Feel the Warm

We're cooking, wrapping, unwrapping, enjoying the tree. And packing for a short trip. The cat doesn't know yet that he can't go.

May you feel the warmth and Light of the season!

Shadowed Leaf

Another kind
of brown leaf.
From a bush
alongside
the road.

Mountain Moment

Doodling in my journal, this time with a tech pen so I can move the ink in all directions (compared to a dip pen).

Listening to the coverage about the lost Mt. Hood climbers, I thought of the uncompromising mountain compared to fragile bodies.

This emerged.

Dragging the dropper

Forget brushes and conventional painting tools, how about just dragging the paint on with a stick?

In this case, I used the dropper-lid of Dr. Martin's w/c. The way the blue feathered out on damp paper was unexpected.

I put the orange on with a natural sponge.

Movin' down the road

After I swirl color around and it comes to adding ink, I usually regret (just a little) not planning ahead. After letting the paint dry, I see what comes to mind for embellishment.

This time it was a row of telephone poles, something to balance the blue weight, something to carry a vague theme of moving on, communicating. Something detailed to balance the blue swiftness.

These are strange poles with triangle tops, but I was working with a dip pen and India Ink on w/c paper, so only careful strokes worked to block disastrous spatters and blobs.

This image now reminds me of a Kansas sunset as we drove the long, flat highway home from Grandma's house.

Making mountains

I love swirling color on, then adding ink to see if I can make shapes. The results never match my hopes, but I still love the potential and the freedom of it.

W/c and a gel India Ink pen, on 140# paper.

Tall doodle bird

Filling
a side
of
a journal
page.

I think
he's a
kind of
penguin
totem pole.

A rare breed.

Got my Flickr back

I've switched to the new Blogger template. Easy! And at the bottom of the righthand column, a Flickr Badge of a few drawings and mini-paints.

Click any pic to see the fullsize one on Flickr.

New journal

I bought this in an art museum while on a trip months ago and have just made it my new journal volume. I LOVE the paper!

Smooth as Bristol paper and no media I tried penetrates to the other side, neither India Ink nor paint nor marker. And it's not particularly thick paper, either.

Macro crazy

I never had an easy, fast camera for closeups until this Nikon. So I took it for a walk today.

Even asphalt patterns look good in this late afternoon gray/blue December light. And a drab boulder becomes interesting.

Plunge into the blue, blue paint

Pure color is often enough. This evokes sparkling, inviting pools, calling us back to our earliest form.

And yes, the salt is there, making textured blooms.

Season's greetings

Doodling again, thinking: there's the red/green of the season, the mask we sometimes wear for social events, and yes, the true joy of creation.

India ink and w/c on 140# paper.

Blending in

Speed bump on the hall rug.

Chaucer says, "Cats nap where they need to."

Doodling in Moleskine again

Mixed media: dip pen in India ink, w/c pencil and watercolors.

Just to play with overlapping and ink on the smoothness of a Moleskine sketchbook.

I like how the w/c beads up on the bead shapes.

Noro wall piece

This started as a piece for practicing stitch patterns and turned into something I wanted to hang on a wall. The color changes of Noro make anything work!

I put it on my front door for better picture taking (as I need all the help I can get). It's about 12" long, 6" wide.

The bobble-looking things are actually tiny vertical strips, where I knit back and forth on 4 stitches to create a straplike structure, then continued on in that row, which made the strap pop out.

Cat closeup

The real version of this drawing in a Moleskine. She closes in, reminding me it's time to get up and make breakfast.

Fair Isle and more hats

This summer I learned how to make cables, lace, intarsia and fair isle. I'm posting the most recent items, since they're the ones at the top of the clutter.

I just finished this fair isle idea/design that turned into a hand muff. (Would anyone use this?) I wanted to do a pattern on circular needles, but not a hat.







I did the cuffs on dpns (for the non-knitters: double pointed needles), then increased sharply to make the center section have enough stitches to fit on a 16" circular. Fit concerns came afterward--the muff seems a bit big, but the double thickness of fair isle makes it warmer.





I did a pastel baby hat to practice fair isle in a smaller form. The adult hats are ones I wear. The thin orange one is from sock yarn. The gray one, in bulky yarn, turned out to have a cloche shape (which you can't see) because I picked up from the cast-on edge to make a brimlike strip.

The pale gray background is a granite step under an overcast sky. The camera works great; the photographer needs training.

These are all quick knits. I started with no particular plans. I like to just knit (in the round, in this case) and see what develops.

Mini sweaters with meaning

An artist in San Francisco asked for sweaters for her red sweater project.

It's been taken down now, but my four were in there, somewhere.

