Tag Archives: girl2

Feeling like a slug!

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Me standing on a block behind my tall daughter in her prom dress
Me and Girl2 on prom night

First, check out Girl2 in her prom dress. This picture was taken on her very last day of high school! She will graduate cum laude, with a cosmetology degree, an associates degree in science and math, and VERY close to completing Eagle Scout. I can’t manage to change my socks daily. This is why, as happy as I am for her and as proud, I feel like a slug.

I  had all of these great plans for 2023. I was going to do a fair every month. I was going to complete a large painting every week, a couple of small paintings, and sketch every day.

With the exception of a couple of small watercolors, I haven’t managed to complete a single painting. I have done a small handful of sketches, but nothing near the volume I wanted to do.

So what’s wrong me? Why can’t I manage to follow through? It’s so easy to get down on myself and think about how terrible I am. But doing nothing is the norm. That is the standard that the human body wants to maintain. Inertia. A body at rest will remain at rest until acted upon by a force, right?

So the real question is what happened before that motivated me to do something? How did I manage to get up and do anything before? We typically throw around words like “discipline” and “plan” without really understanding how those words become actions.

I don’t have an answer to that. I know that routine is the best way for me to get things accomplished. If I manage to sit at a drawing table with my pens and paper, I will draw something. So I have to set the routine to have my pens and paper out, maybe at a specific time or at least convenient place every day. Like the saying goes, “Chance favors the prepared mind.” If my space is prepared and my materials available, it’s a whole lot easier for me to actually sit down and get some work done. The current state of the studio is not conducive to that effort, to say the least

Garage studio is trashed

I did manage to take some supplies with me to the mall while the wife and kids explored the shops. I didn’t get a whole lot of sketches in, but something is a brazillian times more than nothing, right?

Boy2 enjoying some Chinese food at the food court

Girl2 Fills In

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Composition in Primaries

Composition in Primaries

While Daddy is away in Louisiana on a business trip, Girl2 is filling in:

Done in the back of a minivan on the way home, this started out as a wonderful drawing of my beautiful mommy.  Then, over the course of the drive, it morphed into an alien with a spider body… or a spider on its face… with a rocket ship like on Monsters Vs. Aliens.

Ed. Note: While I did paraphrase a little, it should be noted that my three year old really does speak this way.

We'll figure it out

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disgruntledmanequinI’m so desperate to get back to figure drawing group!  I had no idea how addictive it was.  For the last three weeks it has been rained out and this week is the Colored Pencil Society of America meeting.  I’ll let you know how that goes next week.  In the mean time, I will continue to play with my disgruntled manequin.

The Everyday Matters Challenge is still going on.  I continue to work on them every day.  I am getting a little ahead of the site, though, so that I may cut back on the late nights and the time away from the girls.

Girl2's Sketchbook

Girl2's Sketchbook

Speaking of the girls, Girl2 decided she wanted to be just like Daddy when we went to the zoo on Memorial Day.  So, a quick trip through Wal*Mart and she has her very own, personalized sketch book.  Now she can sit and draw with me when we go out.  How cool is THAT? ;)

A Budding Young Artiste!

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girl2apples2I love it when the kids paint with me.  Of course Boy1 and Girl1 are much to grown up to indulge in such trivial pursuits.  But Girl2 LOVES it.  This is an apple tree in watercolor, I believe roseart, on computer paper.  This shall be hanging on the LitK for several weeks before it goes into storage.  I expect to trot it out for the press when Girl2 becomes queen of the planet.  I believe that my bride drew the tree and the circles for the fruit.  But just look at the looseness of the brush and the range of pallet the child has already grasped.  Yes, it’s evident that she is well on her way to being the ballerina, astronaut, veterinarian, biker, artiste, queen that she is destined to become.  I wouldn’t mind applying for that job myself.

edm112fence

EDM 112: Draw a fence

In Robert Frost’s “Mending Wall“, the neighbor states that “Good fences make good neighbors.”  Frost, in mischief, alludes to the sadness that dividing up the earth is the only way for mankind to get along with each other, while simultaneously conceding the point.  We build fences and walls everywhere we go.  We build them to keep things out and to keep things in.  We build them around our homes, neighborhoods, cities, some even like to build walls around countries.  But it’s the walls around our hearts that go up the quickest and come down the hardest.  On those walls, you can spend years taking bits of brick down before you can see into that heart again.  In half a second though, some misplaced word or deed, and that wall is not only rebuilt but reinforced.  But there is something in nature that doesn’t love a wall.  As long as you’re willing to keep trying, they will fall.