Road Trip, Arkansas

I am sooooo far behind on photos from the trip. I was sorting this batch and thought of these for the blog. These are from the last day of our trip, so you are missing quite a bit.



These doggies are for Jennie. From a distance they looked a little like hers, but then when I zoomed in, they are pretty different. Anyway, Jennie, we thought of you and the granddogs. :)





I take a couple of pics every time we cross the Mississippi and it has been a few, well, many. Many different spots. This is a pretty regular crossing on our way home, leaving Memphis, Tennessee, into Arkansas. I don't think I have posted one of these before. So, you have the bridge and the river.



This sunset was at the hotel in Little Rock. It has not been touched or darkened. It was a very beautiful evening. We had just returned from the China Garden a little hole in the wall in downtown Little Rock. No wine and they had to really scrounge the cook's stash to come up with Jasmine Tea. They normally serve regular tea. The waiter was from New Braunfels, Texas, and had been there about 6 months he said. Mentioned because I had on my Texas Longhorn shirt.

Now off to fix my art photos. I'll be back.........

New Pastel Painting, Sketch and Baseball Notes

The NCAA Super Regionals are on for baseball this weekend. While I watched, I sketched and painted.

First, after golf, I sketched for Scavenger Hunt 43 to warm up for painting.


#3 and #4, a stuffed animal and a figurine, and #5 a grocery bag. The stuffed gorilla is about 8 inches tall and so soft and cute. He is black and has velcro hands so he usually hangs on my lamp on my computer desk. It took longer than I thought it would to sketch because of the dark color and all the lines. (I bought a watercolor sketchbook in Michigan with Sue, I should have used that and watercolors - maybe next time.) The figurine is from Peru and is a copy of an Incan antique, made of pottery. The grocery bag is woven nylon from Bolivia. It is multi colored. It is probably at least 20 years old. Still good, we usually carry our snacks in it in the car. I guess I should use it for groceries and save the planet. I never think about it. Shame on me.

Then I touched up the Magdalena painting and am calling it finished. I will take a photo tomorrow and you can see the improvements. I have to figure out what kind of frame would look good on it. The one I planned to use is too brown for the blue, green painting. I have to frame it for the show. Or you could buy it now and then you could frame it as you want. :)

I decided to do a small painting for the show as well. I found a photo I took along the highway in New Mexico near Magdalena and cropped out these two yucca plants. I like the results. I will take a good photo tomorrow. This was very yellow from taking it with the lights in my studio. I fixed the photo as best I could, but it lost its vibrancy. I was excited about it though, and wanted you to see it as soon as possible. Check back for the better photo.


This is 5 x 7 inches on Ampersand Pastelbord, sand color. It will be framed in a wooden frame, sort of maple color. It will be right against the glass. Some pastelists say you shouldn't frame against the glass. Then you tell them the French have done it for years and for some reason that makes it more acceptable. Weird? I have been doing it for several years now and it works fine. You don't have to worry about the mat slipping or having pastel dust fall on it. They look like oil paintings except for the reflection. You can use museum non reflective glass to solve that problem.


The baseball games were interesting. We watched Louisville clobber Oklahoma State, 9-0. Guess the fact that it is the first time for Louisville to play post season, they are all hyped up. Everything worked for them today and nothing worked for Oklahoma State. I would like Louisville to go to the College World Series, but since OSU is a Big 12 team, I would like them to go as well. Oh well, what happens, happens. Fun to watch, since it doesn't affect the Longhorns. Then the Texas Aggies played Rice and Rice won in 10 innings. Drat. Whatever happens there, only one Texas team will be in the World Series. :(

My friend, Janice, here in Bastrop is a St. Louis Cardinal fan and two of the Longhorn players were drafted by St. Louis in the Major League Draft. Kyle Russell and Nick Peoples were their selections. That would be great if they make it! We could root for them together. You can read about the draft and how it affects the Longhorns on Joanna's page. She has a review of the draft on her draft summary page. We always want them to be drafted and make it in the big leagues, but don't follow or enjoy the professional games. There you are, then.

