Have you ever had one of those moments where you thought you couldn't get any stupider? And then you proved yourself wrong? Well, let me introduce you to my stupid.

I was drawing a lovely dragon today:



Got the pencil sketch down, laid the ink lines really neatly, was having a great time and enjoying myself. Well, as much as I can when I'm doing art. I've noticed I get really anxious when I'm doing art. Fidgety. I just can't keep still long. Anyway, I started putting the masking fluid down (that's the orange stuff). Once I finished that and was working on closing the jar up and cleaning the brush out, I noticed the lid had a huge glob of solid masking rubber on it and decided to peel it off.

I don't know the exacts of what happened next, but I do know that the lid went zipping out of my hand and landed on the floor. I angrily put the jar of fluid down on the desk and went down to fetch the annoying lid, and when I got back up, I noticed, to my horror, a HUGE puddle of fluid on the one corner of my piece. It was practically a lake. Annoyed but not discouraged, I knew that if I just spread it around a little and let it dry, I could just peel it off.

Unfortunately for me, I forgot that I'm impatient. I also forgot that masking fluid is wet. And, on top of all that, I forgot that wet paper is prone to tearing. So even though the corner had bubbled up despite being taped down, which I knew to mean that it was still damp, I peeled the masking fluid away. Along with the top layer of paper. Luckily I'm using Bristol board so it didn't tear the entire thing away, but nevertheless.

Argh.



So I don't really know what I'll do. It wouldn't be a problem if I was using colored pencils alone, except I had planned on making the background a watercolor wash of some sort. The finished surface absorbs the color differently from a torn surface, so that'll just look crazy. So maybe what I'll do is cut a piece of Bristol board and glue it down over the damaged part...

No one will notice, right?

....I think something is out to get me. I really do. I was just typing up a post about how I hadn't been around here much, and how I have a ton of art to show off when BAM! My post dissappeared!!!!

Well. I guess it was less dramatic than that. I accidentally hit the back button and, well, you know how that goes. But it's easier for me to blame it on mysterious forces than to recognize that I'm a silly.

Anyway, I have some art to show off that I'm just dying to put on here! I don't really know why I haven't been posting my art (that's slackerese for "I'm totally lazy and would rather be goofing off"), but at any rate, I have a few pieces that need to be shown to the world!

So let's get down to business, yo. I colored my IF picture for the word "fleeting", and I'm rather happy with the colors (though the skin could have had more contrast. Ah well!). I never did get around to posting it to IF, but then again, I've been very busy being lazy.

And she's still nude, of course.



Oh yeah, in case you hadn't noticed, there's two pictures there. I really like the sketch and the colored version as two separate pieces, and I thought I'd show them side by side. They just seem to have very different feels to them, and it's always fun to see a work in progress, yeah?

Alright, the next piece is a naked man. Just... a guy that's nude. Chad mentioned that I hadn't drawn any men in a while, and after thinking back and realizing that, yes, it has been like a year or more, I decided that I should probably start with the basics. So after searching around DeviantArt for naked man models, and blushing a bit along the way, I decided on a model and just drew him. It was fun. I feel like I learned a lot, too. Like that I usually draw men as skinny women.

You can look at the reference photo and then my drawing . Or you can look at my drawing first, whichever. But I decided that I wouldn't post that one in plain sight, in case there are any heterosexual guys looking through my blog. I don't want to frighten them off with questions about their sexuality. Guys can be like that, you know.

And! One more picture, and I'm pretty happy with this one. I decided that it was time to create myself a deviantID, which is a little picture you can have on your DeviantArt profile page that... I dunno, is you? Most people don't actually have pictures of themselves, though. So I decided to break the mold and actually draw me!

Except it's a much cuter version of me, but nevertheless 99% pure Julie.



I cheated a bit by taking a picture then tracing the lines for the table, chair and lamp, as well as getting a skeleton down before drawing the rest of the girl. But I really feel that, by imitating real life, I'm learning a lot about how to represent it better. I don't want to have a really realistic style, but I don't want my anatomy to look off and wrong, either. So I'm trying to reeducate myself on the basics so I can incorporate it into my style. Plus, I've always thought that people need to practice drawing realistic anatomy before moving their style to something less realistic. Otherwise, you start creating your own anatomy in your head, and it looks so right to you that you don't understand when someone tells you that it's wrong.

Anyway, I hope this is the beginning of a lot more art!

So IF's word this week is Fleeting. I wasn't going to do it... until my muse came to visit me one night. He hasn't been coming around so much lately, but I guess he decided there was nothing better to do. Plus I guess I was in the mood to finally listen to him... and I'm extremely glad that I did.

I don't think I'm done with this piece quite yet, but just getting the sketch out of my system felt really nice. It's amazing how easy it is to forget what it feels like when you haven't done it in a while.

