On Sundays, my sister Shannon and I try to get together for Art Day. We work through classes or projects together, maybe try new materials or play in our journals. The real key is setting aside a couple of hours to hang out with our creativity and one another.

Our focus this Sunday was drawing. Each of us chose a subject to work with. Shannon’s was so sweet and small she could easily put it in her pocket to bring it over!

We did some scribbling.

And blind contours.

And what Carla calls cheater blinds.

We had fun.

To be honest, I still can’t quite believe that I can have fun drawing. It’s been the hardest of all the arts for me to get comfortable with. I’ve finally started to let go of my attachment of the results. I’ve stopped using everything I draw to assess whether I am capable of drawing. Instead, I have come to appreciate the way that drawing gives you the gift of a deeper relationship with what you choose to draw.  With every thoughtful line, you are a witness to its character.

What a perfect way to spend a rainy Sunday.

PS If you’re looking for some drawing inspiration, Shannon’s currently enjoying Intro to Realism with Karine Swensen offered through Carla Sonheim.

Every Sunday is Art Day at our house! Since the kittens have arrived, we haven’t braved a wet medium – until now! We spent the afternoon exploring a colourful watercolour lesson from Lynn Whipple and The Year of the Spark!

We had fun with stencils and shapes.

And watercolours.

There are about a million things we could do with these beauties!

We added words.

And will eventually string these all together.

I think the colourful table shows what fun we had!

And if that’s not enough, there’s Shannon’s smile!

What will you create this week?

Every Sunday is Art Day at our house! This year we often spend it working on a lesson from Carla Sonheim & Lynn Whipple’s Year of the Spark. This week we dove into an exploration of our artistic self, including our favoured colour palettes.  It was fascinating to see the through-lines in everything from our favourite foods to our favourite shapes and colours.

It was especially nice for my sister Shannon and I to be able to talk through our answers and share our artistic selves. It was fun to see where we were the same (we both put a big table as key to our creative environments) and where we are different (I choose simple. Shannon chooses complex.) Not only did we get to know ourselves better but one another too!

This is the palette I favoured this week.

And here are Shannon’s.

I also drew on Lynda Barry’s book Syllabus. One exercise she gives her students is to do a lot of colouring and then line their crayons up in a row and see which colours they favour. So fun! When I was figuring out what to call my set of much-used colours, Shannon noted they are “garden colours” and that works for me!

Speaking of the garden, I popped out to try and find a plant that Shannon really enjoyed the scent of when we painted with found items last year. This geranium leaf was a contender but not the right peppery one!

Art day is also giving me the opportunity to learn to use my DSLR! Hopefully we’ll keep seeing my photos get better and better!