Leaf of the Day: Shriveling Peel, Watching Paint Dry, and Two Acerolas.

One big problem for me, with this kind of detailed work, is waiting for the paint to dry. There is just no use trying to hurry the process and putting more paint on while the coat underneath is wet. You will just get mud. I have to go away from the drawing board and make yet another cup of tea that I won't drink. A dangerous tactic is to slide over to the computer as that can just end up with hours of "important" browsing. I have recently had to impose a new rule on myself. No Internet between nine and five.

However I have made some progress with the fruit today, but the peel is drying out and changing shape as I look at it. It is nothing like as fragile and annoying as the water plantain saga here though and at least I did not have to get wet feet trying to secure these models. Two of them are Barbados cherries, There are 3 plants in the garden I have found so far. One is a small tree and the other two are low bushy shrubs which are dwarf varieties. The flowers are very pretty small and pink, like tiny little wild roses. They are also called Acerola, or Antilles cherry, Maliphigia glabra.


Image from Texas digital flower project. here

They could easily be confused with the similar Surinam Cherry which I sketched and ate lots of back in April here. The Surinam cherries are a very attractive lantern shape whereas these are just cherry shaped but smaller. I also think the Surinam cherries were tastier.

I sketched these just to get the colours right. The dwarf variety is much darker crimson. I hope that if I work very hard tomorrow I will be able to finish the fruit piece... I hope I am getting quicker.

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Acerolas