My niece was excited about eating her chocolate milkshake at Rutledge Cab Company in N Charleston. Great restaurant bytw!!!
It’s All About the Cherry
Category: kilimanjaro
Beach combers
On the palette Aurelian yellow, vermilion, burnt sienna, Thalo blue(joes blue), manganese blue, alizarin, quin magenta.
Hope your Sunday is wonderful. We are getting much needed rain here on the river!!
Margaret xoxoxo
Mary Whyte and Mom’s 96th Birthday
Well the time has come to take a class from the famous Mary Whyte. Off to St Simons next week via Dick Blick class in Savannah to spend my gift certificates. You know I “need “ something. Right?
Best part will be hanging out with my friend Karen Schaaf who I haven’t seen since before covid. Karen recently got her NWS signature and will be in the next issue of Splash 22. We can say we knew her when. Met her at Cheap Joes taking a class from the late great Charles Reid. I think I have almost every book he wrote.
“I Told Her to Smile” because I did and she didn’t. Painted on Fabriano 300# hot press. 11×15”
Thinking about repainting it since it looks off to me now. Nose too long and the mouth twitched to the side. And what’s with the light streak across her chin. Bytw mom did NOT like this painting. Never pout mom, never pout.
This is the photo the painting is based on taken on her 90th birthday. A friend said she was concentrating. Maybe so.
It has the baby’s name in one corner heart her parents in another, her dob in the third and place of birth in the last one.
Bytw NOBODY is at the movies so quite safe. We had the theater to ourselves. Well the top half. A couple that came in after us sat way down in front. Socially distancing! Yeah!!
Margaret under her quilt on the sofa who really needs to pack for her Mary Whyte class next week but heck I can do that tomorrow right?! Xoxoxo
Blue Bell time
About 15×15″ rough Fabriano 300# mixed media. Goauche Watercolor and pastel.
Who would have thought that would ever be a combo you would use together but LOVED the technique the speed and the splashy fun.
Spring bluebells at Castle Howard
Got a little carried away making lines with my sword brush but who knew it made those long splatter marks. Load a sword brush with a lot of paint and water and sling it and you get stripey lines like on the bottom right.
I had my splatter all over the floor feeling my inner Jackson Pollack and the tv and the table and goodness knows where I will find it. 
Cobalt and alizarin I think. Oh and cerulean. This was just using a regular brush making lines rolling it. Who knew you could roll a paint brush to make marks?!
Adding greens by making them. Viridian and yellows for the green more splattering and slinging paint
Adding pastel to the trees abs blue and green pastel to make shadows and marks. Then white gouache mixed with yellow. Last thing I added was some cheap Joe’s American Journey sky blue mixes with white gouache. I may go back and add some Andrew’s turquoise mixed with white gouache too and some blue & purple pastel. Maybe
If you ever get a chance to take a class from Robert Dutton do. The man is a wild man with ideas popping out of him like a pot boiling over. Taking a three hour class from him next week. Can’t wait. Had to order some new soft pastels for it from Amazon because we don’t have an art supply store anymore. 😩😩
Margaret xoxoxo
Field of flowers
You know one of the things That is a good side effect of the pandemic is all the zoom classes with famous artists that you could never afford to take from in person. And no travel. Do it at your favorite painting table. A win win if there is one in this hideous pandemic.
Today I took a class with Keiko Tanabe on shopkeeparty.com. she just zips along. This class went alot better than thenlast one I took with her so I may do another.
Quitting now. I worked on my sky a bit. And splattered a lot with white gouache, cad yw, opera, and some Joe’s Andrew’s Turquoise. Softened a few edges. Lightened a few spots that had gotten too wet to paint the bushes on and gone dark. 
The photo
Will try again with a different building on Hahnamuhle rough instead of Kilimanjaro cold press. Let’s see how it does.
The sketch. Not much to it is there?! Kilimanjaro 300# cold press.
First wash. Dry brushing once I remembered to. Oops. Scratching in the field a bit. And splattering the green to simulate followers. The sky omg. Puffballs. Eek.
Progress. Using my cheap Joe’s Scroggys loose goosy, a kind of saber brush, to paint the flowers – all those lines. It also makes great hair, branches and sometimes telephone lines.
Adding details and darks. Trees and bushes. It was still to wet to do a lot of these but I plowed on chasing Keiko.
NEVER drink espresso Before Doing phone lines. Wobbly lines. Sigh.
Finally remembered how to dry brush trees. Added some neutral tint and some yellow ochre and alizarin to the sky. More cobalt too.
Thought it was done. But eeek. That hard edge under the house bushes. Had to wipe them out some.
And done.
If you are interested in taking online classes. Shopkeeparty.com offers all kinds of art classes twice a week. Every Tues am there’s a one hour one that is free to the public on YouTube. There’s also an extensive backlog of videos on YouTube all free for the watching on Shopkeeparty. John Harrison who runs it has been doing these for a year now. Another COVID benefit. He’s in England. His artists are all over the world.
