Faeries

This was faerie night at AFK Drink and Draw.  They were so exuberant!  They threw flower petals everywhere!  The costumes were fun to draw and they did good poses.

These were not meant to be a pose for sketches, just messing around.

Link, Evangeline, Heather

First, the 2-5 minute sketches.  These are just a couple examples of the 5 I did.

LJ called this Faerie Tails!  They were all bent over in a huddle so all we could see were backsides and wings!  :)

Heather

Evangeline

Link

And at the end they harassed a human… I didn’t draw this pose either

AFK is running a drink special all week in honor of Spock (and Leonard Nimoy’s death)

Odd Signs

There is a newly built McDonald’s in my area.  It doesn’t have the large Golden Arches sign.  I don’t remember that I’ve ever seen one without (well, except in Europe).   This one has a huge and somewhat creepy Ronald McDonald on the roof.

Then I drove over to Georgetown to sketch a sign I saw on Saturday.  It is across the street from Packaging Specialties

Spock is not dead

In case you’re not a geek or didn’t hear, Leonard Nimoy died Friday at the age of 83, of COPD.  It was a sad day for us geeks.  I’ve been wearing my TOS Science Officer badge with a black band since then.

I watched TOS in high school on a black and white TV.  (For those who don’t speak geek: TOS = The Original Series).  Nimoy’s portrayal of Spoke meant so much to me as a teenager. In TOS, it was Spock with whom I most identified.  I never particularly liked Kirk.  As many of my (geeky) friends have said, his character – and how he portrayed him – was a role model for those of us who felt we didn’t fit in.

In Seattle, we’re fortunate to have the Science Fiction Museum (attached to the EMP – Experience Music Project), largely funded by Paul Allen and blessed with many items from his collection.   The museum announced that in honor of Leonard Nimoy, on this weekend only, they would display the costume tunic he wore as Spock during TOS.  So, of course, I wanted to go see it.

I went at opening time, thinking it wouldn’t be very crowded.  I took a number of photos and then I was able to do a sketch.

Spock is not dead.  Live Long and Prosper.  Leonard Nimoy did both.

There are a bunch more photos here, including some in the lobby for the Star Wars exhibit.  I still want to see that but today wasn’t the day.

Leather Journal

On Saturday morning (28 Feb), I attended an Italian Leather Journal Making demo with Janice Berkebil at the main Seattle store of Daniel Smith.  I’m already signed up for the all day workshop but I wanted a preview.

Janice showed how to chose papers for the journal and how to fold and tear them in preparation for sewing into signatures in the journal.

intricate way to tie the closure strap

People in the demo said that waxed linen thread is available at Packaging Specialties in Georgetown.  They’re at 5^th and Michigan (515 S. Michigan St.Seattle, WA 98108).  I expected a boring store that sold cardboard boxes.  Was I wrong!

It’s bright, colorful and full of decorative and clever ways to package gifts and other items.  It more than compensates for the loss of PaperZone in that regard.

The waxed linen thread, used to sew the signatures and books:

There is also a bin that is sold at 50 cents a yard, rather than by the whole spool.

There are lots of plain tins for making small watercolor palettes, @$1.25

I’ll be back!

Wintergrass

The Friday ad hoc group met for the 2nd annual outing to Wintergrass, a bluegrass music festival in Bellevue, WA.

Though it took an hour to drive to the location, I was there enough early to start a sketch while awaiting others.  This is the Wintergarden atrium.  There are comfortable chairs and very tall bamboo plants, still with the red lanterns from Chinese New Year.

This is a composite of various groups of musicians.  The two standing on the right were actually together.  But then they stopped playing and the group broke up so I couldn’t get the rest of them.  The same happened with the man on violin.  I decided I could squeeze in one more musician if I could find one sitting down.  I wandered the hall until I found one!

I’ve been drawing from live, short-pose, costumed models at AFK Drink and Draw every week.  The practice had noticeable effect today as I am now able to draw people quickly.

Got to talking with a vendor who asked about the sketching we are doing at the gathering.  I showed them this one and she said, “That’s Cliff!”  She recognized the man on the right from the sketch!  It helped that he has long white hair and beard.  She said he’s a well know teacher.

My final sketch is a vendor.  This is Gary, a mandolin maker in Renton!  It’s  Cedar Mountain Mandolin Company.  It’s not so good a portrait as he was moving a lot, talking with customers.  The mandolins held still, though!

We gathered in the Wintergarden Atrium again to share sketches and have a group photo.

Left to right:  Vivian (new, from Stephanie Bower’s “Good Bones” workshop last weekend!), Natalie, Tina, Lynne (back), Kate (me; front), Gwen, Nilda, Nancy.

