Pencil Shavings

I Feel Like I'm Eight Again

Is it wrong to love my bike this much?

I haven't had a bike crush this bad since I was eight and got my bright red Raliegh three speed.

But now.

Well last week I went out and bought myself an Electra Townie in dandelion yellow (see picture below for proof of colour), and I want to ride it every where.

It's kind of like the Volkswagon Beetle of bikes.  It comes with lots of cool options including a little flower vase (although I think I might be regretting not getting the coffee cup holder) and it is, as the salesperson said "like riding a couch" it's so comfortable.

It's also a totally girly bike.  I can't even remember owning a ladies bike before, but I have one now.  I ride it every day to the grocery store to pick up what I need (I feel so european with this shopping daily stuff)

Now what I really need is a basket, to carry my flowers and wine in and I'll be in bike nerdvana!

 

Ring the Bells That Still Can Ring

Ring the bells that still can ring,

Forget your perfect offering,

There is a crack in everything

That's how the light gets in.

~Leonard Cohen "Anthem"

The last few weeks have been so hard for me.  I've felt like I'm being crushed with sadness with sorrow.  I told a friend that I wasn't even sure, that if I could hang on long enough, that there was another side to this depression.

The answer came back to me with calm certainty, "There is always another side.  You just have to hold on long enough."

So I've held on.  Finally tonight I opened my sketchbook and began to work. 

"There is a crack in everything, that's how the light gets in.  "

And even though I am not fully back into the sun, I can see the light through the crack that I wedged open with the tip of a pen.

Bed Rest - Who Knew That Would Be So Difficult?

On Thursday I went for day surgery.  It was a minor thing (all things considered) but the rules were to rest for three days after.  My husband, likely terrified that he would lose the use of his personal chef, took that to heart.  I've been trapped in bed since then with only minor forays out to wander around until I am caught and banished back to my room.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

It's so difficult to just stay in bed.  Luckily I do have my iPod Touch and the Sketchbook Express program  - so I've been doodling.

I might be getting a little better at it too.

I'm alone now in the house, this enforced rest means that I don't even get the joy of picking up my own art supplies for school.  An extremely frustrating bit of business I assure you.  Especially since they will be calling me to ask questions about the list and I won't get to touch the paper, or admire the brushes.

Sigh....

The good news is that I will be back in class on Monday.  I can hardly wait to get out of this fluffy pillow filled prision!

365 Days of Art - Day 293 - Perspective Disorder

Well that was weird.

On Day 293 I was sketching with non-waterproof ink.  (I love this stuff)

But when I looked at the picture I drew it was like I had been viewing this guy through some kind of convex mirror.  The perspective was all wacky.

Now I could say that I did it on purpose to make it a caricature, but I didn't.  I"m not going to lie to you I have no idea why this piece came out so skewed.

It could have been the way I was sitting and holding my sketchbook.  Or it could have been that I shifted position myself part way through the drawing.

Or maybe I just need new glasses.

The best part of my day today was realizing that I'm feeling good enough to get back into my art in more than a perfunctory way.  I had been feeling so sick since last weekend that it was starting to make me wonder if I'd had something more serious than the flu.

But today I finally stopped thinking about trying something new and actually cleared the decks (or more accurately the table) and got started.  That was a good feeling.

Of course the good feeling was completely offset with the bad feeling of finding an empty tube of my daughter's Lip Smackers lip gloss in the dryer with my husband's dress shirts while wondering why the clothes smelled so unusually fruity as I was taking them out.

Motherhood is such an adventure.

365 Days of Art - Day 292 - No Tears

Crawling out of the pit I was in.  Between getting the flu and feeling like the universe was lining me up for a shot into the corner pocket I just couldn't get on here to write.

I thought I could update you yesterday, but by the time the decks had cleared and the kids were in bed I couldn't keep my eyes open.  I updated my Fanpage saying that anything I wrote last night would resemble the rantings of 100 drunk monkeys... which seemed to get approval from some of my friends there (I may have to investigate drunk monkey writing style to see if that will get me more readers!)

Now - onto the days of ART!

