I had left my painting on the easel outside on the picnic table last night. The wind blew it off onto the cement and it was now covered in little bits of sand and dirt.
So, the first thing I did this morning was to scrap those bits off. I then tried to repair the damage.
So here it is after another few hours of painting on it. It still needs work. The roses are coming along, but the background needs a lot of help.
This is the first time I've painted in oils since last summer when I painted the Alphabet series.
I think I forgot a lot of how-to. But I had fun.
This is where I stopped for the first day.
Victoria was very thoughtful and brought me some flowers. I had told her I'd like something more interesting than just roses to paint. She brought a bouquet with these beautiful coral colored roses along with Calla Lillies and baby's breath.
I rearranged them into an arrangement with just those beautiful roses and took them out to the picnic table to paint. Sorry Victoria, I guess I'm not tired of painting roses - maybe I'm just tired of painting red roses.
First, I had to make my way up to my studio to gather my materials and equipment for painting with oils. Darrell was kind enough to carry everything down for me since I am still using a walker and can't carry anything.
[This was the first time to go upstairs since my knee surgery and my left knee was not happy about having to do all of the work going up the stairs.]
I started out doing a contour drawing with an ink pen.
I reported to Swedish Hospital in Ballard this morning for my right knee replacement surgery. I've been very anxious about this surgery and am thankful it's over and I've survived so far.
As far as I know, all went well and I am relatively pain free. I'll be here overnight and hopefully go home tomorrow.
Today's Quilt Freedom Workshop with Joe Cunningham was about three color quilts. We started off by looking at some quilts from the International Quilt Museum.
Then he had us cut and sew our fabrics in specific ways, producing parts and pieces to make into an arrangement that pleases us.
This is an actual date! Hailey joined me and we did some contour drawing and some blind contour drawings. Then we put some watercolors on the best ones. It was fun!
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| This is mine. |
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| This is Hailey's - isn't it great! |
Darrell and I hit the road, east over the pass to Chelan, to visit his daughter and family. We haven't seen them in quite a while.
We visited the property that the bought to build their new home on and then headed to Wells Dam, where Matt works, for a private tour. I stayed at a vista spot and sketched while they went down into the bowels of the dam.
It was about 99 degrees, too hot. But I found a shaded spot where I could sketch and paint.
After lunch in Wenatchee we met up with his uncle Eddie to get a key for the gate of their family cemetery. We drove up Badger Mountain with the plan to show them the cemetery, but were unable to reach it because the remote road was closed to vehicles because of fire danger. Now they know where it is and can come back when it's not so hot and dry.
During today's Sew Modern Connection monthly zoom meet-up I sewed together the blocks I had previously made. They were made from the last of the fabrics I bought from the local fabric rep's yearly sale.
At the start of the meeting I put the blocks up on the wall, moved them around a bit and then got busy sewing them into rows. Two and a half hours later it was a quilt top.
I did a two-fer today. I made my Art Date for the week coincide with the Seattle Urban Sketchers Outing today, Friday.
They met at the Dr. Jose Rizal Park, at the north end of Beacon Hill, in the shadow of the stunning Art Deco tower with a majestic view of Seattle and Elliott Bay.
