Micah's shoes

January 29, 2012. A pretty normal Sunday afternoon- drizzling rain all day, wood burning in our stove, some popcorn and a card game, dog walks, some lesson plans, sitting around doing nothing together. Thank God for Sunday afternoons.

Remembering Sicily

January 28, 2012. This image was in my mind from our trip to Sicily a few weeks ago. I kept thinking that I wanted to stop the car to take photos of these old farmhouses along the road, but I felt too sick to do anything but close my eyes while my wife drove. I decided against using a pen this time, as I think it detracts from the warmth and softness of these old structures.

blue undercoat

January 27, 2012. Not sure I like this one, but I'm just trying some different things with color. I'd never thought to do an undercoat before, but did it with this one. Also trying different things with the sky- using a dryer brush. Anyway, it's fun to experiment.

if the shoe fits

January 24, 2012. This has got to be the mildest January since we've been in Germany, and I don't mind one bit. Here's a little drawing for a book illustration today. It's one of my shoes alongside one of my son's shoes.

Giglio

January 21, 2012.

Beppe's Pizza

January 16, 2012. I've been fighting a battle with a stomach flu the past week or so, but I think I'm finally on the upswing. Thankfully, no one else in my family got it. This picture is reminiscent of our time in Palermo, although at that time I wasn't interested in pizza, or food of any sorts for that matter. Our sea voyage back to Genoa was a bit rocky, and quite a few passengers got sick. However, our trip was nothing to complain about, considering what happened to another vessel in the same waters just two nights ago. After hitting a rock, the entire cruise ship pitched over, and rescue operations are still underway to find many who are unaccounted for.

Taormina, Sicily

January 7, 2012. I sketched this scene in the beautiful town of Taormina, which is situated on the tops of high bluffs overlooking the blue Ionian Sea. It was a beautiful night. The last couple of days the weather took a turn, as did my health. The winds have been ferocious, with thunderstorms and some hail. I spent much of the time in bed with some kind of flu. We head back to Germany tonight, with fond memories of our experiences in Sicily.

Mount Etna Erupts!

January 5, 2012. We were woken up at 6:45 am by Giuseppe knocking on our door, yelling for us to get up and look at the volcano. He told me to draw a picture of it while it was erupting, so here's the result. Truly one of my greatest memories in my life...

Mount Etna out our window

January 4, 2012. We're in Mascali, Sicily (Italy) and loving it. A very long trip here, some complications as our car is slowly falling apart, but this is the view from our window of Mount Etna, the largest active volcano in Europe. Giuseppe and his wife Aura are wonderful hosts, who have a plantation and hotel here in Mascali. On the way here, we thought we were going to lose the driver's door to our car, but got that fixed. Now our muffler went out and we have to get it fixed before we go home. The ferry here was an interesting experience. We didn't get much sleep, as the kids slept in the stairway and the adults tried sleeping in a room with a symphony of snoring and cell phone conversations.

Happy New Year from Kandern!

December 31, 2011. Happy New Year 2012! Here's another view of our living room just before our guests came over for game night. The drawing below is the view from sitting on the sofa in this drawing. Kandern was filled with smoke and noise last night. We dared the town square, dodging missiles, bottle rockets, and fire crackers. It was like a battlefield for a half-hour down there. By the way, you can see our poor little white dog sitting there on the sofa wondering how long the barrage of bombs was going to last.