We’re in that betwixt and between season… only the daylilies are blooming here.
Hemerocallis ‘Catherine Woodbury’.
Originally I planned to use only peach and pink daylilies but as the years pass I see other colors sneaking in. If you look closely at the upper right you can see a yellow bloom… hmmmm… who are you?
It’s time for Photo Friday… ooops! I mean Saturday! Here’s part of what’s blooming in my garden today.
This is Hemerocallis Rosy Returns… a lovey reblooming daylily that lives just outside my front stoop. Fragrant too!
I am a victim of poor record-keeping, self-inflicted of course… I think this is Hemerocallis Heidi Eidelweiss. She’s a tall girl and looks fabulous against my dark brown house!
I should have pulled this volunteer parsley plant when it first appeared but I have a weakness for their Queen Anne’s Lace-like blooms… shown here arching over the Hakonechloa.
So… I’m sorry I’m late but I was out and about yesterday, sketching and painting with two delightful artists… now friends… I met through Sketchbook Skool! More on that later!
Have a great weekend!
It’s the first Friday of JULY! Oh my… the weeks are going so fast!
Here’s my Endless Summer Hydrangea with blooms in various stages of development. I’m taking this as a sign that this’ll be a good year. Some years it turns out to be more of an “Endless Bummer” as my friend says… she’s had horrible luck with hers.
It bloomed better once I learned to prune back the dead stems only after the new growth had started… looks ugly ’till then but it pays off in the end.
The Astilbe are just starting to bloom too. I have them in a range of colors but the pinks are always the first!
Have a wonderful Fourth of July!
Today I joined our plein air group at Lake Runnemede in Windsor, Vermont. The plan was to paint the expanse of waterlilies against the distant mountains… that’s Ascutney in the distance.
Don’t you love the cloud reflections in the water?
There’s a resident family of Canada geese and after some discussion they decided to form a conga line directly across the lily pads.
After Monday’s post I kept thinking of why I keep my sketchbook-journal and remembered this piece of wisdom from Julia Cameron I wrote on the page where I played with my watersoluble inks.
So much of the adventure of the life we lead rushes past us in a blur. Velocity is the culprit. Velocity and pressure. A sketchbook freezes time. It is an instantaneous form of meditation focusing us on the worth of every passing moment. So often the great adventure of life lies between the lines, in how we felt at a certain time and at a certain place. This tool will help you remember and savor the passing parade.
—Julia Cameron, Walking in this World: The Practical Art of Creativity
We all have an inner critic, the IC, that noxious voice getting in the way of your artistic progress. What we need is a way to retrain our critic to critique the work instead.
As an example I’ll show you a spread I made a few weeks ago while out with my Thursday plein air group. They’re all fine artists and at every excursion I talk to myself………………. Do. Not. Compare.
It has issues, my IC sees the mud, the poorly defined tree mass and the random scratchy lines in the chairs. Is that helpful? Not really. As I critique the piece I register that as I created this piece I hurried my lines… I needed to look… really look and slow down. My trees have nice trunks but again, I rushed. Breathe! It’ll still be there… what’s the rush?
A good critique also reflects on the pieces that DO work. I managed to capture the depth within the barn and the stacked feed bags.
Practice! The more work you create the looser the hold your inner critic has on you. I remember that day clearly. As I sat painting and chatting, I savored the sun, the beautiful breeze, freshly picked sweet strawberries and especially the pleasant camaraderie of a morning spent with friends.
Every time I see this I will remember it all… and my critic has been banished!
Color in the garden doesn’t always come from blossoms. Take this ab-so-lutely fabulous shrub… it’s a cypress. Chamaecyparis pisifera ‘Sungold’.
I couldn’t leave without showing my pink spirea. You can see it on the far left in the first image. Spiraea japonica ‘Dakota Goldcharm’. I can’t tell you how many photos I took trying to catch one of the bees on a blossom. I took a video showing the multitude of bees buzzing about… and if I can figure out how to save and upload I’ll be sure to share!
Every Day Matters. Along with it’s corollary, Every Day in May, is it the only art challenge I’ve ever stuck with. I admit to being a softie for this challenge, back in 2012, sketching items on this list helped me cement a daily art practice. Although I no longer need a prompt to inspire daily drawing, I still enjoy capturing my every day life by working through the list in my journal.
Be here now. Because really…
Every Day Matters!
Since I finished my latest sketchbook this morning I wanted to upload my EDM – Every Day Matters pages when I noticed I hadn’t uploaded my work from my way back in February! So… first things first…
I’m working my way up to number 328… good thing there’s not a deadline! See the entire list here at Danny Gregory’s site.
Mid June brings out the lovely blooms of my Azalea ‘Pink and Sweet’. Never has there been a name more apropos, the scent is divine. Where’s Smell-O-Vision when we need it?
Don’t you just love that blush of gold and those little filaments on the buds?
… and those long stamens and pistil? (don’t be impressed… I had to look them up.)
Dana Burrell... Art 