Mirror Lake in the Uintas

Mirror Lake

It has been really hard this summer to find time to draw. There always seems to be someone who needs me, and I haven't made it down to my art room in awhile.  Until the past few days. When I finally was at the end of my sanity, I locked myself in my room for just one hour, and started this drawing. I felt SO much better afterwards. It was amazing. I could deal with all the things going on again and didn't feel so overwhelmed. Lesson to myself - drawing is therapy and I need to get proper doses of it.  Because I have done so many portraits lately, I decided to take a break and do something totally fun with no pressure. I wasn't kidding when I said I thought landscapes would be easier. I can't believe how much easier they seem. That being said, I see things I want to change or try next time, now that I am looking at this, but it was kind of a free exercise to see what I could do with my newer pastels and all of the techniques I have learned.  And, strangely enough, some of the techniques I learned for portraits helped with this. 

It took me a few days of locking myself in my room to get this done, but I did it. This is from a photo of Mirror Lake in the Uintas.  I took the photo 3 years ago and have wanted to draw it for a long time. I think it was a good one to try. 

Now I just have to decide what is next.  Portrait, landscape, or something else? 

My latest commission

This is what I have been working on lately. I have found that it is quite tricky finding time to draw now that my children are home all day. I have made a few arrangements that have helped, but I definitely get more done during the school year.  That being said, I enjoyed drawing these four children. We have known them from before the oldest was born. In some ways that makes it harder because I keep saying, "no, that isn't quite them yet... no, I don't think the eyes are right.... hmmm... that one looks too old..." etc. I actually got on an artist website (wetcanvas.com) and posted one of the drawings to get some feedback.  It was incredibly helpful, so I plan to post more on that site in the future.  It helps to get other eyes looking at it, and I had about 10 people comment with suggestions.

As for the rest of the summer, I don't plan to do as much art.  I will still welcome commissions, but I may not start them until mid August. That could change and surprise me, but we have a lot of  plans coming up and I don't really want deadlines at the moment. I have one other commission that is lined up, but I also have some projects of my own I want to try.  There is a landscape I want to try drawing.  Now that I have done faces, landscapes seem easy.  I don't say that to downplay landscapes, it is just that if you make the branch of a tree go at a slightly different angle, it still looks like a tree.  If you make eyes go at the wrong angle, it looks like a Picasso.  :)

Maybe I will work on some quilts this summer and post them here, or maybe I will post photographs from our adventures. We shall see... when I started this blog, I planned on posting all of my creative outlets.  I haven't done that for awhile.