Are your dogs friendly?

No, they are not. Sorry. Please don’t bring your dog/child over here.

This sketch was done digitally with Procreate while I was sitting by the Indian River. The whole scene was done from my imagination.

The other evening, we took Chloe and Mack down to sit by the Indian River. There was a gorgeous cooling breeze and we were relaxing with the dog children. Of course, here comes the dithering older lady with her dog and her mask hanging under her chin. I eyed up the mask, breeze was in our favor. No one around us and here comes the 6 foot distance infringer with a dog. Really?

“No, sorry, they aren’t friendly.” She seemed confused with this answer and was still approaching when Mack erupted in a series of “Protecting the Realm” barks. He can be quite intimidating when he wants to be. She stopped and again I told her they weren’t friendly and I apologized. (Actually a bald faced lie but she didn’t have to know that.) She hung around us a few minutes but seriously, when someone tells you their dog isn’t friendly, why would you still walk your dog near the people? Especially with a 6 foot social distancing rule?

I was trying to be nice. I could have said, “Lady, please don’t bring your dog over here because I don’t want them getting hurt by your much larger dog and I want to sit and enjoy the evening with my husband and I don’t want to socialize with you and the mask on your chin.” They always say their dog won’t hurt yours but I don’t know that and I don’t want my very tiny dog getting hurt. All dogs are unpredictable. Chloe has a broken ear because of another dog. Plus I want to sit outside and enjoy the evening air without speaking to a stranger. Pandemic sucks.

She wandered away and my husband looked at me. I shrugged, sorry. He knew why I lied to her. People just don’t listen and they want to approach Chloe and Mack with their dogs. It’s easier to lie so they’ll go away. If they were alone with no dog or children, we’d let them pet them.

I sketched this ‘toon right after the lady left. The point of it was to show the size difference and it is very scary to us when you approach with a larger dog. Chloe was sitting on my lap and Mack was on the little table that should have had my water while I sketched this.

I get it. I want to hug everyone tiny dog I see, too. Chihuahuas are tiny and cute but they are very delicate and easily injured. Chihuahuas aren’t bad dogs, although they can be quite intimidating. They bark to protect themselves and their families. THAT is their defense mechanism. Please use common sense when approaching someone with any toy dog especially if you have a dog with you. It’s better to be safe than to be responsible for a accident.

Plus, we are supposed to be social distancing. I get nervous when people get close to me, too.

Drawing people

I have a daily practice of drawing people. If no one is handy, I use the SKTCHY app for reference. I do two types of sketches. A five minute timed sketch and a Cheater Blind Contour sketch. I use brush fountain pens for the the timed 5 minute sketch. This helps with my brush skills. The other sketch, I use the big fat chunky Higgins Indian Ink Chisel marker that I received in my Artsnacks box back in May. I love that marker. I use the Uniball vision for the fine line.

Here are some examples of those people. Four of these were assignments from Make Art That Sells Assignment Bootcamp. You’ll see more of these over the next couple of days….

Sketchbook with my “tools.”

Sketching with my iPad

I was the biggest skeptic of digital “art.” It seemed too easy to draw over photos. Every time I saw a digital portrait on Instagram, I passed because I thought it was too perfect. Then I joined the SKTCHY app on the iPhone and I saw more digital portraits. Some looked way to perfect, but others had that look where you can tell the artist did it by observing, not copying. I was still skeptical.

Then I saw the David Hockney exhibit at the Met. I walked into a room where there was a large Digital screen and on it were David Hockney’s paintings done on the iPad using Procreate. There is a feature where you can loop the drawing process and they were playing that on the screen. You can see the entire drawing and painting process. I was enthralled. Amazed. SMITTEN. I sat down on the floor not caring who was around me and I was in Heaven. WOW.

I walked out of there with a whole new appreciation of digital art and how it can actually BE art. You can use the iPad as a sketching tool. A tool to create cartoons and animation. I have even mimicked collage on the iPad. I follow a Hong Kong artist named Rob Sketcherman and I was impressed with his digital urban sketches. (Alas, I haven’t seen many posts from Rob lately, I hope he and his family are ok with Hong Kong’s issues.) I starting to use the iPad to urban sketch and I love playing with various features to see what happens. There’s always the “Undo” button if I don’t like something. I also like that I can pull a painting or sketch into Procreate and work from the original to create something new. I did that the other day with the Unicorn post.

Below is an example of an urban sketch (on location) that I did back at the end of June. I have been wanting to get out and sketch more but I have to adapt to the new world we have now.

At least I can still get out……

SKETCH FROM THE JENSEN BEACH CAUSEWAY/IPAD-PROCREATE

Sketchbook fun

It was a wet stormy day the other on Independence Day. Usually we get hit by a passing storm in the evening. Sometimes we just get “heat lightning.” Other days we get the whole kickass “boom- booms- light- show” and then no rain at all.

On Independence Day, we got the whole show and we kept our fingers crossed that it would wash out the neighborhood armageddon of fireworks. It didn’t, but gratefully it wasn’t as bad down here as it was when we lived on Long Island.

Chloe and Mack do not like “boom boom’s” of any type. Chloe shivers the whole time and if a thunderstorm happens during the weekday, either John or myself get a Chubby Chi cemented to our lap. Mack barks at them as if that actually would make them go away. Doesn’t work. Don’t tell Mack. He thinks he does a great job protecting the realm.

This has been a difficult time for us and we know we are not alone. We are doing the best we can and trying to be smart about when we leave the house. We stick to a routine of working from home (my temp studio is in the garage) and around 4:30-ish we make dinner. After dinner we might take a ride to sit by the Indian River or the beach (it’s usually empty later) and sit until sunset. Sometimes we take Chloe and Mack. We have our daily routine, with or without rain.

Below is a page out of my sketchbook. The furred babies would not be happy to be out in the rain. Although Chloe does appreciate umbrellas. Mack could care, wet is wet. He’s a pig, he’d roll in the mud if we weren’t watching him.