Light rail is coming
Aug. 15, 2021. I’ve joined my pals Roy and Dave for a Sunday morning of fun sketching around the future Mountlake Terrace light rail station. After walking around the construction site for 15 or 20 minutes, I’m afraid that no…
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Even on a hot summer day, these golfers are up for some clubbing
THE SUN IS beating down hard on Beacon Hill at the start of summer, a prelude to even warmer days ahead in the forecast. But the scorching temperature — 89 degrees — isn’t keeping people from hitting some balls at…
Montaña de Oro State Park
The travel sketchbook is out again! First vacation of the “post-pandemic” times took me to the beautiful California Central Coast, where I sketched the rugged seascape at Montaña de Oro State Park and the impressive haystack-shaped rock at the entrance…
It’s Happy sails for this empty-nester couple who took to the sea
A GLEAMING sailboat named Happy is making a stop at the Port of Edmonds after a speedy sail at 11.2 knots from Bainbridge. It doesn’t take long for the sleek Moody Decksaloon 45, a German-built vessel owned by Hugh and…
June gloom over Gas Works Park
June 13, 2021. This morning the @uskseattle group gathered to sketch in person for the first time in 16 months. It was a typical June-gloomy day of drizzle and clouds but everyone seemed really excited for the return of the regular monthly…
An arms race: A vaccine clinic works swiftly to inoculate a diverse crowd in Kent
“THIS IS GOING to be quick. Just take a deep breath.” HealthPoint worker Bao-Yen Tran must have repeated those words dozens of times today. She is part of a team of health professionals administering a second dose of the Pfizer…
Seattle Maritime Academy’s floating machine shop is an old vessel with new purpose
THE VULCAN, one of three floating machine shops built for the U.S. Army in the 1950s, still is filled with old tools that were used to repair Army patrol boats during the Vietnam War. The bulky barge has been permanently…
Months after protests rocked Capitol Hill, lingering concrete barriers disturb the peace
BACK IN EARLY June, the old building that houses the Seattle Police Department East Precinct on Capitol Hill became a focal point of protests after the killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. I remember sketching protesters when the whole area looked…
At a COVID-19 testing site in Renton, driver after driver learns how to properly swab
A TEAM OF ABOUT 20 medical assistants staffs a busy COVID-19 testing site in Renton on a recent soggy morning. Like a fly on the wall, I’m standing between the lanes of the former vehicle-emissions station to sketch the scene.…
Hot-dog stand sketch: a behind-the-scenes look at the process
I can’t believe it took me so long to try a cream-cheese-slathered “Seattle dog” from Betty Aklilu’s Deez Dogz stand at Fifth Avenue and Pike Street in downtown Seattle. Read the full column: For the owner of Deez Dogz, it’s…
For the owner of Deez Dogz, it’s all about connection (and cream cheese)
THE TOASTED BUN is slathered with cream cheese, and the hot dog is split in half and covered with sauteed onions. “That’s the Seattle Dog,” says Betty Aklilu, the friendly food vendor at Deez Dogz on Fifth and Pike. At…
From pencil to ink
If you aim to make ink sketches with a certain degree of accuracy, it helps to block out the composition in light pencil first. I like to use an H pencil for that part of the process. The pencil marks…