A quick sketch

A quick sketch in an old Handprint journal. It still had two empty spreads. One more to go. Lamy Ef with Carbon Platinum Black ink.
What I was looking at. Now in the trash. They always seem to mold before Thanksgiving.

Fun sketch along with John Muirs Law on Shopkeeparty’s YouTube. Give it a whirl! It goes live shortly.

I think I actually baked a perfect loaf of bread. Gorgeous and tasty.

Margaret who has a painting to finish. Xoxox

Inktober – 24 Down

Seven to go. Used three pens. Lamy Ef or a micro uniball and sometimes a white pentel gel pen.

What can I say. All Zoe.
Here’s the star. She’s run me off the sofa except for the corner of one cushion. She needs the rest today.
One of my favs
She doesn’t often lie facing me.
If at first you don’t success try try again.
So I succumbed to too much white pentel gel pen. Might have been a good one otherwise.
Love this one.
The best one so far I think. Drawn w a micro uniball.

Kicking back. She rarely lies on her back.
Out my windows this am!! Love the light hitting the mist.

Margaret excited I have made it this far in inktober. Xoxoxo

Nest time

We started with an egg sketch.

From a fun paint along with the delightful Berskshire, England artist, Liz Chadderton, on Shopkeeparty.com. She’s always a lot of fun and brimming with ideas, tricks, and tips. Plus she loves to paint any and all animals. I wish I had her energy!
We started by drawing eggs off center in the sweet spot. 1/3 up and 1/3 from edge. Used a piece of rough arches.
Next we applied masking fluid to our eggs..
Then we drew the nests and applied more masking fluid. I used a bamboo stick. Masking will ruin your good brushes so NEVER use it on them.
Then we applied a light layer of watercolor using our chosen colors. Liz said to only use 6 colors. You never needed more than that.

Mine were indigo, Thalo blue, Prussian blue, burnt umber, Payne’s grey, and moonglow. I finally added raw sienna. I needed a lighter earth tone.
Then we dried it added more masking fluid for more sticks and added a middle tone layer. As usual I went a little dark.

Hair dried a lot of masking fluid today. Something ideally you should never do as it makes it tough to remove.

More masking fluid added and dried then the darkest color. I tried using Q-Tips to put the masking fluid on. DONT. Yuck.

Lots of blobs of masking were what the teacher ordered. They take a while to dry.
Then we rubbed and rubbed and rubbed off all that masking. Now it’s too white. So we used a rigger, in my case a Cheap Joes Scroogys Loose Goose brush. Don’t you love the name? It’s really a slim dagger brush. Makes the best curls and swirls. And terrific curly hair.
Last we added more color to knock out some of the whites. Mine were a little over powering. I also used my loose Goose to sling lines aka brushes on it.

I also dipped my Loose Goose into some Winsor Newton white gouache to add a few more pieces of straw and curly bits where I didn’t have any. Bet you can’t tell where I did that.

This class is available for purchase on Shopkeeparty soon if you would like to try your hand at a nest or one of Lizs other classes. All are available as video on Shopkeeparty.com.

I highly recommend Liz! Margaret xoxoxox