Category: Inktober 2017

A not-so-shy sky

  By ,

So I was really happy to find the perfect photo from our trip this summer for the Inktober prompt of “sky.” We were traveling west across Nebraska, the clouds were all kinds of threatening, and there were tornado warnings both north and east of us. Didn’t know if I could do justice to it, but I was going to try.

I did my picture — then discovered that today’s prompt was actually “shy.” Guess I’ll have to do another one tomorrow.

Picture was done with the Pentel brush pen, India ink, and brush that came in the Artsnacks box set for Inktober. The brush and ink were key to filling in that stretch of road.

What else did I do today? I planned to scrub down the kitchen, help the girl organize her magazines and comics, and paint. Instead, I slept in, bought groceries, and hung out watching my husband play Mass Effect: Andromeda. Plan to write a few sentences before I switch over to reading for half an hour or so before sleep.

Sketch:
ink drawing of cloudy sky over flat landscape
Photo:
cloudy skies over flat land

Not ready for the weekend 

  By ,

How can one not be ready for the weekend? Quite simply, still too many things on my to-do list for the week still untouched.

On the other hand, the weekend does mean sleeping in — and it’s a three-day weekend, so that’s a plus.

No words today.

Inktober prompt was sword. Swords are from a visiting exhibit (Samurai: Way of the Warrior) that was at the Chazen Museum of Art on the University of Wisconsin campus. I was very irritated with this sketch and noticed all the things wrong with it. (I can give you a list.)

Sketch:

Photo:

Long morning 

  By ,

Today had school drama. Slow motion, check Twitter to see if there were updates, then try to keep working drama. By midmorning, everything was resolved, people had done their jobs, and that was that until after school when I heard the boy’s view of things.

Today’s words: 1,025

Nearing the one-third mark! I’d like to be farther, but the only way to get there is to keep going.

Today’s Inktober prompt was “long.” I really wasn’t sure what to draw for this, but went with a long mountain ridge from Rocky Mountain National Park.

Sketch:
mountain sketch
Photo:
mountain ridge

All wet

  By , ,

No, the weather is dry and lovely. The plumbing backing up into the garage — that was wet. Thank goodness for reliable plumbers, but what with making sure the girl had her picture day form and her homework and her trumpet, and talking with the plumbers and turning on and off water around the house, I think it was 11 before I ate breakfast. Didn’t really have lunch, either. And I think I forgot to take my morning dose of allergy medicine, which is a mistake in ragweed season.

However, it was still a good day. The plumbers dealt with the problem. Damaged things that had to be thrown out were minimal. I wrote. I drew. The sun shone. A good day.

Today’s words: 300

Today’s picture is also from the Henry Vilas Zoo. The prompt was “underwater.” See? The day started and ended with water — all wet.

Sketch:

Photo:

Raisin tart?

  By ,

Today’s Inktober prompt was “poison,” so I did some tree frogs (poison dart frogs?) from the Henry Vilas Zoo in Madison, Wisconsin. No color this year, unlike my pretty blue one from last year.

(Post title comes from a line in The Happiest Millionaire.)

Sketch:
Frog sketch
Photo:
Frogs
Words today: 264

Also today, I set up a Facebook author page. Not a lot there yet, but it’ll build over time. Feel free to like it.

Broken bone

  By ,

Not my broken bone, but a dinosaur’s — apatosaurus, I think. This broken femur fossil is on display at the geology museum of the Colorado School of Mines. This was one of our stops this summer on vacation. To the extent I can, I plan to combine the daily Inktober prompts with vacation photos to plan my sketches this month. Today’s prompt was “divided.”

Sketch:
sketch of broken dinosaur fossil
Reference photo:
broken dinosaur femur, fossilized
Got words in, too!

Today’s words: 1,573
Words 2017: 166,296
Average words/day: 605

With the bug this weekend, my daily word count suffered, but I’m still making progress.

Inktober begins

  By ,

My feelings about today are complicated. Dad would’ve been 89 today. And I’ve been under the weather all weekend, so my energy was low — as in, I made it to the grocery store this morning, then napped all afternoon (and husband took our daughter to her soccer without me). So no writing all weekend, either.

On the other hand, I really loved doing Inktober last year, and I’ve been looking forward to it this year. I even downloaded the suggested prompts. So here are the prompts and today’s sketch.

inktober 2017 prompts
sketch of napping on couch