I can tell I'm starting to ramble emotionally, so I'll just post the picture and run along now. Some nudity, but hell, it's my blog after all. And besides, it's not like disgusting nudity, like the naked girls men tend to draw. With cannon ball breasts. You know what I'm talking about.

So this week's illustration Friday is Poise, and as it just so happens, I recently did a pretty little piece of pixel art.... Well, I think you'll agree with me that she just oozes poise. If you can ooze while being poised.



She's a Water Fairy, and I just like her. She's really shiny, but on the other hand, so is water. I plan on using her in my cyberpet website, in a maze that I've been working for what seems like 10 years. She'll have three sisters, too; Air, Fire and Earth, but they're not done yet. Soon!

So you know what's annoying? December comes along, and I'm totally full of the creative juices. I'm making cookies and bread and Christmas presents by the bucketful, and I think, "Wow, this is fun! I'm really creative and inspired! I bet things will only get better from here!" Then January gets here, and it's like someone dumped a big bucket of icy cold reality on me and all I want to do is huddle up on the couch with a book or a video game. I don't even look at my art desk.

Then, ah, the fresh air of spring hits my lungs, and all of a sudden it's creativity city once again. I have all these grand ideas for my blog, the dessert that once was my Etsy shop, my art, my websites... you name it. I even have plans to start an aquarium in my front room, have some fishes to watch and keep me company, and drive my cats crazy.

And it's not that I'm upset that I suddenly have this energy again, it's just frustrating having to live through two or three months of hibernation. I don't understand why I do it, but I do and nothing I do can change that. I think I just have to accept that as a part of who I am and just get over it. Or possibly move tho Florida. I bet learning to live with it is cheaper and easier though.

So I do have some pictures to share. I know it's been a while, but bah, I'm tired of explaining myself. I'm sure you all love me, so I won't even start.

First, some art!



I actually did this piece a few weeks ago, but I rather like it. Well, except for the fact that I can't transfer from pencil to inked lines without messing something up. Unfortunately, that's usually the eyes that I mess up, which totally ruins the whole piece for me since I put most of the emotion in the eyes. Ah well. This is what I get for enjoying small pictures so much, right?

I was working on this piece shortly before (I think) and then some time after taking reiki 1 classes, and it was just such a neat experience that this piece came out because of it.

Ok, next up! I hope this picture makes you drool.



Well, maybe they won't make you drool, exactly, but they make me drool anyway. What these are supposed to be are teeny tiny mint meringue cookies. I accidentally stumbled across the recipe from Joy the Baker, and they just looked so cool that I had to give them a try!

But man, I have to tell you!!! These things were a sticky mess. I ended up with meringue everywhere (which dries hard as a rock) and green tinted finger tips for..... well, they're still green tinted, actually. Mmmm... but they're so good! They're peppermint and they melt in your mouth and they're just so creamy and airy and crunchy and good! Not to mention cute.

I did, however, not read the recipe correctly. Instead of attaching the whisk attachment, I used the normal beater attachments. I was wondering why the heck my meringue wasn't getting very stiff, but figured what I had was just going to have to work. They turned out kind of droopy looking compared to Joy's cuties, but I'm not worried about it. I plan on trying the recipe again, this time with LESS peppermint extract. And maybe even an orange flavored version. Possibly maple? No, that would be just weird. Probably. Maybe it would be good...... or just weird.



Anyway, that's the important artsy stuff going on in my life right now. I know it's probably not really important in the grand scheme of things, but it keeps me busy.

There really isn't anything like pixel art. The closest thing is counted cross-stitch, but that takes about 50 times longer to do. And I'm way too impatient for that. Pixel art is just so relaxing.

I'm still slowly working on my cyberpet website, though not nearly as much as I used to. I have about 20 creatures I need to finish before I can open a new section, and I figure at this rate it'll take me the rest of the year. But it's fun. I did this cute little dragon yesterday:



He's not the most impressive piece of pixel art I've ever done, but I enjoyed it, and I know my cyberpet friends will as well.

Oh, but I've been having so much wrist pain lately that I know I shouldn't do any more for a while. Or any crafts, for that matter. It's even hard to be on my computer for any length of time. I'm not sure why I'm in so much pain, though, except maybe I haven't given myself enough time to fully heal. So maybe I'll take a couple of days and just goof off. The problem with that is that I don't know what to do when I'm trying to give my wrists a rest. I mean, you use your hands for almost everything. The only thing that makes my wrists feel better is walking, and I can't exactly do that for three days.

Ah well, I'm sure I'll think of something.

