I’ve been trying out watercolours for the first time since my age was measured in single digits. I didn’t like it then, as I’m too much of a perfectionist and it annoyed me that watercolour paint didn’t stay where I put it.

But life itself is much more fluid these days. I thought perhaps I’d let loose of some of my control-freak nature and just see what happened.

I wasn’t sure if I was going to share my work or not. Again, letting go of the control freak, I decided what the hell. But I still have to give an advance apology/explanation for my efforts. 1. I have NO training on how to paint with watercolours. 2. I’ve not tried to do this in over 30 years. 3. My brain isn’t working quite right.

So. I meant to find hubby’s pastels and play around, because I had some good clean cardboard I didn’t mind wasting. Instead I found his watercolour paints, from… high school era. Black, white, green, red, blue yellow. Not a lot to work with! Also the only proper watercolour paper I have was gifted to my by Socks, and is post-card sized. So I sat down and looked at what she’d sent me. Paintbrushes that hold water in the barrel. Big black pencils that, mysteriously (to me) said watercolour on their sides. Hmm. So I did a quick sketch of the first thing that came into my head, in black, and then filled it in with paint. Here’s the result.

The eye is terrible – but that’s the first thing I drew and the rest didn’t quite follow along those Disney lines. Ah well.

So, next was to find something else to paint. I wanted to do the bell from my local church. While thinking it over, I realised something. I’ve had a small set of expensive Derwent coloured pencils since I was a teen. I recalled that the tin they live in says ‘watercolour’ on it. Holy shit, I’ve had a good set of watercolour pencils for decades and didn’t know what they were for.

So I drew the bell. The perspective is all wrong. I know. I refuse to care.

I thought about it for days before I finally got the nerve up to wet it down.

I actually made the perspective worse! But I learned a lot and it was fast and, dare I say, fun. I’ve another project in mind, way above my skill, but screw it, you have to start somewhere.