After the outing, most of us had lunch together there. Then I went over to the UW bookstore.  It’s smaller than the main one.  I saw this display with all of Gabi’s books, the post card set (from the Urban Sketching book) and some appropriate supplies.

I was looking for a particular paper.  I had a very nice chat with Tom, the art supplies expert at the store.  When he referenced Roz Stendalh, I recognized a kindred spirit! I also learned I could have ordered any art supplies I needed from the tiny UW bookstore at Renton Landing for delivery there from the main store!  Unfortunately, this knowledge comes too late as the store has closed.

A few more photos, here.

Firewire

Despite being kinda tired out after all day at Sew Expo, I went to Drink and Draw last night.  The model’s aka was “Goldfish” and she was dressed as a character in a comic local to San Francisco, called “Firewire”.

She wore headphones

Don’t know her name or whether she was dressed as a character, but a friend also posed for us:

I finished the sketchbook.  I was tired. So I left early, before the last round of longer poses.

Sew Expo

What does this huge fabric show have to do with sketching?  There are two connections.    I spend the entire day at Sew Expo at the Puyallup Fairgrounds.  This thing is massive, with a capitol M.  People come from all over the country.  The person I met who came the furthest came from Atlanta, GA!

This is the first connection:  My very first stop when I arrived at 0845 was the Pacific Fabrics booth to buy 2 panels of the fabric designed by Chandler O’Leary,  a Tacoma Artist.  There was no one at the booth yet and so I had no waiting!  She’s also an Urban Sketcher and has a wonderful blog about her travel sketches, Drawn the Road Again.

Here is a photo, taken later, of the panel and a couple closeups:

The second connection is this fabric, which looks to me like a watercolor palette!  I wasn’t going to buy any more fabric, but this was just too perfect!

See my photo host for more… and the Million Pillowcase challenge.  I added 13.

Georgetown, my favorite sketching neighborhood

After a visit to Daniel Smith Seattle, I stopped in Georgetown for a sketch.  There are still so many spots I want to sketch in this old, funky, neighborhood.   It was another beautiful sunny day of 55 degrees.  This is the Elysian Brewing Company.    Though they operate several restaurants, this is the location of their full production brewery.   I thought I should get a sketch done today as it’s supposed to start raining tomorrow and for the next few days.  Poor us… thinking of those still frozen and buried in snow in the Midwest and East!

The company sign is a bit of photo collage.

I was at Daniel Smith to pick up some supplies.  Look what I found:

This is a box of 100 postcards made from the sketches that appear in “Urban Sketching” book by Gabi Campanario, the founder of Urban Sketchers and the “Seattle Sketcher”.  I don’t think I knew about these before.  If I were going to the USk International Symposium on Singapore this year, it would be fun to have a set and get as many of them autographed as I could!

What a crowd!

Though the new Starbucks Roastery on Capitol Hill was quite full of people, it wasn’t the crowd with a line out the door and down the block we’d be warned against.  The Crowd today was the number of sketchers.  We were combined with a few people from Stephanie
Bower’s workshop.  The group was around 40.  It was hard to count with everyone moving in and out to look at sketches.

I came up on the bus.  On my way up to Starbuck, I saw this artist painting en plein air on the overpass.  The headphones are our signal that he doesn’t want to engage in conversation.

I was early as my bus only runs once an hour at the time I had to leave home. It may be unpatriotic but I really can’t stand Starbucks coffee. So I tried the black tea.  It was served in a rather fancy setting and it tasted good.

I’d previously sketched inside the place so today I sat next to the window and sketched the McMenamins Six Arms and the street up to the dome and facade of the First Covenant Church.

My plan for the main sketch outing was Melrose Market, as I’ve never been there.  However, by the time I got there, I was quite full of sketchers!

I found this quiet corner at a back stairs.  The cart had what appeared to be old arrangements and containers.

The day was sunny and 55 degrees.  I learned later that the wind chill in my home town area of Michigan is minus 24 degrees!  I’m glad to be here.  I sat for a few minutes outside on the street to sketch the facade of Starbucks.

By 1:30pm, Starbucks was too full to find a table big enough to share our sketches.  So we lined them up along the outside of the building.  They extended nearly half way down the block!

More photos here.

Tacoma Play Day #2

Yesterday, Urban Sketchers Tacoma held our second “Play Day”.   It is conceived as an orientation to the group for new members and a chance to play around with new media for sketching.

I gave a presentation about the on-line component of Urban Sketchers.   Here, I’m setting up the monitor (photo by Frances)

Over lunch, we had a “what’s in your bag” session.  Here is Frances

Darsie demonstrates his clever and unique “Field Easel Bag”

During the “play” part of the day, there was opportunity to try out new techniques and media.