Afternoon Stroll

This is something I've been working on for quite some time. It started as a silly doodle I did in my sketchbook back in 2006: I initially wanted to color it then but couldn't decide whether to do it digitally or traditionally and ultimately got busy with other things and put it off....But I came back to it last year and redrew the sketch deciding I really wanted to break into my brand new pastels which I've had since college and never really used :O ...I did a few rough pastel thumbnails to figure out the color scheme but was hesitant to start the final illustration mostly due to anxiety over whether I'd be able to pull it off since I haven't used pastels in so long.......but at some point you just have to shed your fear and jump in and so I finally started working on it recently, finishing it within the last few weeks.... I'd forgotten how much I enjoyed pastels despite the messiness and I had fun relearning even though I made mistakes(getting a bit too heavy in some areas and I'm not especially happy with those roses.) It's probably the largest traditional illustration I've done in a long time-it's about 14x19". I couldn't scan it easily so I photographed it instead and the colors and contrast aren't reproducing quite right but I wanted to share it anyway.