Day 534 Dr Sketchys

December 17, 20151 Comment

Tired Santa – Ink glitter pens and Watercolor in superbee tablet. 20 Minute sketch. My favorite of the ones I kept.

Was great fun last nite.

All the sketches are 10×14 watercolor and ink with wink of Stella glitter pens. I started with my Winsor Newton wc markers but found it easier to use my two small travel palettes I took to France- a whiskey painters palette and a cotman palette reloaded with artist grade watercolor. The skin tone is quinacridone sienna. Paintbrushes are the waterbrushes.

What every girl wants for Christmas – 20 minute sketch

Ink glitter pens and Watercolor in superbee tablet.
Princess Augusta got a little wild and XXX rated with her poses. I have this one to the guys because they stood for twenty minutes with their hands in the air and they were so embarrassed over the pose. Think cheeks were bright red.

Naught and Nice -15 min sketch

Ink glitter pens and Watercolor in superbee tablet.

WIP – Santa’s Ugly Christmas sweater. Ten minute sketch. Ink glitter pens and Watercolor in superbee tablet

First we did a fast sketch of the model and were suppose to just do the head. I forgot and started drawing his body and his tank top. After we drew him we had to make up an ugly Christmas sweater. The face could use more work.

I won two tickets to the Chat Noir New Years party with this sketch. Hurrah.

I also won a free drink with another sketch but I forgot to take a picture of it. Oops!!!

It was models choice.

Best prize we all received tickets for the current Chat Noir show. Thanks Chris and Princess Augusta.

There are a few more but they really require more work.

Thanks for reading.

Margaret xxx

Day 494 -Vive La France!! 🇫🇷🇫🇷🇫🇷

November 16, 2015November 16, 20152 Comments

🇫🇷Feel free to use this image. Posting France sketches on my website and will continue til they are done. 🇫🇷

Gussie and Bob in front of pregothic Saint Sauveur Eglise in Les Andelys.

First a Bob joke. We discussed whether or not to do the climb to Chateau Gaillard. Bob told me it was the third worst climb on the trip and many were known not to ever return from it. Lol.

Started in 1220 and finished 100 years later Saint Saveur Eglise was one of the first churches with Gothic elements. A rooster or chanticleer tops the spire as they do most churches in France. They represent the denial of Peter and from the blog myfrenchheaven.com “Thereafter, the kings of France will adopt the cock out of bravado. When meeting their rivals who treated them as roosters, they would say that the cock is a brave and early rising fighter.

The cock is also the bird of light and faith, the enemy of evil and darkness, etc….”

🇫🇷As most of you know we are just back from the best trip ever is Viking from Paris to Normandy and well not quite back because of the bombings. We stayed in Conflans near Paris and disembarked from there instead of a few blocks from the awesome Eiffel Tower. 😒🇫🇷

Leonard Porkchop Zimmermans Happy sticker I stuck on a street post near the Eiffel Tower. He’s blanketing the world with these free stickers. Check him out on Facebook.

🇫🇷A chilly nite in St Germain en Laye section of Paris. 🇫🇷

The day after the bombing Parisians were out doing what they do best enjoying the city.

Richard the Lionhearted’s Chateau Gaillard in Les Andelys. The chateau and the town were built in the lye twelfth century. Of course they had to build the chateau before he permitted them to build the town. Hmm

Les Andelys from the boat. So charming. Did I say that already!!?

Map of Les Andelys borrowed from the Viking bulletin board. It changes with each port of call.

Garden in Conflans
  The rooftops of Conflan From the Chateau Mountjoie. All the chateaus sat above the river to command the river.

The Cpunt of Montjoies tomb in the Conflan church. Too cool. i have read about crusaders tombs but never seen one.

The tomb below the church window. The Viking chefs favorite fromagerie in Conflans and Tetons de Venus. Yes it means nipples of Venus. Wonder if hers were encrusted with mold? Guess they are by now. Lol

More mold encrusted cheeses.

That’s a lot of mold to make that delicious cheese!! 😳 Of course my son Ben said that’s how they make cheese. I guess like everything else in the US ours is sanitized before we see it.

The Viking chefs favorite chocolate shop in Conflans. Lots of deliciousness there.

My sis at the Eiffel Tower on a rainy gloomy day.

Sacre Couer.

Well enough photos for the day. Go forth and book a Viking cruise. They are awesome. There were people on our cruise who had been on six or seven. Some had done the Seine cruise more than once.

Thanks for reading.

Margaret in Atlanta recovering jet lag!

Day 485 – La pause de beaubourg

November 8, 20153 Comments

Le Brasserie La Pause Beaubourg near the Hotel de Ville and Georges Pompidou Contemporary Art Center. Delicious food and wonderful staff. This is the view out their window. We are there again today – so delicious.

