Rocks and Trees

Joshua Tree National Park always makes me think of Dr. Seuss. When I was young, I thought the alien looking trees in some of his books were imaginary. Until I moved out to California and saw Joshua Trees.

03/09/2020 A big Joshua tree in the middle of a Joshua tree forest.

I planned to camp there this week, then this atmospheric river showed up. A desert full of rocks and washes is no place to tent camp in heavy rain! My friend, Jeannine, and I decided even two days would be better than rescheduling and having something else interfere.

Sunday, March 08, 2020. Sun and rocks behind a dead Juniper tree.

The weather Sunday and Monday was just about perfect: sunny, calm, with temperatures in the 60s during the day and 40s at night. The clouds were thickening all day Monday and by 4 pm it looked like a was storm moving in. I got back to Poway about 8 pm Monday night and by 9 pm it was raining. Great timing!

April 2015
Chynna (my Aussie dog) in Joshua Tree National Park.

Joshua Tree NP is a land of rocks and "trees". Joshua trees are actually arboreal (tree-like) yucca plants. I first went there in 1997 with my sister. Since then, apparently, it has become a hipster destination. The last time I camped there in 2015, I drove up in the middle of the week expecting to be able to get a first-come campsite early in the day. I drove to each campground, but there was not one open site. I ended up finding a site after dark in the Indian Cove campground outside the park boundaries.

Indian Cove campground.
Our campsite next to the rocks.
White-throated swifts were flying arond the rocks behind us.

This time, I decided to reserve a site several weeks ahead. The only campground with sites available during the week that had 3 days open was again, Indian Cove. But it is a beautiful campground with sites surrounded by the same rocks that Joshua Tree is known for.

Some animals we saw on the trails or in the campsite.
Clockwise, Antelope squirrel, common raven,
Sonoran gopher snake, Western Side-blotched lizard,
Pinacate beetle, Desert Cottontail.

The campground is actually within the park boundaries, but doesn't connect directly by road with the rest of the park. So we had a 15 minute drive each day to get back inside the park. It was worth it. The campground was very quiet and serene. Sunday night was the night of a super moon, so there was no Milky Way to be seen, but the brightness of the moon made up for it. I longed to be able to take the time to sketch, but being there such a short time I only did a quick sketch of the campsite and filled in a few of the animals we saw after I got home.

3/09/20 Wall Street Mill Trailhead. 

Most of what we saw at JTNP consisted of rocks and trees, but very impressive looking rocks and trees! We did go on one hike to see some historical landmarks. It was only about 1.2 miles from where we parked to the gold mill, but that apparently was enough to discourage most of the tourists. All the parking lots were full and I had to time it right to get a space as someone drove away, but we hiked back to the mill pretty much by ourselves.

We saw some old cars that I remember from 1997, but I seem to remember them having hoods and roofs back then. However, I haven't found my photos from that era to confirm my memories.

Wall Street Mill was active during the 1930s and 40s. It was used to crush and mill ore to extract the gold. There are several brief, but interesting, stories explained about the history of the site at plaques in the area.

View looking up hill from the end of the Wall Street Mill.
Gold was extracted from rock ore at this site.

It was a great, although short, trip. I arrived home tired and sleep deprived but itching to get back to the desert for another camping trip soon. Next time, probably Anza-Borrego desert.

Face Time

In my determination to learn how to sketch people, I have read several books that have given me good training suggestions. I am especially interested in faces and expressions. Here are a few of the faces from the last couple of months.

Koh-I-Noor Tri-Tone pencil on Canson Black Paper

The book "How to Draw People" by Jeff Mellem advocates drawing a face map. Visualize a balloon with a rubber band around the equator to place the eye zone. The bottom of the nose is half way between the equator and the bottom of the balloon and the mouth is halfway between the nose and the chin at the bottom of the balloon.

I didn't get the map quite right, but the hypothetical child still looks better than my previous attempts.

Faces are very striking on black toned paper with metallic pencils. I love the way the eyes stand out. (Spectrum Noir metallic pencils and Canson Black paper).

The left face is Donnie, one of my grandcats. On the right are Sam and Ben faces. Below is baby Sam sketched from a photo.

One book with step by step instructions on drawing eyes is "Figure It Out! Simple Lessons, Quick Results" by Christopher Hart. The book's emphasis is on cartoon type figures, but the instructions on eyes have been helpful when drawing from photos. Here is a page of my notes from this book.

Another tooth bites the dust!
Exceed journal paper, colored pencils

And my latest sketch, from my bullet journal, of Sam, who is losing teeth.

