Bold Persephone

I've spent the last three days on this lovely lady:

Still trying to master skin-tones darker than "vaguely Mediterranean".  ::sigh::  Practice, practice, practice.

This piece is inspired by Russian Iconography (hence the goooooolllllld), a particularly lovely Instagram update by Black Girl in a Big Dress (the eponymous web series is one of my Very Favorite Things), and Halloween 2000 (I personally was a Maenad that year, but one of my friends dressed as Persephone, and wore a very similar flower crown).  (I should try to find photos from that year- I was appropriately scary with all my blood smears, and made a lot of drunken frat guys feel more than a little freaked out.)

I'm thinking I may actually go into that gold background with some ink and do some intricate patterning (perhaps pomegranates seeds?), but I wanted to get it preserved for posterity in all it's pristine-ness, before I screw it all up.

Plus, you know, the novelty of updating more than one time in a week...

But on to not-art-related things!  I bought myself a new suit the other week (since the old suit- purchased about 15 years ago- was cut for the old body, which TLG has rendered permanently curvier) and today I took it to a tailor like a real-live grownup!  Because, you see, when you have a shoulder(-and-bust)-girth like mine, you have to buy jackets that are way too large for any of the rest of you.  Which is why I've never been much of a blazer person in the past.  Sleeveless/stretchy fabric all the way, baby.  But anyway, the tailor poked and prodded and pinned and finally informed me that next time I should be shopping in the petite section for my tops, so that she wouldn't have to shorten the sleeves so much.  The more you know!

I'm pretty excited to see how it turns out; I expect to look far more professional than I did in the dressing room, where the sleeves were hitting my knuckles and I didn't appear to have much of a waist (but at least I could move my arms without splitting the seams!  Something I have literally done to jackets in the past!  So yes I am always extremely paranoid every time I try on a "fitted" jacket!)  I'll post photos so you can be excited, too.  You're welcome!

Shiny!

You guys, I'm so excited about what I finished up today that I'm not even going to bury this lead:

BLING BLING BABY!

That's the angle that lets you see the shiny gold embellishment, but here's what the whole thing looks like:

Inara Serra, ladies and gentlemen.

(Fun Fact: I sent a shot of this to my brother earlier today, and he demanded I put a banana in the photo so he'd have a size comparison.  I did, but since bananas come in all sizes, I'll just tell you the page is like 9"x12" or so)

I've actually been working on this piece since the last time I updated (before, even) in addition to my daily stuff, so I'm pretty glad to be done with it.  And like I said: so pleased with how it came out.  It was my first Big Experimentation with using masking fluid, and doing iridescent accents.  I learned a lot from it (namely that if I'm going to do larger pieces, I need to suck it up and get REAL watercolor paper from The Internet and stop pretending like Strathmore will ever fulfill my needs), which I will surely put to use in future pieces.  Woo!

Now let's look back at Other Stuff, including me adding color to the Ladies of Firefly (which I can now tell you started off as a thumbnail for the above piece):

I spent probably four nights adding color.  They could use more noodling, but (having reminded myself of the SKETCHBOOK NATURE OF A SKETCHBOOK) I've decided to move on.

Oh speaking of sketches, here's one I didn't finish because I lost interest!

Characters from ElfQuest.

And the reason I lost interest in finishing is because I got this super sweet metallic paint to play with!

Plaaaaaaay!

But I made up for it by spending a few days working on fan art for other fandoms, ie for Tamora Pierce's Song of the Lioness!

Yes, yes, I know the freckles are too stark.  OH WELL.

This was mostly about seeing what it took to get a nice, even appearance from the gold.  Minimum two coats, is the answer.

So, yes.  Feeling good about Art at the moment.  Also feeling good about having passed the Series 66, and my upcoming Insurance Licensing Exam.  Also feeling good about my awesome family.  Yes, goodness all around.

To the Nines

First of all, Happy Anniversary to Me!  And Nathan too, I guess... nine years, and still kicking.  Woo, go team!  That being said, let us jump into the many days of doodling since last we met.

First off, I got into a serious Salt Experimentation Phase from March 23rd-26th.  Behold:

What's going on here, white balance?  Who knows...

Thaaaaat's better.

Black and White!  Black and White!

It was fun, just to play around again, let whatever wanted to happen, happen, rather than being concerned with representation.  And you can see up there in upper right-had corner where I took the playing back to sketching, which in turn brought us the offering for March 27th:

But who is this mysterious lady?  The world may never know...

A conversation with my mom, combined with missing a certain friend, and my hair being ridiculous, led to this little sketch of Anne Shirley on the 28th:

The wind must be up- look at those chapped cheeks!

And then missing my brother and his boys took tangible form in my sketchbook on the 29th.

The trouble with trying to draw the people you love is that it never, ever looks right, because you know their faces too well...

We're going to skip ahead a few days to April 1st, and Easter, where I had another bit of "fun experiment times", but this time with wax resistance:

Super Fun Bright Colors Time!

And now we back up (but also go forward) to a bunch of line drawings of the Ladies of Firefly.  None of them are colored yet, because I need to run a copy of them so that my nephew has a chance to color them the way he wants to.  So you can fully expect to see them again someday in the not-too-distant future, only with color.

