Sheffield-on-Sea

Though Sheffield is entirely land-locked, each summer the council bring the seaside to us. I was in town yesterday and discovered sand, trampolines, a pool with pedalos, candy-floss stalls and dodgem cars, right in the city centre. This year we also had this wonderful helter-skelter:

I used my 'lining-over-colour' technique again, which I'm really enjoying. I'm not very patient (John will tell you...) so while I was waiting for the paint to dry, I got out a smaller sketchbook, and laid down the watercolour base for a 2nd sketch - the neighbouring roof towers of the Town Hall:

I painted the same view last year, during our very first SketchCrawl. 

It started to spit rain, so I did some shopping (yippee), then had some lovely tomato soup at Caffe Piazza, next door to Sheffield Cathedral (they do the best soup in town). The sun had come back, so I took my coffee outside and painted the view:

I also did a quick sketch of these young lovers (ahhhh...):

John was away, so I didn't much fancy going home. Instead I went to see an inspiring little exhibition of Kid Acne's work, the centre of which was a huge display case, packed with his sketchbooks. Which set me off again - I got another coffee and sat outside Caffe Nero to draw the Winter Gardens:

Quite tricky I must say, and I think I overworked it a little, but putting the colour down first did help to stop me getting bogged down in fuss and detail.

It got very windy and I suddenly realised I was frozen! Time to go home. What a nice day.