I didn’t go to the farm this week due to a very busy schedule. The weather has been beautiful here in central Oklahoma and I am dying to get back to the garden. The redbud trees are blooming this week in my town and they are gorgeous. I have been spending a lot of time caring for the seedlings and probably have about a hundred plants on my balcony now. I think about 70 percent of what I planted has germinated so far. I have replanted some things which did not sprout after a few weeks. The seedlings seem pretty healthy so far. Some of them are a little bit yellow and I think it’s due to a lack of sunlight. My balcony is north facing and only the railing gets good sun. Unfortunately, when I put the seedlings there the squirrels knock them down repeatedly. Some of the plants have purple on the underside of the leaves. I have learned that this is a phosphorus deficiency and they needed fertilizer. I bought some Dr. Earth fertilizer and applied it a few days ago. The sweet potato and scarlet runner beans are growing the fastest. The tomatoes and tomatillos are growing up well but the peppers are growing slowly. The bunching onions seem to do better when they are not in the direct sun. I think that they are all ready to be transplanted to the garden but I don’t know when I can do it. I received some late birthday gifts from my family this week. I got some Alexandria strawberry seeds from my sister and some new art supplies from my mom. I am very grateful for the wonderful gifts. I thought I would give a short review of the 76 piece prina sketching set I received. It is a great value at around 25 dollars. There is a graphite pencil set from 5H to 12B. I am excited about this because my previous set only has 4H to 8B. I tend to have a heavy hand and so prefer the hard pencils. There is a kneaded eraser and a white eraser and they had average lifting power. There is a pencil sharpener, which is basic. It is metal and does not catch shavings but makes nice spiral shavings. There is a charcoal set with soft, medium, and hard black and white charcoal pencils. I think these all work well. There is a sandpaper for refining the pencil tips. There’s also a green and a brown charcoal pencil, something I haven’t seen before. There’s a set of colored pencils, metallic colored pencils, and watercolor pencils. Although these could have been more pigmented, for the price they are acceptable. The set comes with a water brush and watercolor brush. The bristles on these were a little bent. There’s a fine liner included with two tips, thick and thin. It did bleed through the paper. There is a sketchbook included as well with white, tan, and black paper. I did swatches of the pencils on this paper. The paper is smooth but not that thick. It definitely is not good for use with wet media. There should have been a wood less graphite pencil but it was missing from my set. There are three blending stumps or tortillons in different sizes as well as a pencil extender. There is a short tutorial booklet including directions for drawing a butterfly. There were a few errors in the labeling and instructions. Overall, I was impressed with how much stuff came with the set but wish the colored pencils were more highly pigmented. I am looking forward to drawing even more with this new set. I will put some photos below of my tests of the set. I always prank my boyfriend for April Fools Day so I am trying to think of ideas for this year. Our pawpaw trees have arrived and they look great with a few buds already. Can’t wait to plant them!
Lisa Ledbetter 