Don't Buy Any More Markers

Not any colored pencils either. You don't need more of them. That's what I told myself when I parked outside of Office Max this morning to take some things to the shredder. Unfortunately I turned down the art supplies aisle (I swear it was an accident) and this package of colored pencils caught my eye. It's supposed to be a representation of skin colors of the world but I don't really draw people. I was attracted to them because of the range of tans, browns, peaches, almonds, and roses that aren't a part of traditional colored pencil arrays. So I picked them up. After taking my bag of papers to the shredder I went back up the aisle to look at the markers and there was a package of fine point markers with the same colors. *sigh* So I bought both of them.

I used two of the colored pencils when I drew and colored in a pangolin out of the Learn to Draw Chibis book. I have been frustrated at not being able to find colored pencils that approximate the colors in the book, now I have them.

Today's Mark Making exercise for Day 8 was a grid of marks. It was kind of a fun exercise and it went quickly because I used the fat black colored pencil.

It wasn't nearly as foggy this morning as it has been the last few days but still I noticed that the bare branches of the trees behind the house were frosty with the moisture in the air.

This squirrel made the leap from the birdbath to the suet cakes feeder and then up to the top of the crook holding the suet pellets. It stretched down to investigate but evidently didn't have much satisfaction because it was gone in a flash.

I've tucked the Gratitude Journal basket under the chair next to where I sit at the table so it reminds me to fill in a daily page. I did the school run this morning at the crack of dawn (well, it seemed like it to me who usually sleeps until 8am or so) and I was very grateful that the predicted dense fog was barely visible. Then in the afternoon the sun came out! Hooray! It got up to 39 degrees this afternoon so the sunshine didn't warm things up much but it sure cheered me up.

I had Writer's Guild this evening and I volunteered to help GBB organize the food for the Guild's upcoming workshop day. We've already decided we'll cater it in, not cook or ask for potluck contributions. We're not fools.

Tomorrow morning is Novel Writing group on Zoom. One of the members still hasn't submitted. I hope she doesn't send in something in the morning and expect it to have been critiqued by 10am. Maybe she hasn't been well. I should give her the benefit of the doubt. Be nice, Barbara Sue.

I got my taxes organized and took the envelope in to the accountant this morning. I got an email from the state Dept. of Revenue saying that I was late filing my Sales & Use Tax forms. I knew that getting a seller's permit last year might come back to bite me in the butt and today it did. I had to pay the taxes and a penalty for late filing. Man, they get you coming and going.

--Barbara