Throughout last year, we never had rain for our monthly meet-ups. In June, it was pouring the day before the meet-up. But the sky cleared up next day (and it was quite hot as well). In September, even though the forecast said it was going to rain, it was sunny throughout the day. Then we concluded I (the only member who joined all the monthly meet-ups) am a hare on’na (a woman blessed with good weather) and bring the sun. This month though, the sun was finally not with us. We had February’s meet-up on the 16th in Ueno. In the morning, it was raining and it looked like it would continue all day. 昨年の月例スケッチ会はいつもお天気に恵まれ、直前まで雨予報の日でさえ太陽が出て暖かい一日になるということばかりでした。月例スケッチ会に全回参加したのはわたしだけ。次第にわたしが晴れ女なのではないかという冗談がまことしやかに囁かれるようになりました。ところが、今月の上野でのスケッチ会はついに太陽が味方してくれず。朝からしとしと雨が降り、一日中続きそうな様子でした。 They were waiting under umbrellas, but... But, as I arrived at Grand Fountain in Ueno Park, the meeting place, it literally stopped raining. We were like, “wow!” I was surprised myself since it was just a ...

It was just before Christmas we had Year-end sketch session at Marunouchi, Tokyo with Paul Wang from Singapore. You might have red the report (by Momoko-san's post), it was such a fun time especially in the morning most of members got together in the terrace of Shin- Marunouchi building to capture Tokyo Station, there participants were able to see Paul in action since they shared a table. Unfortunately I had class to teach in the morning so I missed most of morning session.. But in the afternoon, I was privileged to sat next Paul to capture Marunouchi Mitsubishi Ichigokan Museum scenery, then I was able to observe Paul's carefully applied watercolor strokes so close. Throw down is next fun thing, but seeing directly in action is the best! How influential to sketch together! I enjoy including him in my sketch. It was almost twilight then, we called it a day.

As is always the case ( recently) we had a lot of participants in our monthly sketch meeting.. no wonder, especially this time we had Rob Sketcherman joined with us. His iPad digital sketches are just stunning! The speed as well as the quality are breathtakingly awesome! Of course everybody participated at that day was certainly a hero and each sketche was unique, but seeing Rob's is different dimension level... And as is always the case we were not able to see others sketching while we were in action of ourselves, but thankfully Rob provided time laps to show us how he created sketches on location! Thanks Rob! Here, This is Rob's time laps video. Here are mine of the day. I loved the laidback ambience of Monzen-Nakacho a lot. ( certainly we'll come back)