first pencil I could grab...paper out of printer... bird sketches.....
One of an Oregon junco...a little black headed, pink sided, seedeater that lives year round in large parts of Oregon...usually stays in flocks...happy little birdies...at least they make people happy to see them flitting around. I want to do a water color of the bottom sketch tomorrow for a card. I remember my first biology class in college...I was excited to be able to learn the names of all the little birds in my yard....then I discovered the teacher called them all dickey birds. I was flabbergasted...some education...haha.

This is all the art I did today...has not been a blue ribbon day. First, I didn't sleep a wink last night, so I couldn't make it to the computer club meeting this morning.....I guess the social committee went all out and it was decorated in Halloween splendor.....with lots of candy and goodies...dang. The 50/50 was the largest in months...almost 75 dollars which I'm sure I'd have won if I'd been there...haha.
Then Jack comes home from shopping at Costco and he had a $450 dollar ticket because his handicap parking ticket expired 4 days ago....yikes...He can appeal, but not in town. It was another county so he has to go there and only on certain days. In finding that out, he discovered his driving licence had expired too...we didn't get the heads up they usually mail out. Anyway, this time he has to have proof he's not a terrorist or alien so he digs out his birth certificate...which of course they won't accept. It's signed by everybody but the angels and has a huge gold seal of approval....but that's not good enough for them. Nor the fact that he's held a valid licence in this state for over fifty years.
So he contacts...or tries to contact the city and building where they are keeping something better for him....but got lost in the telephone maze when he had to start typing his name...backwards...Hentges, G, John using the key pad. He did learn it would cost $20 to get this copy even though I think no person will be involved....he didn't have anyone on the phone...just numbers. I think they'll accept all the info...then call up the copy from the basement...send it out via email, all electronically......and collect twenty bucks...I don't know....I'm going to do it for him tomorrow on the internet.
So, then I went down to the DMV to find out what I would need although I don't need to renew for five years. They didn't like my birth certificate either....that precious little piece of yellow paper with the seal and the signatures of my oh so young mother and father...the paper I've been guarding for over half a century...nope...ain't worth nuthin' lady. BUT...I have a passport so naah naah naah.
There's more but I'm tired of talking about it....I want to go back to the fifties thank you.....or back to bed might do, too.

colored pencil on 140lb hotpress watercolor paper .

..couldn't get it all on scanner.
Billie Jean
Billie Jean is up for adoption but you have to go to Arkansas to get her.

3 overripe bananas means banana nut bread.
what's not good for you? eggs...bananas...milk...nuts...

I cut a slice into quarters because no one has ever been able to find any calories in such a tiny piece, so it's safe to eat.

come on over

graphite on watercolor hotpress

Perfect day today. Did exactly what I wanted to while it drizzled outside. Messed around...watched my soaps...drew this horse....made a carrot and raisen salad, pea soup, and cornbread for dinner.

They tell you to learn when to quit on a drawing, but on a pencil drawing I don't want to quit. How simple my life would be if I'd rid myself of all my colored pencils and watercolors and simply worked with a pencil...it's my favorite.

I get so irritated with Blogger. So many times I can't access my blog to work on it. They throw me on a page to begin a new blog and they won't take my password. Don't ever ask them what your password is unless you're a whole lot smarter than the average bear. Finally after about the 15th time, using the same password, they let me in. Fie on them! A hex on them! May bleach splash on all their clothes tomorrow.

colored pencil on lordyknowwhat

done many a year ago and never dated

This was done for a children's book I had in mind. Several...many postings ago I talked about some Canadian Geese I was privileged to help raise and I thought it would make a great story....I had tons of pix of the geese...and the story had a great beginning, middle, and end.

I did three illustrations and couldn't do any more.

I've always wanted to illustrate children's books and it was painful to finally realize I just didn't have the stick-to-it-iveness to do a big project. Well...sticking to it wasn't the problem...it was just total lack of interest...it just disappeared.