So I discovered "plarn" about a week ago, and was instantly interested. I mean, there's all these plastic bags laying around with no real use other than taking up space and using as a garbage bag for the bathroom trash basket. We were just recycling the extras that we couldn't use, but I knew that, in the end, plastic bags are hard to recycle and cost the recyclers more to recycle them than they actually get out of it.

So I thought, what the heck? Let's give this plarn thing a try and see what it's like! I decided to start with the same design as my pink bag of death, because it's a good, easy pattern and it's also a useful item! Imagine the irony of using a reusable bag at the store, made from plastic grocery bags, instead of plastic grocery bags.

And it's actually really easy to make the plarn. It's a little hard to work with, but that might be because I made the plarn too thick and am using a hook too small, but my bag is surprisingly pretty so far and really tough and sturdy. I'm excited to start using other bags to see what they'll look like as plarn. Walmart bags would be especially pretty, with their blue and white coloration.

Here's what I have done so far, using Wegmans bags.



I've already started the mesh part of the bag, and it looks great. I'm thinking about decorating it with brown ribbon when I'm done, to dress it up a little bit.

But I'll tell you one thing. We have cats who are afraid to death of plastic bags, and they'll be really happy when I'm done making this thing.

I have a secret love of felt. Not like the special handmade, hand dyed wool felt that someone spent hours making. Nope. My secret love is with the cheap acrylic/nylon/polyester felt that you can get at Walmart for 15 cents a sheet (which is, by the way, made of 100% recycled bottles, so I feel kind of nice about that). It just has so much potential, and it's so easy to work with, but most people totally ignore it. What do people actually make with felt anymore, honestly? The cheap kind of felt. Not much that I know of. I know wool felting is coming back into style, but I haven't seen anything made out of the cheap stuff lately.

So a week or more ago, I bought a huge stack of the stuff, getting every color they offered. There's something really satisfying about having a stock of crafting supplies, so that I can open a drawer and get what I need rather than going out to the store (which means my projects are also cheaper for me in the end, since prices go up over time). I actually got all that felt for fall and Halloween decorations, but as soon as I got it home, I knew what I wanted it for.



I made these cute little dragon dolls. They're full of wires so that they're perfectly posable, and really adorable. The blue one I kept for myself, but the green one was made for a friend's birthday and has already left my home. The blue dragon is feeling a bit lonely now.



I just can't wait to make more of them.

Memories are a good way of bringing light back into your life, even for a moment. This poor dragon seems to have lost his love somewhere along the way, but at least he can still call back those memories.

Alright! I finally managed to get an Illustration Friday piece done before Thursday I have mixed feelings about this one, though. I like the idea of it, but I'm not sure I like how it actually turned out. BUT, I learned something from it, at any rate.


Click for larger view

Size: 9x12
Media: Prismacolor markers, pencils, white gel pen and watercolors
Status: For Sale

But only because it's so bright and cute. I just loved making this bag! This is actually my second attempt at this pattern, but the last time I made it, I followed the instructions exactly. I used cotton yarn and made both the bag and the handle longer. Well, when I actually went to use the bag, it stretched so far that it was like three feet long when I was holding it with stuff in it. That wouldn't do.

So I shortened it a bit and tried using acrylic yarn, and of course I had to make it cute in the process It's currently for sale at my Etsy Shop, if anyone's interested.

Per usual, this is extremely late. I mean, another hour and it will be Friday again and there will be another word. But I just had to get this picture out, because it was extremely adorable.

And although she looks very sweet, she's actually sour.


Click for larger view

Media: Photoshop Elements

They say she was fiercely cute : D Yeah, so this is a cheap recycling of the critter I drew today, but I was thinking the whole time while I was making her, "Man, she's fiercely cute,". Or maybe it's just me.



And yes, I love pixel art.

"Bursting free from the clutches of man, she sped through the dark, quiet forest toward her long forgotten home, hoping to see again the chittering dragonflies and the shimmering blue waters. As she reached the edge of the forest and saw beyond the golden glow of the endless summer sun, she knew she had made it."

I really enjoy this one.


Click for larger view

Size: 8x11
Media: Prismacolor markers, pencils and white gel pen
Status: For Sale

Yay, my first IF piece. I wanted to join in on the fun last week, but the word ended up being punch line, and nothing came to mind for that. But for this piece, I instantly thought of the book Blue Moon Rising, in which the dragon hoards butterflies instead of gold. This was a quick and fun piece!


Click for larger view

Size: 9x12
Media: Prismacolor markers, watercolors and white gel pen
Status: For Sale

Now I don't know if I even have any readers, but I thought it would be unfair for any of you who might be out there reading this to be left out of my give away. I decided, on a whim, to give away a very nice 8x10 print of my "Water Wings" picture:



I'm going to collect names until the end of the month, and then draw one out of a hat and send the winner my lovely picture! So if you're interested, just comment on this post and I'll put you in the drawing!