Autumnal Adventures!

I’m writing to you on rainy Sunday afternoon with a pot of tomato sauce bubbling on the stove and a pan of tomatoes roasting in the oven. We’re well into autumn and I’m still processing the leftovers of summer in the form of many slowly ripening garden tomatoes. I’m a busy bee right now and I have some exciting news I hope to share with you all soon, but in the mean time, here’s a little of what I’ve been up to art-wise in the past two weeks!

This painting is of the University District Pedestrian Bridge over on the East side of town. I had a good view of it while I was waiting to get into the Terrain show at the Jensen-Byrd Building on First Friday, which was a rainy night. I like the contrast of the white arch and the dark foliage and sky.

I also participated in the Monster Drawing Rally benefit for the Spokane Art School this past Friday. Artists work on a painting/drawing for one hour and at the end of the hour, the painting is auctioned off for $50 to benefit the School’s children programs. Last year, I was sweating bullets toward the end so I decided to do even more prep work this time. I went with some happy pumpkins, I’m not much of monster girl!

Autumnal color palette!

The final piece! Mixed media-watercolor, pastels, and gold ink for some extra sparkle!

October is also known as Inktober to many artists. Inktober is an international art challenge founded by Jake Parker where people draw to draw in ink every day for the whole month of October. You can use the official prompts or do whatever you want. Trying to squeeze in some drawing, I drew during this month’s Art Salvage board meeting with the kind indulgence of my fellow board members.

I love drawing people I know and parts of my daily life because when I look back at the sketchbook, it will take me back to this time in my life and the people who surrounded me. So valuable!

Silly robot doodle!

I’m honored to have my work decorating the poster for the Kantorei Choir’s “Grant Us Peace” concert at St. John’s. I feel like the peaceful atmosphere of the painting is such a good fit for the concert’s name!

Small explorations!

I started doing a series of small paintings (5” x 3”) for the Little Spokane River Artist Studio Tour and I’ve really been enjoying it.

Thanks to everyone who braved the snow and cold rain to come to the show by the way! All of us artists really appreciate it! The show went really well and I am hoping to do the show next year.

Had way too much fun painting this little garbage goat! I wasn’t surprised that he got snapped up right away!

Paintings inspired by the landscape around my home. The painting on the bottom left was inspired by photos I took on my drive home. I saw that, pulled over and then walked back to take photos and a very nice lady asked if I was ok and I was like, “”Everything is fine! Just an art emergency!”

The top painting came from photos taken at Lake Crescent near our campground from my trip earlier this summer. The bottom left is the Monroe Street Bridge and the painting on the right is also based on my drive home on an evening with a beautiful sunset.

Fall and spring scenes here. I had a lot of fun playing around with different mat colors to go with paintings.

My feature in the Spokane Coeur D’Alene Living Magazine this month is all about my love for beautiful fall foliage. The year I did this painting the Japanese Gardens stayed open a couple days longer than usual so we could all enjoy the fabulous colors of the leaves. I hope we have a beautiful leave display this year and that the surprise snow earlier this month didn’t put it off!

Sketching at the Spokane County Fair

I always enjoy visiting the Spokane County Fair. I explore all of the animal barns, check out the crafting section (special interest in knitting and quilting), and pop in to marvel at the GIANT pumpkins and towering sunflowers, before wandering off to eat something unhealthy on a stick. No rides for me, but I do enjoy watching them-all flashing lights and color. What is your favorite thing to do at the fair?

I came out of the animal barns to the rear view of the carnival rides. I loved the colorful tent and Ferris wheel and sat down right there to draw!

Amazing Eurasian Eagle Owl.

My September Spokane Coeur D’Alene Living Magazine column using sketches from a visit to the fair two years ago, pigs and a really fun bear ride where people climb into the cavity of the bears and ride around and around and around. No thank you for me, but cute to look at!

My animal sketches for this year at the Spokane County Fair. I forgot my stool so all of these were drawn standing up and color was added from memory while sitting on the bleachers. I always enjoy exploring the animal barns at the fair and the chance for an up close look at the different species. It can be challenging drawing a live subject but I feel like you learn so much more about the animal than you do when you draw from pictures.

GIANT PUMPKINS (that is all.)!

