Laurelines

Antidote for the blues and the grays

I will NOT complain that we've had several rainy and gray days in a row---I am deeply grateful for every blessed raindrop that is sinking into our parched land and helping to refill our lakes, rivers, streams, and reservoirs. You know I am. Still saddled, though,  with the head cold from hell (well, from France, actually) and forced to cancel a family trip, I've spent the morning fighting the fogginess inside and out by.... drawing. And then painting. Nothing cheers me up like a dip pen, violet ink, Schmincke paints and some oil pastels thrown in for good measure. Add the tulips and anemones from this weekend's farmers' market and we've got ourselves a party!

Si se puede

You don't have to be a fan of a certain US presidential candidate to thrill to the words 'yes, we can.'  For most of this week I was dragging my cold-addled self around like a thrift shop mattress. I was drawing and painting like one, too.
Today, I felt some better. I kept telling myself I can, I can do it, in spite of this week's evidence to the contrary.  Here are some sketches and a couple of fountain images from Paris, drawn there, painted here.  You know, they're not the best things in the known world, but they're not the worst, either, Oui, je peux. Si se puede.

Paris in March, part 2!

Some sketches from my small accordion notebook, as well as a couple of pencil portraits of darling Claire Toussaint, Casey's daughter, who looks as if she stepped out of a quattrocento painting! I did NOT do her justice, but, you know, I tried.
She's promised to sit for me again, though, so all is not lost!

Here are both of my recent small accordion sketchbooks, for comparison. The top one is the Parisian one; the bottom one is from Hawaii.

A few more fountains to come!

Paris in March sketches!

I'm back after a week in cold, cold, sometimes rainy, always inspiring Paris. Casey and her daughter Claire and I walked at least 1,000 miles in six days.  You may find this hard to swallow, of course, and that is your prerogative.  My feet tell me it was 1,000 miles and I believe them. Gosh, it was fun, even though none of us was really dressed warmly enough and I came back with a whopping cold as a souvenir! Mais bon.
Here are the first batch of sketches. I worked in two sketchbooks---one a small accordion sketchbook like the one I used in Hawaii. This one I used for sort of general travel vignettes---the last three sketches of this post come from the small book. The other was a larger accordion sketchbook I'd dedicated to fountain sketches several months ago. Some of these fountains you will have seen before, but my past sketches of them weren't done in

the sketchbook dedicated solely to fountains ( are you still with me here?), so I had to do them again.  It was like resketching old friends.

More to come!

A Paris sunset

Drat. I just managed to lose the text of a long post about the work I've done and the friends I've seen in Paris the past few days. Well, there you are. Here's the skinny: I've had a fabulous time, working a lot and sharing the days with some dear friends. Casey Toussaint and her incredible daughter Claire have been my partners in crime for this trip. They're both so bubbly and lovely --- you'll be able to see some of Casey's sketches on her blog rue Manuel Bis in the next few days. We've had dinner and tea, respectively, with those elegant Parisiennes Tara Bradford of Paris Parfait fame and Florizelle of the sophisticated and compelling le Divan Fumoir Bohemien. Tomorrow, our dear friend and Casey's almost neighbor, Ronell van Wyck (her fabulous blog is African Tapestry)  joins us for the day.
I will share with you what I've been working on this trip in the next days. I've been busy and productive and now I'm tired and cold. But happy!  So, for right now, I can just manage posting two views of the sunset from my hotel window,  taken tonight, seconds apart. Much more to come!

Artful children (in particular, mine!)

You know how it is. You meet someone in cyberspace---you can't remember exactly how your trajectories crossed,  but a connection is made. And so it is that I've appeared on Jean Van't Hul's great blog, The Artful Parent. The interview with photos was posted Monday, March 10th.
Jean wanted to know how I reared my daughters to be creative and to value creativity in others.  It was one of my chief goals as a parent, as it is no doubt one of yours, if you are a parent, too.  Anyway, I hope you'll check out her blog tomorrow and on the days afterward.  Jean's a gifted writer and a devoted mother of adorable Maia. Her blog is full of great info and links and interviews and images and.... all kinds of artful stuff.  By the way, one of my sketches will be given away in a drawing there. And also, by the way, Maia will be appearing in my 101 Faces Project in the near future, I hope. Lucky me!
Here are some photos of my daughters' early years as artists-in-the-making:

Kate, at four years old, painting, followed by

Cecelia, drawing before she could walk!
Third is a photo of the girls painting together, a few years later.
Last, is a self-portrait by Kate, but it could have just as easily been a portrait of Cecelia.

I leave for Paris on Wednesday in search of fountains and other watery manifestations! As always, I will have my laptop with me and hope to blog while I'm there.  A bientôt! See you soon!

Goodbye to Hawaii, sketching with friends

This will be the last Hawaii image for a while. I've got some more, but life is moving me onto the next thing, so bye bye to Hilo for now. In a scheduling move of staggering genius, I leave for Paris next Wednesday. Didn't I just put away my suitcase? Well, March and February are cheaper months to fly and to be hotelled, so there we are.
Still, I had time in between water-seeking jaunts to have Amanda and her family for a visit and to drive us all to the next state to see our wonderful friend Cindy. Sketching of gargoyles, trees, people happened and hilarity ensued, of which some examples are as follows. Check out Cindy's and Amanda's website (sooner or later) for some of their sketches.