This Month's Gazette

| Issue N9 | Jun 25 |

| Issue N9 | 1st June 2025 |

---

SUMMER AMUSEMENTS

delightful June in South Yorkshire

June is here!!! HOORAY!!!

The month of strawberries, red poppies, bbqs, salads and a sweetness in the air that celebrates the arrival of summer in the Northern Hemisphere.

This month carve out time to get out and see the world near you! Here are a few creative prompts to give you ideas!

Create an Adventure Sketchbook Spread (3-7hrs):

• consider visiting a place you’ve been meaning to explore… then put your exploration date in the calendar and protect that time (5mins)

• prepare a sketchbook page with wash tape and a light watercolour base inside little vignettes (10mins)

• pack your bag, take a sketchbook and some minimal tools to draw/paint there, don’t forget water and snacks (20mins)

• take time to enjoy exploring and snapping photos (3-7hrs)

• carve out time back at home to add journaling or any little details you don’t want to forget. Use pics you’ve taken as reference if need be. (1hr)

Celebrate Strawberries (1-3hrs):

• Find a local farm where you can pick your own strawberries and eat them back at home (2-3hrs)

• Take inspiration from some old posters on public domain sites and draw a pretend strawberry festival just for fun! (1hr)

• Join one of our summer drawing Zoom sessions where we will celebrate all things strawberry!!! (1:30hr)

• If you do manage to pick a large amount of strawberries, why not make your own jam? Either that, or find some Bonne Maman jam (in my books, the jars alone - with their cute gingham top - are always worth the money AND you can turn them into Jars of Joy!!)

A Colour Party (10mins and ongoing)

• Create a Colour Photo album on your phone (or a real paper album is ever better but takes a lot longer)

• Anywhere you go, wherever you see colour combinations you LOVE, take a snapshot and add it to your album - make it like your personalised portable colour museum.

Have a blast this month!

---

MONTHLY REPORT

Last month, for our co-drawing session, we had artist Melissa Lakey as a special guest and we drew her landscape of Joshua Tree together. This is some of the gorgeously fun sketchbook spreads club members created from the Joshua Tree images Melissa selected. The call was wonderfully chatty and Melissa generously shared some travel sketchbook tips. You can catch that in the replays (see link in archives below). Also Melissa is now on Substack HERE.

Artwork by Michelle, Priscilla, Khanukaevaa, Rashmi and Stacie (in that order)

Later in the month, for our co-creating session, we also had the privilege of hearing from illustrator and author Holly Surplice who lives in the Scottish Outer Hebrides. We talked while creating jars of joy. You can catch the replay in the archives.

Jars of Joy artwork by Michelle and Helen

---

PICK & MIX on the theme of COLOUR

Blog posts:

• Rebecca Green’s Q&A addresses points in depth on colour palette in this blog post

• If you want to get very geeky about the colour wheel and its history this 3 part blog posts by PRINT might be of interest. They share Sir Isaac Newton’s work from public domain (I only read a bit but it was fun to open and see at a glance how much thought he put into it back in 1730).

YouTube:

• Sandi Hester on making helpful colour charts (also anything by Sandi Hester is funny and helpful, I’ve become a big fan). Plus, she’s moving to the UK which is pretty exciting!!

• How to Read A Color Wheel by Art Summits

• How To Pick Color Palettes by Dylan M

• This How to Make Your Own Paint like Rembrandt is fascinating - do let me know if you have a go at this.

• This video with Guido Maestri painting trees on canvas with Maria Stoljar.

Podcasts:

• Talking with Painters on the topic of colour - Inspiration from the Archives on Colour (part 1) and (part 2)

If you have any recommendations on this theme, please leave them in the comments, it’s open to all just now!

---

Poet’s Corner

Excerpt from What Is So Rare As A Day In June? by James Russell Lowell

And what is so rare as a day in June?
Then, if ever, come perfect days;
Then Heaven tries earth if it be in tune,
And over it softly her warm ear lays;
Whether we look, or whether we listen,
We hear life murmur, or see it glisten;
Every clod feels a stir of might,
An instinct within it that reaches and towers,
And, groping blindly above it for light,
Climbs to a soul in grass and flowers;
The flush of life may well be seen
Thrilling back over hills and valleys;
The cowslip startles in meadows green,
The buttercup catches the sun in its chalice,
And there's never a leaf nor a blade too mean
To be some happy creature's palace;
The little bird sits at his door in the sun,
Atilt like a blossom among the leaves,
And lets his illumined being o'errun
With the deluge of summer it receives;
His mate feels the eggs beneath her wings,
And the heart in her dumb breast flutters and sings;
He sings to the wide world, and she to her nest,
In the nice ear of Nature which song is the best?

---

DATES for June

• Tuesday 10th June 7pm BST - Co-Drawing scenes from Ile de Re, France (1hr30)

• Monday 16th June 7pm BST - Co-Creating, chatty session where everyone brings their own creative endeavours (I will be painting a lampshade, stripes of course) (1hr)

• Friday 20th June 7pm BST - Monthly Video, Travel Sketchbook (part 2)

• Monday 30th June 7pm BST - Co-Journaling session (1hr)

Note: all Zoom sign up Luma links will be in the club chat (exclusive to paying members). Head there to sign up, it calculates your time zone and it will remind you a day prior to the call. Super clever!

---

SOME THEMED CLUB ARCHIVES

Travel Sketchbook

• Gazette with lots of links on the topic (free)

• Travel Sketchbooks, Co-Drawing Joshua Tree with guest Melissa Lakey (paid)

• Monthly Video: Travel Sketchbooks part 1 (paid)

Still Life Challenge

• Gazette with lots of links on the topic (free)

• Kick Off Party (paid)

• Co-Drawing Still Life Masterpieces with guest Citla Flores (paid)

• Bundle of 5 still life photos to use as references: bundle week 1, bundle week 2, bundle week 3. Please have fun playing with colours and adapt the props as you wish. (paid)

• End of Challenge Party Co-Journaling session (paid)

De-Mystifying Visual Journaling

• Introduction to the series (all paid)

• Pop-In week 1

• Pop-in week 2

• Pop-in week 3

• Pop-in week 4

• Pop-in week 5

---

Thanks for reading the 9th issue of the Time Foragers’ Club gazette.

Next month: Jane Austen picnics, summer colours and more exciting guests!