 Well, hi there. It's Sandy and I have a sketchbook flip through my very first sketchbook done in 2020 already Every year. I actually complete a couple of sketchbooks watercolor pencil pen all different kinds, but I don't usually finish one this fast So I thought I would share it and this is a sketchbook that I started and it's all in pencil I did it for the 30 days to more confident sketching class that I just taught and Anywhere where you see a day written on one of the pages. That's one of the lessons from class and Has been videotaped the other ones are just stuff that was either practice or Random things that I felt like drawing and I did have a big section at the end Especially where there's lots more that's not in the class that I included just to finish up the sketchbook Now the reason that I taught that class is Because I keep getting asked when are you going to teach some fine art watercolor? classes and those are more in the intermediate to advanced level and One of the reasons that I've avoided that is because if I tell people to draw a tree So that we can paint it. They don't know how to draw a tree They know how to draw their idea of a tree what they think of a tree and what they've thought a tree looked like Since they were in the third grade But not look at a tree and draw the tree that they see and that's where I'm hopeful that in this class You're drawing for 30 days in a row. You're looking at pictures of these objects that we're drawing you're looking at landscapes and translating them into lines and Values so that then when we start painting and I pull up a picture and I say here we're gonna go paint this you don't get overwhelmed by it and That's whether it's watercolor or Copic or colored pencil or different mediums that I want to do more fine art pieces in and more advanced training I Need my students to be a little bit more comfortable with drawing first and a 30-day Time period of drawing even if you don't get to be a pro because I can't teach you everything I know in 30 days But at least that's going to give you the confidence to dive in and try it Because once we get to the advanced level of any of these classes. I can't be giving you sketches you need to be able to draw them yourself and Both from my students online as well as students in my in-person classes Drawing is one of the skills that I find most people lack because we want to get to the color right away We don't want to stop and do all of the learning to draw part But translating a picture into black and white and seeing the values and seeing the darks the mediums and the lights and Starting to learn to recognize What the dark value is where is the dark value in that picture that you're looking at and where is the highlight? For some people, that's a huge revelation revolution revelation. Yes, it's both it's Opening your eyes to seeing where that light and shadow is and how much dark value do you need to make a light value look light and When you practice that in pencil and just doing that in a simple black and white format It's going to really help you when you try strike When you start trying to translate that into Something else in a medium where you're going to actually apply color to it as well so that's the reason that I taught that class and It was a really fun class for me personally to do in addition to the whole teaching of it because I learned a ton from it And I don't know if I necessarily should say I learned a ton from it I was reminded of some basics that I have known my whole life as an artist I've always known that before diving into a painting. It's much better to do a pencil study So I can get some values down to do a color study so I can Test out different color combinations that I want to use and I tend to just dive into the finished artwork And then I get sad because it didn't work the way I wanted it to Because I didn't do all the prep work to get there and I think this Exercise of just doing this book is going to help me to slow down a little bit Do some of that prep work before I get moving on to my finished pieces And maybe that's going to increase the quality of the stuff that I do create and I'm really excited about that This little section in the back is filled with sketches of pictures That I've taken on vacations or pictures that I've collected from paint my photo Which is one of the places where the photos that we using class come from Just all different kinds of things that are in my I want to paint this folder and Started putting those sketches in here now That's this will be the preliminary black and white study for a lot of these that I will then do some more studies of Both in black and white and color but just getting those photos out and starting to do this initial sketch for each one of them has got me over the moon excited to dive back in and Go create these because I started getting the vision for what I want to do with this when I get my paints out And when I start trying to do more with it, so This was really enlightening for me in terms of remembering my roots remembering how much I love drawing I Well, I shouldn't said I needed to remember how much I love a drawing but just remembering how much I love the whole process of drawing and sketching and Preparing for a finished work of art and being able to just get out a pencil and do something as simple as a sketch Really makes me a happy person And it's also going to increase the quality of my artwork and all of that together is a really good thing So whether or not you decide to take a class in sketching that's up to you whether or not you want to do that I recommend getting a sketchbook anyway And even if you're one of my card making students who just wants to learn how to make scenes for your stamped images on your cards doing sketches is actually going to still help you because it's It's that whole idea of learning how to draw a tree learning how to see a tree and draw a tree and know Where that shape is and not try to draw what's in your head for what a pine tree looks like but what a real pine tree looks like and And this class will help you to do that but just doing it will help you to do that too So get yourself a sketchbook. This one was a terrible sketchbook It had terrible paper in it and I still made it work I still enjoyed it and I loved the cover of the book. I loved the deckled edges So I just got something that I thought would be inspiring to me to get out every day So get whatever kind of sketchbook you want and just fill it Fill it with art and just draw every day 10-15 minutes a day if you can commit to that much and just do it every day That's going to make you a better artist. Whatever the medium is that you decide to use All right. Thank you very much. I will see you again very soon. Take care. Bye. Bye