The trees along the path

Walnut Ink sketch June 20, 2011 ©Sweet Enemy Art

Thanks to Arkonbey and some Indian Roast coffee, I've actually been experiencing some nice mornings out in the garden.  On Monday, when I didn't have to be to work until lunchtime, I took my beloved walnut ink out to the garden area and did this sketch, about 9" x 10".  This is perhaps the first real "plein air" piece I've worked on in years.  

I must say, it's a good idea to work monochromatically when you're faced with a bazillion* little pieces of information.  Especially a monochromatic medium that is easily correctable.  

*bazillion is apparently not a made-up word, or this spell-check is more forgiving than I thought.

I'll have the Walnut Ink out at the shop on Tuesday July 19th from 4-5:30 if you are in the area and want to stop in and try your hand at it.  Gorgeous stuff. 

A quick wrap-up from Open Studio Weekend!

Well, it's Wednesday, and I finally feel like my batteries are re-charged.  This past weekend was fantastic, despite all my usual cries of "I'm not reaaaaady!!" leading up to it, and the weather being the usual mix of rain and heat.

Lynn Powers and I had easily 65-70 visitors the first day, and a few less on the following.  What a blast to have that many happy art-enthusiastic people filling the house with great energy!  Nice when it's empty afterwards too, of course, and I certainly needed a full two days to recuperate from all the excitement.   As you'll see, I was a little over-the-top with energy.  Yikes!  And look at me with a drink in each hand.  Crazy.

Myself & Lynn, at the tail end of Saturday.  Photo courtesy of Barbara Lang.

The shelf vignette outside my studio.  Photo courtesy of Barbara Lang

Rick on the deck!  Photo courtesy of Barbara Lang

Lynn (on the left) and myself messing about with PhotoBooth

I had so much fun, and yet still didn't get to have as much interactive art-experimenting for our visitors as I would have liked (partly as it was too busy!) So I'm hoping to have another "mini-open-studio" in July or August.  This will also give those a chance who missed the first round to come and see what sorts of trouble they can get themselves into here...  So if you want to be notified, please be sure to sign up on my mailing list!  I'll put a call out here on the blog too, of course.  

Before I sign off, I just want to give a quick thank-you to everyone who was involved, and that includes Lynn, Rick, my family, the Jericho/Underhill OSW group, all our fabulous visitors, and everyone else:  

I couldn't have done it without you!

THANK YOU!