A rescued stag and Challenge no.1

I painted this over a year ago and didn't like it so I thought I'd do a little experiment and try and do a rescue attempt on it - I lifted out the original background and added more washes to the stag and the water reflections underneath and now I quite like it - well it's better than it was anyway!!!!  The original painting was very flat with no tonal value  - It was fun getting out an old painting and seeing if it could be improved upon, it made me realise that my painting has improved a bit over the past year or so!!

After Polly Birchall posted some old school paintings on her blog, I said I would do the same so here are a couple of sketches from my VERY old sketchpad - from 1985!!!  I still kick myself for not continuing with art after I left school and leaving it til now but making up for lost time now!

Even back then my favourite subject to draw was wildlife and portraits.   

And for those of you who are interested in joining in with the monthly painting challenge I've just started on my facebook page here is the first photo - it's one of Gary's and is of 2 greylag geese strutting their stuff in the snow - I think he's captured great character in these geese, why not have a go, any medium, any style, I'd love to see what you artists out there come up with, I'll be having a go as well of course - if you post the result on your blog I'll copy and paste it on to here for everyone to see with a link to your blog and with your permission I'll post it to my facebook page as well - just a bit of fun, happy painting xxx

Stonechat and a Herdy

After finishing my series of garden birds I decided I would gradually start painting the birds that I see when out and about and the beautiful stonechat is one of them.  We sometimes see one or two when we're out walking - they're gorgeous, love the way they perch right on top of the heather and love the noise they make, like two stones being bashed together. Unfortunately, they've been hit by harsh winter weather which has seen a decline in their numbers over the last couple of years. Gary rarely carries his big lens when we're out on a long walk and so he doesn't have any close up photos of the stonechat (yet) so I've pinched my reference photo from Brian Rafferty's blog (I know you don't mind Brian!)

By the way if anyone reading this actually sees a stonechat in this country I know a man who'd be very interested to hear about it Pete Woodruff of Birds2Blog is recording all the sightings he can, to try and discover if their numbers are on the increase again.

Something else which we never fail to see when out walking the hills is sheep of course and the Herdwick breed fondly known as 'Herdy's, native to the Lake District in Cumbria are my favourites. They are such characters and I've got a mountain of photos to choose from as he can rarely walk past one without stopping to take a photo!

I'm trying to get a bit of painting done before I go back to work tomorrow after the Christmas break - I shouldn't complain as I've had two weeks off but I'd rather be out walking or painting than going to work, sigh, keep buying those lottery tickets!

Thank you to those of you who have checked out my daughter's new blog Wildlife with Whitley  and left such encouraging comments - she was thrilled!

Can you tell what it is yet?

Yes I know ...... it's a bird! I was hoping to finish this tonight after starting it late last night but my daughter has invaded my art room to do her homework! ... so it will have to wait til tomorrow now .... in the meantime though ... can you tell what type of garden bird it is from what I've painted so far ... I'm nearly finished with painting the garden birds -  only a couple more to do unless I get any newcomers arriving - I'd love to see some long tailed tits and Gary assures me that I will in time - and a bullfinch and woodpecker would be nice although unlikely I think where I live -  the elusive sparrowhawk is still keeping a low profile.  

I was appalled yesterday when my daughter rang me when she got home from school upset after witnessing some school boys shooting at starlings with a bb gun - why oh why do some kids (and adults) get their kicks from doing that sort of thing -  I just don't get it and never will.

I had a break from painting birds at the weekend to finish a pet portrait and really hoping the owners like it, it's good to get the drawing practice as I tend to do much more painting than drawing these days...

and last but not least I'd like to introduce you to another garden visitor - not a bird this time but an acrobatic grey squirrel - not as clever as Andrew's squirrel from Rambles with a camera fame as he hasn't managed to destroy any feeders yet or get at any nuts but he keeps popping over to have a go.

Acrobatic squirrel

Hope you're all having a wonderful week whatever you're doing, til next time bloggers!