I love to look at art journals. For example, I love the blog Sketch Away, by Suhita Shirodkar, in which she records her days. I dream of being outside, pulling out my sketchbook, and drawing what I experience.
But I have no idea how to get started.
I don’t remember how I found out about Draw Your Day: An Inspiring Guide to Keeping a Sketch Journal by Samantha Dion Baker, but I immediately ordered it, and for the last week or so it’s the book I’ve brought with me to read at Greg’s doctor appointments and physical therapy.
It is, of course, illustrated with pages from Dion Baker’s own journals. I love her style.
She tells a little about her own life, and how she first started journaling, and how over time the artwork disappeared from her journals. She missed the drawing, and needed to purposely reinstate it into her life.
I really appreciate her discussion of tools. She explains the numbering system for pencils, which I really never understood before. She recommends certain brands of art supplies, some pricey and some not, and explains the reasons behind her choices.
But most of all, she explains how to make a sketch journal a part of your daily routine. She suggests multiple ways to use one, and leaves it up to you to come up with your best way to adopt the sketchbook habit. I love this book, and I can’t wait to make sketching a daily part of my life.
You can look at Samantha Dion Baker’s artwork on her Instagram page.
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My art goal for October was to make 15 Inktober drawings (one on each odd-numbered day). I actually made 8, and 3 other days I did the prompts for Octangling, a challenge run by the Tangle All Around Facebook group I’m a member of. So I actually made 11 drawings. Not horrible.
Today’s Octangling pattern is Lap by Lizzie Moyne:
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Train ride to Flemington
when the kids were little
we didn’t have much money
I remember one summer outing
I drove the oldest three kids to Ringoes
and we took the train to Flemington
I think it was their very first train ride
now, Flemington had once been
a recreation of a colonial town
with costumed weavers and glassblowers
and the Stangl pottery factory
but by then it was only a quaint village with shops
I remember we rode in an open air car
we chugged along fields of goldenrod and Queen Anne’s lace
and our allergies kicked in
we didn’t have much money
but I gave each kid a dollar
I don’t remember what the girls bought
but Matt, age 6, got 10 monster finger puppets with wiggly arms
he called them the Boogie Brothers
they were hilarious
when we got home
Greg admired Matt’s puppets and gave them all silly names
Matt calmly told him he was wrong
Greg held up each puppet one by one
and said, “What’s this one’s name?”
and for each one Matt answered in all seriousness “Matt”
while I laughed until tears rolled down my cheeks
In June, 2001, Greg took four of our kids to a former student’s house to look at some kittens. I gave him permission to choose one or two to adopt. (We’d previously owned two cats, and then three more cats. We were catless at the time.)
He came home with four kittens.
“Why?” I asked.
“I couldn’t break up the family, could I?”
Each kid got to name a kitten. They were Channing, Cloud, Bruce, and Zoe.
They all lived fairly long lives. I think Bruce was first to pass, then Channing. Then last year, Cloud.
Zoe, who had been quite fat at one point in her life, weighed only 3 pounds the day she died. She started hanging out in the shower, which was what Bruce did when he was ready to die. I took Zoey to the vet and stayed with her while they administered the shots. Little sweetie. I miss her so. She was nineteen years old, the oldest cat we’d ever had.
But I’d gotten really tired of cat hair everywhere. There will be no more cats at this Huelsenbeck house. Three of our kids, though, have cats.
ARHtistic License 