Improvements and Additions

Can you tell what's different about this?

Hopefully, it looks better than the version I showed you the other day. They are the same painting. But I added reflections of the rocks and trees, and some marsh marigolds along the water's edge.



What about the additions? OK, here's where the rubber meets the road. These two elements have to be added. My (long) past attempt wasn't so great. Mama moose looked like a donkey. I hope to do them better. I am not striving for total realism. Let's call it semi-realistic.

So, I started with just trying to correct the donkey look on some plain old computer paper, painting that, and cutting out the figures to place them on the background.

Why is only half of mama there? Because the finished picture needs to be square. If I cover up part of the background it's closer to what I need. But the background needs to be reconfigured a little bit for better composition.

So I guess it's time to 'fess up as to what I'm doing. Sixteen years ago I got one of my creative jags and wrote a children's book in my head on the 2009 hike in Minnesota's Arrowhead. The title is Moose in Boots. Later that summer, I went manic again, and drew concept pages for the whole thing in a month. Have I done anything since then? A little bit of tweaking of the text. Showed it to a few people. Mostly zilch.

People always ask me if I write books in my head while I hike. This was the one-and-only instance. When these things hit me, I just can't help it. Most of the time I have to just beat out the words like everyone else.

I'd REALLY like to finish this book. But here's the deal. There are 29 paintings I'll need to do. You can see how long it has taken me to even get set up for the first one. I started on what I hope will be the final version of illustration one. Of 29.

Stay tuned to see if I can stay with it. P.S. The dining room table is now converted to my art studio.

I did errands, edited, and read a short non-fiction book that I couldn't put down.

See Spring Aspen Achieved

A Heat Wave

It was 22° today which felt really warm. Cathy and I went for a hike. It turned out to be a fairly tough hike.

I knew this section of the trail had been walked, and we chose to go in boots. Should have taken the snowshoes.

We started at 5-Mile Road and went south. Not only was it in the 20s, but the sun was shining!

We went just a little past the Big Sable River.

The Vince Smith Bridge was sporting a big load of snow. Kind of interesting that it hadn't been knocked off.

There were interesting little snow worms crawling along the rails.

I have a bit of a sore knee, and this was tough going, but we were glad to be outside. And I really overdressed. Guess I'd gotten used to the cold, so I was really warm!

The trail is broken for some distance beyond the bridge, but snowshoes are recommended. Even compacted it's still deep. We kept breaking through. (If you park on Mac Road, please park on the west side. The property owner on the east side is not friendly and will have your car towed.)

I didn't accomplish a whole lot else today. Well, a couple of little things that are parts of other things. But they feel like "nothing."

Miles walked in 2026: 27.5
Hike 100 Challenge 2026: 9 miles.

North Country Trail, Lake County, MI. Mac Road to south of the Vince Smith bridge and back 2.3 miles

See To McCarthy Lake

Spring Aspen Achieved

I spent most of the day painting.

My new pens with a great variety of point thicknesses arrived.

I found a picture of aspens that had the effect I wanted, and drew from that. Things that could be improved: 1. that dark splotch on the left was in the picture, but I should have left that out. 2. If I'd made the background greens darker it would have made the aspen trunks "pop" more.

But I'm fairly satisfied with this. It's mixed media- pen, watercolor, acrylic

Then I started putting the things I've worked on together. This isn't a good composition. That's beside the point because there is something else that has to go into this scene in the foreground. But I'm not quite ready to add that yet.

Also mixed media- pen, watercolor, acrylic

Other than these, I did some errands, crocheted a bit, started a new puzzle and edited a tiny bit.

See Balsam and Aspen

Balsam and Aspen

Still working on trees. Tried balsam fir today.

This one is with the black ink on the paper first and then a watercolor wash over that. I like this one.

This one is with the paint first and then black ink on top. Even though the paint tone is different with more blue in this one, I think I like the first one better. Balsam are dark.

Still struggling with the spring aspen. This is try #5. This is watercolor first with a sponge. Probably too much water. This could be improved with some more paint, I think. But it's still got too much foliage for early spring. The scalloped outlines don't say spring, either. They suggest too much fullness.

This is acrylic paint with a sponge first, and then the black lines over that. Needs a little more pen work so the trunk doesn't just end when it hits the leaves but this is starting to approach the look I want.

I edited and did a few other things. A pretty low-key day.

See Trying Trees

Charley Harper's Isle Royale

This puzzle was loaned to me by hiking buddy Bill. I really liked doing it. It was just the right level of difficulty to be both challenging and fun.

Its a puzzle of the art work "Isle Royale" by Charley Harper who is known for his geometric depictions of nature. Here's the entire puzzle.

The dominant dark shapes are two moose.

But the rest of the pictures are really oriented the other direction with birch and aspen trunks. There are also aspen and maple leaves that you can easily see.

And all the other animals are just hiding out in the trees. It would be too many pictures to highlight them all, but here are a few. The squirrel.

The butterfly.

A flicker.

And four wolves. I show this one, even though its tail bleeds off the edge because it has a blue jay on its back.

There are also a red-headed woodpecker, two chickadees, a sparrow, and a brown creeper.

It was a very busy day. I went to Muskegon to the dentist where they took new x-rays and said that the bone has grown back very well, so we scheduled a date in March for the implant!

And then, early this evening, I gave my program about the NCT via Zoom to the Green Mountain Club in Vermont. It would probably be more accurate to say they hosted it because people from anywhere could sign up. They said there were 123 people watching. And time for questions afterward. I love to share "my" trail with people!

See Delightful Cat Library