In my efforts to increase my posting of rough sketches (and to continue to inspire my own drawing on and off the computer), I am presenting three sketches. The one above is done in pen on paper – it is a copy of a John Neill drawing from Tik Tok of Oz, a book by L. Frank Baum. The character is a talking mule called Hank (he is the mule of Betsy Bobbin).
This one is of my daughter, although she looks at least five years older than she is in real life in this quick colored pencil sketch. The challenge (from the book A Drawing a Day) was to choose five colors not necessarily in the image and draw.
This is my favorite of this post: a drawing done with iDraw on an iPad mini of my daughter’s boots. I am quite pleased with the result. Using iDraw is like a cross between finger painting and Photoshop.
Someone wanted recommendations for books that teach drawing. I will mention two that I own:
- Drawing on the Right Side of the Brain, Betty Edwards
- The Natural Way to Draw, Kimon Nicolaides
Both emphasize learning to see. We may think we are seeing, but usually, we are creating a symbol for how our left brain thinks an object should be.
Thanks to everyone who has made suggestions for renaming this blog! The blog renaming process may not happen for a bit, as I’ve been busy with paid gigs, I need to redo the header for this blog (which takes time), and no one is paying me to redo my own blog header.
This recipe for zucchini dill soup is adapted from a recipe in Susie Fishbein’s Kosher by Design cookbook. When my friend made us the soup, my kids actually loved it (a first for a creamy, pareve vegetable soup). My friend said the secret is use lots of dill. So I renamed this recipe zucchini dill soup (as opposed to zucchini soup alone). My version has a vegetable broth base and less zucchini (but feel free to double the recipe for a crowd or to freeze some of the soup).
Make the Vegetable Broth
In a large pot boil these vegetables in water for over an hour:
- 1 or 2 turnips
- 2 or 3 onions
- 1 large carrot, cut into pieces
- 1 leek
- 2 cloves of peeled garlic
- 1 stalk of celery
- 1 bay leaf
If you are missing any of the above, don’t worry. As long as you have some vegetables, it will taste good! Feel free to find your own substitutes (you could use parsnips, for example, but I find those too sweet). Onions, though, are a pretty good idea for a vegetable broth.
Make the Zucchini Dill Soup
- 5-6 cups of vegetable broth
- 2-4 zucchini, trimmed and cut in chunks
- 2-3 onions
- 1 bunch of chopped dill (fresh)
- 1 bunch of chopped parsley (fresh, optional)
- 1-2 garlic cloves, peeled
- olive or coconut oil, to saute the onions
- salt and pepper to taste
- optional: add fresh lemon juice
In a large pot, saute the onions and garlic until translucent. Add the zucchini for about 3-5 minutes. Add dill and parsley. Add the broth and bring to a boil. Simmer, covered, for 25 minutes.
Either transfer the soup to a blender or food processor to blend until smooth, or use an immersion blender. My food processor worked better than my immersion blender. Season with salt and pepper.
The lemon juice was not in Susie Fishbein’s recipe, but the last time I made the zucchini dill soup recipe, I squeezed in half of a fresh lemon. I liked it with lemon.
Update: when you add the broth, you have a choice of just adding the liquid broth or including some of the vegetables, such as the root vegetables (turnips and carrots), garlic and/or onions. I would remove the celery and leek, because they are stringy. Definitely take out the bay leaf.
Friday afternoon right before candlelighting and who comes to visit but three deer? One quickly hopped the fence when he saw us, but the one in the front had a staring contest with my husband and then with me. The deer finally jumped over the fence to depart when I danced back and forth with my camera. My husband said it looked the deer might pounce on us.
