Sketchbook challenge update!

A drawing that was inspired by a photograph I had taken during one of my travels.

I wanted to allow myself to be a little more free and it became something more about creating shapes and shades.

Trees & pathways! I love landscapes.

I was inspired by spring and its beautiful colors, the rest just happened and its a drawing that has now given me some new ideas for my jewelry.

Close up!

 

So we are half way through our Sketchbook Challenge! ... have I fallen off the sketch-a-day wagon? ... well if I'm going to be honest, just a bit ... life happens, you're busy all day and at the end of a work day you realize there was a promise I made to myself! ... in speaking with friends who have also taken up the challenge, I know that I'm not the only one and I have only missed a day or two! That's not too bad now, is it?

I'm so glad that I decided to join this challenge.  The first thing I realized, is that I have quite a few half-filled sketchbooks that have been collecting dust.  In looking through them, I re-visited lots of drawings and notes and scribbles that went back to the days of being at school.  If you have ever kept a diary, a sketchbook is very similar really.  Both, journals that guard your thought process, whether it be through words or images.  A diary or sketchbook is a vehicle for any person to release, exercise and confront their intuitive, emotional and intellectual responses.  

Somehow, I had personally forgotten how important a sketchbook can be.  Ideas and thoughts for new artistic projects constantly run through my mind but I had failed to take the time to anchor those ideas!  Having that sketchbook as a "safeguard" for my thoughts, I feel, gives my mind a chance to refresh.  Being able to look through your sketches, allows you to expand them, edit them and create something further than what your mind had initially thought of ... and sometimes a sketchbook is just a great vehicle to exercise your hand, to better your craft! ... practice does make perfect!