I love Johnny Jump-Up Violets and the way they create a carpet of violet and green in the lawn in early spring. I've always wanted to take a photo that captures the parade of blossoms, and finally managed it this spring.
Of course I wanted to paint the scene in my new concertina watercolor journal. I started with a pencil sketch. Then I painted in the various violets -- the closer ones I painted in detail, and as the violets grew farther away, I painted them as flower shapes, and finally as blobs.
When the flowers were dry, I painted around the many violets in shades of green, and created a shadow color by mixing permanent blue violet with Hooker's green.
I created the concertina sketchbook by cutting a 6" x 20" strip from a sheet of 300 pound Stonehenge watercolor paper, then scoring the paper every 5" with a bone folding tool and folding in a zig-zag folding pattern.
Blick sells sheets of 300# Stonehenge Aqua watercolor paper for $12. The sheets are 22" x 30" so you can make 3 of these accordion-fold journals for $12. That's reasonable for journals, and the paper is absolutely lovely to work on.
You can paint on both sides of watercolor paper, so when I fill up one side, I'll flip it and paint on the other side, creating a folded record of my spring in nature.
You may recognize the cover of this sketchbook from an earlier post about painting phlox.
I love this little watercolor sketchbook! It's pocket-sized, and the 300 pound paper is a dream to work on.
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