The babies' nest was ruined and the survivors hatched under a blackberry bush in the rain...after the eggs had rolled down a bank. This picture was to illustrate a bedraggled baby. I look at it now and want to get going on it again.

It's been at least ten years, and if I had finished only one picture a year I'd be almost done.

Like Gilda Radner said, "I base most of my fashion taste on what doesn't itch."..........hmm, naah, that doesn't fit.

How about when she said, "I'd much rather be a woman than a man. Woman get to wear cute clothes and be first rescued off a sinking ship."....nope...still not right.

How about, "Dreams are like paper, they tear so easily".

graphite and colored pencil on Bristol
Charme
This is a Haflinger mare who lives with Gail at
http://gailatthefarm.blogspot.com/
Since she is a much loved pet who receives a lot of attention, and a horse I've never seen, I hope this drawing isn't too far off.

There are many horse stories from around the world telling when and where a certain group of people first saw these animals, and one of my favorites is about Egypt and the Hyksos.
Hyksos is just a name given these Asiatic people who seemed to have appeared out of nowhere. They swarmed over the hills and descended down on the quiet peaceful people living along the Nile. And the startling thing was they drove horses pulling chariots.
The Egyptians had never seen a chariot, a horse, nor the composite bow used to kill them. While ducking the arrows from this modern war bow, the survivors fell in love with the horses..... who wouldn't? .....(well, my husband wouldn't) and they eventually learned to handle both horse and chariot better than the Hyksos.
So, although the Hyksos stayed to rule the land for awhile, I think the Egyptians came out ahead.
I wish someone would write an historical novel about this period of time. The wonder and amazement of seeing their first horse ever...plus chariots, probably fastened the Egyptians to the sand, their mouths open in awe and wonder, making the invasion a slam dunk.
I'm guessing now....(I know more about the Hyksos than the historians do...haha.)

colored pencil on hot press watercolor paper
Wanda
This drawing is really twice as big...includes another window and much more of the couch, but I couldn't stand to put down one more pencil stroke I was so sick of it. I should know by now I cannot do big pieces...I don't have the patience...already I'm thinking about the next drawing and my fingers are itching to get at it....and my mind has left this one. After a couple of things are done...like the face and the folds...and they turn out ok, then the rest is just work. You don't think Michelangelo painted the whole Sistine Chapel do you? ha! He finished up those pesky cherub eyes and the peons filled in the rest....(hang around for more history facts)

When I was fifteen I had a cat named Cinderella. A few days before Cindy was to have her first litter of kittens she began looking for a place to have them. I thought it was curious and interesting how she went about it.
She searched every nook and cranny for the best nesting place. If I opened a dresser drawer and turned my back she'd be up in it, rooting around. "Oh, no you don't", I'd tell her, putting her back down on the floor. But if my bedroom was where she wanted to be, so be it, and I put a box, with a bit of a blanket, near the dresser.
But off she bounced to investigate the yard... flowery corners or dark caves under bushes.....and I followed with the nursery box. There didn't seem to be any pattern to the places she scoped out. And I patiently...well, scratch that...not so patiently followed with my box.
One day I came home from school...no Cindy...and I knew she had finally had her babies....I looked everywhere.....ev ver ree where.
It was my mother who finally found her. Cindy had those babies in an open keg of nails out in the garage....right on the nails!
Mommy and babies were just fine. We transferred them to the back porch, but she moved them again back to the garage... not the keg.
Eventually I won, and she stayed on the back porch.
She definitely was not the sharpest nail in the keg.

a gray day...rain is pattering in the bird bath, but my new yellow chrysanthemums are shining out like sun in the garden. A little red headed woodpecker is hanging upside down on the suet feeder filling his little gullet with fat for the cold weather. I'm home alone. I feel like making oatmeal cookies.
Nuts, raisens, cinnamon, cloves, eggs, brown sugar, rolled oats...what's not good for you?
Fun to make...too bad I have to throw them all out.
(You certainly weren't planning on eating them, were you Pat?)
Shall I eat
or shall I not
I knew the rules
But I forgot