An apple tree mandala

I am currently taking part in an online painting class called Bloom True with Flora Bowley. It's really interesting and a great new way to look at painting. I'm really enjoying the process of playing with paint.

One of our class exercises was to draw a mandala pattern, starting in the centre and creating concentric circles where each is a different design. I love pattern and I have been working (slowly) towards making my own patterns. This was a fantastic pattern making exercise and I will definitely be drawing more like this. I took inspiration from an apple tree as I was coming up with repeat motifs.

My lovely family were suitably impressed that I had drawn this. The kids used their most favourite word of the moment - "Awesome" and my husband asked if I had used a stencil. Well done family! I am feeling very appreciated by my family, particularly after I showed them a painting I did as a teenager and the blonde one if it was by Van Gogh!

New watercolours

I've had a couple of new art materials arrive over the past week - Neocolour II watersoluble crayons and Staedtler Aquarelle watercolour pencils. I've been watching various tutorials online which use gesso as a base and so I wanted to have a play with the materials to see what suited my style best.

I painted gesso onto half of a page in my A3 sketchbook and stamped my favourite new Stampendous stamp with StazOn around the page.

Neocolour crayons on gesso - the colours were vibrant and smooth but showed the texture of the gesso underneath. The colours stayed wet for quite a while which was great for moving them around but I also kept smudging them too.

Neocolour crayons straight onto paper - I love the bright colours here. The initial drawing can be seen through the colours but I like this as it adds shading. It dried quickly so not much smudging.

Aquarelle watercolour pencils on paper - colouring in firmly with the pencils gave a good vibrant colour. Pencil marks weren't very visible after painting. A subtler effect could be acheived than with the Neocolour crayons. You can see the smoothness of the colours in the corners scribbling I did.

Aquarelle watercolour pencils on gesso - The colours here were more muted and stayed wet for longer.

An experiment! I coloured in the flower with the Neocolour crayons and then used a mini mister to wet it. I added too much water and it all ran a bit. I was just wondering if this would work for when we are camping and I want to take some sketchy materials with me.