Summer Dreaming

We’re hanging out just under 100 degrees right now here at my house and I’m planning on popsicles for dinner. Despite the discomfort, I’m glad that summer isn’t over yet. I’ll hold onto the warmth and daylight and plein air painting for as long as possible. I mean, my tomatoes are just starting to ripen!

Painted sitting under a pine tree on our 10 acre property, looking out over our neighbors’s fields toward the distant hills. Done EARLY in the morning.

It is sunflower season up here north of Spokane, which means that swarms of people are parked all along the roads and highways, trying to get selfies with the flowers. Sunflowers are one of my favorite flowers (They were my wedding flowers, in fact), but I find all this sunflower mania frustrating because people are not respecting private property and are trampling and damaging the flowers-even if they don’t break any flowers getting into the field, sunflowers have a very shallow root system and the repeated trampling is not good for them. If the fields get to be too much of a hassle to maintain or the farmers can’t make a profit with the damaged plants, then there won’t be any sunflower fields at all and that would make me SO SAD.

This particular field is not far from my in-laws so I was able to spot it pretty early on. It was easy to set up along the dirt road (outside the field) to paint.

There is a saying the sunflower faces follow the movement of the sun across the sky and that is true to some extent in wild and garden varieties, but the commercial variety has a thick neck and frequently gets stuck simply pointing east, which means that in many of the fields I’ve been seeing, the sunflowers have their backs to you. Still, there’s always a couple that break the mold!

My Canna Lily is blooming its heart out and I’ve been spending time in the early morning admiring the way the light falls through the leaves.

I’m working on a large painting of a wedding bouquet for a commission. The key flowers are red Gerberas so I bought myself a bouquet and did some studies-first a quick sketch in the case of this painting and a more involved painting, as in below.

Couldn’t resist doing a purple shadow!

This is a painting of the Aer O Toaster, a large neon sculpture that hangs in the Spokane International Airport in Baggage Claim. After I did a quick sketch of it, early this year, the artist Ken Yuhasz commissioned me to do a painting for him. It was an utter delight.

Hope that you are all doing well and getting to enjoy the beautiful place we live in in whatever capacity you can.

Manito Park

Manito Park was one of the first places that I got introduced to in Spokane when I came here for college. 90 acres of gardens, trails, and grassy areas for ponds (not to mention the duck pond and the incredible Gaiser Conservatory) make it a landmark destination, worth visiting over and over again. I have picnicked in the lilac gardens in Spring, admired the flaming maple foliage of the Japanese Garden in the fall and strolled the formal pathways of the Duncan Gardens in the summer. I think my favorite garden is the Joel E. Ferris Perennial Garden. There is such a wide variety of plants that there is always something new to look at and I admit to doing bit of window shopping, "Ooo! Could I grow that in my yard?". Luckily the Friends of Manito Park have their twice yearly plant sale in June and September where you can buy many of the plants found in the garden. 

One of the beds in the Joel E. Ferris garden. So many different foliage shapes!

Subjects that are back lit are always fun to paint!

The Gaiser Conservatory is a favorite refuge of mine during the colder months of the year. I get desperate to see living things and wandering through the tropical jungle and dry desert areas under the conservatory glass are just the boost of warmth and light I need on a gray, cold, February day. 

I stared up toward the roof of the conservatory to sketch this tall tree.

You can see the shade cloth the staff put over the conservatory to keep the plants from frying in the hot Spokane summers. It is very pleasant inside even when temperatures outside climb.

A wall of orchids!

The dry, desert side of the conservatory. I love the large cacti and agave!

Here, the garden is still slightly shaded in the morning light.

The Duncan Garden is laid out geometrically, a formal sunken garden. Planted in a "carpet bedding" style, the overall effect is of a dramatic abstract painting, masses of color offset by the repetition of green hedging and embellished with a fountain and rotunda.

My pen sketch of the garden before adding paint. I used a Pentel Pocket brush pen, which I am madly involved with.

So much color! It was a joy to paint!

While sketching at the park, I had to stop in at the Rose garden to admire all of the different rose varieties in bloom. On weekends it is a popular place for weddings.

This rose was leaning on a pillar of the white arbor that is so popular for wedding and prom photos.

I love the broken color on this flower.

A path going away, tempting me to see what is around the corner.

Instead I resisted and made this painting!

Painting and sketching in Manito was a delightful way to spend the morning. I envy the people who make walking in the park part of their daily routine. It is so beautiful and there is such variety among the gardens and landscape that there is always something new to see! I need to return and do some painting in oils soon!

Spring Wildflowers at Dishman Hills Conservancy

One of my favorite places to visit in spring time is the Dishman Hills Conservation District. The first time I drove out there, I was surprised by the nearness of the car dealerships on Sprague, skeptical that a wonderland of hiking trails could actually exist cheek by jowl with the rows and rows of shiny SUVS. Luckily I was wrong. Once I strode up the trail, away from the parking lot, it was like I had stepped through the wardrobe and into Narnia-dappled sunlight under tall trees, enormous boulders, deep glades, and most of all-wildflowers. Arrow leaf balsamroot being my favorite. They look like yellow daisies with a large arrow shaped (hence the name) soft leaves. They covered the hills and fanned out along the trails. So now, every spring, I got to Dishman Hills to spend some time with my favorite wildflowers. Having such a beautiful area so close to the center of Spokane is a treasure. Get out there and explore!

If you'd like to learn more about the Dishman Hills Conservancy and their worthy cause, check out their website http://www.dishmanhills.org/. They have regular expert led hikes covering topics such as butterflies, geology, and  yes, wildflowers. Hiking and trail information is on the website. 

Hiking trails in the Dishman Hills are winding and exploratory.

Hiking trails in the Dishman Hills are winding and exploratory.