I was lucky enough to spend another weekend in St. Louis. It was a mixed trip -- part baseball, part dancing, and a little bit of painting in Tower Grove Park. This park has quickly vaulted into one of my very favorite places to paint, but I've been having trouble getting a print design that I like from my April sketches. So I revisited both the bandstand (above) and the Old Playground Pavilion (below) with very quick sketches, just trying to work out composition.

Going in just planning to do quick sketches freed me up somehow. My watercolors have mostly been a progression of pencil to more careful pen drawings and finally watercolor. I enjoyed skipping the middle step, and there's a freshness to these that energized me. I did a whole series in just one morning (plus one more the next morning), when usually I would only have managed two drawings in that space of time. Once again, Tower Grove has given me inspiration on top of its intrinsic beauty. I'm excited about trying some more work in this style.