My two page sketch journal spread from yesterday with ASk

Tri Dee Art Supply is on a corner in downtown Mt. Vernon, across the street from the Co-op Grocery and Deli. Just looking at the two story square brick building from outside, you know it's going to be fun shopping in there.

Thank you, Tri Dee, for my Palomino Blackwing 620 pencil!

I had such a great time, inside the store and out. First, I saw this fabulously colorful umbrella, hanging upside down from the ceiling as a lamp shade. While I sketched it, a woman came in from her walk in the sunny spring weather. She liked it, too. As well as the stack of retro toys and games behind her.

The store owners gave each of us sketchers a Palomino Blackwing 620 pencil, favored by John Steinbeck and others. See the story of the pencil, here. At one time, they were going for $40 a pencil on Ebay.

Outside, on the front sidewalk, was the sandwich board advertising more fun stuff to do here. A tree was all cozied up with a yarn bomb made by an expert. All sorts of colors and patterns decorated it and it was custom fit to the bifurcated tree as it branched out above head height.

The wall mural in the alley is a huge chalkboard, where you can finish the sentence: Before I die I want to:___________________. One person wrote: ......Take over the world with GOATS.
What would you write?

"Response" at Pier 1 in Anacortes

It's all about the tires!

Interesting things happen when you hang around a dock long enough. No, not that! I'm talking about sketching with the Anacortes Sketchers this past Monday.

A typical Pacific NW fishing boat was on its way out as I sketched on the sunny west end of the dock. A "certain aroma" occasionally wafted by. All sorts of leisure craft came in and out of the harbor while the crew washed windows and cleaned the already pristine decks of the "Response", a tanker tug and firefighting vessel. While I was sketching, one of the crew came out and assumed his best "Captain Morgan" pose for a good 5 minutes. No problem. Got it. Little did he know that for me, it's all about the tires! I loved the necklace of huge tires laced around the "Response" as she languished there in the shadows.. How much does just that big tire alone cost? I don't know, but here's what a $42,500 one looks like! 

Sailing Away

Here's what she looked like as I was getting ready to paint the all-important shadows. Arrrghh!
It was kind of cool, though, as she gracefully pirouetted 360 degrees and let us see the entire boat before she sailed away. Her crew can rightfully be proud of her.

Info about the "Response"---Built in 2002, by Marco Shipbuilding of Seattle, Washington (hull #489) as the Response for Crowley Marine of Jacksonville, Florida. She was the first Response class tug built for Crowley Marine. Besides being a tug for seagoing tankers, she is a Class 1 firefighting vessel, capable of throwing over 13,000 gallons of water per minute a distance of 400 feet. Quoted from tugboatinformation dot com.

 Avast me hearties! Steer your vessel to the Port of Anacortes 6th Annual Anacortes Workboat Races and Pirate Faire at Historic Pier 1 on the Guemes Channel in downtown Anacortes.