Watercolor Wednesday: Christmas and the New Year

I've got a lot to share this month, owing to most of my artistic efforts in November and December going toward Christmas gifts that couldn't be revealed here until they were received. Also, I received a number of supplies for Christmas again this year, and I wanted to include those in this post. I'll start with the watercolor and drawing stuff.


Every year a group of my online friends and I participate in a Secret Santa gift exchange, and this was part of my gift to this year's recipient. It's a painting of Puddleglum from The Silver Chair accompanied by some of his most famous words from the climax of the book.

And here's a closer look at Puddleglum:

This was another Christmas gift for a friend. It's a painting of me as a Hobbit and him as a Ranger a la Tolkien. I was pleased with the faces in this one.

Here's a rough sketch I did to prepare for that picture, though my friend appears as a wizard instead of a Ranger.

If you're friends with me on Facebook, you've seen this one already. After writing the posts about the Rankin/Bass Christmas specials, I couldn't get Jack Frost out of my head, so I sketched him out.

 Then, after Christmas, I went back and painted him using my new watercolor pencils.

And since I was going to be setting out on the 100 Mythical Beings series, I decided to make Jack my first official entry.

And now for the supplies and such. My wife gave me a large wash brush (which should help me do backgrounds better), a new palette to put my tube paints in (unfortunately, I have discovered that my inexpensive tube paints don't appreciate being dried out in a palette and tend to break apart), a spray bottle to activate the paints in the palette, a mixed media sketchbook, and the yarn to make a scarf like Newt Scamander's from Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.

My Secret Santa bought me a drawing set with graphite and charcoal pencils, erasers, sharpeners, and some charcoal sticks. (Also something it calls a sketch stick that I haven't quite figured out the purpose of.) I've never worked with charcoal before, so this will be a new experience.

My mom bought me some Micron pens, which means my watercolors can have cleaner lines than the Sharpies I was using would allow for. (I used these to ink in Jack Frost's final version and the Albion piece above.)

My mom-in-law bought me this watercolor pencil set, which also included a sharpener, eraser, water brush pen (much easier to work with than I'd been led to believe), and a blending brush. I've used these a couple of times (see blue version Jack Frost and the Albion piece) and it's been great. I'll probably work with these as much as my typical paints in the future (and these are much more portable).

My father-in-law usually gets my wife and me each a journal for Christmas, and this year we got these beautiful hardcover journals. The picture doesn't show it, but the spines are open so you can see the stitching holding the pages together.

I also got a journal with Newt Scamander's monogram on the cover (no, I'm not obsessed).

I also received a 4-year Q&A a day sketch book (you are given a prompt each day to sketch, and you run through the same list for four years, tracking your progress and your memories as you go).

Last but not least, some Moleskine sketchbooks since my current sketchbook is all but full.

One of them is dedicated to the 100 Mythical Beings series I've mentioned recently (the inked Jack Frost is already on the first page). Here's the cover (not my best work, but I may add to it as time goes on):

I also did some knitting in the last few months. These are potholders that went to the same person as the Puddleglum painting. (They're double-knitted for extra insulation.)

And here is the Newt Scamander scarf I mentioned earlier. This picture kind of washes out the golden color of the yellow tweed.

This picture is much closer to the actual coloring.

I'm a Hufflepuff now. Hufflepuffs are cool.

So that's what I've been up to with my art the last few months. Has anyone else been working on projects? Is there something you'd like to see me draw or paint (perhaps a mythical being to add to the book)? Let me know in the comments.