Consumed With Christmas

I didn't fall off the face of the earth, I've just been all wrapped up with Christmas (pun intended). I always try and have the bulk of the shopping done by Thanksgiving weekend, but that never happens. Fortunately, I am pretty much finished with shopping. I just have mailing gifts, Christmas Cards and wrapping presents to do. We aren't into the double digits of the month yet so, I'm feeling pretty good right now. I have been sketching daily too.  I've been pretty good about keeping up the practice. I love curling up with my sketchbook after the kids have gone to bed and just practicing or doing home work from the numerous e-courses I'm taking. I am also discovering tools that I like and don't like. For example, I prefer the Strathmore Visual Journals (mixed media and drawing version) over the Canson Mixed Media Journal. Canson claims to handle water media but the pages buckle and wrinkle like crazy. Not so with the Strathmore. Here are some things I've been doing and you can see that some of the pages have buckled. I suppose I can iron them but, I barely have time to do art!  In future posts I will tell you all about the e-courses I'm taking.