Day 1750 It’s Saturday
— Read on margaretmccarthyhunt.com/2018/10/13/day-1750-its-saturday/
Day 866 Drawing dogs and a journal review.
Babysitting the dogs in Atlanta. Livia my sons pit bull lies around striking elegant poses. Some dogs are just interesting to draw and she is.
Drawn in my strathmore watercolor 400 journal which really seems to NOT alike the Carbon Platinum ink in my noodler Konrad. It takes forever to dry inevitably smearing.
Here’s one I haven’t finished yet. The thing about a dog is that usually sooner or later they strike the same pose so if you are patient and wait she will get back in the same position.
I do love drawing animals. I bought this book for $5 at Sam Flaxs yesterday on their sales table upstairs. She bases her sketches on sidewalk cracks so something Else to look for when I go out people watching today.
Here’s the stillman and birn journal which lays pancake flat when it’s opened. My two favorite sketchbooks because of their paper are the Stillman and Birn zeta and Beta series books and the Strathmore 500 Mixed Media Journals. Lovely crispy paper that loves ink and watercolor.
My biggest problem is that neither of them ever lay flat when open like the moleskines do. Sadly Moleskine has been outsourced to China and now has really nasty paper in them.
But these new softcover Stillman and Birn DO lay flat. Hurrah. I was so thrilled to find that I went back into Sam Flaxs and bought two more on the spot. You can’t buy them in Augusta.
Why that curve bothers me.
The wc strathmore book always has a lot of curve in them. Hard to take a pic of and terrible on a scanner unless you stand and flatten the book with extra pressure. Usually it has a curved line if you draw across the pages. Not good.
Off to the Atlanta races.
Margaret xoxox opening that oyster
Day 866 – Time to Draw
Brunch at Cafe Lily in Decatur. Atlanta is loaded with people to draw and delicious food to eat. Cafe Lily is no exception. The most amazing Greek Omelet ever and polenta from heaven. Think the richest creamiest grits ever.
Colors used quin gold and burnt sienna for trees. Umbrellas cerulean and burnt sienna. Quin gold and a green Daniel smith primateks on table cloth and bushes. Ultramarine blue and burnt umber for blacks. Brown hair burnt sienna and umber.
Sketchbook Stillman and Birn Beta. Lovely cold pressed paper that lets you lift color so easily.
Off in search of people to draw and photograph.
Margaret xoxoxo
Day 874 It’s done.
Still using Ted Nuttalls transparent colors plus cerulean for greys. I decided to paint the background with quin gold to brighten the page. The cookies have a lot of small dots down with my #6 Isabel which has a very sharp point. Still a little large but oh well.
Lettering is done w the same 6 Isabey and deartrementis document brown a good fall color.
Greys are quin sienna and cerulean or a brighter blue that dwells on my palette next to cerulean. Looks very close in color but brighter when u use it.
This is the back of the page. A page meant to be entertaining for a two year old and a four year old. My grandchildren Henry and Livia. I left a wide gutter on this back because sooner or later I hope to do enough if these to bind them into a journal of our days at the cabin.
No quin gold background. Like it better gold.
Ttyl. Time for yoga at the Y.
Margaret xoxox
Day 879 TV Sketching
Not the best sketch but an it of Sunday fun drawn while watching Mick on CBS Sunday Morning. I can pause the tv and draw. If it weren’t suppose to be Mick I would say this was a great sketch. Background is gouache. Face is painted with watercolor. 
Here’s the sketch. Done w a pentel brush pen in my Stillman and Birn Mixed Media Sketchbook.
Ttyl time to paint.
Margaret xoxox enjoying this rainy Sunday
Day 887 From the Overseas Highway
Only 125 miles are so starting at Largo West and ending at Key West the southernmost point of the US.
A sketch done on the sidewalk in front of the High Art Museum late one fall afternoon. The entire facade was in shade by the. Sad because it’s gorgeous gleaming in the bright noon day sun.
I painted it later with Ted Nuttalls transparent water color palette.
The High at noon.
And the High in the late afternoon.
The swooping facade made it hard to paint it white because it’s hard to tell what is what from anything but a pic taken at the same angle. And my photo was all in the shade. Who wants to see an all grey building?!
I should draw it again. Oh well.