Day 292 I was still playing with my dip pen and non-waterproof ink and had fun rendering this onion.  I like the look actually... the tone on the outer cracked skin and the lightness of the flesh underneath.   I'm getting a little better at handling this medium and I hope I can keep getting better until I have some control (and learning the patience to go slower while drawing).

I'm getting back into the saddle here, and I'm glad.  I've missed writing.

Flu, Sick, Bleah.....

One of the lovely and unexpected bonuses of having children is that you get to experience a whole new world of germs.

My oldest daughter and I got this bug at about the same time this weekend, but while she is young and resilient, and was back at school on Monday, I am old and decrepit and am still trying to shake it off.  Today is really my first day to be able to actually sit at the computer and not feel ill from simply looking at the screen.

I will update progress on the 365 days as soon as possible, as well as the postcard project.  Meanwhile here is something to make your day a little prettier.

Flu, Sick, Bleah.....

One of the lovely and unexpected bonuses of having children is that you get to experience a whole new world of germs.

My oldest daughter and I got this bug at about the same time this weekend, but while she is young and resilient, and was back at school on Monday, I am old and decrepit and am still trying to shake it off.  Today is really my first day to be able to actually sit at the computer and not feel ill from simply looking at the screen.

I will update progress on the 365 days as soon as possible, as well as the postcard project.  Meanwhile here is something to make your day a little prettier.

The Apologist

This morning I promised a few updates to make up for the posts I missed recently.

But after lots of time outside, and lots of work updating The Postcard Project, I am couch bound with a locked up knee.

I can't get to the basement to scan my sketchbook pages, or hobble around taking pictures of the pages and getting them transferred to my photo server.

It's frustrating to be suddenly incapacitated like this.  I couldn't even tuck my daughter in tonight because I couldn't get up the stairs.

I know that this isn't a permanent thing, and it seems apt that when I make promises here, fate seems to conspire to make me fail.

The good news is that my darling husband made me tea, and got my ice pack and laptop.

It's not as bad as it could be, aside from having to postpone my promise to you.

365 Days of Art - Day 270 - Experimenting (Bombay India Ink)

On Day 270  I had picked up a bottle of Bombay brand India Ink in sepia.

Using my grandfathers old dip pen I played around with it for a while mostly doing doodles.

I'm not usually an ink artist.  I'm not sure why, I do like it, and I certainly like the idea of it, but I do struggle with technique.  Something I should practice I guess.

After fiddling with the doodles for awhile, I flipped the page in my sketchbook and thought about drawing something else.

Sometimes something funny happens when you are about to draw, you become intensely focused on the act of drawing itself, almost to the point of being unable to actually draw.

I saw my hand holding down the edge of the page, and felt a strange compulsion to actually draw the hand holding the page .  I suppose I could have dawn the hand and the pen, but I've been there and done that.

So that is how the hand drawing came about.

Some exciting news on The Postcard Project front is that more cards have arrived (see the comments) and I have sent more new images out.  It's slow progress, but I'm not too far behind.

However if everyone on the planet requests a card, at the rate I'm creating them it will take me about 14 million years to complete them.  I better start taking my vitamins.

365 Days of Art - Day 268 - Presents!

Sorry for the delay updating the blog.  I was off for most of the afternoon yesterday getting poked and prodded at the hospital. 

It seems to me that the older I get the more invasive the tests get, and I'm often left to wonder if medicine is really that much more advanced than the days when the local barber was also the town surgeon.

By the time I got home I was feeling pretty frayed around the edges, and sitting in the waiting room next to the pregnant teenager and her friends who insisted on on wondering loudly why there were so many old people in the hospital, and couldn't they just have an old people hospital so the young people wouldn't have to wait so long, didn't improve my mood much.  Although I was heartened with the thought that they will be old someday and have to put up with the noxious prattling of insensitive teenagers then.

Meanwhile, Day 268 was spent playing with one of my new birthday presents, a beautiful set off PITT Pastel Pencils.  I grabbed a couple of Packham pears out of the fruit bowl and set to work.  The pastel pencils are really lovely on the paper in my Fabriano sketchbook.  I am really delighted with them.

I haven't always been a big fan of pastel work, but lately I can see the charm of it, and I think I will keep working on bringing colour into my pastel work.