saturday scarlet

The first bee balm is just beginning to bloom!

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world watercolor month

July is World Watercolor Month, and people all over the planet are trying to paint something every day and share it. Since my daily markmaking habit feels pretty solid (today is #550) I've decided to push myself a bit, by expanding beyond my usual sketchbook or card or miniature size. I have a watercolor pad of 11x15-inch sheets, and if that doesn't sound very large, let me tell you this: it looks vast to me before the brush first touches the paper! There are about 20 sheets in the pad...how many will I have to paint before it feels as comfortable as the 5.5x8.5-inch sketchbooks? This iceberg is painting #3, and it's the first one I like enough to share with you. I hope if you are having the kind of hot, humid weather we're having, the thought of ice and ocean will make you feel a little cooler for a moment or two.

Do you happily jump into new adventures,

or do you have to push yourself to try new things?

And if the  latter, how do you do it?

I'd love to hear!

~~~~~

thankful thursday

Hummingbirds.

The tiniest breeding bird in Massachusetts.

Brightening even a rainy day.

Need I say more?

~~~~~

seven sketches

Pencil sketch made in the barn while keeping an eye on Hazel.

She had broken a horn tip and was feeling vulnerable.

She soon felt much better.

Another breakage: I dropped two of my porcelain watercolor dishes

before I even had a chance to use them.

They come in a set of five little stacking dishes and one cover.

Now I have four dishes and no cover.

This is, as they say, why we can't have nice things.

This watercolor card was painted on the Solstice.

I was thinking about how the sun comes up behind my hemlock tree.

And these standing stones at Avebury were drawn from an historical photograph.

These not-standing stones are in the South Paddock.

Moxie kept me company while I was painting

but she had a challenging time trying to stretch out comfortably on the highest one.

There have been very, very few iris flowers this year - I don't know why.

Maybe more will bloom before the summer is over?

I live in hope.

Meanwhile, I have the rudbeckia -

although a goat first tried to have a piece of this one!

~~~~~

wordy thursday

At the moment, rain or shine, my world is many shades of green.
These pictures were taken yesterday, when it wasn't raining.

I was checking a transplanted clump of Chelone lyonii

and there next to it was this razzle-dazzle:

A nice surprise - white spiderwort appearing in an unexpected place.

The first comfrey flowers of 2019:

Last year, my comfrey plant grew so tall and wide

it got flattened by it's own weight in a rainstorm.

And then continued to grow upward from it's prone position! It was huge.

I was told that comfrey doesn't need full sun, and "full sun" areas are at a premium here, so in the Autumn I divided the root mass and moved most of it to a new bed by the east boundary stone wall.

Now there are two plants, both doing nicely and beginning to bloom.

It remains to be seen if either or both will turn into another massive shrub-sized plant.

 Every year I look forward to jack-in-the-pulpit:

There are a couple of places where I expect to see it

and am careful not to cultivate until it is safely up.

But I always find it in other spots as well.

It often becomes hidden by other plants growing up around it -

as this one, now surrounded and overtopped by violets.

And concluding today's program:

one of the new rudbeckias.

Three are already blooming,and the fourth has several buds.

I don't know if any of the flowers will be as brown as my original plant,

but they are certainly bright and cheerful and very welcome.

~~~~~