Ttyl
Key West is looming but first a stop at Buzzards Roost for dinner and to stretch our legs.
Margaret whose bottom is really tired.
Day 883 from I 75 North
Heading north to freezing Atlanta after spending the night in warm Ocala Fl. 😱 where are those lovely ocean breezes? Still at Key West?
Funny thing happened last nite. I turned on my iPhone maps to see what restaurants were near our hotel in Ocala. It said it would take us Three Days and seven hours to walk to Carolines on Duval where we had eaten the night before.
Bytw we voted to eat at the nearby IHOP instead of riding in the car to another restaurant. So tired of riding.
Dinner at the Half Shell Raw Bar. Yes I was naughty. Fried shrimp and excellent fries. The reason to eat at Half Shell Raw Bar is NOT the food which is good but the view of the harbor while we waited for the Christmas lighted boat parade to begin.
Our view is the Bar with our waitress in the center of it. Fun place to hang out.
The lobster pot Christmas tree at the Half Shell Raw Bar.
A tree on the docks.
One of the boats. 
The coast guard entry. 
Oops the back of a really fun boat. The front is on my camera which is NOT wifiing to my phone like it is supposed too.
Another random entry.
Another shot of the decorated docks.
Ttyl
Margaret xoxox who has to get back to navigating.
Day 887 Christmas Craziness
Has started. Sorry for the short post! 
Brunch at Blue Heaven is always a treat. Amazing shrimp eggs Benedict with key lime hollandaise. I know sounds terrible but oh so good.
And the atmosphere is just fun and whacky. Breakfast with the chickens lunch in the shade is their motto. Actually I fed the chickens some of mine. They LOVE blueberries.
This is the view from our table. Even during high summer it’s so wonderfully cool under their trees.
Bytw Hemingway used to box on this property. Famous people are never far away in Key West.
Back to my Christmas stocking knitting crisis. Oh wait I have to bake cookies and pack the car and finish wrapping and. Sigh. Helllppp. 
Third attempt at stocking is the harm. 
Day 892 Christmas Memories
I am working on a journal book for my grandkids. This is page three. They are painted on sheets of 8×10″ 280# arches. Sooner or later I hope to bind them into a book.
The tree is their tree and the toys their two favorites Santa brought. Of course those are their stockings that I knitted for each of them the year they were born.
Colors -Ted Nuttalls transparent colors plus cerulean. The two colors I can paint without are Daniel Smith Quin gold and cerulean. Well there are a few others but use those a lot.
I did a base coat on the tree of quin gold before painting it with greens. It alway shows as a nice glow.
Lettering is done with a small 6 Isabey sable brush which has a wonderful point.
Busy day. Off to binders to buy more quin gold And cerulean.
Ttyl
Margaret not looking forward to Atlanta traffic but hearing the call of her Binders gift card aka spend spend spend.
Day 856 Happy Veterans Day
Somehow saying Happy Veterans Day seems like a conundrum to me because is not happy and people remembering it are sad.
That said I am sharing sketches of War Memorials I did in France last fall in Normandy at the sites of the Allied D Day Invasions 71 years ago.
The Canadian Cemetery at Beny sur Mer. It was odd to me that people to young to know the men buried there were crying over dead relatives.
That said I found myself doing the same thing as I shared a link to my dads historic battle of Foxhill at the Choisin Reservoir in 1950. PBS recently aired a riveting documentary about the week long battle. I had heard bits of the story but to actually see the 32 below conditions they fought in, the rugged almost arctic landscapes, the mass burials of the Marine dead,the frozen Chinese who were shot because the Marines had no other choice in this desperate time was a totally different experience.
The beautiful Canadian Juno Beach Museum shaped like a maple leaf on the beaches of La Manche, the Sleeve as the French call the English Channel. A stunning building wrapped in glowing aluminum with state of the art exhibits.
The Ranville Eglise next to another Canadian Cemetery in Caen Normandy France. The day was getting dark and somber threatening rain that afternoon.
The Pegasus Bridge Museum. Using gliders brave British paratroopers jumped behind Nazi lines BEFORE the Allied invasion forces landed on the Normandy beaches. I am sure many of them are now buried at the nearby Ranville Cemetery. They are immortalized in the movie The Longest Day.
Thanks for stopping by.
Margaret xoxox
Margaret McCarthy Hunt Art 