I managed to draw a few sketches before the flowers fell, never know I might even get some fruit off them this year.
These orange Japonica quince flowers are very different from the Japonica quince flowers I drew a few weeks ago and the fruit , if I ever get any is a lot smaller.
Aquilegias are sprouting up everywhere, the seeds have spread around the garden very well and I can see loads of new plants sprouting up ready for next year. I think I’m going to have to thin them a little ready for next year.
I bought a yellow poppy from the supermarket this year, drew it for a few days then put it out into the garden, of course the slugs thought it was their birthday and ate all the flowers! I don’t like slugs but won’t use pellets in case they kill the birds that eat them.
I’ve been reading up to find out how to deter them. Copper doesn’t work well, salt affects the soil, so this year I’m using rolled oats and hair. Yes hair, apparently slugs don’t like it so as I emptied the hoover and saw all the hairs I thought I’ll give it a try.
So far it’s working, slugs are hiding under the pots but they have stopped eating the plant and more importantly the buds. Maybe I’ll have a few more flowers soon, fingers crossed.
It looks like I’ve been really prolific this week but I’ve just spent half an hour here or there where I can. It’s a little but of peace and quiet and it helps me to relax. Hopefully the weather will continue and there will be more days in the sun.
Thanks for taking the time to stop by today. Till next time, have fun x
Hi there, how are you?
This week we went to a local farm park. I suppose it’s a kind of petting zoo for kids but there wasn’t any actual picking up of the animals (probably a good thing). Although they do sell food to feed the animals.
We arrived just in time to feed the lambs. One of the farmers came out with a large crate filled with bottles of milk and we were all allowed to hold the bottles out to the lambs to drink whilst he told us a little about them.
Dotted around the park were various coops containing different breeds of chickens, turkeys, pheasants etc. I have to admit I do love a chicken, we started to draw some of the birds, then wouldn’t you know it the heavens opened and the rain started. We’re not afraid of a bit of water but it’s hard to draw on wet paper so off for a cup of tea and home we went.
Most of the sketches had been drawn with pencil and looked a bit scrappy so later on I got my brush pen and paints out and tidied them up a bit using some very ropey photos I’d taken on my ipod for reference.
Some of the turkey photos were a lot better so I decided to draw from them. The shape looks a little off but I think that’s because of the angle at which I took the photo.
Turkeys are strange looking creatures, not what you would call conventionally beautiful, except maybe to each other. One of the turkeys gave me a very long hard stare and as he did his dangly bit (technical term hehehe) got shorter and shorter till he had pulled it right up over his beak! I didn’t even know they could do that.
It was an interesting day out and since it wasn’t too expensive to enter we’ll probably go again, maybe draw some of the other animals.
Thanks for taking the time to stop by today. Till next time, have fun.
Hi there, how are you?
It’s the time of year when everything starts to come to life. There are many things I love about this time of year, the weather, the promise of new life with buds and spring flowers but my favourite is the spring blossom.
I don’t think there is any kind of blossom I don’t love. Cherry, apple, plum, the hedge row hawthorn, any kind of blossom fills my heart with joy.
The flowers don’t last long so while they are here I run around with my ipod or camera snapping pictures or if I can drawing and sketching little sprigs of blossom here and there.
All of these are drawn in different styles, with different pens, splashed with watercolour. Some from life others from pictures I’d taken previously, Cherry blossom, quince blossom, apple blossom. I’ll probably draw more as the season continues because it makes me happy.
Thanks for taking the time to stop by today. Till next time, have fun x
Sunnyfae 