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I participated in the Pop-Up Shops on Delaware over the weekend. It was super hot but also my best event so far! Ok, so that's only out of two total events to date, and the first one was a craft fair that ended up being the wrong crowd for me, but I was still happy with the overall experience.  I sold quite a few cards, one of my favorite board mounted paintings, and gave away a few business cards. It was really nice to have so many strangers tell me they like my art. Your friends and family kind of have...

Gotta give credit where it's due right? And let's be honest, I basically want to be Tonya Lee, the woman behind Scratchmade Journal--the absolute, hands down, best website I found while I was just starting my watercolor journey. I'm impressed by Tonya's style, her generosity, and the abundance of research she's done. I do not have the patience do be so methodical, but hot damn do I appreciate the folks who do it so I can learn from them! I probably read her article on supplies for beginners half a dozen times when I was deciding what to purchase when...

White watercolor paint is a freaking waste of time and space. I have some. I don't use it. Why? It doesn't work! In other painting mediums, white is used to add or restore highlights. But watercolor is transparent, so trying to put white watercolor over darker colors simply doesn't do much! You can still see the layers underneath! Thus: pointless. If you want to add opaque white as a finishing touch, you gotta go with gouache or acrylic. Or--as many watercolor snobs will tell you--you gotta keep the white of the paper for your whites. Now I'm not a tyrant--I...

It was a forehead smacking moment. It took me much longer than I really want to admit in this eternal forum of public-facing internet to realize that the letters in pigment names stood for colors. PB meant "Pigment Blue," PR was "Pigment Red," and so on. But that slow dawning of realization also meant that I will never, ever forget what those letters on my tubes of watercolor paint mean. All watercolor paint is made from powdered pigment, a binder (typically gum arabic), additives and/or preservatives, and water. You can buy the individual parts and mix your own watercolor paint if you...

If you're tired of painting on paper, watercolor ground is for you! I tried watercolor ground for the first time and filmed it for my little baby YouTube channel. It took a lot more time to prepare since you have to paint it on your surface and let it dry a few times before you can even paint on it. It behaves a lot differently that watercolor paper, but that also means there were unusual effects. It was exciting to go through the process and I totally nerded out while watching the actual paint move on the ground. Get notified...