Summer of Colour, Week 2 - Juicy apricots

The colour combination for week two of Summer of Colour is an especially juicy one - two pinks and an orange. I was hoping for some red and/or orange for this week, as I bought some lovely apricots on Saturday and wanted to paint or draw them. The colour combination was also perfect for getting that box with those "other" colours out. That's the box with all those colour that didn't fit into one of my regular paint boxes. As I don't use them very often, I decided to make a colour chart first, before deciding which pinks to use. There are some very nice colours in there, I have to say. I think I have to get that box out more often.

I decided to use Rose Madder and Quinaqridone Magenta for my watercolour background, and then added the apricots with coloured pencils. I had to cheat a little bit, as it would have been almost impossible get all the depths in their skin with just one orange. So I used two, although actually, they are just two different shades of Cadmium orange, so they are basically the same colour. Moreover, the apricots themselves have lovely deep red cheeks, so I did hold myself back there.

Happy Summer of Colour!

Stockholm i mitt hjärta, Part 6 - Sigtuna

Today, we are visiting the beautiful town of Sigtuna, a one hour's journey by train and bus from Stockholm. It is the oldest town in Sweden, founded in 980 at the shores of Lake Mälaren, and one of my favourite places. It has a picturesque medieval town centre with Sigtuna rådhus, the town hall, built in 1744.

Stora gatan, the main street with its beautiful old buildings, takes you from one end of the town (the bus stop) to the other and down to the harbour and water front.

At the harbour, we stop and have a cup of tea in good company, soak up the atmosphere and get ready to explore the town.

Along Strandvägen, there are many opportunities to stop, sit down and enjoy the views over the water. More intimate ones...

... and bigger ones, where you can meet the locals.

There are many runestones in Stiguna, ...

... and some church ruins too. The ruins of Sankt Olofs kyrka, the church of St Olof, built in around 1100 and situated in the churchyard of Mariakyrkan.

Climbing up a little green hill, an old bell tower is hidden among the trees.

At the edge of the town centre, we come across the ruins of Sankt Pers kyrkan, the church of Saint Per, also built around 1100.

Can I get a job here please?

We're back in the main street...

... but before we head to the bus stop and off back to Stochkom, there's time for a cup of tea and a slice of blåbärspaj med vispgrädde (blueberry tart with whipped cream) at Tant Bruns Kaffestuga. You simply can't go to Sigtuna and not visit Tant Brun. Tant Brun is a character from the much loved childrens books about  Tant Grön, tant Brun och tant Gredelin by Elsa Beskow (1874-1953). The building is one of Sigtuna's oldest, and the café among the oldest cafés in Sweden. And the pies and cakes are delicious.

Summer of Colour, and intuitive painting

Summer has arrived, and with it Summer of Colour, the six week blog party with weekly colour prompts, hosted by Kristin from Twinkle, Twinkle. I finished the challenge in 2013, but only got to week two last year (you can see all the paintings I did for SOC here). It really is a great fun challenge, and this year, I want to finish it again. So I sat down to paint already on Monday afternoon. But I think I got a bit too excited, and ended up mixing up the colours for this week. Instead of using two blues and one green, I used two greens, and one blue.
  

 So I went back to my desk and my sketchbook, and did a quick second one, this time with the right colour combination. I used my trusted "What's in your fridge" theme as inspiration, using watercolours for the background and coloured pencils for the subjects. Two years ago, choosing a theme for my paintings for the challenge (watercolour background with pen doodles on top) worked well, so I might do that again this year, working myself through the contents of the fridge.

 

June is going to be a busy month, creatively, as apart from Summer of Colour, I'm also going to dive into intuitive painting. Three years ago, in June 2012, I took Flora Bowley's online class Bloom True, to get some new ideas, and to generally get my painting mojo back. But I never really got into it and to the end of the course somehow. Maybe I just simply wasn't ready for it back then. But this different approach to painting continued to fascinate me, and I had been thinking about giving it another try one day.

Tuning in to your intuition, letting go, being brave - these are all things that appeal to me very much right now, both on and off canvas. Most of all, I want to put Fun back into my painting process. And my life. I somehow seem to have lost it along the way a long time ago.

When an e-mail announcing a new class beginning in June arrived a couple of weeks ago, I decided to sign up. I'm really fed up with standing in my own way by over-planning, over-thinking, over-expecting... and although it will be challenging, I'm now ready to try and let go. And to just splash some paint on canvas and let it develop. I'm quite excited about seeing where this journey will go.

These are the two canvases I'm working on. I've applied the first two layers, and it's all looking a bit chaotic and ugly. Even more so because both canvases already had layers of paints on them and I just went over them with some gesso. Especially in the first (upper) piece, it made the first layer of reds and yellows rather dull. This is actually one of the canvases I used for the class three years ago. The other (lower) one was a painting I did in 2001. At that time, I was very fond of using lots of modelling past and gold. It was high time to let it go and put it to better use. I've always been a firm believer of painting over any paintings you're not really happy with. And these layers will soon be covered too. So it's alright if they look a bit chaotic and ugly.

Happy Paint Party Friday

and

Happy Summer of Colour!

Planning and organising your blog posts

2014 has been a rubbish blogging year for me. Despite all my good intentions, ideas and plans in my head, the posts ended up few and scattered. And despite of all my good intentions, ideas and plans in my head, 2015 was precariously beginning to go the same way. The problem is that sometimes, all the good intentions, ideas and plans in your head just aren't enough. I'm great at making plans in my head, with the best intentions to put it all into practice. But unfortunately, I'm even better at procrastinating. In April I decided that I needed a proper plan if I wanted to turn things round and actually put my plans into action. I started my Blog Schedule. For me, putting things down on paper and ticking them off when they're done, is extremely helpful to actually getting them done.