Margaret xoxoxox who should sell some art to pay for the expensive sliding door that’s getting g replaced. Salesman coming today. Eeekk.
Daffy for daffodils
Got a little carried away painting daffodils yesterday over and over and over. Wanted soft edges and kept getting hard ones. I used up a half sheet of 300# Kilimanjaro painting these.
They range in size from 10×10″ to about 7×7″.
Some have salt added to them which gives the speckled look.
You can still see salt on this one. Oops.
After lunch I forgot the salt and splattered them. Oops
Cad yellow light, Indian yellow, Daniel smith sodalite and green apetite, quin magenta and sap green. Oh and some Daniel Smith gold and opalescent blue.
I also added salt to three of them. Wish I remembered to do it to the last two.
Margaret xoxoxo
Wet on really wet
Winter in St Petersburg makes me glad we don’t live in a cold cold clime like that. Half sheet Kilimanjaro 20×15″
These are some famous buildings in St Petersburg. Took an online class from Tatiana Assimova (she’s on IG) where you spoke Russian to us and Vlad translated simultaneously. How crazy we live in a day and age you can take a class live all the way from St Petersburg while it’s being translated in Sarasota FL on zoom?!
The sketch and my paper sopping wet. We wet both sides and let it sink into the paper. I used a big hake brush to do it.
Mine was so wet it was still dripping on the back side FOUR hours later. I kept trying to paint the people and my trees in the foreground and they just kept running.
The trees are painted with a half worn out chip brush. The cheap house painting brushes you can buy for $1 each. Or by the bagful at Michael’s.
Finally used a hair dryer on it. BOTH a front and back sides. C R A Z Y. Nothing was drying. Maybe because I had the windows open?! Usually everything dries quickly running the AC or heat.
sky wash of Daniel Smith neutral tint over a yellow ochre layer. All very wet. It does make great skies though.
Onto the buildings. Yellow ochre and neutral tint. I did not get the 911 at first that you had to use straight color to keep it from running a lot. Oops. I did by the time I got to the building on the left.
Colors neutral tint yellow ochre and a dab of burnt sienna.
More trees and buildings. My details kept mushing into the backgrounds. Oops. Too wet.
And now everything else was running together or running away. Sigh. I kept waiting for the trees to dry but no no no they weren’t. I scrubbed off the lilac grey in the foreground.
Hair dryer time.
Here it is now. A fun experiment.
Electric lines done w a liner neutral tint the gouache. The snow spattered w white gouache on a toothbrush. Lots of paint slinging. You should see the tv on my painting Table. Oops.
Oops I did it again
Two paintings in one day and a nice long nap on the sofa when I finished. 
I painted and drew from 9 am to almost 5! Guess my artistic block is over. Amazing how a vaccine takes the pressure off! Hope you get yours soon.
The drawing. 300 # cold press Kilimanjaro. Nice paper! Masking fluid was added to reserve the white of the whiskers.
Off to a wild start with Liz Chadderton. You too can paint a cute Easter bunny. She makes her animal paintings look so easy but let me tell you they aren’t. My paper kept drying out making hard edges. Sigh.
Almost done. This only took 40 minutes and about forty years of practicing. Only 3 colors used. French ultramarine, burnt sienna or burnt umber and opera pink. Masking fluid on the whiskers.
So I added some more dark grey to separate the ears from the sweet face.And that’s a wrap. Back to my nap. 😴 Margaret xoxoxo
The Road Less Traveled
Done. For sale 15×20″ cold press 300# Kilimanjaro
Love my trees. Painted with Daniel Smith Payne’s grey a yellow mix used for the trees yellow ochre Holbein lilac and a cad yellow light. A few bits of cobalt cerulean mix.
Oh and most importantly painted w a saber brush and a dagger brush uncontrollable but make wonderful lines for trees.
The snow was done w cobalt. I tried adding cerulean but always get a nasty opaque grey with it so wiped it off. Scrubby scrubby.
Other colors used burnt sienna burnt umber and Prussian blue in his jeans.
I got carried away having fun painting the trees on the right. Finally decided to wipe some out by scrubbing with a paint brush. They are not the focal point.
My morning greeting. Anyone need a kitty kitty?!!
Margaret who can’t let them starve. Xoxoxo
Crash and burn
Go round 2. Misty Mountains arches
Watched a free YouTube video on shopkeeparty with David R Smith this am. Very interesting technique. Uses lots of water. Wiping spraying letting colors run.
This was go round 1 on Kilimanjaro. I used too much alizarin and could not get the ring to lift. Oh well.
Too tired to type more.
Margaret putting her feet up. Xoxoxo
Margaret McCarthy Hunt Art 