Shelter

Tuesdays #bandofsketchers prompt was Shelter.

This is a bit late. Shelter flummoxed me until I saw my cat getting in a box. Then I looked up cat shelters online. Expected to see cat charities but it came up with a load of sweet shelters for outside cats. This pyramid shaped one with a little porch seemed ideal. I don’t know if the door closes but it looks snug. X

Hot

Why do I feel hot? I’m melting. Not my age? It’s winter, I’ve got the heating on. But I’m hot. I’m not ill, I was, but I’m getting better. I guess it’s because I have been standing in front of the cooker making tea (evening meal). I was looking for a drawing to show how I feel and this one from a couple of days ago illustrates it well. As you get older life seems to get more complicated. I swear I think bits are going to start falling off me!

Anyway, I’m feeling a bit better. But even so, I think I will have an early night. Life, its wonderful but complex.

house portrait

From May 2020, when I first started my part time illustration course. I am still quite pleased with this drawing. Physically, I was fitter and could draw without shaking too much. I tend to add less details these days too. I’d like to get back to drawing outside. Maybe meet up with urban sketchers again. Even though I havent caught Covid, it’s done things to me mentally. I guess I got a bit of cabin fever during lockdown, and since then it’s been easier to avoid people – you never know if you will just burst into tears… I think I’m OK, god knows what its like for people living through wars or famine. We can still do things here, well some of us can. I worry for people in food poverty or who can’t afford to heat their homes. It all spins round in my head. which is why I’m writing this at 3.11am…. must go to bed.

In the second world war and afterwards they had ordinary people just writing down their everyday lives in diaries. They were collated to record what had happened. There is a film called “Housewife 55” or something like that, which starred Victoria Wood. If you can find it, it’s worth watching, very poignant. maybe they were their own kind of bloggers.

Experiment, atomic

I experimented with a sunset sky and added texture to it. Then I added some flood fill colours on a low tolerance so they didn’t spread far. Finally I used a sketching app to add the face and hair. I called it atomic because it reminds me of cloud chamber patterns, the patterns of electrons and Cosmic rays make as they pass through cold wet air.

Sunday lunch

Strange lunch, orange flavoured Hot Cross buns with chocolate chips. We were having a big meal for our dinner and we had a big breakfast so I just wanted a simple, small meal to eat. Today’s #bandofsketchers prompt was Sunday Lunch so I did a quick sketch of these. They were tasty, but I think I prefer the original flavour. Less sweet and with Cinnamon. Also its very early in the year for Hot Cross buns. X

How do I draw from imagination?

How do I draw from imagination? I talk and think my way through things, by describing how they should look in my mind or verbally helps to make me think more about details of the image I’m drawing.

For example, this drawing was based on a memory of my walks in a local park as a child. There were trees that seemed to have faced in them. They were probably Ash trees, they seemed to have long spidery branches with tipped up ends like fingers. The path wandered around past stone walls that I used to balance on. Behind me was a play area with a slide, swings and a roundabout and seesaw. This is a memory drawing so it isn’t exactly accurate and things have probably changed a lot. I haven’t been back for years. But the face in the tree gives me a bit of a feeling of nervousness I used to get as a child.

Huge spider

I just looked down because I saw something from the corner of my eye… A huge house spider was boldly walking out from under my armchair! I don’t mind spiders normally, but I jumped! My hubby gently picked up the spider… And put it on the other side of the room! They are good for catching insects. I think it had come out to look for food. It had better watch out though. I’m afraid out cats patrol for them and sometimes catch them.