I will be at this show this year at Kay’s art studio! This is my favorite show of the year to visit so I’m so excited to be a part of it. An extra bonus is getting to snoop in the artists’s beautiful gardens and studios as well as ll the fabulous artists.

There I am in the fourth column! I hope to see you there!

Lake Crescent

One of the highlights of this summer was getting to make a quick foray up to the Olympic Peninsula with a dear friend. She was kind enough to share with me one of her treasured places-Lake Crescent. We had quite an adventure getting there (over 10 hours of travel for me) and tent sites can’t be reserved at the camp ground near the lake so when we finally got there after a major road closure, we found that the campground was full. Quick Googling found us another campsite not too far away and we were able to spend the night there and the next day, we woke up and had this view to look forward to. Lake Crescent in all its glory. Worth it!

My friend, Danielle, is an experienced camper. In fact, my first experience camping was when I was 10 years old with her family. While I pretty much never camp (This is the first time in nearly 5 years!), Danielle has carried on the tradition of camping and has picked up all sorts of outdoor skills and supplies. This is a tiny chimney style stove that she used to boil hot water to make us coffee and instant oatmeal one morning. Do you guys go camping?

This was the view from our campsite. I could see why this was Danielle’s favorite campground in the area! Lake Crescent is incredibly clear and I was fascinated by the way the color of the lake changed depending on the depth of the water. I painted this as the light shone through the trees and adorable duck families paddled by. A great memory.

Our campsite was just yards up from the lake front and we had a great view through the trees. We hung Danielle’s hammocks and we had our morning coffee and contemplation in them. I, of course, chugged my coffee and put it down so I could draw. These little stuff sack hammocks sure are fun and I can’t believe how easily you can set them up. I may have to buy one!

Danielle has a camping tradition of playing the ukulele and singing around the campfire after dinner (multi-talented, this friend of mine!). I painted this by the light of the dying campfire, using memory to mix colors. Her face should be much redder due to the fire, but I’m quite pleased with how it came out, especially the contrast between the warmer colors of her face and the cooler ones on her hand and uke where her phone screen light (for reading lyrics) shone up at her. Ah, the magic of camping!

In the grand tradition of National Parks, Lake Crescent has a historic lodge that’s heavy on the dark wood and has a giant fireplace. My favorite spot was the sun porch-windows all the way around with views of the lake and great light. I painted this while enjoying a mojito and it’s a miracle that I didn’t drink my paint water or put my brush in my mojito.

Photo credit: Danielle Curl

More camping adventures with Danielle doing the work and I sketch. 😄😝 I drew her progress from right to left across the pages and she started a fire with flint and tinder, split wood for smaller slivers and built the fire into something to cook our sausages on!

Photo credit: Danielle Curl

This is probably my favorite painting from the trip to Lake Crescent. This is the Devil’s Punchbowl, the deepest part of Lake Crescent. You can see down over 40 ft and that is not at all close to the bottom! It was cold, SO COLD, but also, so beautiful. Danielle lasted longer than me, you can see her swimming in the far right sketchbook page. Freezing to death, I got out of the water and onto a rock to make this painting using water from the lake. It was very windy so I had to clutch my supplies to keep them from blowing into the water, but on the plus side, I dried out quickly for our walk back to the car!

What’s been your favorite trip or adventure this summer?

Fall Art Classes with Megan

Hi Guys!

Here’s a quick update with the classes I’m teaching this fall at the Corbin Art Center and the Spokane Art School!

Garland Sketch Crawl

For students 14 years old and up

$20

Tuesday, September 10, 2019, 5-7 P.M.

Come sketch the fabulous landmarks of the Garland neighborhood with me. Learn to sketch on location and add color with watercolors, colored pencils or markers (your choice). Urban sketching is an art adventure!

Sign up here

Intermediate Watercolor

For adults

$120

Thursdays, 5-7 P.M.

September 12, 19, 26 and October 3, 10 & 17, 2019

Intermediate Watercolor Adventures!

Taken one of my classes or dabbled in watercolor before? This class will help you build on previously learned skills such as color mixing, making a wash, working wet in wet to help you capture subjects in an expressive, personal way.

Sign up Here

Daily Sketchbook

For adults

$80

Tuesdays, 5-7 P.M.

September 24 and October 1, 8 & 15, 2019

Want to have more creativity in your life? Learn tips and tricks for incorporating a daily sketchbook habit into your life. We’ll learn to compose on the page; draw from everyday objects and then paint in watercolors.

