The other day we brought a supply of brown flour from Wonderbake and instead of letting it get musty (we had an attack of hundreds of weevils in our last batch of brown flour), I have been using our trusty old Kenwood bread-maker (see sketch No. 1683), which have had since the early 1990’s, to use up all the flour. Then I am freezing the bread for future use.
Wed-19-Feb-2025
I’ve had this cheap little palette since I was a teenager. The plastic lid is held on with some tape but it still works. The other day I added a row of new colours – by glueing in some bits of old plastic into the part in front which used to be set aside for a paint brush. This palette is the smallest one I have…but I still can’t resist cramming in lots of colours!
Tue-11-Feb-2025
Somehow I managed to loose my old SwissArmy knife on the way back from our last holiday in the UK, so my daughters bought me this one as a replacement, for Christmas. This one has even more widgets on it! I usually use it to sharpen pencils and open bottles of wine and beer on holiday, but now I can saw things and snip paper!
Mon-10-Feb-2025
Here is the Christmas present I got from my sister – some Anker SoundCore P30i noise cancelling earbuds. These are a good affordable substitute for Apple AirPods – which I loved but finally the battery packed up. I found it challenging to sketch such a black object!
Thu-6-Feb-2025
After many years we invested in a pressure cooker. I was a bit nervous using it for the first time as for some reason I think of them as possibly exploding…naturally it was fine. My nervousness wasn’t helped by the incomprehensible instructions – here is a sample: “To raise temperature by cook after cover shown as 6) and pressure limit valve hooking the right position of exhaust pine. If any wrong position and fail to get use effect (shown as 7) and the lift indicating vane pole”. All English words but not in comprehensible sentences!
Wed-5-Feb-2025
This is the first sketch in another sketchbook made using 300gsm Baohong Hot Pressed paper. The first of these tall thin sketches was done at J.Co donuts (I always thought they were a Filipino company but it seems they are Indonesian). We went out to the mall firstly for me to post my passport to the UK and secondly to buy some stuff to prepare to join the Luneta Art Fair. The second sketch is the only tall and thin thing I could think of to sketch the following day, which I did while we watched the TV.
Wed-29 and Thu-30-Jan-2025
I picked this blossom up near our apartment and thought that the colours are so beautiful that I had to try and sketch it. I used watercolour pencils, watercolour, a tiny touch of ink and a yellow Posca pen to do this one. According to Wikipedia the tree has been nominated as among 100 of the “World’s Worst” invaders – it is not native to the Philippines but is widely planted as an ornamental tree.
Tue-28-Jan-2025
I was a bit stuck for a subject to sketch, the day I drew this, so I looked on Instagram to see what some of my favourite sketchers were up to. Seeing that @everydaylizmc had sketched some pencils, I thought I would give that a go too (also because that day I had sorted out all my sketching materials). If I am stuck for something to sketch I find that just looking at what some of your favourite artists have done, is a good way to get an idea.
Mon-27-Jan-2025
I usually sketch the presents I got at Christmas to say thank you. These are some of them – two different types of coffee, chocolate and shaving cream from Human Nature. I wasn’t sure where I was going with this sketch…I started with simple shapes and then used Watercolour Pencils to add texture and detail.
Sat-25-Jan-2025