Wildflowers, Roses, and Cowboy Golf

No sketching after breakfast. We golfed in Silver City, very nice day. Larry shot an 83, 38 on the back nine. Wow. Fun to see. The damaged holes from the floods are repaired. There is still one bridge out. We didn't see the rattlesnake with no rattles. Thank goodness. We did see some "cowboy golf". We were wondering if they had boots on. We didn't get close enough to see. Drat.

The flower photos are for Joanna. The wildflowers are at the VLA and the roses here in the yard of our temporary house.

Later,
Jo

Back at last

We went to El Paso and collected Larry on Monday morning, stopping to renew my driver's license since we were in Texas. We golfed in Las Cruces, NM, at NMSU, spent the night, golfed in Socorro, NM, NMIM,T and were rained out after 10 holes. Gene and Larry golfed in Albuquerque on Wednesday at UNM. These University courses are quite nice, lots of green and trees. All are established courses and well cared for. We walked in Socorro since the course was so wet. It is great to have our son with us on vacation. We had not spent much time together, just the three of us, since 1997 when we moved to Bastrop.

I did not sketch or think much about art the last few days. :) The photos are some of the beautiful clouds we have had this whole month, a rarity in NM. The antennas are at the Very Large Array between Magdalena and Datil, NM. An amazing site. The cow was at the Kelly San Juan Church south of Magdalena. The makeshift outhouse was creaking in the wind and the cow was nervous and curious. :)

The sketch is my breakfast today. Rice cakes with peanut butter on a plastic red plate. Hard to show colors in sketches. The ZIG pen on the Canson sketchbook. It has very nice paper and will support a light watercolor and the Sharpies don't seep through too much but do bleed a little as I mentioned before. I'm behind on the scavenger hunts, of course, but will try to catch up with the next one.

More Photos

Forgot these today,
Jo

Plein Air Day

Before I forget, check out Katherine Tyrrell's new link browser Squidoo and the wonderful links she has for sketching and drawing, pastels and colored pencil. She is incredibly organized.

I first did a sketch when I finished my coffee for the Hunt. #8 and 9 - something you step on, porch and mat, and #10 and 11 something open and something plastic, the trash can. I started to sketch it closed and you see the change in plan when I remembered I needed something open. Whew... one more done.

I actually did a plein air acrylic today. It is 9 x 12 of the old Kennecott towers/smoke stacks in Hurley, New Mexico, about 15 miles from the house. They are scheduled to be toppled and demolished nesxt year so a last of these landmarks. The mine now belongs to Chino. One went up in 1939 and is 500 ft tall, and the other is 625 ft. tall and built in 1967. I need to put an "idea" of letters on the left one and a brace or pipe of some sort on the right and taller one, otherwise it is about done. I used Liquitex acrylics, ultramarine blue, cadmium red, cadmium yellow medium, and burnt umber - hookers green (Dick Blick), titanium white (Daler-Rowney), and yellow ochre (Windsor Newton). I like the result, although acrylics dry a little darker than one expects. I try to compensate, but the dark trees are a little dark. Experience will help. I haven't been working with acrylics except on vacation and so ....

It was a beautiful day at the time, the rain clouds building. Flowers everywhere brought on my the rain. Gene was on his bike. I started this about 11:00 a.m. and finished about 1:05 p.m. When painting plein air, the light, clouds and atmosphere change so rapidly that two hours is about it for one scene. I picked Gene up about 25 miles down the road and we went to Deming, just a few more miles, to check out the golf course. It looks like a typical small town course, flat and back and forth. We probably won't play there unless we are desperate. :) It has been raining since we got 'home'. We are getting ready to travel tomorrow. Pick up son, Larry, in El Paso and have a golf week. More blog, down the road.........

Scavenger Hunt 6

I started the new hunt. I am a little late, but it is not required to finish and you can join in anytime. Come try it! You can do the sketches as finished as you want or spend as much time as you want on each. It is just an incentive to draw. It is fun to see all the types and ideas of the other artists that post. A variety of styles with new artists and others in and out of the hunts.

Number 1 - fire, so .. the burner on the stove. Number 2 and 3 - something hot and something red, the ristra (string of red hot chili pequin peppers). Number 4 - stamps. Numbers 5, 6 and 7 - something cold and label, Gatorade and something with a star, my painting apron. The sketches are with the Zig pen and watercolor pencils for the color in my Canson sketch book. Probably 15 minutes each .. I'm practicing not erasing and trying to become more accurate at quick sketches.

The photo of the roses is thrown in because I just can't believe how many there are on the 3 large bushes.