House Portrait in progress!

I am making good progress on my current project - an 10 x 8 inch pen and ink house portrait. 

This property has quite a few trees and foliage around the house itself. One of the trees is situated right in front of the front door. I always try to make sure at least part of the door is visible, so I have been working with the owner to determine how big to make the tree.

Here is a progression that you might be interested in seeing - from initial pencil drafts through several revisions of the front tree:

  Rough pencil draft placing house features, trees, etc.

 Additional details on the house and landscaping.

I sent this draft to the owner to see if the scaling-down of the front tree was acceptable.

 The owner wanted to expand the tree a bit more to reach up to the upper window, so this is the adjustment I made.

The owner approved the height of the tree, but I did some additional tweaking on the sides to fill it out a bit more.

I actually did some more revisions on the brick work as I thought it looked too heavy and uneven here. Stay tuned for the next update to see the finalized pencil draft and beginning pen work!

Visit to Matthaei Botanical Gardens, Ann Arbor, MI

So the kids and I were looking for something different to do last week and decided to head up to Matthaei Botanical Gardens for a visit. The weather was warm, but not too hot, and we had a great time.

They have a wonderful Conservatory inside - we took a quick look through where we saw a number of beautiful plants including some I couldn't find identification on. My girls are 4 and almost 2 - they weren't stopping for long to let Mom look for signs - so I snapped a few photos hoping to identify things later. If you have any ideas on what the unlabeled items are, please let me know! :) 

We then made our way outside to the Gaffield Children's Garden. It's a fantastic place for the kids to explore, interact and enjoy. I highly recommend it if you are in the area!

Purple Heart

 

Not sure - very cool leaves, though.

Not sure? Love the variegation on the leaves.

Pincushion Cactus

 

Black-Eyed Susans

 

Another not sure - beautiful leaves on this tree. Any ideas?

 

One of my all-time favorites - Purple Cone Flowers

 

Have you had a chance to visit any of your local botanical gardens or other interesting summer-time sites? I'd love to hear about it!

Do you have a favorite summer flower?

As usual, I can't wait to do some sketching, even if from my reference photos. So many fun shapes and textures to capture!

Squirrel on Tree - Ink and Colored Pencil

This is another sketch from a few years ago. We live near the University of Michigan campus here in Ann Arbor, so squirrels are always around. This one was climbing down a tree as we sat outside on a beautiful fall day. It is skinnier than you normally see at that time of year! 

I tried to capture the wonderful curves of the tail as it swished around, so I included some of the line work here, even though it may look a little odd in the finished drawing. 

I quickly added some colored pencil after the fact. It should probably be a little more gray, but at least the color adds a bit more life to the drawing.

African Daisy Blossom - Graphite Sketch

I've been busy traveling a bit lately and haven't had a chance to do much drawing. But I am tired of looking at my last post! :) So, I figured I would upload a sketch I did a few years ago of an African Daisy blossom. 

I love the unique shape of the petals, which are also known as a Spoon Daisy or Spider White. Hope you enjoy it, too!

Do you want to learn a little more about me and my art?

Are you curious to learn a bit more about me and my art? Just nosey? That's OK, too! :) 


Come on over to Meet the Makers, Interviews with artists and designers from around the world. They have published an interview with me today: 


 Creative Carol Creech

Hope you enjoy learning a bit more about me! Have a great day.

Blog Design Update!

As you can see, I've been working updating the look to my blog!

I have added a link bar to the top for easier access to my other sites including Spoonflower, my website, Zazzle store and Facebook. I have also tried to increase the font size a bit -- still working on getting the posts to a larger font (think I have to just do that one at a time as I make new posts.)

Anyway, hope you like the new look. Let me know if you have any questions, suggestions, ideas, etc. I'd love to hear what you think!

In the meanwhile, I will be working on more drawings (have a couple of house portraits in the queue as well as more wildflower drawings to do...), so stay tuned for more drawing fun!

Spoonflower Profile - Newly Updated!

Spoonflower recently reorganized the shop profiles, adding easier navigation and viewing. You can now have a shop banner and can view fabric designs by:

Sale Status:

• Fabric for Sale - these are designs that have already been proofed and are available for purchase.
• Designs Not for Sale - these are designs I am working on, but have not yet had proofed (i.e., printed up on fabric to approve.)
• All - view all designs, regardless of selling status

Sorting: Now you can also sort (yeah!) by:

• Recent - recently created designs
• Popular - most popular designs
• Collections - designs by collection. I have expanded on some of my floral designs, so I have split these up into collections such as Woodland Peonies, Iris, Daffodils, Tulips, etc. For all design viewing, you can click on Show Me More Designs to see more in that collection.

I think the new organization is so much easier to use. Feel free to stop by and look around! As always, I would love to hear what you think of any of the designs, constructive suggestions included :) You can comment here on the blog, or right in Spoonflower at the bottom of each design view page. Happy browsing!

Red-Tailed Hawk Tail Feather - First Molt?

I had a rare find when I was out and about recently -- a beautiful feather. I looked it up and think it is a red-tailed hawk tail feather from a first molting. I was able to do a very rough sketch of it and took some photos. I hope to do a more detailed pen and ink study of it, adding color. This is graphite pencil with some colored pencil added to get a sense of the color scheme. 

I love the pattern of dark brown, tan, and creamy white and was fascinated to see all of the details up-close.

Have you ever found anything unusual in your wanderings that you were able to draw or photograph?

Trillium line drawings in ink

I have started working on some wildflower drawings using sketches and reference photos I took on my art retreat last month. Here are two line drawings of trillium wildflowers. My goal is to work on adding colored pencil to these. Stay tuned to see how they are coming along!

Working on some more fabric designs - flowers, lions. stripes, oh my!

I have been doing a little more work on my designs in Spoonflower - adding some slight variations to my botanicals can transform a pattern. For example, this new design featuring my purple cyclamen could be used in a number of ways, but I can see it as a delicate scarf!

 

Another example is my rose with buds - can you tell I like stripes?! :)

 

I also have gone back to black and white with this lion study in pen and ink. I could see this being used as-is or paired with a solid fabric for a quilt, tote bag, place mats, kitchen tea towel and more.

What colors or patterns do you like in your home or for projects?