Elsewhere in the Blogosphere
I am pleased to announce that I will be part of a tour of Sydney Taylor Book Awards. See the schedule:
MONDAY, FEBRUARY 11, 2013
Ann Redisch Stampler, author of The Wooden Sword
Sydney Taylor Honor Award winner in the Older Readers Category
At Shelf-Employed
Carol Liddiment, illustrator of The Wooden Sword
Sydney Taylor Honor Award winner in the Older Readers Category
At Ann Koffsky’s Blog
Doreen Rappaport, author of Beyond Courage: The Untold Story of Jewish Resistance During the Holocaust
Sydney Taylor Honor Award in the Teen Readers Category
At Bildungsroman
TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 12, 2013
Linda Glaser, author of Hannah’s Way
Sydney Taylor Book Award winner in the Younger Readers Category
At This Messy Life
Adam Gustavson, illustrator of Hannah’s Way
Sydney Taylor Book Award winner in the Younger Readers Category
At Here in HP
Louise Borden, author of His Name was Raoul Wallenberg
Sydney Taylor Book Award winner in the Older Readers Category
At Randomly Reading
Deborah Heiligman, author of Intentions
Sydney Taylor Book Award winner in the Teen Readers Category
At The Fourth Musketeer
WEDNESDAY, FEBRUARY 13, 2013
Sheri Sinykin, author of Zayde Comes to Live
Sydney Taylor Honor Award in the Younger Readers Category
At Read, Write, Repeat
Kristina Swarner, illustrator of Zayde Comes to Live
Sydney Taylor Honor Award in the Younger Readers Category
At Writing & Illustrating
THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 14, 2013
Linda Leopold Strauss, author of The Elijah Door
Sydney Taylor Honor Award in the Younger Readers Category
At Pen and Prose
Alexi Natchev, illustrator of The Elijah Door
Sydney Taylor Honor Award in the Younger Readers Category
At Madelyn Rosenberg’s Virtual Living Room
FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 15, 2013
Blog Tour Wrap-Up at The Whole Megillah
About the Tour: The Sydney Taylor Book Award will be celebrating and showcasing its 2013 gold and silver medalists and a few selected Notables with a Blog Tour, February 11-15, 2013! Interviews with winning authors and illustrators will appear on a wide variety of Jewish and kidlit blogs. For those of you who have not yet experienced a Blog Tour, it’s basically a virtual book tour. Instead of going to a library or bookstore to see an author or illustrator speak, you go to a website on or after the advertised date to read an author’s or illustrator’s interview.
I have been working on this blog since 2007. When I started, I thought I would write about the Borough of Highland Park, New Jersey. In turns out, I rarely write about Highland Park, and the name Here in HP confuses some people who think of Hewlett-Packard. In any case, few of my readers live in Highland Park. I prefer to post my art, my art sketches, my Photoshop and Illustrator attempts, my photos of nature, food and whatever else looks appealing, a few book reviews, a recipe here and there. I’ve decided the blog needs a new name.
So, how to go about making a decision? Fortunately, the urls will not have to change. The blog is merely positioned as a subdirectory of my main domain:
https://www.leoraw.com/blog/
It’s just that annoying Here in HP that I do not like. I want something related to art. Here are a few ideas:
– Sketching Out
– Sketched Out
– Sketch and Photo
The idea of Sketched Out is that I put up sketches when I can, but most of the time I am sketched out, so you get a photo or a book review or a recipe.
Obviously, I’ve got sketch on the brain. I would love to get your help. I was thinking of making this an official contest; however, I read over contest rules, and one must have a definite end to a contest. I’m afraid the unofficial contest does not end until I finally like the new name. Also, one is encouraged by U.S. law to limit the contest to only U.S. entrants, as one would have to follow the contest rules of every single country in order to make it internationally legal. Well, I’m not doing that, either. So this is an extremely unofficial contest. Unofficially, I may give a prize to the winner (an Amazon gift certificate). And equally unofficially, I may post the names (with links to their blogs or to a recent blog post of theirs) of the honorable mentions.
So, do you have any good ideas on what I should rename this blog?
Update – more ideas:
- Sketchy
- Drawn Out
- Sketches and Stuff
- Sketches and Such
- Rough Sketch
Instead of skipping Nature Notes yet one more time because I have no new photos or observations to add (I did see a hawk on Sunday flying over our home, to add one new comment), I decided to post a photo from last summer in three different ways.
It can seem like a different photo if you crop it differently.
This is probably the one most people would pick … and indeed, I posted a similar version of this butterfly photo last summer.
For more Nature Notes, visit Rambling Woods:
