I got a perfect afternoon in the Badlands of South Dakota today. I'm heading across the country to Washington State, and it was a gorgeous afternoon to stop. Plus it was early enough that almost no one was there. I couldn't have asked for a more wonderful afternoon. The place is transporting. It's hard to believe it can exist even as you're standing in the midst of it. To top it all off, and afternoon moon was hanging low over the rocks.

Mr. Darcy has been unsure about this whole traveling thing, but he's decided he likes having his own hotel bed, and he was utterly fascinated by the prarie dogs today. He also just looked good against the backdrop of the Badlands.

I got to spend one lovely night at one of my favorite places on earth recently and catch up with old friends there. It was great to sit and paint the mountains before breakfast with a pot of tea.

My friend Mark Goshorn Jones was shooting a movie short at the Annesdale Snowden mansion in Memphis not long ago and invited me to sketch on site. I submitted a sketch for my sketch feature in the Daily News, but I stayed a while and had a good time doing several sketches. Here is the full set. I enjoyed the juxtaposition of the cameras and working action with the grand old house.

I've had rotating house guests lately, plus my sister has been in town, mostly for our annual dance weekend (which explains my recent silence here). I managed a hat trick of teas/chai out being festive with people and sketched all three. It's nice to have happy memories in my journal.

I took another hike in Rockport the other day and tried a new and lovely trail before coming back around to the Evergreen one. I'm going to have to do some more serious painting in there, but in the meantime, here are two sketches from my journal.

I fell in love with this enormous, dancing cedar tree and had been thinking about it. The second time past I had to stop and sketch. I may go back out with oils as well.

Here is a photo of me painting at Rockport that Jude Dippold took.

Jude took me to Hilt Run waterfall yesterday. It's a mad scramble down a slope to get a good view, and I'm only just learning to use poles. It was raining a little as I painted, and then I had to close the book to put it in my pocket for the climb back out, so all my nice white areas got splotchy. Watercolor just doesn't dry at all quickly in the humidity here. I do at least have this memory in my journal, though it's not as pristine as I would like.

The lower part of the falls is 90 feet, and it was stunning to sit there and drink it in. Here's a short video I took so you can hear the water.

We took the ferry today as a day trip to San Juan island. It's a bit over an hour's ride, and it's utterly beautiful. The ferry weaves between tiny humps of islands that dance on the water. I sketched almost nonstop. Here are the full set of sketches from the outbound trip.

I'm in Concrete, WA, again painting and working on some illustrations as well as having a little much needed vacation time. I started the trip off well with lots of tea. Since I left 73 degree weather for 37 degree weather, it seemed called for.

5b's bakery here is delightful and does a pot of tea just right, which is rare. They also have a quite lovely cinnamon roll, and it's a beautiful place to sit.

It's been rainy, but I got some landscape sketches in today as research for the book illustrations I'm working on. I'll post them when I get them scanned in. In the meantime, I also visited Sauk Pottery, a local potter who uses enormous wood fired kilns that hold 300 pieces each. Just amazing. Not surprisingly to anyone who knows me, I also bought a tea cup.

I finished printing the first batch of "Midnight" this morning. The print is based on a journal sketch I did of Amanda Parer's art installation Intrude at the Brooks Museum in Memphis. I did a number of color tests on this one and ended up with a lighter sky and paper. I had thought that perhaps a darker gray would be nice, but it didn't pop as much.

I was completely enchanted with this lit up installation. I have a major illustration project in house right now for the national Presbyterian Church, and I have a show to hang March 1, and all my brain can think is "BUNNIES!! I want to make art about BUNNIES." You can see that I caved. Sometimes you just have to go with what's calling your name at that moment.

Here are the color tests I did.

And here is the original sketch.