Drawing White Flowers in Your Nature Journal

Question from Phyllis:

On another topic, more art than nature study, I have a question for you: do you have any tips for drawing/painting white flowers? We're trying to draw these flowers with watercolor pencils right now. In the past, I've drawn a background behind, and left the white. Any other ideas? It's hard!


I did some experimenting and found a way to easily include white flowers in your nature journal. Using a watercolor wash and then putting the white flowers on top is one solution to the problem.

Steps:

• Make a watercolor wash on your page and then let it dry.
• Sketch lightly with pencil your flower's leaves, stem, and blossom.
• Use watercolors and paint your leaves and stems.
• Use white watercolor paint and very little water to fill in the white flower, keeping the paint very opaque.
• Let your paints dry and then go back to add darker details and shading.

I use tube watercolors with great success.

We made a short video tutorial for you to watch.


I really like this book and even though it says it is for use with acrylics, I find it perfectly applicable for watercolors as well. If you click the Amazon.com link below, you can preview the pages inside. I love the visual index at the end of the book.

Many families wait to offer watercolors from a tube to their children. In our family, we found these watercolors to be a lot of fun and the boys learned early how to only squirt out a little at a time. I gave each one their own set along with their own palette and brushes. With a little training, you can offer these paints in your family as well.

Enjoy!
Barb-Harmony Art Mom

Ideas for Drawing in Your Nature Journal

I decided to share some links to pages that I use to help us draw in our nature journal. Several are links to coloring pages but I like their black line drawings that simplify an object so we can learn to draw them on our own in our journals. Make sure to check out all the links even if they are from a state or habitat other than one where you currently live. Many times there are animals, plants, and birds that you will have in your location too. I don't necessarily print the coloring book pages out and color them. We will use them as a guide to draw our own sketches of things we see in our Green Hour or for our nature journal.

Wildflowers:
Celebrating Wildflowers from the US Forest Service
These coloring pages are in PDF format so once you bring up the page, you can print out just the page you want and there is no need to print every page out on your printer.

Birds:
Feeder Birds Coloring Book from Cornell
These are not only coloring pages but could actually be used as notebooking pages for your nature journal. I print out the table of contents to keep in my notebook as a reference. This way I know what birds are included in the coloring book.

Trees:
Guide to Tree Sketching
I've shared this one before but it is worth listing again.

Flowers:
How to Draw Flowers and Plants
Step by step to various garden flowers

Mushroom:
There's Fun in Fungi
This is a PDF file. On page 5, there is a great illustration of a mushroom and its parts that you could use to easily draw your own mushroom.

Ducks and Geese:
3 Easy Steps to Drawing a Duck
A little more advanced but still great tips

Draw a Butterfly-Scientific Illustration
This is a fantastic page that teaches about how a scientist draws a specimen.

Various animals, birds, and reptiles:
Wildlife of New Mexico
This coloring book is worth a look. I think it is especially well done and many of the animals are found in other states as well. PDF format.

Wildlife of New Jersey
This is another really well done coloring book.

Wetlands Coloring Book
Lots of great ideas for drawing animals and scenes in this book.

I know I have one reader from Hawaii that participates in the Green Hour Challenge. This link is for her.
The Forest Jewels of Hawaii
Coloring pages of Hawaiian Birds

Hope there is something here that will help you with your endeavors to draw in your nature journal.

Barb-Harmony Art Mom

Ideas for Drawing In Your Nature Journal

I decided to share some links to pages that I use to help us draw in our nature journal. Several are links to coloring pages but I like their black line drawings that simplify an object so we can learn to draw them on our own in our journals. Make sure to check out all the links even if they are from a state or habitat other than one where you currently live. Many times there are animals, plants, and birds that you will have in your location too. I don't necessarily print the coloring book pages out and color them. We will use them as a guide to draw our own sketches of things we see in our Green Hour or for our nature journal.

Wildflowers:
Celebrating Wildflowers from the US Forest Service
These coloring pages are in PDF format so once you bring up the page, you can print out just the page you want and there is no need to print every page out on your printer.

Birds:
Feeder Birds Coloring Book from Cornell
These are not only coloring pages but could actually be used as notebooking pages for your nature journal. I print out the table of contents to keep in my notebook as a reference. This way I know what birds are included in the coloring book.

Trees:
Guide to Tree Sketching
I've shared this one before but it is worth listing again.

Flowers:
How to Draw Flowers and Plants
Step by step to various garden flowers

Mushroom:
There's Fun in Fungi
This is a PDF file. On page 5, there is a great illustration of a mushroom and its parts that you could use to easily draw your own mushroom.

Ducks and Geese:
3 Easy Steps to Drawing a Duck
A little more advanced but still great tips

Draw a Butterfly-Scientific Illustration
This is a fantastic page that teaches about how a scientist draws a specimen.

Various animals, birds, and reptiles:
Wildlife of New Mexico
This coloring book is worth a look. I think it is especially well done and many of the animals are found in other states as well. PDF format.

Wildlife of New Jersey
This is another really well done coloring book.

Wetlands Coloring Book
Lots of great ideas for drawing animals and scenes in this book.

I know I have one reader from Hawaii that participates in the Green Hour Challenge. This link is for her.
The Forest Jewels of Hawaii
Coloring pages of Hawaiian Birds

Hope there is something here that will help you with your endeavors to draw in your nature journal.

Barb-Harmony Art Mom