TRNP/Maah Daah Hey Trail - Part 2

With thunderstorms, achy feet, and a washed out river this is where we decided to take a bit of a detour from the trail and explore some of the other sights in the area. This is also where I was brutally attacked and the reason for the delay on this post.  I sat down on a bench quite unsuspectingly, opened by sketch book, laid out my crayons, and began sketching the teepee, fence, and barracks across the way.  A few minutes later I heard a loud obnoxious shout from across the lawn in a deep southern drawl, "Oh, my gawsh, look everybody, she's going to sketch!"  As I had suddenly gathered the attention of um, every single human being within a 10 mile radius, 5 people came running straight at me. Looking at what I had on my paper, barely a few lines, I mumbled a few words to them and humbly packed up as soon as I could get them away.  Don't get me wrong, I like talking to people, just not being called out unsuspectingly in front of a crowd and descended upon like a flower that a swarm of bees are heading straight for.

Back at home, I looked at the sketch I had and the frustrating memory that went along with it and decided to erase it all and start over and draw the fort instead.

 

 

Off the trail we had the chance to explore other parts of Theodore Roosevelt National Park that we would not have otherwise seen.  In this case, doing a few of the day hikes in the northern unit, I fell in love with the rock formations of cap rocks, flutes, and cannon balls, all signs of the erosion of wind on rock with varying densities. 

 

Heading back down to Medora we stopped at this small town of 100 people whose claim to fame is a sod post office.  It no longer functions as a post office, but instead has an interesting array of historic items inside.

We spent our last day back in Medora just looking around and relaxing.  Here I was sitting at the motel pool enjoying a beverage whilst watching no one swim. After all the running around we had done the previous 9 days it was nice to sit down and relax for a day before heading home.

Gold Medal Park

Monday evening I had the opportunity to get together with the Visual Journal Collective through the Minnesota Center for the Book Arts. The event for the evening was sketching outside on site (a personal favorite), in preparation for a Minnesota State Fair sketching get together. The sketch location was Gold Medal Park right next to the Guthrie on the Mississippi River. Above is my sketch for the evening.

Sitting at the top of the park I almost forget how much of Minneapolis is really visible. With the Mississippi River, the Stone Arch Bridge, the Guthrie, and a park setting, it was hard to decide what to draw for the night. While walking around the park, my eye caught sight of this old building across the river.  I really wish I knew what it is. Please do let me know if you get a chance, so I can add a name to my sketchbook.

I did want to take a few seconds here and talk about process, as everything takes time and thought to develop and unfold.

1. This is what I was able to draw by the end of the gathering (by the time it got dark).  In general I like to make a bunch of quick pencil lines to get an overall idea of perspective, scale, proportions, and composition. At this point I try to not get too carried away in details.  Once I got home and looked at the sketch again, I decided to add the bold boarder.

2. Erase all those pencil lines! Graphite never really stays on paper anyways. Once everything had been inked over, I erased all the pencil lines and started to add color with the sky.

3. Hmmm... more color and more detail.  Windows always seem to be worth the effort in drawing every little mullion. From here I kept adding more layers of color and then decided how to do shade and shadow (or just shade in this case).

If you get the chance to compare the end image to the photo, there are two key things that were intentionally changed to create a more interesting image.  One being a more exaggerated perspective (from my view the perspective was too flat, I thought something a bit more dynamic might be more interesting), and I changed the direction the sun was coming from to let the light façade lead the eye across the page.

Seriously though, what is the name of this building?





Mill City Farmers market

 

A visit from fellow Seattle urban sketcher, Tina Koyama, led to an impromptu urban sketching gathering that I was able to join in on this morning at the Mill City Farmer's Market in Minneapolis. This, being one of the farmer's markets around town that I have not been to before, was all new to me.  After walking around a bit (and buying a few bits of food) I really came to appreciate the tightness that having  a market in between the nooks and crannies of buildings can lend itself to.