Sign up here!

And with the Corbin Art Center:

Drawing on Gratitude

10/03-10/24, Thursday

1:30-3:30 PM

$59

Read More Here

Introduction to Watercolor Painting and Beyond!

10/24-11/21, Thursdays

5-7 PM

$62

Read more here!

Recent Paintings!

I’ve been a busy bee, teaching classes, doing shows, and traveling, but I still managed to get into the studio to make some paintings recently!

I spotted this scene back in February while walking around downtown. I just love Garageland’s sign-how could I not paint it after that? And the Budweiser truck adds a great pop of color to a grey late winter’s day (painted in the sweltering heat of summer, imagining a chill in the air!)

I see this door every time I head down 2nd Ave to go to the galleries on Adams St and I just love how ornate it is. I’d love to know the history of this building. I know it is part of a historic district but not much else. Also the address is S 178 1/2 Howard St! 1/2! I do love a good address.

Did this painting of my aunt’s lake house while day dreaming about being back at Priest Lake. Moon rise on a warm summer’s evening.

More attempts to stay cool in the summer time by using my imagination (We don’t have air conditioning!). This is the Woman’s Club, on the lower South Hill. It’s a gorgeous little historic building and every November I do a holiday show there and while I’m trying to hold onto August with all I’ve got, I know that snow and winter is just around the corner.

My latest couple of features in the Spokane Coeur D’Alene Living Magazine! This one is June.

A painting of the North Hill Masonic Center, now a restaurant, that was featured in July’s Spokane CDA Living. You may have noticed that I like doors. This one caught my eye on my regular commute down Garland to teach classes at the Spokane Art School.

Next up: Adventures with a childhood best friend at Lake Crescent!

Arborcrest Art & Glass-This Weekend!~

I’ve been fortunate enough to have two different organizations to make a painting for their advertising and marketing. You have all seen my Kendall Yards Night Market Painting, but I thought I’d show you guys how it turned out when their graphic designer added all the event information to it. I had a lot of fun walking around Kendall Yards and seeing “my poster” up in all the store fronts!

In the studio with the original painting!

In the wild!

Arborcrest Art & Glass is another organization that reached out to me! I’m going to actually be at this show with all my paintings and prints AND my new calendar this Saturday and Sunday. I hope you guys will be able to come by and say hi!

The original painting. I so love the swooping swallows at Arborcrest. I stand close to the edge of the cliff and pretend that I’m soaring over the Spokane Valley with them.

I love how the poster came out! It’s a bit hard to tell in a photo but the designed pulled the yellow background in the bottom half of the poster from the paint I used on the yellow building. In person you can see the slight paint granulation creating texture behind the fonts. I love details like that!

Coming up next: Some of my recent paintings and adventures at Lake Crescent with a friend!

August First Friday

Hi Everyone! I know this is a bit last notice, but I’m the featured artist at Craftsman Cellars in Kendall Yards here in Spokane for the month of August and Friday the 2nd, I’ll be there from 5-9. I’d love for you to join me for a glass of wine and some live music (starts at 6:30) and don’t forget to grab an ice cream cone at Brain Freeze Creamery just down the street! Hope to see you there!

Spokane Summer Heyday!

We’re in the heyday of summer here at the Perkins’s household! I’m trying to make the most of it.

Strawberry picking up at Green Bluff. I picked a total of around 36 lbs in June to eat fresh and to make fruit leather that I treasure in the winter (if it makes it that long!).

Doing some house cleaning and assessing things found in the back of the closet.

Enjoying a rainy summer day, painting some salmon berry leaves photographed in Priest Lake in a sketchbook.

Plenty of Plein Air sketching with my Garland Sketchcrawl classes at the Spokane Art School.

Demonstrating how trick it is to draw the Garland Theater sign at last week’s class, haha!

Playing with a colored pencil with a multi-colored lead (orange, blue, green, yellow) and drawing an interesting intersection of buildings downtown by the Parkade.

Completed this painting last night ask the sun went down behind the trees to the west of a volunteer sunflower in the rocks by the edge of the deck. Did this sitting on my deck, barefoot, listening to cricket buzzing and the sound of the neighbor’s goat. Peak summer joy! What have you been up to this summer?

