Please click to enlarge image

It wasn’t until days later that I found out March’s full moon was dubbed ‘Supermoon’ due to it’s closeness to Earth.  Well, what to do? There was no room left on the full moon page and I had already sketched and painted the Sweetleaf snipping!

The border around the Sweetleaf page became the extension of the full moon page.  Not exactly what I had in mind for the Sweetleaf, but then just because it’s my journal doesn’t mean I have total control 🙂 That’s part of the fun of journaling!!

I found the Sweetleaf trees/scrubs scattered along the cart path of number 10 at our neighborhood golf course.  I’d been hoping that the coming of Spring would help me ID more trees along this path. If you remember, when I  was working on the Sketchbook Project, I counted 20 varieties. I was thrilled when the flowers of the Sweetleaf caught my eye. I so love adding new-to-me-plants and trees to my list! This particular small tree needed special attention due to its unusually shaped trunk.

I did this quick sketch around 5 pm, Saturday afternoon. I wanted the tuft-like cluster flowers to show off since I really didn’t achieve their look on the previous page. I used pastel pencil on toned pastel paper. I stroked the pastel with my waterbrush – my set of Derwent pastel pencils act like watercolor pencils but have the opaque qualities of pastels.

I then sprayed fixative over the page. Some of the white flowers weren’t standing out so I then used a white Neocolor II crayon to add the final touches.

The other common name: Horse-sugar comes from the fact that horses and cows love to graze on these sweet leaves. My tree book also says that fruit, described as small dry drupe, will form in the fall. Oh goody, more to look forward to!