Sketch, Hand and Bug Catcher

Scavenger Hunt 43 is on the way on wetcanvas.com. I started sketching these Hunts to keep me sketching regularly. Sketching is not my forté. I tend to plunge in without much of a plan in the excitement of getting an idea down. In my sketching, I try to work in pen and ink so that I can't erase. Sketching like this makes me really look at something and make a plan before I put pen to paper. I'm not always successful, but I do think I'm getting better or at least quicker. You can tell in my sketches if I have thought it out or just started putting down lines. Wonky ellipses, perspective, etc. By sketching from the Scavenger Hunt list, I draw things that I normally wouldn't. You can sketch any landscape and the viewer will not know if it is true to life unless it is a very famous or well known landmark. Sketching well will help in painting. In painting, if I do a detailed drawing, I cover it up with pastel, oil or acrylic. If I am accurate in what I see, I can paint without as much thinking and planning. That is super, because I like to be done quickly. If I take too long with a piece, I get bored and over work it.

It is also good to vary your medium once in a while to force you take care and be watchful of your technique. With this in mind, I did the first sketch today in pencil, an ordinary #2 in my generic sketchbook. The drawing is about 6 x 8 inches and took about thirty minutes. I did erase on the bug catcher .. tsk, tsk.


Number 1, your hand with fingers curled and number 2, make something from a piece of paper, then sketch it. I made what we used to call a bug catcher. We would draw bugs inside when your fingers opened it one way and none when opened the opposite way, We would show it empty/blank and then touch it to someone's head and open it with the bugs showing and say we got them off their hair. Ah, kids. That is the extent of my origami skills, besides making a hat that looked like a boat from newspaper. So this is my hand with the bug catcher.

And .... I posted before midnight! Wow.

D-Day

A special thanks to all the U.S. Military that served in World WarII. Thanks to all our military that have protected us for 200 plus years and today!

My brother, Powder, was in the Army and in the Invasion of Normandy on D-Day. He never talked about it much. Some with my Mom and she said he couldn't believe that the ocean was red with blood. He was and engineer in the infantry and they spent much time blowing up and building bridges. He received two Purple Hearts. He was wounded when a wall collapsed on his unit where they were resting for the night. They had to be dug out of the rubble. The second was for having his feet frozen in one of the long marches. He said that he woke up in the "Mash" unit and they were going to cut off his feet. He talked them out of it and was sent to England to recuperate. He then went back into battle. He was on the way home from Germany for leave and continue to the Pacific when the war ended. He did come back to our home town and graduate from high school. My brother, Tommy, was a little perturbed with that. Heh, heh. Tommy was the valedictorian of the class and all the fuss was made over Powder coming back from the war and finishing school. I do think the war had a big affect on him, depression and post war problems, but the Army didn't do much for them in regards to the soldiers mental health at that time.



Powder was meant to serve, I guess. He went to work for the New Mexico State Police. He is in his uniform in the family photo. The State Police in New Mexico handle state investigations as well as do the patrolling of the highways. It was a tough job at that time (well, any time), they were few in number. He put in long hours. Powder was also a chief of police in Grants, New Mexico, and a U.S. Marshall for a time. He grew up on the ranch. He was on the basketball team in school in Magdalena and whatever sports they had. He was a bull rider in rodeos. He spoke Spanish and went to Mexico to help control hoof and mouth disease with some government program, I think in the fifties. His last job was an antique dealer in Neosho, Missouri. He was in the nursing home there and died in October, 1999. (And of course I can't find the photo today of him in his army uniform, sorry.)

It is D-Day today. I was reminded when I read Paul Dorrell's blog last night. He is a gallery owner, promoting local artists. He has great information there and is an inspiring story himself. Today he is writing about the National D-Day Memorial which he had a hand in. Very nice and interesting story.

Happy Birthday, Barbara!

First of all, June 6 is my sister's, Barbara's, birthday! I hope she has a great day.

She is seven years my senior, if I am allowed to say that and not give away her age. :) So I was always the pest in her world. When she was in high school, she had to take me along at times. It was her responsibility to get me off to school in the mornings. Very irritating as I wore braids and hated breakfast foods. I wanted coffee and toast or left overs from last nights dinner. I was very messy (still am) and she was very neat. So....





