Scottish Tattoo Convention Preparedness Week

The Scottish Tattoo Convention is this weekend and I am getting pretty excited, I have a wee bit of merch this year, I managed to have stickers printed and prints from one of my paintings for sale. The stickers came in yesterday on regular paper sized sheets so I had a fun night of cutting those wee guys out over and over and over. The painting I managed to sort out on Monday, but if I were more on the ball, I might have had a bit less of a frantic week this past week. I had been thinking about doing a painting for the convention since about November, but I only actually started painting it around the 14th of March, I know I am pretty good at procrastination right! But it worked out, I finished my painting and found a printers in Edinburgh to make me prints, so look out convention here I come!

We bit of my progress shots of the painting slowly but surely coming together.

Also a wee bit excited that I sad I would post and look at me here I am posting!

June Drawings

As I said in my last post, I have been drawing, and quite a bit too. The top one is based on the stories of Baba Yaga, and Dominika helped me with the Russian Cyrillic. I am hopefully going to start painting the kiwi this week as well as the koala paw. I am really excited how the paw came out as I took the reference photo a couple weeks ago when Hayley and I went to the zoo. The paw just looked perfect for drawing. And the mole makes sense if you know Kris, its part of his nickname, and it was his birthday. So here are a few different things I have been working on from india ink, to just plain sketches, and watercolours, I have been a wee bit busy with it.

I am also on instagram and I post my drawing more semi regularly there so if you want to find me there it is @courtenaydickson, but if semi monthly is enough for you don't worry, so far it looks like I am keeping to that schedule!

Oh ya and I promised an update on my tattoo,

Drawing

I have been super busy with my new jobs, working six days a week is not conducive to blogging, but it has been great for drawing and painting, so silver linings. So that is basically what I am all about just now, work work work, draw draw draw, and occasionally sleep. Working at the tattoo studio has been really great though, I feel like I am learning so much, I have my first aid course booked for the end of May and then I will be able to get my license. So hopefully lots more developments on this end. But for now here are some of the drawings and paintings I have been working on.

Drawing Projects

I have also been doing a bunch more drawing, and its been fun, I have a bit of a project going which I am hopefully going to paint. So far I have been drawing animals from Endangered Species List which I want to turn it into a sheet, so I have started from A and drawn the animals in descending order alphabetically and that had good reference photos. Which is difficult and sometimes sad to find some of these amazing animals that only have a couple images coming up on google. It is interesting learning new animals, and drawing animals I wouldn't normally think of. 

 I also made Dixon a valentine because we have been watching a lot of Parks and Recreation, and Ron Swanson is one of the best characters ever. So enjoy that one!

Watercolour

Last weekend (so this was stuck as a draft for the past two weeks, I though I posted it so hopefully it all makes sense still. So rather than last weekend thing around July 22?) was a rather productive weekend, drawing wise and house wise. We had loft insulation put in last week and so we had everything that was in our attic down in the spare room and living room. So first things first, we went through all of the boxes, its amazing how much stuff accumulates up there in a year! I was amazing how much stuff we were able to get through. Then Gordon and I took the extra things away to the dump/recycling center, and Dixon got ready for his weekly skate.

So after putting the remaining boxes into the spare room temporarily, I got down to the important bits, drawing. Which I was extremely productive for the day, even though I managed to watch 2 movies and facetime with my sister for at least an hour, not to mention copious texting with progress pictures along the way, with Camille and Caryn.

I am doing a wee series of paintings, of which I have two painted and one drawn, and I am really liking them so far. I am using India Ink which I haven't used before and I am painting all of my lines, which I have tried before, but it wasn't as successful, it was a bit messy. But I am really liking the ink, it behaves a lot like the watercolours I am used to but it is a lot of fun. Each of the paintings will be places I feel are a bit like my home, so one is Canada, one is Scotland and the last is the Netherlands, so one for where I am from, one for where I am and one for where I have never been. (The scanner cropped the edges a little bit, there is a nice white border around each)

Also a wee bit about the house, we picked a wallpaper we can agree on for the spare room, which is exciting! So I really want to make a start on the spare room and get the finished.

