My Art! (And a side conversation to keep it interesting!)

Before I start this post I just have to tell you a story about a conversation that Stace and I had tonight. We were eating dinner and somehow the conversation turned to conversions (I think it started with talking about the difference in the size of the milk container here vs the size of the milk container in the US and the cost difference). Anyway, I told Stace that there were approximately 4 liters in a gallon (I just looked it up and it is really about 3.8 liters per gallon - so sorry Stace, I was just a little off). When all of a sudden I saw the light bulb go on and the following sentence came out of Stacy's mouth, "You mean that we have been paying close to $6 per gallon in gas?" - realizing that we pay around $1.50 per liter here. I just thought it was funny that this just hit her when we have been here for almost 9 months. I will chalk this one up to her lack of comprehending numbers. I am not being rude here, you can ask her and she will say the same thing. And if you ever get the chance ask her how far away something is from her! It is quite a hilarious game! One I often use to pass the time.


Ok, now back to the real reason for this post. Since coming to Australia I decided to try and work on something I have always enjoyed but never taken the time to work on when I was younger. (You will laugh at me but I always wanted to take art classes in high school but thought they were only there if you wanted to take something fun and so I never fit them into my schedule.)

So I bought some books, downloaded some tutorials off the Internet, bought some supplies, and started reading and learning some different techniques. I really focused on being able to draw people, as this has always been the hardest thing for me to draw in the past. I aways found that you can have a beautiful drawing of a person and then the eyes look "off" and it ruins the whole drawing.


Mostly the time that I spent practicing was on the train to and from work. I would take the daily free news paper that they hand out and use the pictures as models. So most of my pictures were limited in the amount of time I could spend on them. I would only work on a picture for the period of time from getting on the train until I got off so most of the pictures are less than 30 minutes drawing time -- with a few exceptions.


I also wanted to start trying to paint at the same time, so I set up a little table to work on a picture at home on evening when we were just watching TV. I have just now finished my first attempt at a painting and so Stace suggested that I need to put a picture of it on the blog to keep a record of when I finished it. So here it goes, hope you enjoy. I am going to put some of my drawings on as well.


Here is a picture of the first drawing I did. I use it as the bench mark for the rest of my paintings to see the progress that has been made.

Here are a couple of my other sketches.

And here is my first painting attempt. Of course it had to be the Opera House since we are living in Sydney!!!!