Security Cameras

Yes, just disguise your security cameras witha potted plant.

New York City

Went to see my friend, Deb, in New York. We sketched the area near Madison Square Garden while we were waiting for the train.

Long John Silver's

It seemed silly to draw a Long John Silver's, but there were interesting angles that proved challenging from this perspective. Plus, I have a soft spot for LJS's, as you can see in the story. I'm not sure of all people who were raise Catholic have such an affinity for this place, but I certainly do.

The other reason that I drew it was because I was out to draw, but the weather looked menacing, and I wanted to draw something from my car. So, I parked across the street at the closed Value City store and set up in my front seat. The closed Value City is weird, because they were rather overly optimistic when predicting how many parking spaces they would need. It's the largest ever parking lot for a single, stand-alone store.

Great Lakes Science Center

Did this after getting bothered by the tiny red bugs over near Hornblowers. I didn't worry about bugs here, but I did worry about a seagull dumping on me and some sunburn. Neither happened. There was a nice breeze, but the sun was pretty unrelenting.

Light Bistro

Hornblowers

I went up to the lakefront to draw on Friday morning. When I set up in a little area adjacent to the parking lot for Burke Lakefront Airport. I had to keep moving, because there was an infestation of these tiny red bugs. There were big bugs, but those weren't nearly as bothersome. My goal quickly became to finish the drawing and not take any bugs home with me.

I finally moved closer to the steamer to do the color, and there seemed to be much less bugs there. While I was drawing there, the new owner of the steamer stopped by. He told me about how they were doing renovations for their software company there. Then, Lolly the Trolley came by, and I didn't immediately realize, but they had stopped the tour to see what I was doing.

Cleveland Cultural Gardens

I had to make two trips to the Cleveland Cultural Gardens in order to do both of these Chinese lions that stand guard at the Chinese Cultural Garden. I sketched the first one, and then a huge, dark, scary cloud moved over head. I went to Koko's Bakery for lunch, and I inked the first lion while eating my rice bowl (which explains the sauce you may see on the paper) and free custard tart. Koko's is great for this. I think if they think you've waited too long for service or your food, they give you something for free (though, honestly, I don't think I've ever had an excessive wait there, even when they're swamped, so maybe they give you something free if they recognize that you're a repeat customer?).

I did the other one later, when I couldn't stay home a second longer due to how hot my apartment was. Yet again, they turned off the a/c! My apartment gets very hot because the sun beats on me from about 3pm until the sun goes down in the evening. So, I went back to the gardens to enjoy the nice breeze outside that wasn't coming in through my windows.

Lincoln Park House

I don't often get people who want to see what I'm doing while I'm out drawing, but the other day, I did. I had parked near Lincoln Park in Tremont in order to draw the bath house. When I got out of the car, I looked up and saw this house. I quickly blew off the bath house, and I decided to draw this instead.

Shortly after I'd started, a guy came out of the house and came over. He was very happy to see that I was drawing his house, because he'd thought the house next door was "nicer." It wasn't to me, the one next to it was pretty boring. I told him, "But your house is purple!" He said that his daughter likes to sketch, and he might bring her over. He did, and she said something like, "That doesn't look like our house." Her father tried to make nice by saying something like, oh, it sure does, look at that, it looks just like it. Oh, well, remember? I said, "Everyone's a critic."

The nice thing was, as I'd went to move on, his daughter was in their yard holding a sketchbook which was very nice.

Progressive Field

I still call it Jacobs Field. I think it's an Ohio thing, where no matter how many times people rename something, they continue to call it by the original name. I also still call the arena "The Gund."

Second, this was an odd angle for drawing the baseball stadium, but it's what I could see from the shade. The overhang above the seats was the hardest to get the angle right, but that's the part that worked out the best, in my opinion.

Not many people were around here early Sunday morning, so it was nice and quiet for drawing.