More lettering fun!

Just a quick post today as I'm feeling very tired. 

I've been in a fair bit of pain with my back this past week...

The walk around the lake last weekend aggravated it. 

I have managed to do a little more for my class homework. 

This homework was all about lettering inside a shape. 

Can you see the heart shape below? 

The heart shape below isn't quite as pronounced as the one above but it is there.
The heart is shorter and wider.

We also did an appropriate quote inside a shape. 

I'm having so much fun with the creative letter play. 

I would definitely recommend Andrea Joseph's Creative Lettering class.  

It includes 4 weeks of daily lessons apart from weekends. 

I still have some homework to catch up on so lots to do. 

These were done with a fine liner, ballpoints pens and a little colouring pencil 

in my A5 Moleskine sketchbook.

Linking up to Sunday Sketches again. 

Check out this week's other participants HERE.

Sketching and lettering fun!

I finally finished the double page spread in my Moleskine A4 watercolour journal.  The full spread is 58.4cm/23" across both pages.  I have been working on it here and there between the Sketchbook Skool Creative Lettering class videos and the subsequent homework.  I'm still behind on homework but I love that the classes are available indefinitely so there is plenty of time to catch up.  The lettering class is amazing and I'm already implementing some of the ideas into my journal.

I adore pelicans!  

While I love ALL birds, the pelican would have to rate in my top five favourites. 

Linking up with Sunday Sketches again and I'm actually on time this week! 

To see the sketches from other participants, click HERE.

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Now, onto some of my Sketchbook Skool Creative Lettering homework from the past week. 

I can't tell you enough how much I'm enjoying the class. 

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The weather was lovely today so we went for a drive to Forest Lake.  We stopped along the way to pick up some lunch at Zambreros Mexican restaurant...my favourite dine-in or take-away!  Their vegan burrito bowls are SO yummy!  Jalapenos and lots of spicy Verde sauce for me...LOVE their Verde sauce! I took this photo of one a while back. 

Another reason I love Zambreros is that, for every burrito or bowl you buy, they donate a meal to someone in need.  How lovely is that?!  This was a photo I took of their wall earlier in the year  so the amount of meals given would be much more now. 

There was lots to see at the lake and I will share more pics in my next post but I just HAD to share a few of the cygnets with their parents!  It's the first time I have seen baby swans in person.  And look at that, I even caught an ibis coming in to land and didn't realise it until I looked back on the photo later. Cool!

These cygnets were a decent size but they still had a soft down instead of adult feathers.
They were SO darned cute!

I will post the rest of the Forest Lake photos in my next post.
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Today is Father's Day here in Australia and

 it's my second Father's Day since my Dad passed away.
I still hear his voice in my head a lot,
especially him singing songs.

I miss him every day.
Love you, Dad xo

Sketches, pens and pencils...

No urban sketches this week but I have been sketching other things, namely myself. 

I have fallen woefully behind with the Sketchbook Skool klasses 

so I'm desperately trying to catch up.
Back in Week 2 of this semester,

Koosje's lessons encouraged us to do some self-portraits.

I sketched this one with a Derwent coloured pencil 

while looking at my reflection in a mirror. 

A couple more sketches below.

Top right - Sketched from a photo of me using mechanical pencil.

Bottom right - A contour sketch done with a continuous line 

in pen.  We weren't allowed to lift the pen from the paper 

until the sketch was finished.  

I did mine very fast while looking in the mirror. 

I had so much fun with this particular exercise.

Jumping ahead to Week 5,
we have Andrea Joseph as our teacher.
Andrea is Queen of the Ballpoint Pen!
A quick way to loosen up -
write a favourite quote in various ballpoint pen colours.

Speaking of pens,
I wasted a lot of time the other day
searching high and low for my PITT calligraphy pens.
I eventually found them but
I realised that I needed to do something
to make it easier to find particular pens.
These are just some of my pens.

Now they are categorised into this small drawer unit
which I've yet to label but at least I now know where particular pens are
when I need them.

I still have homework to do for part of Danny Gregory's klass,
as well as for Brenda Swenson's and Cathy Johnson's klasses.
Wish me luck!

Lastly, a couple of quick pen sketches in my A6 pocket Holcroft quad-rule sketchbook.

Linking up with Sunday Sketches and Artists Play Room today.

Sketching raisin toast

Happy Sunday to you! 

Today actually felt like Saturday to me for some reason. 

I guess I always lose track of days when Aaron is on school holidays.

I did a bit of homework for Sketchbook Skool today. 

Danny Gregory is teacher for this first week of second semester. 

Yet another awesome klass!

My homework - A slice of raisin toast. 

