Well I am still on track with my 75 days in Ink Sketching Challenge.

The fact that I don't have the fall back of being able to erase has made me look harder at what I am drawing, I am looking more at the shapes in the subject rather than the overall thing. I find myself looking at, the wren I sketched; triangle for the beak and that adjoining a semi-circle for the top of his little head..........I got lost with my adjoining shapes and disn't even realise till the end that the resulting drawing was not bad at all :)

It didn't register that I was doing what I had read a number of years ago, about Cezanne doing and teaching: “...treat nature by means of the cylinder, the sphere, the cone...”, Paul Cézanne.

I have started to actually practice this now without thinking about it because I don't have the liberty of just taking lines out any time I feel like it - its amazing what a simple ink exercise can do for you. I should have gone "lead free" yonks ago !!

Anyway here are some more of my ink sketches - and apologies some of the scanning was not so great:

HAPPY NEW YEAR 11

May your hearts be full of love and laughter,

your days be full of sunshine

and your nights full of peace and contentment.



I have already said that I am not making New Years Resolutions, but I have decided to make lifestyle changes. I am not going to drop 6 dress sizes in a week or train for a marathon............I am going to slowly trick myself into some healthier lifestyle choices.

 

They say if you o something for a month it becomes a habit, so I am going to make small changes one at a time and if after that month its still a little bit of a struggle then I perservere for longer without ading a new change to stress me. The first should be easy : eat 5 srves of veg and 2 of fruit a day. The adde bonus to this should be that I have less room for rubbish.......but then again .........is that a Mars Bar I hear calling from the cupboard? LOL

 

I have been doing a lot of watercolour with my ink sketches and somehow started journaling with the pics too - anyway here a few from the first 17 days [today is day 17].

 

 

Merry Christmas from Downunder

OK I have been away from doing my art as much as I should and want to. I lost both of my old dogs since I last posted - that hit me hard. I have one little dog now - her name is JoJo - and surprise surprise.....she is a dachshund. She is a funny little thing - was quite nervy when she came to live with me [seems it is an inherited thing which is why she is with me and my sister elected not to breed with her]. She is a lot better now - mostly. I have had to finish work due to my continuing back issues and that I think added to my time away from doing the things I usually love - a little depressed - I can admit that now.

I am pulling out all stops to ensure that I plan my days to have time for computer stuff, artt and dog [not in that order of course] but if I plan for a certain time for things then I will force myself until they again become joyful parts of my life that I don't recriminate myself for not doing. Yep been on that cycle - don't do something ....berate myself for it ....feel guilty .........avoid it due to guilt .....ooops! downward spiral. ENOUGH! I can seem happy to the people that I chat with and crawl into my hidey hole and do nothing that is my joy. Well this is my wake-up notice to myself - I must post here at least once a week and by declaring what I will do I have nowhere to hide.

I have also started Brenda Swenson's 75 day ink sketching challenge, so I will be posting some of those pics too. Here is the start of a new me - I always reckon that that there is a lot of pressure with New Years resolutions so I am making mine now! Wish me luck.....

No pics today. I have had a health problem [temporary] that affected my eyes and no art or much else done. Its so annoying when you are limited in what you can do - not much time on the computer or watching TV.

Bored? Not really I had a friend at work tell me how she listens to "talking books" while she does other things and I thought I would try it while drawing and I had my first one from the library and couldn't draw or anything! So nice to listen to an English who-dunnit like a radio play [it was the one guy reading it though, but he put on the different voices] - it was great. So much so that I have another ready for me to pick up from the library.

I am working on a professional peer presentation for work and so I thought I would get a little something for myself to complete the new computer equipment.......I am now cordless! I have a wireless mouse and keyboard and its great - I can have the keyboard on my other desk, my lap almost anywhere! And it is so much easier to use the keys than on that the really old board that I had - sort of like going from an old manual typewriter to an electric [those old enough to remember will know what I mean].

Well that is about all for now except the old dogs are bugging me because they think on the days that I am home that dinner should be served when they want, not at the usual time! LOL!

I forgot one of the puddy - tats that I did and she is such a gorgeous creature - hope I captured some of that in this pic.

Well I Can't believe that its been 12 months - that I have been so slack! I have let a lot of things slide and that needs to be rectified! I have had various issues but I am going to make sure that I post once a week. I did make this as a New Year's resolution but then I had computer issues. I have a new one now and lost all my old files in the process. I have now bought an external harddrive to save everything on - live and learn.

The floods here in Queensland delayed the computer repairs a bit .....and I was a just slack through February after I got the computer back - well as a Luddite I was trying to figure out Windows 7 which was loaded on the new one....easier! Not! Well at least not for this little black duck. All those people in t he ads who say they designed it and its so much better must all have grown up with computers and can operate them in their sleep. Makes me feel less stupid if I think that way. I have the hang of most of it now but there are times when I just have to walk away.

Maybe I have the wrong kind of brain - I wonder if Mac is easier...............

Anyway I have been delayed in a Wet Canvas swap because all the pics that I needed of perple's pets were loaded on my computer and the ref pics were online. So after having to wait nearly a month and a half before I could get the pics loaded again I have started in earnest and hope to finish soon.

Here are a few of the pics that I have done since the computer has been back up.