I know, I know... River's face is too narrow... oh well...

Speaking of color!  TLG has been super obsessed with letters and numbers lately, so I thought I'd make him a little treat in my sketchbook:

Phoning it in?  Maybe.  But it's my sketch book, and I'll phone if I want to...

He liked it so much that he wanted to keep it, which of course he could not do, so I promised him I'd make him one of his very own, which I managed to get put together before he came home today:

Plus a few words of Especial Interest to him right now.

So that's where I stand with all of that.

As for my studies, they're also going well!  I managed to bump up my timeline again, so I'll be taking the Series 66 on Monday (yes, this coming Monday- eep!) which I'm pretty excited about.  After that I should be halfway through the process!  Woo!  As much as I've enjoyed this time of learning (and getting to be around Nathan for most of the day) I'm read to get out in the field and start doing, you know?  You know.  Yeah you do.

Valentines and a Red Ribbon

Another group update...  but first, a word of explanation.  As you know, I love to make Valentines, and since I'm doing a watercolor project this year, naturally I figured I'd do watercolor Valentines!  With that in mind, I bought a little pack of 4"x6" watercolor postcards, and started experimenting...

02.07.18

Oh.  Oh no.

The very first thing I realized was just how spoiled I am to have such high-quality paper in my sketchbook.  Because the quality of these "postcards"?  Er... not so hot.  In fact, I'd say it borders on awful, and honestly it blows my mind just how terrible the experience of painting on it was.  But I thought to myself, "I won't let myself be limited... I just have to figure out how to work around it!" and I kept at it...

02.08.18

Er....

...and continued to be aggravated...

02.09.18

...to the point were I really wanted to scrawl across this one, "A crappy Valentine is better than no Valentine, right??"  (but I didn't.)

Still no.

02.10.18

So after three days of working on very dispiriting things, I decided to give myself a break, and paint a blue jay in my sketch book.

Blue Jay of Happiness?

I was very grumpy with it the day that I did it, but in retrospect I'm actually fairly pleased with how it came out.

02.11.18

And the next day I still couldn't face going back to the awful paper, so I did something else fun:

The Red Ribbon

Although to tell you the truth, I want to give it more line work, but it's fine, it's fine...

02.12.18

The next day was Monday, and the day I started studying for my Series 7, which means that by the end of the day I didn't have much left in the way of brain power, so I went ahead and tried the crap paper again, and made a silly little Valentine for TLG.

Sweets for the sweet.

It's not so bad, I suppose, and by that point I'd started to figure out how to work within the limitations of the media, which led me to the following night...

02.13.18

...and the making Nathan's Valentine!

Altered Love

So basically the key to painting on this paper is to not to attempt to blend or layer colors at all.  And accept that you're not going to have anything resembling a smooth wash.  And I will probably just give the remainder to TLG to play with, because as much as Nathan enjoyed his Altered-Carbon-inspired-valentine*, the paper is really just the worst.

The schedule that I'm keeping for studying is pretty much as intense as I'd feared, so expect more of these grouped-updates in the future, because while I might have time to sketch or do a quick painting, it's going to be rare that I also have the time to actually post it.  And most likely it will be a Tuesday or Thursday, when Nathan has Bedtime Duties.  So hang in there, Gentle Readers, and we'll get through this Very Busy Season together...




*(in case you were wondering, the show more than lives up to the book: it's freaking amazing and I can't recommend it enough.  And I 100% want a Hello Unicorn shirt...)

Stranger Danger

It took us a while, but we did finally get around to watching (and finishing) Stranger Things.  I'm sure it will come as exactly 0% of a surprise to find that we loved it.

There were many things that I appreciated about the show: from the pure aesthetic of the thing, to the craft involved in keeping it so perfectly 80s; from the gripping story-line to the outstanding performances; from the adorable rpg sequences to the commentary on the power of friendship.  And, of course, the wonderful things they did with the female characters, making it a truly feminist piece of art.  And yes, generally I would want to really dig down deep into the whole "here's how they treated the ladies like actual people," aspect of it:

Nancy has a best friend to save, and zero fucks to give about relationship drama.

but the truth is that it was not the stereotype-subversion of a female character that really made me stand up and cheer the loudest:

The hair you give your virginity to.

That's right, it was what they did with the obligatory 80's popular-douchebag-love-interest, Steve Harrington, that made me just respect the hell out of the creators of Stranger Things.

We all hated Steve at first sight, right?  We're supposed to.  He's that guy.  That arrogant jock guy the nerdy-yet-still-hot girl has to sleep with (or at least want to sleep with) before coming to her senses and falling in love with the sensitive-artist-best-friend-type-she's-been-overlooking-for-years.  And Steve does his best to live up to that stereotype, putting pressure on Nancy to skip studying for smoochin', breaking John's camera, and generally being a thoughtless dick.

But then (in an already wow-didn't-see-that-coming reversal) he gets his ass kicked by the sensitive artist.  Like, hard.  But what does he do?  Does he double-down on his dickishness with his dick friends, like we totally expect him to?

