Travel v. Home

There is almost nothing in the world I like better than traveling-- from big cities to small, sea side villages and everything in between.  I'm always amazed at how you can go halfway around the world and still find similarities from place to place and at the same time, you can move from one neighborhood to another in a city or town and each has it's own sense of identity.  There's nothing more exciting than exploring those similarities and differences and getting a sense of how people live.

I'm always excited by the prospect of traveling to places I've never been before and drinking it all in.  But I also love the feeling of going back to a place for the second or third or 100th time and discovering hidden gems with each visit-- the tiny little cafe that only the locals know about, the independent bookstore-- so rare to find these days-- that has open readings every night, the jazz club that despite being decrepit and smoky is packed with people and has a line out the door. Even places that I haven't liked much have drawn me back at times, given the right opportunities, because I'm intrigued to find out why people stay there.

No matter where I go, or for how long I'm gone, ultimately, I long for home.  I crave my own bed, my comfortable chair, my sweet kitty cat-- who does not travel well and so inevitably is left at home to sulk-- and the opportunity to start planning the next travel adventure!

Jane Austen

I'm late this week in linking up to the FINAL week of Summer of Color2.  Maybe it's because I hate to see it come to an end. This has been a fun challenge for me and I've loved seeing how everyone has interpreted each week's colors so differently.  I'm looking forward to a Summer of Color3 in 2013.  Many thanks to Kristin for creating and coordinating this event!

Since I'm so late this week, I'm also taking the opportunity to link these tiny, watermelon ice colored scribbles to Paint Party Friday--  another of the best sources of inspiration to be found!

Zendoodles... Kinda

I've been intrigued by the whole zentangle movement. It seems that some people are able to spin out these beautiful creations in a zen-like calm. I'm not sure it has that effect on me but I would like to be able to create some of the gorgeous pieces I've seen from others. Perhaps practice will make perfect. Linking up to Sunday Sketches!

How does your garden grow?

After a devastating heat wave last week, this week we have seen cooler temps and rain, rain, rain.  It's lovely to see the flowers perking back up.  Our lawn, despite frequent water last week, is still looking a little heat singed.  I'm hoping that we will see some renewed lushness (is that a word?  i'm fairly certain that lushiosity is not-- but it sounds so much better!) after all this rain. 

Heading over to Paint Party Friday now for some fresh inspiration.

Hope everyone has a great weekend!

Summer of Color2-- Wild and Reckless

This week's theme colors for Summer of Color2 were Wild and Reckless!  Now doesn't that sound fun?  Do not ask me why I thought a proper tea pot and tea cup would best depict that... perhaps I was in an ironic mood.  Or maybe it was because the tea supply is a brand called Stash.  You have to wonder what the medicinal value of that tea might be... and just how wild and reckless you might get after drinking it. 

Can't believe the Summer of Color is almost over...  Just one week to go!  This has been fun. 

I also did some mindless doodling with the wild and reckless colors in mind:

I did this while being completely mesmerized by the men's semi-finals and finals at Wimbledon this past weekend! 

Happy 4th of July!

Strawberry Lemonade

The Summer of Color 2 Challenge continues this week. I can't believe we're two thirds of the way through already!  Unfortunately, I did not have much time this week and so I'm sharing a quick 10- minute sketch from my journal, which takes the idea of strawberry lemonade quite literally.  The photo looks a bit washed out-- the actual colors are a little more festive.

I will say that with the heat wave we've been having lately, strawberry lemonade (on its own OR as an ice cream flavor) sounds quite delicious.  Hope all who are in the path of this heat are finding a sprinkler to run under, having some watermelon or an icy cold glass of strawberry lemonade (vodka optional!) and enjoying their summer afternoons!

RIP Nora Ephron

I have to admit... I'm not much of a 'rom-com' person.  I think even the term sounds silly.  In fact, I make fun of my sweetie for loving sappy movies like Love Actually, The Holiday, P.S. I Love You, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. 

HOWEVER, pretty much anything that Nora Ephron touched was the exception to the rule for me.  I'm not sure why... maybe because her characters always seemed a little more quirky than the one-dimensional characters found in most formulaic romantic comedies.  Maybe because all her films-- even though they were set in modern day-- had a nostalgic feel to them.  Whatever the reason, I rooted for Harry and Sally to get together. I was devasted when The Shop Around the Corner closed because the big, bad Fox Books moved in.  I was sure that in some small hotel in the midwest, Michael the Archangel was adjusting his wings, drinking his milk right from the cereal bowl and smelling like cookies.