Waiting at school

I pick up my granddaughter at school twice a week. She is in first grade, so this is the second year that I have chafed at the amount of time that is spent waiting for her class to come out. The elementary school and middle school are sited adjacent to each other. If I don't get a parking space on the street 20 or more minutes before classes start to be released, it is not possible to get near the school, as cars line up in the street in both directions and impede all traffic through that neighborhood. Last year I knitted socks to make the time productive. Now, I sketch things.

#Inktober 2019 Palm trees in Poway.
Inks: Diamine Chocolate Brown and
Monteverde Malachite Green

There are, of course, palm trees.

10/07/19 Horse crossing at elementary school
Exceed journal paper
Chinese rainbow color pencil

Poway was known in the past as the "horsey" community. In the decades since the schools were deemed "award winning", the influx of high-income people have taken over many of the horse properties, but many still remain. It is amusing to me still to see the intersections with push buttons high on the crossing poles so that horseback riders can trigger the crossing lights to allow them to walk across. There is a riding path adjacent to the school and I tried out a new rainbow pencil to sketch the horse Xing sign. It was interesting to use one pencil to get multiple colors in the scene. I was disappointed by the way the yellow disappeared on the cream colored paper.

10/19/2019
Horse crossing at elementary school
Strathmore Toned Tan sketch paper
Marco Rainbow Pencil

I repeated the scene using my new Marco rainbow pencil on Strathmore Toned Tan paper. That allowed the yellow to come forward, but I learned that sharpening a rainbow pencil in a long sharp point does not make it as easy to get the single colors. I didn't have time to include the background details this time.

The second sketch was done while I stood on the sidewalk. Several mothers with kids in tow walked by me as I sketched, smiling when I glanced up. I thought they were smiling in support, and maybe they were. But when I closed my sketchbook, I noticed the 2 minute poses on the back from a practice life sketching session.

2 minute pose practice sketches.
Strathmore Toned tan sketch paper
Pentel pocket brush pen

Then I wondered if they were smiling at the pose sketches. I am intimidated by observation if I sketch in public. Yes, I have read about how to overcome that fear. I'm sure that it will go away someday, like the fear of speaking in public has. So, for now, I will assume they were smiling in support, not amusement.

Once a geek, always a geek

I am a science and technology geek. I think I was born that way but then, I also was nurtured in that direction. When I was in second grade, having read all the fun books in our little school library, I was forced to pick a book from the science section. I picked "Earthworms" and learned that they have five hearts and can regenerate up to half their body. What!?! It was like finding out that there were aliens in my backyard. I reread that book over and over during the week I had it. When I had to take it back, I begged my dad to buy it for me and was broken-hearted when he said he couldn't buy a library book. But, that day he put the book in his lunch box and made me a hand lettered and illustrated tiny book about earthworms during his lunch hour. That little book of stapled, lined paper written in pencil was kept in my desktop cedar chest with my most precious keepsakes until I was 16, when most of my treasures were destroyed. Now why did this story come to mind?

Goulet Pens recently recorded a video of a presentation by "the napkin note dad", who discussed the impact that written notes can have on those who receive them. I highly recommend this video. For Starwars geeks, there is a funny story about trying to go through TSA with a light saber.

Writing is often thought to be outdated in the digital age, but a hand written note can be more evocative and more permanent than a text, or even an email. Part of the power of a hand-written note is in the memory evoked by the sender's distinctive handwriting, as well as any little doodles or sketches that can be added. Those notes are often saved and reviewed for years. Since seeing that video, I am considering how to encourage my granddaughter with written notes. Maybe even make her a tiny, illustrated book about something that she is geeked over. Like earwigs.

Notes about earwig observations.
Exceed 100gsm paper and inks

Sam and her dinner guest. Ink and ink wash.
Still working on shading. Exceed 76gsm journal paper.
8/19/19

One of the things that I appreciate about my dad (who raised three of us as a single dad in the 60s when single parents were not common and single dad's were almost unheard of) is that he never said,"You're a girl, you shouldn't be interested in science and math." The societal attitudes at the time certainly did not encourage girls to pursue STEM interests. My dad sometimes brought home little things in his lunch box (he worked at a research facility) to demonstrate simple scientific principles, like electrical charges and chemical reactions. Because of dad, I didn't give in to peer pressure in school to hide my enthusiasm about learning, especially about science. I'm glad I got to be a geek when being a geek wasn't cool. I love seeing the same enthusiasm in Sam.