Danielle Calabro

There is a place in Orlando, FL called Leu Gardens , it has been well over 10 years since I have been there but I remember it like it was last year. It is magnificent, I remember walking around there for hours. When I was younger I would go there to photograph the flowers. Sadly I have lost touch with it, talking about it makes me want to go again, take my kids to one of the movie nights they have there. Go during the day and photograph some of the flowers all while listening to my children tell me how hot and bored they are, it's great to torture your kids with a little fresh air. Honestly I'm not sure how they will act bit hopefully they would enjoy it. I sat down last weekend and started this sketch and I finished it up last night, it reminded me of the times I use to go to the garden. I sketched this out in pencil then went over the sketch with my Micron pens and color was added with Copic markers. I am sure you have heard me say this before and I am going to say ...

We are have now made it to negotiations with the bank for our new house, hopefully they do not come back with a ridiculous counter offer. Then it is one to running the numbers then inspection. If everything good good then hopefully we will be moving in a couple of months. Then my poor children will get pulled out of school to start a new one, wish this would have been finished before school started but I have lost hope with that. So I have been a little stressed and have hit an artist block again, painting is being forces so it is time to step back. Instead of forcing an idea I have turned to my trusty sketch book and doodling. My way of keeping my creativity flowing, when I can't focus. I do plan on starting the next painting I am going to use for a Christmas card, that should be one of the next couple of post so look for it, think Carrot and coal.

Watercolor Pencil and Ink Well, here is another Zentangle™ I did, what should have only taken me a couple of days to finish took me about a week. Here is what I have learned with this little piece of art. I decided to use watercolor colored pencil to add color, which by the way is not the norm for a Zentangle™, from what I have read anyways. I drew out the basic area that I wanted to tangle then used the watercolor pencils to color the area in then used water to turn it in to the watercolor. I used regular watercolor paint for the larger background color. Which I think I may upgrade to the tube watercolors, using the smaller pallet watercolors can be a bit time consuming. So here is the problem I found when using watercolor pencils with your regular multiliner pens. Apparently the watercolor pencils still keep that waxy film even when it is diluted with the water.  Don't get me wrong, I loved the pencils and I think they will be great with other projects but not so much wit...