Learning Watercolor

I started learning about watercolor in March 2018. Two difference therapists suggested trying to develop an art journal and my son encouraged me, but I procrastinated. My DNRS coach finally suggested learning something new that was different from what my brain was already doing (i.e., writing grants, managing research projects, analyzing data, writing reports...). So I chose watercolor after seeing some engaging video tutorials on Instagram. My first watercolor was some roses using Mozart Watercolor brush pens.

Dogwood branch

Second Watercolor

My second painting was a dogwood branch, also using watercolor brush pens. (Note that I am learning to use the blog software so really just created this paragraph to see what happens with layout features).

Then what happened (still checking out the blog software, haha).

1. I bought a basic set of Winsor & Newton watercolor paints. It came with a brush, but that brush was lame, so I bought a few other brushes.

2. I watched a tutorial by Maria Raczynska and painted a whale (see below). (Now that a year or so has passed and my skills are better maybe I should try the whale again, what do you think?)

3. After learning from Maria, I bought some Arches watercolor paper (the first paper I bought was Canson, which was ok, but Arches is better). I also bought a watercolor block because I hated the warped pages. A watercolor block has all the pages attached on all boarders and you separate each page from the block with a knife when done.

4. Then I just kept going (like Dory says, "Just keep swimming"), painting whatever I felt like when an idea came into my head.

5. If I felt like I needed to learn a skill, I searched YouTube and found a good tutorial, like, painting ocean water.

6. So you can check out my progress on my Instagram

This was my first watercolor using a demo from Maria

This painting was from an online demo, but I added the swans and made it look like a landscape I knew from where I grew up.