Janet Marsh's Nature Diary

This is a book I got waaaaaaay back in 1986, and it is just a beautiful book.

It's not a how-to book, but more of showing a way to record your observations of life with drawing. It is full of drawings, sketches and watercolors of the natural world. Focusing mostly on birds and small animals, the author kept a kind of nature diary by drawing and painting all the discoveries she made in the area surrounding her home, with notes and remarks about what she had found.

The drawings are lovely and fragile, and so incredibly detailed in some cases, with nearly each twig of a nest having been drawn. I often go back and flip through this book, as each image is a joy to look at.