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I sketched and painted cars twice already in 2006, so for this challenge I decided to use my Grandson Henry's toy New York City checker cab. Since I will soon start my yellow month, as part of the Color Project that I am doing, it was exciting to get an early start.
March was the month for me to explore mixing green watercolor paints. I continue to use Winsor-Newton tube paints and have a cool and warm color for red (alizarin crimson/cadmium red), blue (French ultramarine/winsor blue), and yellow (winsor lemon/cadmium yellow). I also use burnt sienna, burnt umber, and neutral tint to expand the color choices. It was fun to move from blue (January color) and red (February color) to green because mixing a secondary color before changing it further took more mixing and experimentation. I try to choose items for this project to expand my color range and then to replicate the actual color to the best of my ability. For new members of the EDM group, exploring one color for an entire month was inspired by Laura (of Laurelines) and I am now only one of several members who have followed her lead.
I found another tree that is no longer dormant on the block that I walk between my office and parking garage. Most of each of the branches are red or red brown and the largest of the buds are only 1/4" maximum. The buds are extremely complex when viewed with a magnifying glass (see separate sketch of buds at the bottom). There are 4 petal-like structures and where they are open you can see 8 or more circular structures that are darker in color. Each one of them is barely larger than the tip of a pin. The buds are arranged in fours - around the stem - or as a pair on opposite sides of the stem. I decided to watch this tree change over the next few weeks and then to try to ID the tree type. My walk is more interesting since I now have a sweet gum tree and this unknown tree to observe over time.
Those who know me might have said that the appearance of "PEEPS" on the grocery store shelves heralded the arrival of my spring. When I left for work, with a wind chill of 15 degrees, on Monday AM, I seriously considered sketching and painting two boxes of Peeps for this challenge. Today, however, one of a long row of sweet gum trees that line the block between my office and parking garage was definitely "blooming" with multiple 3/4" buds along each branch. All of the other trees in my neighborhoods look dormant. My other favorite signs of spring are the many beds of tulips that bloom all along the streets and in the flower beds in the city - a wild profusion of colors. The tulip plants are approximately 4-6" in height today and many actually look like mutants! Did they always look so twisted and deformed? I will have to inspect them daily to watch them flower to answer that question.
I also brought home a sweet gum seedball that was lying with hundreds of others below the trees. Laura's paintings inspired me and my husband challenged me to TRY to sketch and paint my own. I really think they are works of art all by themselves.
I never wear hats, so for this challenge I thought that I would try to capture my earmuff collection. I have black, red, and brown earmuffs to go with my winter coats. I prefer a firm velvet-covered strip to go across my head and fur muffs for my ears. The black and brown pairs are smooth fur, the red pair resembles a rough shearling. I'm so afraid that I will lose my black pair (I do live in New York City where black is a primary color!) that I even have a spare black pair that still have their price tag in place. I wasn't at all sure how to capture the fur texture in an ink-watecolor wash piece, so I experimented some.