My grandchildren a beloved Lucy Dawg most frequently found snoozing on the sofa. I mean on guard dog duty. She’s. Briard Collie brindle rescue dog and a real sweetheart. 

Same dog second position. She never woke up. I moved. 

Carbon Platinum Black ink in my old Noodler Creaper in Super Deluxe Aqua Bee.  

Back to my grandsons socks. He tried to make a net out of my scraps. Then I figured out he was trying to knit and saying net. When I figured out what he meant he told me the colors and gave me the yarn he wanted and then ran back to add rainbow socks. He’s four. I laffed a lot. 

His chosen colors. Just as he gave them to me. He also wants lots of green. Glad he wears a small sock. Size 10-11 T. 

Thanks for reading. 

Margaret xxx

This should have posted here last not but it was on that other website I have. Sigh. Really just delete it. 

Sketching is like anything else if you want to do it well you have to keep up the practice. 

These are drawn with various noodler Konrads in an Aquabee sketchbook. 

Maron D’artrementis ink. Great new Noodler Konrad but the next time I used it to address an envelope all the ink poured out in my hand. 

Zoe was very wiggly when I drew these. Maron D’artrementis ink. 
This was the first one. Eek. What was I thinking. Not enough practice. 
I could blame it on the pen with no ink. It was out of ink but I didn’t discover that till I started scratching with it. Literally scratching.  

 I couldn’t get up to fill it or she would have followed me. And then her pose was shot. Brown document ink all gone. 

Reloaded one of the pens. No idea what color the ink was. I think a noodler Creaper in carbon platinum black ink. 
Thanks for reading.
Margaret xxx sleepless in Atlanta 

That’s a lot of days of consecutive posting. You know it’s Saturday and usually I am over in Aiken with the group painting. Not today. It’s the day of the BIG wedding shower at the Swan House in Atlanta. Hoping to get some sketching done there. It’s a lovely old house and featured in movies like Hunger Games. 

HOWEVER I did work on these a bit this week. They were done on previous Saturday’s but not quite finished. 

Emily 24×30″ acrylic NOW I actually really like this a lot. Not bad for two hours of painting. 

The background was just too busy and competing with the expressionistic figure. I smeared a piece of board with bits of leftover paint on my palette sheet every week for a while. 

Then I decided to paint Emily on it.   She got a little wild. And for some reason I didn’t think she needed anything under her arm. I mean doesn’t everybody stick there arm straight out??! Duh!! So she got a draped box. 

If you knew Emily you would recognize her in this painting even though she’s really abstracted. 

Ilania. 34×30 acrylic 

I started off with her head the right shape. This was after about a half an hour of painting  but I thought her hair was not right. 

Trying to correct that I got her head too big for her body. 

So I trimmed down her chin and widened her body a bit. 

Now I like her much better. Though maybe a smidge too much of that Golden Green Gold. 

Ilania 20×24″

One more to go. She needs a drape under her left arm and her right arm is just hanging out I space. It was draped over a chair arm. 

The life of an artist one step forward and one step back. 

Thanks for reading. 

Margaret xxx

I have probably said I am not fond of painting trees in watercolor. 

WIP – Oconaluftee River Great Smoky National Park

 ok the river was a green brown but really no blue at all!? I think I can salvage this one. We shall see. I did try to lift some of the color with a Mr Clean eraser BUT the Strathmore 500 watercolor paper  is not too fond of that.  The paint does love the paper so I wish it was easier to lift it. 

 Arches is supposed to be quite easy to lift from. We shall see. I have a stack of 8×10 Arches 300# ripped up to sketch on. Then I am going to bind them into a sketch book after I get a pile of them done. 

I want to paint like Charles Reid (check out his page on Facebook Charles Reid Art) does but tend to use them like acrylics. I can paint just about anything else with watercolor but trees and landscapes. I guess MORE practice. Lol 

WIP – Near Newfound Gap Great Smoky National Park

Definitely not what I was thinking of when I started this. The bottom is supposed to be rhododendrons  so I used masking fluid. So far it’s not working for me. A great sky though. 

Great Smoky National Park Near the Chimneys. Again not what I had in mind. 

I guess that’s the challenge of watercolor sometimes you win. Sometimes you totally screw up. I post my screw ups because it’s good to know you have company when you mess up your watercolors dear reader. 

Hands down watercolor is the hardest medium.  And that’s all I am going to say!! Thanks for reading. 

Since more practice is required this one is looking good for that. Yesterday I took a photo of this silly doe hiding in the neighborhood woods by the road   I guess she thought I couldn’t see her standing in the light looking out at me. 

The Van Gogh Museum posted  this one online yesterday. Nice woods. So I guess I need to try it once we are over big wedding shower weekend aka this weekend. Son is getting married soon. 
Margaret xxx 

A fun “American” restaurant in downtown Brevard NC home of the Brevard Summer Music Festival in the heart of the Western North Carolina Mountains. 

Specializing in farm to table the  food is delicious. The most amazing crab hush puppies more like a crab cake than a hush puppy and outstanding hamburger.

 But the best was the desert I mean my martini Blackberry Shine made with blackberry syrup and moonshine. Better than a desert. 

I hear that Steve Martin has been known to jam with the musicians that play here. He has a house nearby at Lake Toxaway. How awesome would it be to hear him play his banjo for the cost of dinner?

Painted with Ted Nuttalls transparent palette. 

Thanks for checking by.   

Margaret xxx

While I was in Gatlinburg the Arrowmont  instructors were having their show. It will be up til August  20. 

I thought I would share it with you even though a lot of the same art is in the Arrowmont catalog. 

A picture of the artists name follows the picture of the piece. 

Thanks for checking by. Hope u enjoyed the show. 

Margaret xxx