Walking my Chihauhau

Cheering elephants, hatching dinosaurs, dancing birds, and more flow from our daughter’s brush and pencil. She actually orders pencils by the gross. When I explained my goal to sketch at least 100 wolves, coyotes and foxes in about 10 weeks, Lita suggested I try some in pencil and with a technique I haven’t used. When she finds the form of an animal, she holds the pencil quite differently. My best description of the technique is to hold the pencil as if I have a dainty Chihuahua on a leash, a leash that doesn’t have a loop for a handle, but rather just a little ball on my end. This position means I am holding my knuckles down and thumb up; and I hold the pencil fairly far back. It encourages me to draw loosely and find the line. I can see more of the drawing. My normal, ‘writing’ position hides much of the drawing when I’m working on the left half. It’ll take some doing, but I’m practicing “Walking my Chihuahua.” This wolf, drawn from one of our Yellowstone photos, is drawn a la Chihuahua.


We just had a wonderful week with our daughter, Lita, and her husband, Dave. Oregon was kind to the weather worn residents of New Hampshire and produced sunshine in the middle of our rainy season. We bought beads, sniffed flowers, petted an elephant (at Wildlife Safari), got a lot of computer help, hiked, and watched the Olympics. I think Lita is as excited as Dale and I are to see me painting again.

To see more of Lita’s work go to her website: www.LitaJudge.com. To see some of her pencil drawings, be sure to click on “Illustrations” and then on “Sketches.” To see some of Dale and my photographs, click on her “Yellowstone Moran” book and then on “Wildlife.”