Priest Lake Dreaming

I spent a long weekend up at my aunt’s place at Priest Lake with my family. Priest Lake is one of my favorite places in the world. Beautiful clear water, lovely forests, delicious food, time with family-its the best!

This was painting while waiting for our food at Cavanaugh’s restaurant.

The view from the end of the dock. The extra green in the water in the sky is from where the paint bleed from a rogue wave encounter I’ll talk about below. It actually looks pretty good.

Mom and my aunt Judy were talking with my Aunt Marcy on the phone while we were out on the dock. I sat on the ground and tried to capture it. Aunt Judy suggested we try Facetiming her and with some technological wrangling, we managed to get her on the screen. Everyone got down on the planks of the dock and we all tried to squeeze our faces into the tiny iPhone screen. We weren’t very successful and our attempts were keeping us occupied because a huge wave came up and over the dock and OVER US! We all leapt up, there was a lot of shrieking, the dock rocking about, confusion abounding. I grabbed for my sketchbook and loose supplies to keep them from washing away. We were all soaked up to our waists and my sketchbook was soaked as well! I carried it up to the house and blotted it with paper towels and then used a blowdryer on it. I managed to dry it out with minimal damage, except for the separation you can see in the “gutter” of the page on the spread above where the glue dissolved. Luckily, this is a very high quality sketchbook (shout out to Hahnemuehle!) and it is sewn as well as glued so its still holding together well! What an adventure!

Lots of gorgeous wildflowers at the lake!

So many fun different shapes of leaves and flowers. I’m thinking I need to do some more Priest Lake paintings!

Garland Sketchcrawl Class!

Garland Sketch Crawl

For students 14 years old and up

$40

Wednesdays, July 10 & 17, 2019

10 A.M. – 12 P.M.

Come sketch the fabulous landmarks of the Garland neighborhood with me. Learn to sketch on location and add color with watercolors, colored pencils or markers (your choice). Urban sketching is an art adventure!

Sign up here!

Slice of Life

Here’s a look at what’s been in my sketchbook and on my table recently.

We went on a trip to visit my husband’s aunt at her guest ranch-Eden Valley Ranch up in the Okanagan back around Easter. They are at a higher elevation and nearly to the Canadian border so it was interesting to see how much further behind the plants were here than back in Spokane.

I accidentally used a watersoluble pen on this sketch, but the bleeding ink creates a really great effect, capturing the sort of greyed tans and greens of the land just barely coming out of winter (this was back in April).

I’m doing spring cleaning around the house and trying to clear space both physically and mentally!

This door on Howard Street is a favorite of mine. I see it whenever I head to the group of galleries over on Adams Street for First Friday. It’s just so dramatic! I’ve never been inside. To be honest, I think the interior will disappoint me after the door!

The Parkade, captured at sunset with some dramatic clouds. I think of the Parkade as an enormous animate sculpture, a head with broad shoulders looking over downtown and Riverfront Park. I love to watch the way the light moves on and across it.

I’ll be at Art on Blacktop up at 29th Ave Artworks in my fancy new white tent June 21st-23rd! I’d love to see you!

And thanks to everyone who came out to see me at Artfest this past week. I really appreciate it!

Spring in Spokane

Springtime in Spokane is one of my favorite seasons. Right now the lilacs are in bloom, but a couple weeks ago was prime time for the arrowleaf balsamroot, my very favorite PNW wildflower. They are so cheery and remind me of sunflowers and I love how they pop up all over town in early spring. Dishman Hills Natural Area out in the Spokane Valley is one of the best places in town to enjoy their beauty. Two weeks ago I hiked out there, looking for some painting subjects and spent a highly pleasant evening sitting among the flowers.

Gorgeous swathes of arrowleaf balsamroot.

Dishman also have some fabulous rocks and geological features that are great examples of the uniqueness of the Inland Northwest landscape.

Shooting star flowers! They are so delicate and lovely.

Not sure what this flower is.

Ink drawing of the trifecta-pine tree, arrowleaf, and rocks!

In progress

The finished painting!

Sketchbook pages

I’m at ARTFEST this year!

I am going to be at Artfest this year! May 31st 12-5, June 1st, 10-7, June 2nd, 10-5! Its at Coeur D’Alene Park in Browne’s Addition, home to this charming structure. This is my first show of the year and I’m looking forward to setting up in the park and chatting with people about art. Hope to see you there!

