Doodles in Color

In the past, if I wanted a colored doodle, I would print off a copy of one of my black and white doodles and then color them with colored markers.  I never enjoyed the process although I liked the way they looked when finished. Recently I got an idea of how to do colored doodles in a way that I would enjoy.  What I did was put random colors on my sheet of paper and then do my doodle in my black sharpie on top of the color.  I love the results.  I used watercolor on the first three which gives a softer pastel look.  On the next three I used colored markers which give a more intense color.  

This new method is quick and easy and I love the results.  I have started a new sketchbook which will be all colored doodles.  

In my last post I mentioned that I probably would not be doing canvas paintings for a while but that has changed.  Our younger son and his wife will be retiring to Texas in a few months, and they would like some paintings with a Texan theme.  The first painting I will do will be an Endless Rose done in yellow for the Yellow Rose of Texas.  Then I will do a painting with critters from Texas.  I am also tossing around a few other ideas. I love doing southwest paintings so I will be having fun doing these new paintings.

On another note, we have started our last home improvement project.  It is the laundry room. There will be new paint and floors and new shelves.  It is a walk-in room approximately 7' X 5'.  We have decided to get a new washer and dryer.  I like the ones that came with the house but they are around 18 years old so it is time to retire them.  I'll post photos when we are done.

Oodles of Doodles

 I have not posted any of my doodles since my post in April.  Here are all the doodles I have done in the past 3 months

I have not done any painting since I finished  the commission which I featured in my last post.  Since January when I removed my art from the gallery and made the decision not to enter any contests this year, I don't have the push to do new paintings. I love to paint and enjoyed every minute of doing the commission for my friend. Since I finished that project, I can't get motivated to come up with new ideas for paintings. Hopefully I will get inspired to paint again but, in the meantime, I continue to doodle.  When I have new doodles or other art finished, I will do another blog post.

My latest commissioned painting

 Happy 4th of July!  I can't believe it is 3 months since my last blog post.  In April and May I had cataract surgery and was unable to paint for a short time.  In May and June I was busy painting a commission for a good friend.  It was probably the most unusual items I have ever painted.  

When we were visiting in Tucson a longtime friend asked me to paint two wooden urns.  One for her husband's ashes and the other for her ashes when she passes away.  I agreed to do this.  She purchased two wooden urns and had them sent to me.  Each was to have a desert scene on one side, their favorite bird on another side, a Surreal Saguaro on the third side and the last side of one was to have a hummingbird and the other was to have a quail family.  There was a total of 8 paintings, so it took me a couple of months to complete.  Here are photos of the finished project.

It has been a long time since I painted southwest subject matter.  It brought back good memories of all the paintings I did and sold when I was in Tucson.  My friend is happy with what I did which makes me happy.  This was a very special project for me.

I have a number of new doodles that I did in the past few months that I will show in another post which I will do soon.