Sketching

I am wanting to be more spontaneous in my art, I will draw straight on the page when its my sketchbook, but I will so often be afraid of the page when it comes to doing a complete piece. I sketch and erase and fiddle and diddle about till I get it right, or if I want to be very precise I will grid up.

Talking to Jeanne Grant (her blog is listed to the side here - check her out), I realised how rigid I can be.........so I have decided that while I know I can draw and sketch, what I am lacking is confidence in my own ability. I mean here is a sketch of a folding shopping bag of mine that I did some time ago.

So I can do it - its the belief that is the problem. I just have to refine and practice to make sure I get more confidence in the lines I put on the paper.

In order to do this I got myself a copy of Bert Dodson's "Keys to Drawing". It is amazing that while he is mostly saying a lot of what I have heard or read before, but its the way he says it just "clicks" with me. I will be working my way through the exercises in his book.

I would recommend it to anyone to at least have a look at this book, even if you don't add it to your own library. With pride it has joined my instructive books.

I will add pics periodically to the blog as I work my way through the exercises. I hope it will do as much for my quick sketches and initial drawings for projects as I think it will.

Alphabet Swap

I am in the middle of an Alphabet ATC Swap on Wet Canvas
I just loved trying to come up with ideas for each letter - some are cartoon characters so I won't post those here.

But here are:

J is for Jabberwocky

O is for over

SH (we had 27 people ha ha) is for Sheep
- that's Baa Baa Black Sheep!

And Z is for Zingaro which I believe
is Italian for gypsy.

As the weather has been cooling down the arguments about the bedcovers have begun - Maggie likes to get under the covers and just go to sleep, but Buster has to toss them about till they cover his head just right and he is comfy..........lets in all the cold air and she tells him so, in no uncertain terms! I think I will have to dig out the sewing machine and run up a couple of snuggle sacks for them........one for each to climb inside of..........I hope that might stop the arguments.

Once the rain settles and my rapidly rising moat ebbs away I will go fabric hunting. We have had about 12 inches in the last 2 days and its still raining (thankfully it is easing a bit). But I know that the front of my drive will have the start of a Grand Canyon carved into it................the 4 wheel drive comes in handy out here!

Unfortunately dachshunds (expecially mine) believe that they are made of sugar............if they go out in the rain they will dissolve! I need a crow bar to prise them out of the blankets to go out and do the necessaries of life. They believe that if they set foot outside the backdoor the rain will find a way to get them, even if they are on the concrete and under a roof ! So the battle of winter begins !

Went down into New South Wales on the weekend and the Border ranges are gorgeous!

There are so many rainforest plants there but I love the huge tree ferns and of course coming up out of gullies that can be a hundred feet deep or more, are long straight trunked gum trees - some have probably been there since before white settlement.

We were serenaded by the bell birds and although we didn't see any (very hard from a moving vehicle, and there is no place to stop) there were koalas in the area (you can smell them). On the way home I did have a pottoroo do a kamakaze dash across the road in front of me. Thank heavens that with all the hair-pin bends I was only going about 30km/h.