Some of the hats

First of some knitting pics, before I go off to work, before I take more. Four of these went to Rabbitch to distribute to cold, homeless heads on the streets of Canada. She has distributed 75 items, thanks to us web-oriented knitters.

The black/white one is my first item made with fair isle color stranding. I use my own spontaneous patterns for all these. I knit like I draw--small items made up as I go along.

Posting again

I just got a camera I love, Nikon Coolpix P4, and can take pics of all the knitted items that have flowed off the needles in recent months. And there might even be drawing again, if anyone out there hasn't totally given up on me.

I've lost count of all the things I've knitted, but will show the evidence.

Dreaming

This is a very simplified sketch
of a pottery (and tottery) giraffe
who always makes me smile.

W/c on 140# Canson.

A Fall Breeze

. . . a craving to draw swept over me today. Hey, I think I could get back into the paper/pen pool!

I may have knit up a lot of the obsession (learning techniques of lace, cables, silks and softness) that possessed me recently. Fiberwork will remain an ongoing part of my creativity though.

I'm sorting out the drawing pointy sticks from the knitting pointy sticks and looking for paper with the right tooth.

(This imagined scene is from earlier this summer, just to add color to the post.)

Sunset over water

Abstract swaths of color that evoke memories. Watercolor on drawing paper.

Doodling

I took a break from fiber art to play with water and paint in my Moleskine w/c book. As always I'm torn between black/white sketches and color, realism vs abstract.

So I alternate and get better at neither.
But it's all about enjoying the process of creating.

The face is from a statue I glimpsed, then interpreted. The shadowing is random, using w/c crayon and water wash.

Just the middle of the middle

This is a scan of the center section of an abstract (a 16x20). Now it looks to me like Kansas grasses against a summer sky (my birth state)--but I didn't plan that.

Did you know the geographical center of the continental US is in Kansas? I was there in June, so the image rose to the surface in my painting session.

Process: Dr. Martin's w/c, some straight out of the dropper then washed with water, on 140# paper.

Fiber landscape

Getting an image of an item on a scanner is seldom a success, but here's a section of a recent experiment with freeform knitting. Just to say I'm still here making things.

Felting this (heating, matting and shrinking the fabric so the stitches disappear) is an option, though I hear white doesn't felt well. I'll try this again with feltable colors.

Catch that biker!

Chaucer likes to sit on top of the TV and pat the moving pictures. The time he was trying to catch cyclists was hilarious!

Photo in lieu of art pics. Will get the digital camera going soon on recent creative projects.

Hot cat

Is it ever going to cool off? Chaucer thinks his fur coat is too warm.

Checking in

This is where Chaucer goes when he's bored with the lack of activity around here.

And I'm doing summer things that aren't producing drawing. My learning time is filled with the fascination of new knitting techniques and construction (like entrelac, Moebius bowls and bags by Cat Bordhi www.catbordhi.com , afterthought heels, short-rows from both directions, reverse gusset and flap).

But I dare not turn this into a knitting blog or I'll be lost in the obsession with gorgeous yarns and pointy sticks!

And podcasts! Are you listening to any of the fascinating podcasts out there? Try www.odeo.com for one source of lists of them.


A picture of Chaucer exploring my art table, as it was set up last summer. Just to post a drawing-related pic, since I've posted so rarely this month (and feeling guilty about it).

egg and scribble

Playing with w/c crayons and ink in my w/c Moleskine. I like the paper but wish it were more square. I'm not into landscapes.

Fen and sock

Knitting continues instead of drawing, so here's a progress shot of the current sock and Fen, relaxing on the deck.

Mental space to draw

Multiple travels, family issues, and other activities (knitting lace, which is a huge challenge for me!) have kept me away from that playful creative space where I draw.

But finally today, clearing away physical and mental clutter, I took time for a quick test of the new Moleskine watercolor paper with Caran d'Ache w/c pencils and pan paints.

I like how the pencil line partially dissolved and mixed with the paint, yet shows the process, too. Blue and brown pencil with raw umber paint.

It feels good to be playing with art again!

Knitting little red sweaters

Part of catching up after being gone for most of the last 3 weeks is listening to the cool knitting podcast that Brenda Dayne does each week (www.cast-on.com).

She mentioned the Red Sweaters art installation that Nina Rosenberg is doing in San Francisco, Red Sweaters, to encourage discussion about war and raise awareness of the Iraq war losses (espousing no particular political view). Read the "about" link.

I've knit 4 of them to send so far--for me, this teeny sweater takes an hour to make. It's fun to make the stitch patterns different for each one. I invite you to see what this is about. I'm sorry I didn't know about this when we were in San Francisco. I'd love to have seen Nina's tree!