No, no he does not.  He realizes that hey- maybe he is the one with the problem.  And he starts to try to make things right the best he can.  And then?  Then he actually goes to John's house to apologize for being such a dick.

(Obviously his timing was absolute shit, but he did eventually stop his [understandable] freaking out and become genuinely useful.)

That made my chin hit my chest.

You see, it's pretty freaking easy to subvert young female stereotypes.  Just, like, make them not think about a boy for thirty seconds and you've done it.  Like shooting fish in a barrel, really.  And these days it's the cool thing to do, and everyone is doing it, and that is awesome, but not everyone is examining and combating the harmful male stereotypes (hello toxic masculinity), so I want to give props when I see it done, especially when it's done well.  Especially when the character in question is rewarded for acting like a person with a functioning brain and heart, and admitting their errors and working to redeem themselves.  He's not portrayed as weak or broken or any less attractive- he's just human, like the rest of us.

So yeah, lots and lots and lots to love about Stranger Things, including the arrogant jock.  Hells yeah, feminist television.

Joyce Summers Reconsidered

I started re-watching Buffy, and I find myself with a newfound sympathy for her mother, Joyce Summers.

She can't be more than 40 (ie a measly five years older than I am now), she's newly divorced and new in town, with no friends and nothing close to the funds she's used to having.  Her daughter has been indulged all of her 15 years, but now Joyce is determined to be an involved, present mother for the first time in her life, all in an attempt to keep her daughter out of the trouble that forced them to relocate in the first place (::coughcoughburningdowntheschoolgymcough::).  Obviously said daughter is not reacting well to this sudden-interest, but Joyce is trying so hard, reading books and learning to say "No".

That's... kind of a raw deal Joyce has going on there, regardless of her own contributions to the situation.  But having recognized her past mistakes, she never stops fighting for her child- and that's admirable as hell.

Here's to you, Mother of the Slayer.  You're far more bad-ass than teenage me ever realized.

Taken With Too Many Grains

Sometime you accidentally do something spectacularly dumb.

Like, say, use the wrong side of the salt shaker.  Just for example.

And then your husband walks in and says he'll take care of fixing it, so you can just go sit on the couch and watch Castle.  (Thank goodness for good lifemates.)

Reading the Bones

Happy Best Day of the Year!

Since today is my High Holy Day, I took a half-day from work so I could come home and finish up all those little last-minute things before our Party tonight, including turning the pouch for Nathana's "finger bones" into something he could wear around his neck:

now with realistic rattling action!

If you're confused as to what the heck costume requires wearing bones around your neck, it's this one:

The Onion Knight

And if you're still confused (and I don't blame you), I shall point you towards this for Nathan's costume (and this for mine, because they come from the same universe).

Now, check us out!

Official Portrait

Other Official Portrait

And here we are, supporting our Chosen Monarch, IStanis Barathepig:

The First and Most Confused of Her Name

Eventually I'm going to photoshop an antler-crown on her head.  It'll happen- you'll see.

Oh, and if you're wondering about that hint of green on Nathan's gloves:

...that's what post-production is for.

The Day of Recovery

It's been a Recovering sort of day.

We slept in as long as we could, then drove slowly (more slowly than we'd have liked, thanks to a combination of road work and a seemingly unending bike race) down to South Lake Tahoe, where we proceeded to nap for a few hours.

Then I went out walking, to explore the area, and spent some time down at the "beach".

(I will never never never accept "beach" as an acceptable synonym for "lake shore".  QUOTATION MARKS FOREVER.)

It was a nice start to the sunset, but I hustled my way back up to the hotel because Game of Thrones was coming on, and for the first time in four years we're staying in a place with HBO on Sunday night.

(Good night, sweet prince!  And flights of angels sing thee to thy rest!)

Heartfelt Offering

Colors for Katherine!

(Okay, no more Vampire Diaries for a while, honest...)

She Is in Shades of Red and Black

Katherine in offering you... well, someone's heart, anyway.

Katherine with a hint of Elena

Is She or Isn't She

I have a confession to make.

I friggin' love The Vampire Diaries.

I love that show so much, you guys.  So much.  I resisted it when it first came out, because I'd been a major fan of the books when they first came out (I was eleven and read and re-read them obsessively: they definitely had a major impact on my adolescence) and I didn't want to see them get mucked up.  And since they'd already screwed the pooch by making the protagonist a brunette, I did not trust them.

Sometime last year, however, I saw the series on Netflix and decided to give it a chance.  I spent the first few episodes going, "Seriously?  You changed that?  Seriously?" but also enjoying the little nods to the people who had read the book.  And then things got really different... and I was friggin' hooked.  The show beats the pants off the books (especially the bizarro later additions to the series, of which I have only read one because I think the author may have had a mental breakdown.  And you can ask my husband- I literally threw it across the room when I finished it, it was that bad.)  I'm now happily immersed in Season 3, and seriously considering actually watching Season 4 in real time.

The horror.

Aaaanyway, that is a long lead-up for this little doodle, which is the beginnings of what I hope will be a more finished piece in the near future.

You will notice I went Brunette.

This is either Elena or Katherine- I'm not sure yet.

(But it's probably Katherine.)