Despite being exhausted and walking 7 miles today I drew two sketches when we ate there again after our visit to the Georges Pompidou. I even drank a Coke. Something I rarely do.

La Pause Beaubourg where u can eat in the window in the most charming barrel chairs. Tiny furniture in France unlike supersized everything in America. Always too big pour moi!

La Pause Beaubourg

We did sit resting our aching feet and recooperating before we took off for some Marveilieux au Fred on Rue de Pont St Louis Phillippe three blocks from the Hotel de Ville in the Marais.

Can I say Heaven!? Delicious meringues filled with what might be marshmallow fluff?!

Tiny cakes called Marveilleux that melt in your mouth. Wonderful staff. The young homme who helped us spoke English like an American. When I asked him where he was from he said he learned English from American tv shows.

Beautiful churches abound. This one is interesting because it has a gothic flying buttressed church with a neoclassic facade. Gorgeous lit in the afternoon sun.

Hotel de Ville the crenelated embellished jewel also know as City Hall. Amazing building. This is the Seine River side.

Hotel de Ville from the plaza side.

Even the lights, the metro signs and

the advertising kiosk are amazing in Paris.

Notre Dame across the river from Hotel de Ville was amazing. The building is just incredible. So large! I am sure it’s bigger than a football field.

The Rose Windows and all the stained glass unbelievable. We just sat in awe of quite a while. Well worth getting up early and beating the crowd which stretched across the plaza when we exited the building.

To think that only Victor Hugo’s Hunchback of Notre Dame kept it from falling down in the 183os/. Thank you Victor Hugo and Quasimodo.

Views from the fifth floor of

The Pompidou were worth the admission alone.
Parisians packed the plaza in front enjoying the sunny warm fall day.

The children loved the bubble lady and so did we.

The architecture near the Ljmpidoy was quite eclectic. Gothic to modern in a row.

A few more views from the Pompidou.
Ze Eiffel Tower.
We are off the Viking Pride today and the Louvre. No hopping night club to keep us awake tonite on the quai.

Day 484 – Champs Elysees

November 7, 20152 Comments

What better place to start than this gorgeous avenue of world class shopping.

Despite two hours of sleep on the place we managed to walk five more miles including a rainy after dinner walk to the Arc de Triomphe which is gloriously lit at night. Well worth the walk!!

We ate dinner at L’Artois around the corner from our Hotel on Rue d’Artois. A sweet little place with the nicest owners. A nice way to dip our toes into Paris dining. This will get watercolor soon but not tonight after another six mile jaunt thru the drizzly beautiful Parisian streets.

We did a waking tour of the Marais today. Originally the Jewish district before World War II we know what happened. The Nazis actually rounded up the children at their schools to transport them to the death camps. There are plaques dedicated to them all over the Marais.

Charming Patisseries. This is the Marveilleux de Fred. We hope to go tomorrow. Fabulous cakes. Yum!
One of the oldest buildings in the Marais. A half timber building much more typical of Rouen than Paris which was rebuilt after the third revolution of Les Mis fame with its sweeping boulevards.

Built in the 1400s the buildings were not allowed to be all wood for fear of fire.

It also used to have several royal residences. Place des Vosges is all that remains of the home of Henry 4 and Catherine de Medici. She burned the palace when her husband died from jousting wounds and established this park.

We finished the day at the Eiffel Tour. Our tickets were pre purchased they parisinfo.com. No waiting in the block long line. We went straight in at our appointed time 2 pm.

It is amazing.
The building incredible.

And just enormous. More than 1000 meters tall. 700 HUNDRED TONS of steel!!😳
The view from the Eiffel Tower. Still raining sadly. I would like some photos taken in the sun. Please Thank you!!

Thanks for reading.

Margaret hoping in the shower. Xxx

Day 478 – finishing up

November 1, 2015November 3, 2015Leave a comment

WIP??? Mermaid Lorelei and Mermaid McKenzie 11×14 super Aquabee tablet

Not sure these are done but at least they have some color now. Getting into travel mode so I used my travel Palette with Winsor Newton colors and my cotman palette with quinacridones.

The background in this painting is cerulean and yellow ochre. I may darken with ultramarine or inathradone to make the mermaids pop.

Remember this is what it looked like?

WIP – Mistress Princess Augusta – 11×14 drawn when I was done with one of the long mermaid poses. Her right arm still has problems. She was not posed so she was moving a lot and I drew her right arm too long. I shortened it with negative painting but now I think it is a smidge too narrow.
TIP: Really love her skirt. Both of these paintings were done wet on wet after watching a how to impressionistic watercolor video on Marcon Chews website http://www.marvinchew.com/ (You will have to scroll down for the video. Could not copy the exact irk for u! 😐) about wet on wet painting.The skirt turned out especially well I think. Done with ultramarine and burnt umber added to a wash of water that I painted on the skirt first. The background was done the same way.