 

Unlike many of my other drawing that I post here you'll notice that my straight lines are not really all that straight. Yes, I was trying to pry myself away from the dependency of sketching with a ruler.  Not that a ruler is a bad thing, but the more I think about the idea behind urban sketching, sometimes perfectly straight lines look, well, too perfect to really be an impression made by sketching on location. 

 



Here is everyone who was able to make it out. L-R, Daniel Green, Patty Scott, Tina Koyama, Myself, and Amber Sausen. Be sure to check out the Twin Cities Urban Sketching blog for other sketches from the group.

Mixing Colors - Part 1

Lately, I've been working with water color crayons a lot. It's turned into an addiction that I do intend to let go of at some point. For the time being though they are easily affordable, a good quality, come in a variety of fun colors, oh so easy to transport, and don't make a big watery mess that can result from typical watercolors. Like many things, the more you play with them, the more possibilities you discover to do with them.  In this case, I've been mixing every possible color that I own together to see what other kind of colors I can possibly come up with by using what I already have.

The colors along the top and the left side are the ones that I am starting with, and when you add them together the intersecting square is the color you get. Granted, this is by no means a perfect science, but it has definitely been giving me a great idea of how and where to start from in terms of thinking of a color palate, or trying to mix the perfect brown.

Many of the colors do seem quite similar when mixed together, though I do have to say that thus far, I think my new favorites are the neutrals that I get from burnt sienna mixed with a yellowish/ochre color, or anything mixed with gold. I never guessed that I would be using the color gold as much as I have. Saturation also seems to have a lot to do with the strength or intensity of the color. These, for example, are all quite watered down, as I put the pigment on the paper first, and then applied the water to mix the colors together. Had I pressed much harder with the crayons, or applied less water I do think they might have turned out more intense.

Webb Lake 2013

 

Every year this time of year (2nd week in August) my family goes up to a resort in Northern Minnesota on Webb Lake called Sperr's Point. This has been a tradition long before I was born that dates back to roughly the 1950's.  Our extended family along with our friends from Missouri more or less stage a take over of the resort for the week, renting out every single cabin. As of right now we all fit perfectly.

This year, unfortunately, I was not able to join my family for the whole week.  Instead, I was able to stay for two whole days (Sunday and Monday) and drove to work at 3:30am in the morning on Tuesday - with the assistance of diet cherry coke.

The above sketch is our designated cabin that we stay in ever year. Imagine if you will, 6 adults and one bathroom with a limited capacity of hot water, three bedrooms, and a small kitchen/living/dining room all rolled into one.  We stay very close as a family.

There is a lot to do up there, but mostly daily life seems to revolve around fishing, which is not quite my thing to say the least. My favorite place to sit and relax (typically over coffee in the morning or a drink in the evening) is our deck.  From here It's easy to see what everybody else is doing while under the shade of the large tree in front. This also made a great location for sketching as there was already a table out and it was an easy place to come back to at different points in the day.  It's easy to get sidetracked while relaxing on the lake.

Out and About - Minnecon

This year I got the chance to attend Minnecon, the local Minnesota version of NeoCon in Chicago (an interiors product showcase).  Now, what would an *almost* architect be doing at an interior design show you ask? Gawing of course! I've always enjoyed being involved with the interiors on my projects, which is completely feasible when working on small projects.  Needless to say, I wanted to show a few of my favorites.

Remember when you were a kid and you got to play with squishy surfaces?  Well, that level of fascination has transferred into adulthood with this new liquid motion commercial tile by Hirshfields.  Every time you step on it the liquid under the plastic casing of the tile moves. Yes, I spent quite a while playing around on the two sample pieces. 

 

 

I love Arktura and humbly await the day when after years of saving I might be able to purchase one of their coveted pieces for display (and maybe sit on it) in my own home.  After pondering images of this chair online for quite a while I couldn't take my eyes off this original right in front of me.  Just a humble hint if anyone is looking for a Christmas gift.

 



 

And... amazing 3D wall panels by Soelberg Industries.  The waves I have always loved, but the birch plywood nature inspired ones were new to me, and very much in my line of interests. Rumor has it all the panels were inspired by the natural environment in Utah. Plywood is an amazing thing when the layers are used as a part of the panel design by routing out different patterns. 

