Kelp Pickles & Creative Blogger Award

Watercolor & ink (black & white in label) on Arches hot press in 6 x 8″ sketchbook
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The Pickles
A co-worker who lives in Alaska part of the year brought back delicious treats, all made from seaweed. These crunchy pickles taste like sweet pickles except better–with a touch of the sea in them. I love anything tasting of the sea, including raw oysters. Eating raw oysters is like eating peaches: the texture is the same, the soft bite through, and then the sudden juiciness. They always remind me of my childhood in Southern California where I practically lived in the ocean, tasting that fresh salty flavor every time I dove or got knocked under a big wave.

The Painting
I painted this from life (well, from jar) with a light shining on it. I added a few highlights with Golden Absorbent Ground, a product that also allows you to cover and repaint problem areas in watercolor paintings. It creates an absorbent texture that doesn’t bleed or dissolve and is similar to the original texture of watercolor paper. It’s best to apply in thin layers if you’re using it to cover an area to repaint it so that it dries smooth.

The Creative Blogger Award
Two art bloggers and wonderful artists, Nel Jansen and Bonny Racca, both honored me by nominating me for this award. I wanted to acknowledge their kindness and admit that I’m a naughty Creative Blogger. When one receives the award one is supposed to pass it forward, nominating 5 others, who nominate 5 others, etc. For a number of reasons I’ve chosen to opt out of that part of the process, but do appreciate the nomination very much! I’ve also learned these kinds of “pass it on” awards and questionnaires are called memes and their definition on Wikipedia is quite interesting.