"-- dear old Ireland, where the beautiful Shannon flows."

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Approx. 5.5"x8.25", watercolor on paper.
The title is from the quote of unknown origin I put right across the thing, like a greeting card - well it was my Mom's birthday or Xmas or something - I was making a greeting card. Below is the unedited scan of it just as I found it, in a manilla envelope, stuck in the closet where it's undoubtedly been ever since I gave it to her in 1975.

Well how's this gonna look

                the green(ish) background
                                                                                

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1974...

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Actually Christmas 1973, pencil on drawing paper, about 9"x12" without the calendar part, 17"x12" altogether. Last minute gift for Mamaw.
The old homeplace I grew up in, currently holed up in again. If you look close you can see ice sickles on the small tree to the right, and that's why the limbs on the big ivy covered oak are white--ice storm that winter.
That barrel on a frame used to hold kerosene ("coal oil" Papaw called it) and that fed the heat stoves in the kitchen and front room.

Here's the whole thing still in the frame. It's been hanging on the wall in the living room ever since...well, 1974.

These are a couple of attempts to edit the photo in the frame, under glass, to get a clearer image of just the drawing...

Not satisfactory so I switched to the scanner...

...on which it wouldn't fit...

...so I went to cropping and editing...

Finally came up with this, same as the one at the top. (This version makes it more like 7"x12") The top one is sized to fit this page, but the others are larger and can be clicked for more detail.

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Yeah, Don Quixote...

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My mind was too much in "adventure" mode yesterday to settle on a subject, so this turned out to be more of an exploratory exercise with the Pilot Precise V5 extra fine rolling ball pen. I guess technically that makes it a ballpoint sketch. 'Cept not really. It ain't no Bic Stick, although I was trying to use it like one.

 This is page one in a new sketch book, 8.5x5.5" made by Daler Rowney with 80 sheets of 65 lb. paper.
 And you get the full width for drawing as it's attached to the book by a 3/4" strip with perforations.
 Cool huh.

And here's some eggs I drew in pencil in another book a long time ago.

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Some drawings from 1980

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Page from a sketch book, I think. Pencil of a trash can in a woodworking shop or sculpture studio...

Graphite on a large sheet of drawing paper. I lost it somewhere along the way...

Another pencil in an 11x8.5" sketchbook. I sat on the porch of my apt. across from this to draw it. In the glow of streetlights, or whatever you call 'em when they're in the yard.

All the rest are pencil in the sketchbooks. This one was for a design project involving horizontals and diagonals that wound up being replaced by the big graphite piece above.

Taking a break from painting the outside of this house...

For some reason Blogger loaded the pics in different order than I selected, but it worked out because now the best was saved for last.

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Is it the full moon yet? I can't sleep. Oh, I feel the sun coming up...

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