TRNP/Maah Daah Hey Trail - Part 1

Phew! As much fun as it is to take a break and go on a vacation it feels like it can take twice as long to get your life back together once you get back. With all the mad hiking mileage we were still able to make a point to sit down and sketch at least once a day. Since this is taking me quite a bit of time to get together, I am splitting this into two posts - this one being the hiking part of our trip, and the next one will be on all of the other sights etc. Enjoy!

Day 1 - Sully Creek Campground to Cottonwood campground.  We started the day around noon with a 7 mile day starting at Sully Creek Campground just south of Theodore Roosevelt National Park. Right away we found ourselves at the first crossing of the Little Missouri River in less than one mile. Up to our waist line in water we thought - hmmmm... this does seem a bit higher than we were told was "normal."  For the next 5 miles we passed through beautiful wide open scenery as we wound our way up and down hills and through grass fields. At about mile 5 we passed through a gate that served as our official "entrance" to the National Park. From here, the trail conditions we less maintained and sign spotting was a little sparse. So sparse in fact, we never found mile marker 7 which was our key to crossing the Little Missouri River to our campsite at Cottonwood Campground for the night. After a bit of trail blazing and river fording, we finally made it!

 

  Instead of "re-trail blazing" across the river and finding the trail again, we opted to back track 2 miles to the last road crossing and do a 12 mile day up to Wannagan Campsite. While still in the park we came upon an unexpected creak crossing.  Though only roughly 10 feet across, this particular creek was nothing but mud, and the kind that you just keep sinking down and down in. It took us a while to hatch out a strategy and get across, but not without the loss of two sandals. Not long afterwards we saw four buffalo from a distance. As our trail continued to wind up and down and around hills, we eventually ended up on top of a huge plateau for three miles. Not long afterwards we officially exited the park and headed onward for three more miles to our final destination - Wannagan Campsite.

 

The nice thing about backpacking is that you are always in the right place to start off your day hiking in the morning:) we departed from Wannagan Campground for another beautiful hot day of rolling grasslands. Now out of the park, we were hiking in the "Little Missouri National Grasslands." In this sketch Chris was really just sitting behind a large tuft of grass, though looking at it afterwards, he thought he looked a bit awkward as you can't really see what he is doing. I'll leave that one up to the imagination.

 

 

Ok, let's stop looking at all the pretty scenery - I've been hiking in it and sketching it for three days now, and look at the reality of the situation - MUD AND WEEDS! Yes, everywhere. Mostly the mud was dry and cracked up with weeds growing out of it.  Often we would see animal footprints (Buffalo? Elkhorn?), but mostly it just crunched beneath our feet as we trekked on. After our lost-sandal-creek experience we were nonetheless thankful that it was in fact DRY.

 

 

The day we met a river we could not pass. We knew that at about halfway through the trail we would be crossing the Little Missouri River again. At the crossings on day 1 she was higher than we expected. After checking with the National Park headquarters, who claimed it impassable, and meeting a ranger at a campsite who claimed it possible, with too many questions we decided to hop out at the last road before the river - the dirt road 708.  Interestingly enough, dirt road 708, which was supposed to cross the river as well, had also caved in and the only way to get to the other side now was to drive all the way down to Medora. Which we did, and got a hotel room for the night.

 

 

With the river washed out and our route diverted, we decided to drive up to the end of the trail and work our way back down from the CCC Campground instead. Once done with the trail on this day we managed to finish about an hour earlier than anticipated. Thus, we sat and waited, and waited, and waited for our ride to pick us up. One of the reasons we finished so quickly was because we didn't stop for a sketch break. Instead, this meant that people were at the mercy of being sketched:)

 

With many miles on our feet, serious blisters already developed, leg skin irritation issues, and numerous feet issues, we stopped hiking here. A crime? Yes, but it also gave us the chance to see much of the area we would not have seen otherwise.