Featured Daily Sketch: The Woodland Garden, 2014

May 28, 2026 Bernadette

"The Woodland Garden", pastel, 7" x 10" © Bernadette E. Kazmarski — “The Woodland Garden”, pastel, 7″ x 10″, 2014 © Bernadette E. Kazmarski

From 2016 when I featured it as my monthly desktop calendar: So Mimi is once again the subject of my featured artwork. She is probably the most frequently featured feline in the household! Normally I like to vary my featured art each month among felines and composition and colors and media, but my woodland garden is blooming like this already and Mimi and I have been spending time there, and this sketch is so springy it couldn’t be featured any other time.

From May 22, 2014:

This is what Mimi and I did this afternoon. The woodland garden blooms mostly at this time of the year, and is pretty much just shades and textures of green otherwise, but I enjoyed looking at it and how it’s evolved. Winter storms brought down limbs and whole small trees and portions of it had been overgrown until I had the chance to clear those out and renew the groundcovers. The ferns and periwinkle are back on the right, and the cranesbill geraniums, bluets and spring bluebells are back on the left.

Outside of this area the sun is shining on the yard and vegetable garden with brighter blue and yellow of the forget-me-nots and buttercups. Birds are landing in the bird bath and the feeder, and Mimi loves to wander up and down the path, though she spent a good bit of my sketching time as you see below, directing me in details as felines are masters of detail.

black cat — Mimi on my lap while I’m drawing.

Even though work was heavy around that time, all I could focus on was to try to do this sketch I’d been visualizing for the previous few days when Mimi and I were outdoors. It was all I could think about at that moment. Sometimes that’s what happens when I go on overload. So I did. Spending time outside of my work space and focused on artwork clears my mind as nothing else does and I come back with everything in order and ready to work again.

From 2026: I remember sitting out there and sketching. I remember it every time I’m out in the woodland garden, especially in spring. The park bench I was sitting on finally collapsed when the boards deteriorated—that bench had been a gift to my mother from me in the early 80s, after I graduated from college, but it lasted in her yard, then mine, for nearly 40 years! Mimi used to love to sit on it, and it’s the bench in my painting of her, “Mimi in the Formal Garden,” which was commissioned by CWA and has other plants in addition to the woodland plants. She was wearing a leash, so when she grew tired of directing my artwork she hopped down and walked all the way to the end of her leash and that’s where I decided to sketch her into it. I’d give anything to have Mimi sitting on my lap as I sketched once again, but I am so grateful for the experience of her and all we did.

Daily Sketches 2011 to 2015

I think I accomplished what I'd set out to do three years ago today, a challenge to me and entertainment and enjoyment for you: to create a quick sketch of my cats each day as a way to practice and experiment, and present the sketch on that day with no editing, no waiting, no excuses, just to do the sketch and share it.

Read more about the reason for the daily sketches in Daily Sketches: the Idea, Most Popular, Awards.

Click here to see other daily sketches.

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