Reflecting on July

I was just sitting down to write my reflections and my kitten wanted to curl up inside my shirt. This is the most adorable thing ever, but this time it alerted me to her need for a bath. You'd be proud. I didn't get any large gashes this time. This has been the story of July. It has been all kitten baths and meltdowns over breakfast cereal. It has been a challenging month and I would ordinarily be hard pressed to remember the good moments. Thankfully, I can look back at my sketches and remember some really amazing moments... some with my kids and some without. 

My sister and I got out (no kids) and met up with the Bremerton Urban Sketching group #uskbremerton. This group is filled with wonderful, talented, and encouraging sketchers. They all have great stories to tell and this street even had its own story to tell. I wish I'd captured the seagull that made an unusual noise or the skateboarders that were constantly streaming down this one-way section of street.

Our church services moved back inside this month. It has come with its own set of challenges and you can see I've illustrated the hybrid zoom/ in-person service we've done. As a sketcher moving inside has been tough and i've struggled with picking a subject several times.

This was really the most amazing fourth of July. I met up with some family and our kids ran around and played on the beach and even got themselves pretty wet and salty. I didn't know that there would be an airshow with the Tacoma Narrows Bridges in the background. Such a treat!

The next day I went with my kids and husband to a park on the other side of the Narrows and started to sketch the bridges. Immediately and randomly my TWSBI Eco with Noodler's Ink Rome Burning started burping/blotching ink. I tried to make the best of it, but it took forever to dry and I even had to blot it the next day. Noodler's Ink bonds with cellulose and some of the thick spots didn't have any cellulose to bond with. Thankfully on Goulet Nation's Facebook page someone was having a similar problem. Air was getting into my pen and the suggestion of reseating my nib and feed unit did the trick.

I love our new house color! I might get to painting our exterior doors this weekend. The bubblegum pink color I picked out will hopefully be an amazing pop of color.

We would kind of be cheating if we called this an urban sketch. The cross wasn't really in the background of the flowers. It was in the room, but much farther off to the right. The mess of keyboard, microphones, speakers, and cords directly behind the flowers were not what I wanted to sketch that morning. I do like what I did with the stems under water. I used fountain pen on a wetted spot of paper.

We don't have the most architecturally interesting church, but I believe it was designed to be reminiscent of a barn. 

This is Sally's house. It had more rooflines than I had anticipated when I suggested we get together and I sketch her house. I let her keep it after I took a picture.

Then because I still wanted a sketch to bring home with me from the trip I did this fast sketch of Sally. It doesn't do her justice, but she did have a really cute hair flippy thing happening that day. There was a fun story behind her necklace. It was a souvenir that she had wanted, but didn't get. Years later she happened upon it second hand and snatched it up for a fraction of the price. Also, her lips are not large and red... but I thought large red lips would be fun.

This was another Bremerton Urban Sketching outing and I opted to do this plaque really close up.

This month I demonstrated that I really need to practice sketching people more.

I sketched my StablO portable easel for a review. Check that out here. I posted it up on instagram and I even recieved comments from StablO in France. They hadn't yet seen anyone use it with a spiral notebook the way I had. Very fun!

This church and the trash can below were both done at Kiwanis Park in Bremerton at another Bremerton Urban Sketchers meet up. I hadn't meant for the reliefs on the end of the church to look like music notes, but they look like they are. Also, the power lines look like a disorderly music staff.

I finished the month with a bang. I had day to myself and after I spent the morning screen printing, I headed out to downtown Port Orchard. Our family loves this clock tower on the town hall. The clock is partially broken and it is going to cost way too much to fix, it was all great to sketch. In order to get this view I had to set up on the sidewalk: lots of car traffic, but not much foot traffic.

On my way to find a rueben I spotted a couple of unusual masts in the distance in the marina. The Lady Washington was tied up! It was an amazing view for my dinner and it stayed long enough afterwards to sketch. I got lucky!