I’m a lucky guy.  Tina Koyama sent me one of her small sketchbooks.  She makes these from light watercolor paper and endows them with creative covers.  Now that I’ve used one, I know why all photos of her exhibit a big smile.

I’ve only done half a dozen sketches in this 4×6 book but it’s really fun to use and the paper holds up nicely to my pointy devices.   It’s a single 5-sheet signature, providing 20, 4×6 sketch surfaces in a very small, light footprint.

My first use was to quickly sketch this odd metal sculpture.  I’m not sure what it’s supposed to represent but I guess it represents it.  No matter, it gave me a chance to scribble in the book and slop on a bit of watercolor.

And then it rained.  It’s still acting like spring here and I was cloistered behind windows, limiting both my spirits and sketching subjects.

Across the street was this digger, so I drew it.  I should have turned the book and drawn across the long dimension but I didn’t so this image is pretty small.  Still, it was fun to let the Namiki Falcon wander around for a while.

This last sketch was done while I was out for a long walk.  For some reason I was in the mood for a large scene when I walked through the park at Pointe de Lievre, so I plunked my butt on a picnic bench and quickly sketched this and used a waterbrush filled with dilute ink to shade it a bit.  I deemed it a good use of 15 minutes.

I’m really enjoying Tina’s tiny sketchbook.  I’m not sure she has convinced me to spend a lot of time making my own as I’d need to make a lot of them given the way I use small sketchbooks, but she’s nudged me a bit closer to the edge.