The Wisdom in Scribbling it Again

I've been looking through my scribbles from the last two years, and really noticing the differences, not so much in my art itself, but it what my art shows me about how I see things.

Here are two of the very first little pieces I did early in 2014, about the time I got serious about keeping a sketchbook.  They feature an old beat-up birdhouse that someone nailed to a tree long before I moved here.

In the one above, I had just begun to learn about pen and watercolor.  I did this on super thin paper--which was what I had in the journal I was using at the time.  You can see that it buckled pretty badly.  Still, I liked it then.  I remember being amazed at how much more I saw in my own back yard as a result of doing this drawing.  I live in thick woods, and before this time I rarely saw individual trees.

The next one I did in response to a lesson in using colored pencils, which I had never used before.  I had to buy a set in order to do this sketch!

I look at that birdhouse several times a day.  My brain had registered it as "old" and "beaten up."  But I had never actually noticed the cracks and crevices in the homemade piece.  Or the way that moss had begun to discolor the roof.

I've scribbled this birdhouse and tree many times over the last many  months.  Here is my most recent rendition:

Unlike my dogs and cats, which move all the time, this birdhouse and tree remain pretty much the same.  Still, scribbling it over and over has been worthwhile.  The light changes.  The seasons change, bring new growth in the plants all around.  I grow and experiment as a sketcher, using new materials and new paper.

I guess I'll keep drawing it as long as I live here.  Or until, eventually, it rots away.