Final Kolkata Adventures

We spent some time in the South Park Street Cemetary, a historic walled cemetery that housed many British citizens from the colonial era. It was extremely sobering to see the ages listed on many of the large monuments. It was rare to see an age over 40. According to a booklet we got at the office, British citizens who traveled to India lasted about two monsoon seasons before succumbing to tropical diseases.

This was the largest obelisk in the cemetery and it is even bigger in real life. I had to squish it a bit to fit it on the page!

There were many monuments in this style and homeless people lived in them years ago before the cemetery was restored.

This is the Marble Palace, an enormous house of a very wealthy family that still lives in one wing. It is a museum now. We had to pay a bribe to get in because you’re supposed to fill out paperwork with the government to get in, but our Indian friends told us that that process is so impossible that it is better to just give the guard money. We did and were lead on a tour through rooms filled with classical sculpture, huge Chinese vases, and more. The floors were elaborate inlaid marble and oil paintings papered the walls. The lights were turned on as we entered a room and turned off as we left. There was a sense of decaying grandeur in the air.

I was constantly agog at the beautiful outfits of the women out and about on the streets.

The pollution resulted in pink, hazy sunsets, most obvious out in the countryside.

A leftover from the first post! This is my husband doing sudoku in the Telegraph newspaper.

Many of the stores in Kolkata were tiny, sometimes just alcoves with the proprietor sitting on a shelf. This store was just down the block from our friend’s house and we got our water from them. They didn’t speak much English, but whenever they saw us coming, they’d get out the water! Doing this sketch in the neighborhood attracted around forty people in the hour and a half it took me to do it. I had a group of older gentlemen move their bench so they could sit directly behind me and watch my every move!

I spotted this pink and blue house on a walk around our friend’s neighborhood. Buildings are so much more colorful in India than in the US.

There was a frame shop by our friend’s house and they had a collection of Jamini Roy prints in their frames.

Our trip to India was remarkable-a land of many contrasts and incredible energy, but I have to admit that it is good to be home!

Sketching in Kolkata

Kolkata traffic is astounding-cars, trucks, motorcycles, these three wheeled autos, everyone honking and weaving through the streets cutting each other off. Serious accidents are rare because nobody can get up enough speed to damage each other because there are just too many other vehicles in the way. Still, the number of pedestrians crossing the street or standing in the road was BONKERS. Plus, of course, the cows in the road. We took Ubers because renting a car would be suicidal and that way we didn’t have to worry about communicating the address to the driver-it just went directly to their phone.

This is the main temple at the Belur Math complex in Kolkata. This is probably my favorite sketch from the entire trip. We found a place in the shade and I spent a little over an hour doggedly working on this sketch, trying to finish before they kicked us out (they close midday and then open again in the late afternoon). As was usual, we attracted a lot of attention and people drifted over to either ask us for a selfie (For real, so many requests while we were there. We had to have a strict no selfie policy or else that is all we would have been doing!) or to see what I was up to. We had some nice conversations with some other families enjoying the shade as well.

This is one wing of the enormous family home of Rabindranath Tagore, Nobel prize winning poet and writer. It is HUGE museum about him and his accomplishments and the world events surrounding his life at the turn of the last century. Because it is technically a home, we had to take off our shoes and walk barefoot through the rooms and displays.

I have no idea why there are terracotta pots/vases tied to this tree. I saw several trees like this on our adventures, but I couldn’t ever get a satisfactory answer.

A montage page, bits and pieces of the day. The cab was drawn from a photo because none of them stay still long enough for me to draw. I nearly got run down by it just trying to take a picture!

Trying to draw fascinating flowers in the Botanical Garden, but had to give up partway through this drawing because of the mosquitoes. Too many bites and they swelled up HUGE so I decided to move on.

A colorfully paintined storefront door on the left, and a sculpted framed relief of Ganesh on the right.

On the left: A doorway with what I think might be Kali over looking it and on the right, an older couple walking in front of a worn wall.

We went to the zoo because Luke had never seen a live tiger before. We saw several and got to hear them roar which was a smidge hair raising. I loved all these pink birds and managed a couple sketches before wilting in the heat-around 95 degrees with 70% humidity.

