Clean As A Whistle

Since it's Thursday I went down to the Central Library after lunch (and a stop at the bank) to sort books. As I was signing in another Barbara, well, a Barb actually, came to sign in too. We found a couple tables of boxes and bags of books so we dug right in. We chatted and sorted. I tackled the boxes and found a lot of books about yachting, yacht racing, and captain's rules so quite a few of them went into the Transportation bin. Just as I got a notification that my parking meter was running out (I use an app so I don't have to scrounge up coins) we put the last books in the bins, leaving clean tables. Woohoo! That's the first time I've sorted and cleared the tables.

Today's Daily Practice was more flowers. We had a sheet of paper with random blossoms and leaves scattered on it to paint from. I love this teacher because she isn't locked into replicating the flowers exactly. She just paints the colors and some of the shapes which is so freeing for my inner-German, you-must-do-things-exactly-right, self. I also like the size brushes she uses. They're smaller and easier to make do what I want them to.

When I cued up Basic Watercolor, I went back to where I'd left off the other day and painted a sheet exploring what my brushes do and then repainted the page with the branches and leaves. I figure the more times I paint those things the better I'll be at them. I used my new bigger round brush. It's going to take some getting used to.

While I was drawing I saw a squirrel leap up to the top of the suet cakes feeder, then onto the top of the peanut wreath crook, and finally across to the leaning-over crook with the suet pellets dangling from it. I hadn't seen anything on the pellets for a long time and was glad to snap a photo. You can see in the background that the sun was out in the afternoon. It was warmish in the morning (23 degrees), it's 8 degrees now, and is supposed to bottom out at -8 below overnight. Evidently there's another Polar Vortex bearing down on us for tomorrow. Oh goodie. But it's supposed to be back into the 20s on Saturday. Whew. I'd hate for there to be fewer people at the Military Ave. Market because it's too cold to go out.

In Dr. Seuss's Book of Animals, the next page had a picture of a crow in a hat and coat. (It rhymes with the pig and goat on the previous page.) He has such a smug smile on his face, don't you think?

Then I turned to the next page in Drawing Cute, another book I forget about, to find an ice cream cone and a pie. Fun to draw and color but my cone's a little wonky.

Tonight I finished binding off the Limited Edition Wingspan shawl and sewed in the tails so that it's finished. Done. Finito. Now I have to figure out what to knit tomorrow night at Friday Night Knitting.

I was looking on Creativebug (where my 2 watercolor classes are) to find more watercolor classes and instead I found a line drawing class that segues into a watercolor sketchbook and drawing class. I solemnly swear that I won't start that class until I'm through with these watercolor classes. Cross my heart--although I may go to Michaels on Saturday to get a few supplies. Just a few, I have most of what I need. See, I've got another voucher to spend and you know how bad it is if those things expire. (Rationalize much, Barbara Sue?)

--Barbara