Great time at our August sketchcrawl!

The annual Fly-in and BBQ On The River in Excelsior Springs--what fun!

My almost-finished sketch...

Lots more sketches on our Facebook group, here, as well as on Warren Ludwig's blog with his tale of derring-co!

Urban Sketchers Midwest at Kansas City's First Friday/Hello Art event!

We had an amazing time at Kansas City's First Friday event; we were invited to share our sketchbooks and journals at Kendall King Group in KC's Crossroads Arts District.

I brought journals, art supplies, prints, giveaways, and signup sheets!  We gave away a Stillman & Birn Zeta journal and a copy of my book, Artist's Journal Workshop.

Here's Don Gore and his wonderful work--Don invited us to take part in the First Friday event and share our sketchbooks.  That's Don in the red shirt.

People were fascinated by his work!  (So was I.)

Joseph shared his sketchbooks and minded the store when I was out socializing, drooling over others' journals, and snapping photos.  In the foreground, you can see some of the simple travel kits I brought for inspiration.

Jeanette Sclar shared her incredible journals and field boxes, and encouraged people to make their own 5-minute journals.  Her station was really popular!

Holly Spencer had large prints and lots of interest in her work!

Steve Penberthy came from St. Louis to share...his tablet slide show was a brilliant idea, and showed his process from sketch to finished painting.

This is one of Steve's sketches...I wish I had gotten a photo of the finished painting as well.

Don invited other USk-Midwest artists to send some of their work if they couldn't be part of the First Friday event, and put it up on the wall with some of ours, too.  Very inspiring!

Ladies checking out my journals...

Jeanette sharing inspiration

Wish you could all have been there!  

June Sketchcrawl, KC area--VanTill's Winery

Joseph adds the finishing touches after the rain drove us indoors! Malinda's daughter looks on...

His is on the left, mine's on the right...

Lots of color, and good food and wine as well.

This is Carolyn, our newest member!

Sketching the folks at the next table

Our dear friend Malinda and her youngest...

Here's Malinda's sketch of the cob fence at the winery...

Carolyn and Holly enjoying pizza and goodies--the box was full of art supplies I was passing along!

Holly's gorgeous hand bound sketchbook...

And her sketch from last month...in a VERY large Moleskine.

I think the part we all enjoy most about our crawls is sharing the sketcbooks afterward!

We finished up and got back home in the nick of time--a BIG storm blew up and nearly took this tent arbor down!  Van Till's had to move all their visitors inside while the staff literally tried to hold everything down out here.

Our Sketchcrawl last weekend!

I'm glad to see this old car is back in the lobby of the Elms Hotel after its extensive renovation--couldn't resist sketching it!  Still using just the primaries on this one...nice range of neutrals!

My pen was acting up on the tree...so I did more writing than usual.  and at right, Malinda's young one was playing with his tablet...he moved a lot!

As always, we had a lovely late lunch/early dinner and shared our work.  Kelly's friend couldn't join us, but it was a good group for lunch!

We missed Christiana and Bill and Vicky this time, but hoping everyone else will add their sketches!

Duty, Honor, Sadness

My husband is in charge of the flags for the local Legion post...so it was his sad duty to lower them again, yesterday, for the attacks on our embassies in Libya, Yemen, and Egypt on the anniversary of 9-11. They will remain at half staff until Sunday.

Fly-in at the Excelsior Springs Airport

Our August sketchcrawl and my finished sketch, once I'd added notes at home...

Cute little Piper Cub

Joseph and Malinda watch take-offs and landings

Malinda sketching

Airplanes...Malinda's dad used to own one, so she really understands how they're built.

The hangar just to the right of this one is where they had a huge BBQ spread.

Work in progress...

The Fokker triplane in the background was a magnet!

Chatting...

My quick sketch of the triplane...it was made from a kit, 3/4 size, with a VW engine!  The pilot says you have to fly it every minute...handles better on the ground than in the air...

The Red Baron takes off...

All in all, it was a great sketchcrawl, even though there were only a few of us.  The food was great, the pilots were terrific, the music was from the 40s and 50s--jitterbug, Sinatra--and we had a ball.

35th International Sketchcrawl--Kansas City

I sat at the bottom of the steps out in back of the Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art and sketched the west end of the facade...

I took this photo after I finished...you can see I just did that far end!

Frustratingly enough, my *ahem!* Ahab pen went on strike, in the warm sun, and dropped a big blog in my sky area at left.  So when I got home, I decided the evergreens would work well if they were ALL a field of spatter!  I protected the building with one of the post cards I'd picked up, and spattered away.

Actually, I was pretty frustrated with my pen...several people had stopped by to watch me work, and I mentioned that to one young couple.  The girl insisted I take her pen, so I finished with my NEW art supply!  Bless her!

We were there to see the Decorative Arts from the World's Fairs, 1851-1939 exhibit.  It was a bit overwhelming!  But I loved the Art Nouveau section...there wasn't room for that huge glass vase at bottom...it was 3 feet or more tall, so I turned my book and drew it on the side.

This was the first sketch of the day--I kind of posted these backwards!  It's right at the entrance from the parking garage...light and surfaces and sculpture and visitors all at once!

Here's Jeanette and Cindy heading for the World's Fair show, about halfway down the hall...I couldn't resist shooting the picture before chasing after them!