One more post to go!

Adventures in India: Home Stay

Hi Guys! Long time no talk! My husband and I spent the first half of March in India, visiting a dear friend of his. It was quite the experience-hot, beautiful, alarming, smelly (both good and bad), fascinating and very, very different from my ordinary life in America.

The journey to India is LOOOONNGGG-it took us around 26 hours to get there and about 30 to get home.

We stayed with my husband’s friend’s family while we were in Kolkata which was a fabulous experience. This is the view into the dining room from the living room and I made all sorts of notes about my surroundings.

This is the view across the room from where I was sitting when I made the drawing on the previous spread. The carpet patterned thing on the wall covers a painting of a battle from the Mahabharata. It is gorgeous, but after buying it, they learned that a battle painting can cause arguments in the home so they keep it covered up.

The bed in our room was very comfortable in red and gold. Every night we erected a tent of mosquito netting to protect us and slept under it with the fan on.

This is the view outside the window above our bed. Every morning someone would hang laundry in this little rooftop courtyard and in the afternoon they would take it down. Pigeons, sparrows, crows, and the occasional kite (like our hawks) would perch on rooftops and eaves.

Quick sketches of our friend’s maids who came once a day to sweep and mop, and a sketch of their two year old.

A rare quiet moment!

Biscuits and tea were a high point of every day. We brought home the same tea mix that we had while we were there and I am now learning how to brew loose leaf tea at the age of 31!

Next up: Our adventures outside of the house.

Mukogawa

At the end of last year I made a foray over to Mukogawa Fort Wright Institute out on the west side of town and was delighted what I found-tall trees lining a long and misty path, surprise public art, a delicately decorated historic church moved from GU’s campus decades ago, rows of brick buildings, formerly barracks and fort offices, now repurposed for the college, a fabulous brick path and more. Thank you to Akihiro Nakahara for the fabulous tour...I was really inspired!

This painting is the result of wistfully thinking about spring as I batten down the hatches for another snow storm. Koi fly at Mukogawa in the spring time for Boy’s Day, a Japanese children’s holiday.

In progress shot.

I had to laugh when I saw the Sisters of the Holy Names Music Center on the Mukogawa campus. I went to Holy Names High School in Seattle and it seems like the order of nuns pops up all over the Pacific Northwest!

One of the things I love about the Fort Wright Mukogawa campus is the quantity of tall old trees, especially the ones lining the road into the campus. I even heard that one of the oldest ponderosa pines in Spokane is here on campus! Want to take a stroll?

Sketchbook studies of a petite white and gold church decorated with all sorts of interesting shapes. I heard it was moved over the Fort Wright campus from Gonzaga long ago. Anyone have an information about its history?

A surprising sculpture in an evergreen shrub.

Gloriously colored and patterned brick make up the paths in some parts of campus.

Portraits in Oil

My goodness, January just flew by, probably because I came down sick for about half of it, so I was only conscious for the other half! February is here and will be gone before we blink as well! It’s been a while since we’ve talked to I thought I’d get up a blog post and reconnect with you all!

So, I don’t know if you guys know this, but I also paint in oil paint as well as watercolors. I love the thick texture you can get with oil paint and the JOY of being able to put a juicy highlight right over a dark section of paint. Here are some paintings from several sessions last spring.

A tricky painting with cool light coming in from the window and hitting the edge of her profile while warm light from a lamp glowed on her shoulders. Also, an excellent lesson in how color bounces around!

Another portrait of my friend Sophia, rocking a gold suit against a maroon and cream backdrop. Once again, cool light on one side of the face and warm on the other. I love the pop of orange on the glasses!

Close up on a nice thick highlight!

I took this picture part way through the painting because I really loved how it was coming along and then I totally overworked it. MAN! But this is another friend of mine and she has offered to let me have another go at painting her in the future.

2018 in Review

It’s hard to believe it but 2019 is here. 2018 went by in a blur of painting, planes, and book printing! Thank you to all of you who have liked, shared, bought, and supported me on my art adventure. This is has been my best year so far! Let’s look back a bit on what I got up to!

From January to May, I completed the last 20 weeks of my Artist’s Eye on Spokane painting challenge. The Spokesman Review was a favorite painting!