Back to the Basics

So I haven't been posting much lately, maybe I burnt myself out with the 100 Happy Days posts, because I was posting at least once, but usually twice a week when I was doing those. But what else can I say, it is not as if I have been up to nothing, Dixon's birthday was a big one, and we had a brilliant time. I've gone out for meals, and been to shows, but I haven't felt compelled to write any of it down lately. So here we are getting back to some of my blogging basics, maybe.

I have been doing a bit of re-evalutating what I want to be doing with my life, because as nice as it is working in a skateboard shop, so components of that have been stressing me out. So each day off I have had, I have been trying to get back into drawing and painting. Which has actually happened so yay!

Perhaps a recap another day of what I have been up to, for now some drawings.

The first is from a Dr Sketchy's Edinburgh class I recently went to and I am hopefully going to another one next week, which should be as much fun as that, and the rest of the sketches are just for fun. The painting is from a drawing a did a wee while ago, but I have wanted to paint it for ages.

100 Happy Days 43-49

So I am a little bit late updating my 100 Days Happy this week, our internet totally died, so we have been trying to get it fixed al week. But yesterday someone came out and found how to fix it, and thus I am back!

I am also on holidays this week, but don't be expecting exotic locations or anything like that, I'm just using up my holiday days before they expire. Hopefully a holiday is on the horizon, as my residency came through and I'm all paid up with my lawyer. But we have lots to do in the house and not to mention the washing machine also decided to kick the bucket. But hopefully soon.

Anyway lets get going, week 7!

1. Home made Green Onion Cakes

2. T-Rex's can do stuff, with assistance

3. Flitch and Mrs Norris for Wizarding Wednesday

4. New Washing Machine

5. Watercolour by the Castle

6. New Camera EEEEE!!!!!

7. Walks with Dixon

I also got a parcel from Camille, Caryn and James, I need to get a photo of it cause my family kicks ass! I really need to remember to get photos... 

Application

I don't really know where the time went, but it is almost time for my application for Indefinite Leave to Remain, and you know what, I am a bit anxious about it. I suppose I am bound to be with my success rate of 66.6% in these kind of applications. That is to say that only one of them failed, but it still makes you feel really  nervous as you lay away at night. Pretty well everything is in order, as far as I  know, just waiting for some different papers to come through and a bit worried about funds as Virgin Media, TV Licence and Council tax are more than I thought they would be, though I have had a bit more of a heads up for the Council tax side of things. So money will be tight this month.

Other than that I am pretty good, I have started recycling which has made me walk more, because our local recycling spot is not far away, same with the library which is less than five minutes away and today I walked to work, more out of economical need rather than anything else. But it kind of does make you feel good, though I don't know if after this month I will continue, and hour and a a bit each way is a pretty far walk, but we will see.

I have finished Counting at the Zoo! Which is very exciting, I can't wait to send them over to James, Tina and wee Payton. Hopefully sooner rather than later. So here is your wee peek.

I also made soup and roasted my first ever batch of peppers! Which were pretty darn good and the soup even better! So Yay for some cooking.

Sorry that this post has mostly been whining about money, but I have had it on my mind a lot.

Cramond 2013

Its that time of year again and the Island of Punk is upon us, I didn't take as many photos with the Holga this year as I did last year, but more with my iPhone so at least I have some It wasn't as nice and clear and warm this time as the last few years, but it was dry and that made it brilliant. We also were not as prepared this year as last, but I blame Mhairi and Darren, cause they didn't come this year so we didn't put the effort in with the BBQ and everything. Still though I got pretty steamin and had a wee nap and in general had a brilliant time! So can't really complain. The Island of Punk is always a good time.

Dixon also played in the Fuk Redding festival down in London the Day after Cramond so I got some painting done, nothing I can show the whole thing of though I am probably giving away too much already but I am pretty excited that I did some painting at all! So what the heck! Just one more painting to go for Counting at the Zoo and then I can send the last batch off!