Visit to Washington state

Last week I continued my "escape from my comfort zone" quite literally. I went to Washington state to attend an art workshop put on by the Urban Sketchers, May 17-19. And I decided to take up an offer by a former boss, Dan Morris, and pay him and his wife, Amy, a visit. They live in Anacortes, way up north. How far up north? Well I could see Canada from their house! OK, I exaggerate  bit but not by much. It is beautiful country, islands everywhere. Oh, and green, very green! I got the itch to sketch and knew right off that I could not come close to capturing imagines of this wonderfully scenic part of the world. But I tried anyway. Amy took me to LaConner for lunch one day. We sat at a table overlooking a river or lake.

Field trip to Healdsburg

IMAG0386-1, a photo by carried away on Flickr.

My sketch group visited our North Bay neighbors,

New sketches

Here are some recent sketches

Music was the prevalent theme for these two sketches. The second photo is what came out an outing with my sketching group on March 26. Loved the ambiance of the venue. The first photo was a solo adventure. I went to Hayward for the 19th Ukulele Festival on April 7 and had a blast.

April sketching begins

On my day off I took my car to the auto shop for its maintenance check-up on April 1. While the mechanics did their thing, I did my thing. I did some sketching at a Peet's shop on San Pablo Avenue near the El Cerrito Plaza.

A day at the food park

What a blast! Food trucks, tables and benches, a little sunshine. The wonderful aromas from the barbecue truck, Mexican food, waffle truck -  didn't buy anything there but it sure did smell good. Oh yeah, I did do a little sketching. Here are some folks at the slider truck.

January 1

We began a new year of sketching in Emeryville, on the roof of the Ikea parking lot. The biggest challenge was actually drawing in the cold -- at least in San Francisco Bay Area standards. It had to be in the high 40s thanks to a brisk wind. I was all layered up and even donned my fingerless painting gloves. I'll add a better photo of this tomorrow.