Ten Down...P ODay 362

So, you are probably wondering where I was when I went AWOL. Off to an exotic island for a few days, entertaining foreign dignitaries, ran away with the circus? Nope, none of those. I was obsessed with watercolor painting.

Did I suggest try number 3 was going to be the last? I struggled through ten attempts,

Water color looks so easy. Colors blend together. Lines are not well defined. A detail is suggested, not  explicite. Errors can be "lifted off" and repaired. The brushes are easy to clean. If you get paint on your white pants, it comes right out.  All you need is that paint box you bought at a garage sale last year and a sheet of paper from your copier.

So not true! Well, the brushes are easy to clean. Mostly. Just like any hobby or activity, there are a million little necessities you need when you sit down to play. Yes, you can use the paint box with the eight patties of  color that spring to life when you add a drop of water. Red and blue make purple, yellow and blue are greem. There's never enough white to lighten a dollop of color and a smidge of black is always too much to darken a shade just a little. If it's more intense color you want, there are pigments in tubes, The craft store display of supplies includes pallets with 36 colots, 48 shades, and more.  Printer paper wrinkles when wet, if you get it too wet it tears. But water paitnt paper, it's thick and absorbs the mooisture without crinkling up. A $17.00 bottle of masking fluid allows you to preserve little white spots whlle putting down a "wash." There are tiny brushes with a few hairs and big fat brushe thta apply broad stripes of sky or sea.

But none of this makes me an artist. The little boy in my mind does not show up on the thcik white paper, Some attempts resulted in a nice looking boy, but one I did not know. A couple trys produced a picture of an older boy when I was aiming for a two year old. One painting looked exactly like my nephew. How did that happen?

In the end I settled on apainting reminiscent of the child I remember, The good thing is he does not remmeber what he looked like at two. It is not great but it is the thought that counts, Isn't it?