I added the bowler hat to the original sketch.

Thanks for reading.

Margaret xxx

Day 477 – last of Dr Sketchys

October 31, 2015November 3, 2015Leave a comment

Happy Halloween!!

The first three are all drawn with my Noodler Konrad and Lexinton Grey ink. The colors are all Winsor Newton watercolor markers a few tombows and Wink of Stella Glitter pens.

Mermaid Lorelei and Mermaid McKenzie. What librarians do when they are not working!! Wear mermaid costumes and makeup like a character from Avatar.

My two favorite mermaid sketches. Thier costumes were awesome which is why I saved them for Halloween. This was a twenty minute pose that had ten minutes added to it.

I was done in twenty minutes so i started sketching Princess Augusta our hostess.

Mermaid Lorelei and Mermaid McKenzie

Twenty minute sketch. If I ever sit down to watercolor these this one will be great. I barely had time to start painting.

This was a ten minute sketch. I spent most of the time on the tail. Much more fun coloring than the human part. I really like the tail part but the human part not so much.

Mermaid Lorelei

Looking at that part of would be an easy fix. Shave a tad off the right side of her face and draw in her right upper arm. Oops the things u miss when unate drawing fast. The last one with the Kuretake brush pen. Sometimes I just draw better with one than the other. I changed to my Noodler Konrad.

Day 476 – Dr Sketchys part 2

October 30, 20154 Comments

One more day in Inktober. The end is nigh!👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻👏🏻

Love this mermaid pose. Mermaid Lorelei who is on Instagram was great. Held poses like a pro not the librarian she is in real life.

This one needs her pretty quotient raised. Murray body. Face not so much.
All the poses and sketches are fast fast. Some poses are a minute. Some are five minutes. Longest pose is usually twenty minutes. The models though fascinating are not professionals. Sometimes they never hold still so you better draw fast. Draw the head draw the shoulders and work on down. Don’t go back. After three hours and ten large sketches I was exhausted. I intend to go back and finish these but between going to school packing for Paris, babysitting grandkids and dogs I haven’t. I will I promise.

This was a great drawing that turns into a disaster when I tried to color it. The eye ran. I changed pens after that.

More tomorrow.

Thanks for reading.

Margaret xxx

Day 475 – Dr Sketchys

October 29, 20153 Comments

The faun 14x 11″ 20 min Kuretake brush pen, platinum carbon black ink, Winsor Newton watercolor markers, wink of Stella metallic pens.
5 minute sketch her feet were like hoofs!!

Was great last nite. Lots of fun. Great costumes!! Contests, a drink or two and wild music to suit the fast sketching.

After ten 11×14 watercolor sketches I was totally exhausted when I got home last nite. 😳
WIP – Let’s play a game! Trivia anyone?! Noodler Konrad, Lexington grey ink. Winsor newton red watercolor Marker.

Even our hostess Princess Augusta was dressed up. I drew her when I finished some of the other sketches but she’s not done.

Her stockings get black stripes. And her clothes are black.

A teaser. There’s more to this mermaid!! Noodler Konrad, Lexington grey ink. Winsor newton watercolor Markers, wink of Stella glitter pens.
Stay tuned for more faun and the piece de resistance the MERMAIDS!!!

Thanks for reading!!

Margaret xxx

Day 472 – She was too pretty!!😳

October 26, 20152 Comments

She was too pretty 30×40″ ??? acrylic

At critique today the class loved the way she looked but the boss aka professor said she was too pretty so I spent today trying to make her less pretty. It’s hard to make a pretty girl not pretty. This is what she looks like now. I should have known better than to use any pink. .

I decided to use contrasting colors adding a lot of orange with cad yellow light for highlights. I also added some pure phtalo blue for darks. And bits of cad yellow light for sparkles.

I also like the area of carpet under the sofa. All the busy stuff. Fun!

This is what she looked like earlier today. A lot of white on the sofa. I do like the sofa with more cad yellow light on it. The yellow in this photo is nickel Azo gold a rusty gold.

Thought u might want to see her pretty face that wuz up close. I do actually like her better now. Now to get her a little wilder and crazier.

Thanks for reading.

Margaret xxx

Day 468 – I WON I WON I WON!!!

October 21, 201514 Comments

I won an award in the professional class at the South Carolina State Fair Fine Arts show and a CHECK!!! Very exciting.

The SC state fair is a big deal and the top prize in the Fine Arts is $2000 with thousands of dollars of prizes. There are thousands of art entries. So many they fill up an enormous football field sized shed.

NO idea what I won or which one won but I am thrilled!! I did try googling to see if a list was on the net but NO.
TEA TIME