I used PITT pens in various widths and colours -

 dark sepia, black, raw umber, green gold and sanguine - 

in my Moleskine A5 sketchbook.

Linking up to Sunday Sketches and Artists Play Room this week.

My kitchen rules....

I was thrilled to go back to skool this morning. 

Danny Gregory was teacher for the first week of 

the 'SEEING' course at Sketchbook Skool. 

I can't wait to get started on homework but first, 

I needed to finish my homework from the first semester. 

Tommy Kane was such an AWESOME teacher! 

He's a detail man when it comes to sketching so 

that suited me perfectly. 

He also likes to work directly in pen...

me too!

One of our homework assignments was to sketch our kitchen. 

So, this morning, I pulled up a chair and got to work 

on a double page spread in my Moleskine A5 sketchbook...

I had already started adding watercolour when I'd realised that

I hadn't taken a photo of just the plain black and white sketch 

so there is a little colour on this one.

After the initial pen sketch,

I did a watercolour wash....

Then a little coloured pencil for more emphasis....

I'm not sure that I'm fully finished with it yet....
but I did enjoy the process.

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I recently bought a Holcroft Artist's A6 Travelling Journal
at Riot's Arts and Crafts.
It has a flexible Italian-made cover,
 160 pages of acid-free, recycled, quad-ruled, 120gsm paper.
And just like a Moleskine,
it has a pocket for ephemera at the back of the journal,
 a place marker ribbon,
and an elastic enclosure belt.

My first page spread below.

It handled my Uniball Vision ELITE ink pen very well without any bleed-through.
It did buckle quite badly with the wet media but dried reasonably flat,
 also no bleed-through with the watercolours.
All in all, it handled similar to my Moleskine sketchbooks...
but maybe a little more accepting of watercolours.
I think I'm going to enjoy playing in this journal
especially for fast, daily sketches.

Today, I'm linking up to Paint Party Friday.

Sketchbook Skool

Over the past six weeks, I've been attending skool...
Sketchbook Skool to be exact.

Sketchbook Skool is an online course for sketchbook artists of all skills,
 from Beginners right through to Advanced.

Sketchbook Skool - the film from DannyGregory on Vimeo.

Their first semester is called 'Beginnings'
and you can read more about it or sign up for it HERE.

This course encouraged us to
step outside of our comfort zone and try new things.

It encouraged us to make sketching a part of our daily lives.

It gave us access to a fabulous online community of like-minded artists.

The course teachers were absolutely AMAZING!!  

Week 1 - Danny Gregory 

Week 2 - Koosje Koene 

Week 3 - Prashant Miranda

Week 4 - Jane LeFazio

Week 5 - Roz Stendahl 

Week 6 - Tommy Kane

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I had seen Danny's 'Art of Breakfast' video once before but, this time around,

I felt inspired to sketch one of my own favourite breakfasts. 

My first time using a dip pen in my journal, not to mention contour drawing too.

Medium - Pen and watercolour 

Paper - Moleskine 5" x 8" journal

Below, is Danny's 'The Art of Breakfast' video,
just one of the wonderful things we were treated to in his klass.

The Art of Breakfast: a film about Danny Gregory from DannyGregory on Vimeo.


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 Koosje's klass was wonderful too.
She took us out on location to do some sketching.
I feel it tied in well to my own recent outings with the Urban Sketcher's Brisbane group.
This was a sketch I did during one of those sketch-outs.
Sorry, not the best lighting on the day I took the photo of my sketch.


Medium - ZIG Millennium 005 pen and PITT 'Shades of Grey' pens.
Paper - Moleskine watercolour notebook approx. 5" x 8"

Koosje also offered some tips on using coloured pencils and gave a great demo too.
I confess that I still haven't managed to do all of my homework for her klass yet
but I'll post my efforts here when I do.

In the meantime,
here is a coloured pencil demonstration by Koosje
shared from her YouTube channel.




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Prash's klass was a sheer delight!
I fell in love with his happy-go-lucky attitude from the start.
He spoke about his love of journalling
and how it has become an integral part of his life.
I want to achieve that too.
You all know I've whined often enough about finding time
to develop a habit of daily sketching in my journals.
Prash reignited that desire within me so now I'm more determined than ever.
I loved his watercolour demo and all that he shared with us.

Here is one of Prash's videos that I came across on his blog.
In this video, Prash takes us on his sketching tour of incredible India.


Madhya Pradesh - The heart of incredible India from luv kalla on Vimeo.


A bit of homework.

Below, a tree in the distance which I sketched from my backyard;
I was practising gradation of the sky.

Medium - Pen and watercolours 
Paper - Moleskine watercolour notebook approx. 5" x 8"

Stay tuned!

Weeks 4, 5, and 6 to follow....