Tuesday, July 31, 2007

San Juan Capistrano Mission

Last Wednesday my friends, Ginger, Penny and Susan and I met at the Mission for a sketch crawl. It was a beautiful day, sunny, warm but with the most wonderful breeze. When we got to the mission we made a bee line for the center courtyard and didn't crawl very far as there was lots to sketch. After a few hours we left for lunch but Ginger and I returned for one more sketch.


I like to do composite pages of things that catch my eye but sometimes a funny secondary picture appears. Here the brick chimney looks like a cactus birdhouse. Isn't serendipity grand! It is fun filling the page with little bits of the day.


This is a section of the archways that go around the hole courtyard. My sketch is a little wocky and looks like a good old Santa Ana Wind would knock it all down but this mission is not going anywhere! The mission is famous for the return of the swallows each spring. The little blue swallow is the hand stamp for re-entry. When I saw the swallow on my hand we asked for one in our books as well. My ode to Mari, get a stamp whenever available!