Monkstown in the rain

We were sketching in Monkstown a while back. One of those Irish summer days. The forecast is for dry weather, but you leave the house and it's drizzling. You think, it's ok, I have my umbrella, I can sketch in the rain. And the drizzle turns into a downpour, and the ink runs, so you start using pencils, but then the paper gets wet. Never mind the feet. 

It's not often I have to abandon a sketch because of the weather, but I did. See last sketch down below. But then I went into a nice café, Avoca's Salt. I asked to sit in a warm corner at the back, I ordered poached eggs on avocado and toast, and a matcha latte. I could see the whole room of people chatting over coffee. It was perfect.

And then I went out again and a few of us started sketching again and had a great time. The theme was old shops of Dublin, and we were sketching Hewett's, a newsagent that has recently closed. It had opened in 1949 and was run by three generations. It's so sad to see shops like this closing. And I'm glad I have a record of it in my sketchbook now. Although I did spend more time sketching the Hoover repair centre, which is still running. I loved the brick façade and the pattern detail around the windows.

So, despite the weather, we ended up having a great time. That's one good thing about the weather here. It is changeable. It's never sunny for very long. But it's never rainy for very long either!