In February, I did this painting for the Mayor’s Office and was invited to live paint at the Mayor’s State of the City address, a event that had my paintings of Spokane playing behind Mayor Condon as he spoke. His staff bought the original painting for his birthday!

In March, the Bozzis kindly let me paint on the outdoor patio of the Paulsen Penthouse, whose remarkable view and beautiful decorations dazzled me!

In April, I went on KXLY’s morning show, getting up at 4 am to do so! I painted at the station in between segments and had a lot of fun, though I don’t know how the news anchors are so cheery every morning (Coffee, lots of Coffee).

In May, I went to Japan. Visiting Mt. Fuji, Tokyo, Kyoto, Takayama, Kanazawa, and Osaka and I have plans to return!

In June, I spent a short weekend with college friends in Leavenworth to celebrate our 30th birthdays. I did this sketch on the deck on a cold and windy morning, in love with the view.

Fourth of July was spent at my aunt’s cabin in Priest Lake. I’ve been going there since I was born and it has a special place in my heart.

In August, I jetted off to the UK-Ireland, England, and Scotland. I was thrilled by the rain and temperatures below 70 degrees. Travel sketching is always a challenge but the challenge of filling a whole sketchbook in the limited time really makes me get creative when it comes to filling the pages.

I taught several classes at the Spokane Art School and Corbin Art Center, including a couple sketch crawls through the Garland neighborhood throughout the spring and summer.

I made it to several live music shows (a goal for the year) at both the Fox and St. John’s Cathedral.

And the final, crowning achievement! I wrote and put together my book. It was funded on Kickstarter and it is now available for sale to the public at Pottery Place Plus here in downtown Spokane and can be shipped to people all over just by emailing me.

Plans for the future? Taking my book and myself to our sister city in Japan, Nishonmiya and bringing back sketches of that city to share with the people of Spokane. Perhaps a Spokane coloring book and lots of paintings to come. I still haven’t painted half of what Spokane has to offer! If you have any suggestion, don’t hesitate to reach out and let me know!

And in personal adventures: My husband and I am off to India in March. I’ll be bringing my painting gear, of course, so check back here for the colors and flavors of India!

Artist's Eye Book Sneak Peek & Final Holiday Show

I got my first book proof back last Friday! It was such a thrill to hold it in my hands for the first time after so long dreaming about it. I might have squealed with excitement. :)

Here’s a quick video of me flipping through the first part of the book. I can’t wait to get the book out into the world and share my love of Spokane with everyone!

Fox Theater Spread!

Tall Towers down town!

Enjoyed seeing similar stone colors on two separate buildings downtown.

Browne’s Addition

My adventures at Avista Stadium

My last Holiday Show of the Year with Terrain’s BrrrZaar! 11 am-10PM at Riverfront Park. I’ll have a small handful of books if you didn’t grab one during the Kickstarter. I’ve looked at the list of vendors participating and it is going to be such an awesome show! I may have to do a bit of shopping myself. I hope to see you there!

Final UK Sketching adventures

As promised, here is the last of my sketching adventures in the UK, mostly of things I brought back and a little bit of sketching on the way home.

This guy is currently hanging on my mini-Christmas tree in my living room and making me so happy! I love the crazy bangs on the cow and the fact that he is playing the bagpipe. ADORABLE.

I confess, I haven’t actually eaten this. I stashed it in my luggage in case I needed a snack at some point in our journey and then forgot to eat it or throw it away so it came all the way across the pond with me. I cam down with a cold as I was flying home so I didn’t want a candy bar for a couple weeks afterward as I recovered and now it is old. What does one do with an old, strange foreign candy bar?

My beloved blue luggage, sketched while waiting in Seatac for my flight home to Spokane to distract myself from the way my sinuses were pounding.

I drew various bills during the trip and drew the coins when I got home (coins and a couple of fivers were what was left at the end of the trip, no worries, I’m sure I’ll be back in the UK eventually!), adding paint all at the end. Money in the UK is interesting and shows how we’re a bit of an odd duck with our purely paper, one size, all green money. This stuff is plastic-y (goes the wash great, but apparently can get stuck together which is no good when paying bills!), has clear sections, is different sizes at different denominations and comes in all sorts of colors. I enjoyed seeing the difference between bank notes issued by the Bank of England and those by the Bank of Scotland. A theme among everyone though? So many drawings of Queen Elizabeth!