Mother Nature's Sketchpad

Estuary at Swallowfield

Some days, on my walks with the dogs, it is not the brilliant colours or the wildlife or the canine photo ops that draw my eye but the contrast of bare boughs against winter sky, the gentle graduations of  soft blues and greys and greens and whites  from ocean to islands to mountain top, the mists rising from barren fields.  It is the amazing range of shades in a subtle palette.  I think of Mother Nature sketching out the landscape, the curves and angles, the slopes and shadows, adding tints with her coloured pencils, a rough draft to use as the basis for richer artistic creations when she returns to her studio.  Those are the days I wish I could paint.  Today was one of those days:

Osborne Bay, looking toward Salt Spring Island

Seagulls on an old wharf

Under the wharf

View from beach to snowy mountain

Heron on dock

Tree 

Waiting for Spring

Estuary