Whole Foods

Quick lunch at Whole Foods. Iced tea and a shared slice of pepperoni pizza. Most things on the expensive side, but colorful environment and good place for a few vitamins--and Noi Sirius chocolate!

Wine bar at Panini Opa

Always enjoy eating here: delicious food, interesting menu, fair prices, friendly staff.

Moments in time

1) Waiting for the gas tank to fill. Wondering how free and wild the forebearers of these bushes were. Feeling sorry for them, stuck in a suburban parking lot, surrounded by asphalt.

2) Discovering most-popular-local-diner-we'd-never heard-of-till-now, Jack and Benny's Barnstormer at OSU's Don Scott airport. The bacon and eggs didn't last long enough to draw. Should have checked the price of orange juice before ordering, but the scent of long ago Florida vacations was almost worth it.

Iconic Women

Waiting room

Restaurant

Immigrant mothers, in rough and simple contour sketches--the first seen before, the second after--listening to Frederica Mathewes-Green's recently reposted podcast about the Dormition of Mary.

BJ's Restaurant & Brewhouse

A bright spot of panache in a rough week.
The light was a little dim, and still not adjusted to vision with my new glasses. (Just after sketching this, I knocked over the pizza stand trying to cut the last piece, shattered my water glass into myriad shards, and soaked my skirt.)

Dancing Hares in August

Evening light, through clouds. The park is quiet, the second evening after school starts. Maybe the hares are glad to have it back.

From the southeast.

Mellow Mushroom

Looking out the window, from the bar room area,  past the giant mushroom by the hostess/cash register.

The water I spilled last evening buckled some pages of the sketchbook, and may have caused the paint on previous sketches to move a little. The brown seems most affected. Some colors stain; others "lift" easily. The brown, probably burnt sienna, must be one that lifts.

Sunday supper

Painting from memory, later that night. Watercolor play. Chicken cordon bleu is probably delicious made from scratch. Pre-fab, not so good.

Panini Opa

Village salad, Philly cheesesteak, lemon chicken soup, moussaka, raspberry lemonade.

New tools

Sewing gauge

Saturday, I attended a plein air watercolor workshop and learned of a couple new tools. The instructor used:

• a sewing gauge for measuring proportions and sight sizing, and 
• a large eyedropper--first to wet her watercolor and later to draw excess water off palette mixes.

Breakfast for lunch

Trying a new breakfast place, Scrambler Marie's. Friendly staff, pleasant atmosphere, good food. A little pricey.

Dancing Hares

Sophie Ryder's Dancing Hares, across a field of dry August grass. The summer fountain crowds are already waning. One of these days I'm going to take a viewfinder along and get the proportions better.
From southeast.

Five Guys Burgers & Fries

Trying to draw verbs, after watching Suhita Shirodkar's Craftsy class.

Bridge Park construction

The tall gray elevator shafts have grown wings of purple. The intersection roundabout will open next weekend.  Trees in "alligator bags" have suddenly appeared in the median and the middle of the roundabout. The orange barrels are slowly fading away.

Remembering Grandma

Mattias Adolfsson's class in Sketchbook Skool showed me the emotional connection between drawing and memory.  Penelope Dullaghan's gave me an appreciation of the fun of playing with patterns.

Here, I remembered Grandma: above, the rows of canned fruit and vegetables lining her cellar wall; below, the rows of women she sat among Sunday mornings and evenings, on the right side of the small Mennonite church nestled in the hills. I remember their names.

Small Cachet sketchbook I usually practice tv people in; graphite;  Ph. Martin watercolor on top, pastel pencil (with a little Uniball Signo white gel pen) on bottom. 

Panini Opa

I usually sketch the food or (egg basket) lights at Panini Opa. Here, I tried the statue on a small shelf. The woman has no head or hands. Her long dress has many folds.

Trying to copy Marc Taro Holmes, who does such a great job with this kind of subject. (Very limited time.) Drawn in (Pentel Graphgear) pencil, painted on a later visit.

 Although the statue is tones of cream and buff, I used color for fun. The red must have migrated from the wet adjoining page. The waterbrush I was using was a bit too blunt for the task.
Maybe I will darken the wall in the background.

Ready for watercolor class 

I signed up for a local plein air watercolor workshop and bought some materials: Alvin Heritage palette, Nocturna oval wash brush (Royal Langnickel, 1/2"), a few Hake brushes, and a sheet of Arches paper.  Used soft scub to rough up the palette. Attempting to stretch a half sheet for the first time.

Added the recommended perylene green and raw sienna to my palette. Not sure the Cheap Joe's American Journey sampler will have enough of the Alizarin Crimson and Aureolin the instructor listed.

Colors: Winsor yellow, Quin gold, yellow ochre, TP orange, Winsor red, Quin rose, Diox purple, Fr. ultramarine, cobalt, cerulean, cobalt teal, pthalo green, perylene green, burnt sienna, raw sienna.

Haven of Rest cemetery

Formerly Gospel Light cemetery.