Home for awhile

Travel is over for now, I hope, given the huge delays in flights because of storms. All I did on my recent Kansas trip was pack and move boxes for days, helping my stepmother move from her house to an apartment. No time or emotional energy for drawing.

Color and line will return here soon!

Back again

Been traveling, went to San Francisco for a week, drew very little, had a great time. Just got home tonight. Leaving again in 4 days for Wichita.

No (drawn) images, just photographic ones and great memories.

Bluegreen leopard skin

I'm posting mostly so I don't get out of the habit. In my bits of unscheduled time I've been outside working in the yard or walking instead of drawing.

But in the piles of paintings past, I found this. A possible background for an ink drawing, but I haven't gone further yet.

Would make a nice summer skirt fabric, too. W/c on 140# Canson.

Yarn inspired

Rather random, otherwise. Tech pen and w/c on Aquabee Superdeluxe.

Painting suits my spontaneous, extemporaneous needs, compared to the slow pace of knitting construction.

After the circus

I think this is a performer from Cirque de Soleil, exhausted after the second long performance of the day. He showed up to tell me he wants some time off.

W/c on Aquabee Superdeluxe.

Sweeping out five things

The broom on the inside of my front door. Only used for decoration, not sweeping.

Copic marker (a bit too big for this) in a blank paper, not sketchbook, Moleskine.

And Bonny tagged me for this little traveling quiz:

1. Five things in my fridge:
(At least) five kinds of salad dressing
Rosemount Shiraz wine
kefir quietly fermenting in a jar
2% milk (food for the kefir)
a half-full tin of Fancy Feast for the cat's next meal

2. Five things (categories, really) in my (overstuffed) closet:
shoes: boots, sandals, slippers, flats, sneakers
scarves: all kinds--fabric and knit--in bins and on hooks
lots of black tops on hangers
totes and travel bags (not suitcases)
boxes of finished journals

3. Five things in my purse:
3 Pentel waterbrushes
many pens: fountain, gel, tech drawing
gridded small Moleskine
money and a thick batch of cards: ID, discount, credit, debit, too many!
a bottle of water

4. Five things in my car:
a windbreaker jacket that belonged to my mother
box of tissues
umbrella
notepad
garage door opener

5. People I will tag:
Rather than pick, I offer an open invitation to any reader who'd like to do this! Please leave a link in comments if you want to carry this ball on.
--and Crystal takes the ball!

Realistic doodle

Catching the small mundane items while they perch is my drawing balance to doing abstracts. I love watching the gel pen dissolve as I randomly wet it. Had to add a bit of red for no particular reason.

On Aquabee Super Deluxe, which is my favorite w/c sketching paper.

Simple streaks

Playing with Dr. Martins' hydrus on 140# Arches. No interpretation, no symbolism . . . that I know of . . .

My art therapist friend knows differently, of course!

Entering the wormhole (sci fi type)

Or else it's a marble, or an Alice in Wonderland spin.

Playing with w/c on bristol board

Blue Bears

The assignment I gave myself was to paint a blue bear with no pre-drawing. And this idea works for Illustration Friday's theme of "fat."

I experimented with Dr. Martin's liquid w/c on 140# Arches, trying to create the shapes without leaving an obvious contour line, before the first strokes dried too much, yet finishing the image without going back after paint had dried. A super-fast all-in-one creative act (doomed to failure).

Painting eyes in this one-step attempt was a major problem. I had minimal success on some body parts--the righthand bear was second and a bit better--but when I saw their expressions this morning, I laughed out loud.

Don't they look trapped and apprehensive?

Complements

Combining Dr. Martin's hydrus w/c, India ink with a dip pen, and 140# Arches paper. I had a vague initial idea of using only opposites: plaid w/c strokes and curving black ink on top of complementary colors.

That's my story and I"m sticking to it.

Phone doodle

I started making random shapes when the phone rang. As the caller talked on and on, this image emerged. Afterward, I felt the black and white forms represented her intolerance of others, her rigid core beliefs, the many tangled leaves of blame that core feeds.

So I only put color around the forms, the softer abundant world the caller doesn't see.

Tech pen and w/c on Aquabee SuperDeluxe.

Caricature

I watched a fabulous little video on British caricaturists and political cartoonists. One artist said that you know you've captured the person when you see him looking back at you (from the drawing).

This drawing is of one of the cartoonists. Soluble (Pilot) pen with water on Aquabee Super Deluxe.

The Lace Abyss

This bit of knitted lace represents a huge chunk of my time this week. I've discovered the frustration, determination, and satisfaction of slaving hours over a few lines of pattern, trying to turn print into wool lace.

I watched hours of ripping and redoing go by as I confronted my consistent failure in correctly knitting these simple rows. I'm in awe of lace knitters who do huge complicated shawls.

Back to drawing!