Breakfast

I've found that the Internet not only has a wealth of information for artists, but also provides quite a lot of inspiration. For instance, the weekend drawing event has provided me with great reference photos to draw or paint. That is usually the only one that I participate in these days. But there are several others that I could choose from if I felt like incorporating them into my drawing routine. For instance, Illustration Friday publishes a topic every Friday. I subscribe to their newsletter, but I haven't participated before. This past Friday, their topic was "breakfast," so this morning (Monday), after breakfast, I was looking for something to spark my imagination and I thought of "breakfast" and drew this little guy. I had oatmeal this morning and so did he. The problem with this latest sketch pad of mine, even though I like its surface for drawing very much, it scans crappily (yes, I know that's not really a word). It's very annoying that scans come out so much lighter than the drawing and even when I mess around with the image on photoshop, I can't recover any of the mid tones, so the drawings lose all their detail. I'm fairly detail oriented in my drawings, so this is always a source of frustration for me as all of my scans from any surface, leave out a lot of the shading detail. But this surface is particularly bad. I'm sure there are much better scanners out there, but for now, I'm stuck with this one. Anyway, this guy's scan was so light that I darkened him drastically and he is darker than he is in real life. He also looks like he has no mid-tones, but this will have to just do as I have to get my butt up from the couch and exercise and, therefore, have no more time to mess with him.

In other quick news, I gave Phoebe a new box last night and she has been living in it ever since then. I can just pick her up and carry her around in the box and set her down on cupboards, shelves, dressers, etc. and she just stays.

Pachyderm Cafe

I didn't draw all weekend, so I thought I should, at least, produce a sketch this morning. These guys were inspired by the children's book that I was talking about in an earlier post, but I drew them mostly from my head. I do love how elephants make rhinos look petite.

Now I am trying to get myself up and motivated. I have found that if I do my work-out before work, I have more energy for the day, so that's what I am trying to motivate myself to do. Obviously I don't work out before work when I have to be to work at 8:30, but it is doable when I don't have to be there until 12:45.

In other mundane news, I made pina colada bread last night and it turned out great. No burning, no collapsing, no failure to mix properly. I resisted the urge to keep opening to cover to check on it. That may have been the trick. I'm going to take it to work to share it today. And this is all I have, for now...

white board monsters

I drew these monsters on our white board at work. I asked my co-worker and friend to take a photo of them today, so I could keep them in my file. That's the thing about white board art. If you don't photograph it, it's just gone for good. I was pretty happy with these guys, so I did want to save them and share them. Yes, there are horrors at the library, especially in the summer. I crossed out the name of the library, just because...

Otherwise, I don't have much to say tonight. I was up until 4 AM on Tuesday night and slept late yesterday, therefore, I was not tired when I went to bed last night. I think it was coming up on 3:00 before I finally dozed off. Tonight I should sleep well.

New post, no picture...and yay, my blog is still here...

Hi everyone. I had a close call of the "I lost my blog" variety today, but it appears that I have found it. Yes, I accidentally deleted my blog. I meant to delete a different blog, but deleted this one instead. All it takes a click of a button and then "are you sure you want to delete this blog" and there goes two (is it two now?) years of your life. I wasn't too upset actually. I had the entire contents in my google reader and was prepared to start over, but it is still a relief to have it back.

And no picture today. I did draw, but I did a sketch of a book illustration and because it is a "copy" of someone else's work, I'm not going to post it here. It is the most charming rhino and elephant having tea together. If you would like to see it, I can e-mail it to you. Just let me know...

As for no picture, if I had a drawing of bread in my archives, I would post it, but I have never felt compelled to draw bread. I am attempting my second loaf of chocolate bread tonight. The first one (last wed.'s loaf) burned on the white bread setting, so this time I tried the sweet bread setting. Keep your fingers crossed. I already had one loaf of bread fail today. I don't think I can handle another one. My earlier failure was a loaf of cinnamon raisin bread. I followed the directions to a T and the results were disastrous. I put the add-ins (raisins) in when the machine beeped after 20 minutes and they were supposed to be mixed in with the bread. Instead they stayed on top and only the bottom part of the bread baked. Very strange. What does that say about following directions? Do you suppose my bread machine is a rebel and doesn't like that type of exactitude?

Rumpelstiltskin's blog

Here it is.

Just a quick word of what's to come...

I have decided that I'm going to do a retelling of Rumpelstiltskin and did write three quick pages last night. But what I'm going to do tonight, and I wish I could stay home and do it today (grr, for the library staying open today, despite the petition that union gave us to sign that would have meant closing today),is create a blog for the wee man. It will be a fun way to come up with ideas and such. I'm just posting it here, so you can get on my case if I don't produce the blog. That's really my point in telling people about my planned projects. Otherwise I may be a bit more secretive about them.

I want my old blog style back...

I was thinking that my new blog look was just too much. I think simple styles are better for displaying drawings. I'm going to have to play around with it more, but on the surface, it seems that blogger no longer carries the old styles. I only looked around for about 2 minutes, so I very likely could be wrong. I'll have try again when I feel like it. For now, I just have a simple black background that will just be a placeholder until I create a look that is more to my liking.

I am still pet-siting (I may not have mentioned that I was away from home before), but will be back home later today. I miss my cats. I went to see them yesterday and they were all sassy with me. They don't like to be left alone for too long. People think that cats can be left alone for long periods of time, but I don't think that's true. They like their people around, even if sometimes they pretend to be indifferent. I not only want to return home to see my cats, but to make more bread, as well.

The above drawing was my second effort for the weekend drawing event. It was done in my Cachet sketchbook. This sketchbook has the smoothest and most pleasant surface to draw on. Unfortunately, Michaels doesn't seem to carry them. I only have 8 pages left (out of 110), so I may have to dig in my piggy bank and take a trip to Blick.

a quick little sketch with a little rhyme...

I did this quick sketch for the weekend drawing event. The host challenged us to add a poem to the mix. I don't know if I'd call this a poem, but I'll call it a little rhyme. It goes like this:

Birdy birdy in the sky
I'll be your friend if you stop on by.
I don't understand why you fly away from me.
I'm just a pussycat, not your enemy.


Maybe I was inspired by the predators in my midst. This cat looks perfectly innocent as do my own cats, but given the chance, they wouldn't hesitate to tear out a little birdy's throat. And we know this pussy cat is not being sincere. And my inspiration came from a Wild Kingdom type situation that occurred in front of my windows yesterday. Well, it wasn't quite Wild Kingdom as my cats were in captivity, but if they could have made their way to the other side of the window, the little ducklings that were waddling by, inches from the screen, would not have stood a chance and feathers (or more like down) would have flown.

Hope everyone is having a good Thursday evening (or late night, at this point). I keep thinking it's Friday. Why am I so confused? Nobody cares about a good Thursday evening, but Friday is another story...

Edited to add, apparently the wetcanvas website does not allow the word "pussycat." It wasn't letting me upload the image by the same name and then it posted my little poem as *****cat. Internet censorship is annoying and kind of funny at the same time. I had to change it to kitty cat, which doesn't work quite as well as you don't say when someone is a softy that they are a kitty cat, you say pussycat. Some of my fellow weekly drawing event people thought it was quite funny too.