I was saddened to hear that Nora Ephron passed away this week.  I will miss her and her charming characters.  There was no one quite like her.  RIP.

Linking up with Paint Party Friday-- always a great place to find lots of inspiration!

Baseball nut

We're halfway through the Summer of Color2 Challenge and this week's "flavor" was baseball nut:

In keeping with the theme, I decided to go with something a little nutty and used the colors to capture an old Disney favorite. Of course, despite the uniform colors, I'm sure he's rooting for the Yankees!

Hope everyone's week is off to a great start! Don't forget to check out how others are interpreting this nutty flavor over at Twinkle, Twinkle!

Wonderful

Motto for the week:

Linking up with Sunday Sketches-- check things out over there.  You won't be disappointed!

Summer of Color Continues

As I mentioned last week, Kristin at Twinkle, Twinkle is hosting a fun challenge focused on the colors of summer.  This year's theme is ice cream colors-- with different ice cream colors each week. Now I ask you:  What's better inspiration than ice cream, especially on these hot summer days?  There were almost 115 artists who linked up last week!  It was so much fun to see how everyone interpreted the rainbow sherbet theme using different mediums and color palettes.

This week's colors are mint chocolate chip (another of my favorite flavors!) and since I spent some time at the beach over the last few weeks, I decided to do a quick sketch of the beach, complete with the resort's mint green beach umbrellas!  (Wasn't that lucky?  Well, maybe they were a bit more lime green, but I took some creative license.)

This was an attempt to loosen up and put something down on paper very quickly. I tried to use fairly broad strokes and then fill in the color quickly with just hints of color.  It's a style I love seeing when I look at the art of urban sketchers who capture the essence of outdoor scenes so quickly and seemingly effortlessly.  I need to allow myself to be more free and loose.  That's something I'm going to keep working on as opportunities arise. In the meantime, here is my mint chocolate chip beach scene:

Playing with new programs

This week, I discovered a new program that is kind of fun.  I especially like it for manipulating doodles that I'm not that crazy about into potentially more interesting pieces. 

Recently, I got some Copic markers.  Everyone seems to RAVE about these markers and I was swayed by how others used them to create gorgeously blended works of art.  But... these markers seem to be an industry unto themselves.  There are many classes out there taught by certified instructors, etc.  I have not taken any of them.  So, I've been a little disappointed that my own attempts to blend with them are not quite ready to hang in the Louvre (heck, they're not ready to hang in the local Motel 6). Perhaps I'm giving up too soon, but I think I prefer my paints and pencils.

Anyhow... I've been on a bit of a daffodil kick lately and so I attempted a lone daffodil with these new markers and, alas, found it quite one dimensional and cartoony (to be clear-- this was my deficit, not the markers!):

In an attempt to add something to it, I doodled up a few words from Wordsworth (off the top of my head, so I don't think they're quite right) and was equally unhappy with the uneven mess my pen created there, as well. 

That's where this cool little app came into play.  It's called Superimpose and it's for the iPad.  Some of the articles about it lead you to believe that its best use is for things like putting your dog's head on your grandmother's body, but it has some cool features that allow you to manipulate your work digitally-- something new to me.

Originally, the words I wrote were in solid black pen, but they were clunky and uneven.  With this program, I was able to create an outline view of the letters:

Still uneven, but not quite as clunky since they're not as dark.

And then I overlaid them on the daffodil:

Still not a great work of art... and I think I should have made the writing slightly less transparent and not stretched out the flower so much, but this tool might have some interesting potential for other projects.

Linking up to Paint Party Friday.  Hope everyone has a wonderful weekend!

Rainbow Sherbet Daisy Days

I am excited about participating in the Summer of Color Love Challenge this summer hosted by Kristin at Twinkle, Twinkle. For this first week, the challenge colors/favors are Rainbow Sherbet. What a great, colorful way to kick things off, with pinks, oranges, yellows and white. Look for this weeks Linky Widget at the link above and come join in the fun! I started in simple pen and ink, which I kinda liked for its simplicity: But in keeping with the theme, I used my Inktense pencils in my favorite oranges, pinks and yellows to bring some summery colors to the scene. Of course, I couldn't put it away without adding some lettering, which I think ended up being a bit too heavy handed for daisies. But, another great learning moment. Here's the end result: Hope everyone's week is off to a great start!