I wanted to get into a regular blog schedule of three posts a week, Tuesday, Friday and Sunday, sharing both my photography and my drawing and painting. I'm using the free blog planners by Productive Flourishing, and they're working well for me. I'm using the Blog Post Planner, which allows me to order my planned posts into different categories, and the Blog Post Calendar, which gives me an overview over the entire month. I like my notebooks and journals, and I like writing by hand, so I print them out and glue them into my Blog Book. This way, I have everything in one place, and also enough space for extra notes. At the beginning of each month, I write down all the 'left over' post ideas from the previous months, as well as new planned posts into the categories pages and the  calendar, and add new ones, or more details, as I go along. For example, I write PPF down for every Friday of the month, because I want to post something for and link up to Paint Party Friday each week. This also helps me to actually sit down and paint something every week, because without painting, no post. I have not only become more productive blog posting wise, but also creatively. When a post is posted, I add the date in the categories planner, and tick them off in both.

I try to work ahead as much as possible, and I almost always use the Schedule option for publishing my posts after having finished writing them. This way, I don't have to think about it anymore, which is especially useful for when posts that aren't due to be publihsed until a week or two later. And I can also keep my regular schedule even when I'm at work. And thanks to my Blog Schedule, I know exactly what and when to post each blog post. My schedule has helped me to actually post three days a week in May, and to get painting each week, and I hope to keep it up.

If you're sometimes struggling a bit too, with getting your blog posts up more often and more regularly, I hope that you might find the information useful. Or maybe you have some good tips of what works for you?

Peonies. Polaroid SLR 680

Stockholm i mitt hjärta, Part 5 - Södermalm

It's been absolute ages since the last part of my little Stockholm series but there are still a few places to go and sights to see. Last time, we've visited the told town, Gamla Stan. Today, from there we're crossing the bridge and take a stroll around parts of Södermalm. First we walk up to the thop of Katarinahissen, from where we enjoy the view over Slussen and Gamla Stan...

... and Ryssgården square and the city museum, Stockholms stadsmuseum. On a fine day like today, we can see all the way across the water Kungsholmen and with its dominant Stadshuset.

We then climb a bit further up the hill and enjoy the sun and a cup of coffee at Mosebacke.

Refereshed from the break, we explore walk on eastwards past Katarina kyrkan...

... and through the small cobblestoned Mäster Mikaels Gata with its charming old cottages, many of which built of wood.

We walk along the top of the steep cliffs, enjoying the beautiful view of the Gamla Stan across the water as well as the local wild life.

Why not stop at the little cafe with the beautiful view and enjoy a delicious ice cream. It is, after all, a lovely and warm spring evening.

Let's cast one last look back over the water, to the lush greens of Djurgården, before we head back to the bustling city.

Next time, we'll head out of the city again to visit the oldest town in Sweden. I hope you'll join me again.

A little spring lamb in my journal

This sweet little lamb will no doubt have grown a lot since I took its photo earlier this spring (I posted the photo in my last Photo Sunday May post). And I've been wanting to paint it ever since. This week I finally got down to it. I chose to paint in my art journal again. I just wanted to play a little, without thinking too much, using only three colours (Ultramarine Blue, Raw Umber and Titanium White). The art journal is just perfect for this. I might try and paint it on canvas too, so having this little exercise in my journal will be helpful for that. 

I drew the little bell because of a remark that N. made when he saw the sheep photos. Here in Switzerland, it is usual for cows to wear bells ("Treichle"), wether they're up in the alps roaming their summer pastures (and preferably standing in the middle of the hiking paths), or in a small field next to the farm. A cow and a bell belong together like strawberries and cream. When he saw the sheep photos, he said "What, even your sheep wear bells!". Maybe it's not quite as common as with cows, but yes, sheep (and goats) wearing bells is certainly not an uncommon sight here. His remark just made me smile. For me, it's just so normal.

Happy Paint Party Friday!

A reunion in the city, a walk in the countryside and Summer of Colour

Last Sunday, I met up with some old friends here in Zürich. 14 years ago, we all studied together in Stockholm, and since we all live in different parts of Switzerland and Germany, we rarely see each other much. But when we do, it's all the more fun. We did a lot of walking that day, and lots of chatting too.

This past weekend, summer has arrived in these parts, it seems. The temperatures are rising, and it's already getting a bit too hot for me. So I'm even more grateful to have a forest not too far away to go for a walk in its cooling shade. I LOVE forests.

And the cows in the fields always make me happy, especially these here, that still have their proper horns.

I took the Image Pro and the SX-70 on my walk, and I find it fascinating, how differently the images turn out. Each camera has it's own character and personality, making the photos unique to that particular camera.

And I finally got to try out the double exposure function on the Image Pro. I'll definitely have to explore that option more.

This week now is the first week of Summer of Colour, a six week blog party with weekly colour prompts, hosted by Kristin from Twinkle, Twinkle. I did it two years ago, and enjoyed it immensly. Last year, I didn't finish it, but I hope to do so and play along each week. It isn't a painting challenge, you can use whatever medium and technique you like. Click on the button below for full details. For me it'll definitely be paints, most likely watercolour.