Flower Power

Our spring flowers have barely started appearing from the ground, so I headed over to the Bayport Flower House and did a direct watercolor of one of the flower pots that were outside. It had a little bit of a few different flowers. I will go back and make sure to get some Easter flowers to bring home.

Flowers X 3

 Flowers have been front and center lately. These are the tulips my husband bought me for Easter.

I looked for some daffodils outdoors and found these in Sayville.

The tulips made another appearance as a continuous line sketch...hard to do with so many overlapping leaves and flowers.

Happy Easter

 Happy Easter!

I am a little behind again and between the holiday and trying to get organized after the workers were here, things have fallen by the wayside. I did get out to sketch some flowers that Jerry bought me for Easter.

Tulips Past Their Peak

I kept my Easter tulips for quite a while. They are fun to sketch when they start drying up and losing their leaves. I wanted to include the entire plant so I sketched it across a double page spread.

 

Tulips - Version 2

I sketched the tulips again, this time using Zebra Zensations fountain pens with colored inks. Until I did this one I didn't realize that the ink in the pens was water-soluble.

 

Tulips

I picked out a potted tulip plant at the Bayport Flower House for Easter...of course I sketched it.

 

Tractor and Flowers

 Last week I took a drive to Waterdrinker Family Farm in Manorville. I've painted there a few times with my plein air group. Every year they have a big tulip festival and as I drove along the fence on the side of the big field I could see some people out by some of the tulips. I didn't want to go out into the field and felt that it would be a while before the bulk of the tulips were blooming. Instead I drove over to the sales barn and right in front was this wonderful red tractor. I liked the scene with all the plants on display.

Tulip Party

Jerry bought me a tulip plant for Easter. Things got busy but I managed to sketch them before they started to droop. 

As they started to sag I tried using them for prints on my gelli plate. The flowers fell apart when I pressed them down on the plate. I'm sure it would work better with fresher flowers and maybe different colors. This time it worked better than the first time I tried. I had 6 tulips so I was able to do 3 prints. I like the way the dark image and the colored background came out.

Here are my results starting with what I feel is the best of the three.

Fading Flowers

 Somehow I am behind in getting this posted. These were my Easter tulips that Jerry bought me. They were well on their way out, but I liked their shapes. I hope you do too.

Yellow Tulips

On Easter my niece gave us some lovely yellow peony tulips. The petals actually look like they belong to a peony. They are a little droopy, but I like that and they made a nice composition. This was done on Strathmore tan toned paper with gouache.

Pink Tulips

 Jerry bought me pink tulips for Easter. They looked really pretty. Right now they are wide open and look like if I sneezed the petals would fall off. I need to do one last sketch of them. lol

Arboretum Tulips

 I did get to find some tulips in bloom at the Bayard Cutting Arboretum last week. There were big groupings of them to pick from. I did a few.

Tulips on their Last Legs

Do tulips have legs??? lol This is my final sketch of my Easter tulips. The petals are shriveled and dry but I think it still makes an interesting sketch.

Tulip Sketches

 I bought some potted tulips for Easter, and as usual they were fair game for sketches. I did one of the entire set of them and then just a single tulip. I am also working on a larger painting of them which I'll post when it is finished. They are still in their pot looking very shriveled and ready for the trash...but I may just have to sketch them one more time. lol

Tulip

This was done from a photo I took at the Bayard Cutting Arboretum. It was painted directly with watercolors and is part of my #30x30DirectWatercolor Challenge.

Tulip Dance

At the beginning of the week I went to the Bayard Cutting Arboretum. Their tulips were in bloom and looked so nice! I sat by the manor house and did this sketch of the tulips that were in the bed there. 

Here are a few of the photos I took while I was wandering around.

Tulips by the Fence

I wanted to sketch something that yelled spring today. I love that this homeowner in Sayville had a garden full of tulips outside the fence. I was able to sit there in my mobile studio without anyone noticing I was sitting there and see the tulips clearly.

Tulips

Sunday was a mostly wet day but I went out and found this group of tulips near a fence so they were close enough to see from my car. They looked so pretty in a cluster.

We're Off!

I am posting a little early in the day for me since we are off to the airport shortly.

As I hinted at before here on the blog, I will be traveling. Our "home" for the month of April will be Venice. My husband will be working on recording his music there so I am going along to make sure someone sketches Venice...it is a job someone has to do. lol Our flight leaves tonight from Kennedy Airport where I will be sketching later today. I absolutely detest packing and can't wait until the suitcases are zipped and waiting to go.

This was sketched on Sunday which was a damp, nasty day. I needed to see a little color so I sat in my mobile studio in the parking lot of Fantastic Gardens in Patchogue and sketched this scene.

I am hoping that all will go well with the internet we are supposed to have in our apartment in Venice, and that my next post will be from there. I've already made arrangements to meet up with a friend who lives in Rome. She is coming to spend a day with me next week.

Ciao!

Happy Easter & Happy Passover

This is a sketch of a plant that I bought for friends who are having us over for Passover dinner tonight. I know that tulips are traditionally for Easter but they also are celebrating that holiday tomorrow. I got these at the Bayport Flower House which is a local business. They are always gracious to my plein air group and always allow us to come and paint in their shop before Christmas. I've also gone there solo and sketched their flowers outdoors and have sketched their Christmas trees from my car. Their flowers are always beautiful so it is nice to support a local place.