At this hour of the morning I couldn't find a photo of Barbara when she was little, so settled on this photo of part of the family at the ranch. I just love what our Mom wrote on the back.

Happy Birthday, Barbara!

Sketches for Hunt42, Last Day and Home Again

Here are the sketches for Scavenger Hunt 42 that ends today. I didn't get many done. Oh well, we did do lots of stuff! These sketches are in the Imagineering Co. sketchbook with the Micron 05 pen.



#2 Gasoline sign, this was in South Haven, Michigan, 5-10 minutes while we filled the car. $100 ouch!



#3 Watch, on the road when I was holding the sketchbook. I learned to make short lines when in the car, too many bumps! 20 minutes. Between South Haven, MI, and Chicago, IL.



#4 Bumper sticker and #5 motor home/travel trailer. on I-65 in Indiana, 20 minutes. The Micron and colored pencils. We had a hard time finding bumper stickers. A few that I wouldn't copy. Ha.

These three were on June 1 and the last ones are on June 4 on I-65 near Nashvillle, TN.



#6 ticket, #7, breath freshener, #8 cassette The ticket was for the Big 12 Baseball tourney, it is the trophy. Gum and the book we were listening to.

We hit 13 or 14 states on this trip. Whew. It feels good to be back, but is nice and warm here. (Read that at HOT here)

We will be getting ready to go to New Mexico in July. Lots of painting and catching up to do. Hope to sketch on the Hunts, too. We shall see how it goes.

Sad to come home to the end of UT Baseball for the year. Drat. The Horns did not make it to the Super Regionals and the College World Series. Lots of reasons, I suppose. Oh well, another year. When they were good, they were very, very good. We are very proud of the Horns. Hope the seniors all do well, we will miss them next year, don't you know? There were seven seniors and there are some of the others that may be drafted and gone. New team for next year, wow! Hook-em! You can read about it on Joanna's page and the Official Longhorn page. Teams near us that are going to play in the Super Regionals are Texas Aggies and Rice. They play each other, so one Texas team will go to the College World Series. Oklahoma State made it from the Big 12. Interesting. Missouri lost to Louisville and that is where our grandson goes to school. Louisville's first time.

Kentucky, here we are! Photos

We make it to Kentucky on Friday. Smooth sailing and not much traffic -- considering. Lots of traffic, actually, but I wasn't driving, so ...... We were watching for bumper stickers to sketch for the Scavenger Hunt and there were very few. In Texas, we see them on many cars. Is it a southern/western thing? Or was it just because we were looking for them. We found only a few and I finally sketched a couple. I hope to post them tomorrow (well it's after midnight) so tonight.



Crossing the Ohio River into Kentucky from Indiana. We have so many photos of crossing there and the Mississippi. Oh well, one more.



This is the Louisville skyline from I-65 as you go by town. I couldn't get a good photo just as we crossed the river, where you can see more of downtown. Wrong lane and too many trucks.

It was busy here with Christy's graduation and all the visiting, eating, baseball on the internet, etc. Christy was beautiful and wore all kinds of ribbons and stoles for her awards. There were around 400 graduates so it took a while. Just like Larry's, they kept the lights low, so photos of the event cannot be taken. I took some camera movies and they came out OK as there was light on the stage when they were given the diplomas. We had a great time with all the family. David cooked brisket and it was great on Saturday. Sorry to leave them and hit the road.

The Horns are at the seventh inning stretch in their game with U C Irvine and are behind 5-6. Game called for rain and will finish tomorrow at 1 p.m. If they win, there will be another game with UCI for the championship. If they loose, well we won't think about that. Looking good, now to win, right? Nick Peoples broke his left clavical making a terrific catch in centerfield. He is out for the year I guess. Too bad, he is a senior. :( So these games are without him and Preston Clark, the regular catcher. We will hope for the best. You can read about it on the Longhorn official page and Joanna's page. Hook-em Horns!!!