Swim

 

"Swim"

 

It is always fun to go to a pool in the summer time and see kids practicing their swim moves. My favorite has always been diving. The smooth and gracefulness of a dive has yet to be mastered by most kids and usually ends up being a magnificent belly-flop. Undaunted, the kids will pop up out of the water and try again, and again, and again. They can go all day!

 

Just like having the sparkle shoes makes you run faster, having all the correct swim gear makes you a swimmer. Water wings, inner tube, life jacket, and fins complete this little boys swim attire. His gear is complete as he is about to gracefully belly-flop into summer.  

Little Red Wagon

When I saw the word of the week, "eye glasses", several ideas played through my head. I thought of several play on words and other ideas, but none seemed to be my style. I thought of having someone running around with flight goggles, but I had already done flight ideas two times in a row, so I thought I should branch out.

However, the flight idea did give my another idea. I have very fond memories of me and my sister flying down my grandparents hill in Grandpa's little red wagon. Our safest hill we decided was one where, at the bottom of the hill we had to turn sharply to avoid going through Grandma's beautiful flower beds. We thought that we would just stop after the flower beds (7 and 8 year olds do not have much of a grasp on physics). Physics still apply to kids, thankfully just past the flower beds was a bed of ivy and a fence blocking a steep hill. A bed of ivy does wonders at stopping a little red wagon, and when the ivy didn't work the fence always did.

After our afternoon of fun, we looked back at Grandma's beautiful flower beds. Our 7 and 8 year old intentions of avoiding the flower beds had failed miserably. We brilliantly thought to fluff the flowers back up to where they looked a little less run over. After much fluffing and leaning we went in for dinner thinking we were brilliant masterminds. Grandma never said a word.

Yesterday

The word of the week is "yesterday", and I love this. It might have to do with my husband being a pilot, but I'm trying not to be too biased.

I researched WWII pilot's uniforms. They are very different from today's military pilots. I had this idea for a little while, but had never finished the thought on paper. I like that a WWII pilot is looking at some of the newest planes we have. I am very pleased with this.

Sketch of a Mural Painting

 

 

I just received a commission to paint a mural. I haven't painted a mural before, so I thought I would share my step by step process. The wall itself is about 3' high, and 6' wide. My client gave me a couple of pictures to work with, and this is an idea that I came up with. I am still in the sketching phase, and this is a rough composition, but the idea is clearly shown.

 

 



Boy Pilot

 

 

 

 

 

I had originally wanted this to be in sepia tones. After looking through my illustrations, I thought I should try something new. I wanted a warm looking piece with a final blue glaze. Putting a blue oil glaze usually makes pieces look cooler. Since I knew I was going to put a blue wash, my first step to make the piece warm was the watercolor layer. I put a yellow green watercolor wash for the background, and was able to bring it out in the final stage.

 

As soon as this idea popped into my head I loved it! I didn't intentionally draw it to look like my husband, however looking at this now there are a few similarities and can imagine him doing this same thing.