Alissa’s sister had a beautiful baby boy about 3 weeks ago. This is the drawing I did for him. Alissa has gone to visit. I’ve stayed up late, slept late, and ate tons of sugar, but now I’m running out of things to do. I can’t wait for her to get back.
This is the cover I did of a wonderful little book by Josephine Bailey. It stars a donkey named Hotey.
And here are some interior illustrations. They were reproduced in b/w, but I like the color of the paper so I’m posting that version.
This is Sancho the bird from a book I’m working on. I’ll post more soon.
Here’s a color comp and final of a book cover I did last month.
Only a few short days until our national appreciation of marmots reaches its cumulative and explosive end. Groundhog day coincides loosely with the Celtic festival Imbolc, which marked a seasonal turning point. The holiday is also said to have its origin in the European tradition wherein a badger or bear was the weather forecaster of choice. It is our uniquely American decision to place the celebration squarely on the shoulders of a glorious land beaver. The clock is ticking. America’s no-holds, riotous, feel good, weather carnival is at hand. Prepare yourselves.
I’ve also added a coloring sheet for good measure.
Well, there you go. Alissa and I will get everything printed up and sent to my sister’s house. Hopefully the girls will like it, and Ashlyn will hold my princess-maze-promise fulfilled. This blog is starting to look sort of feminine, but the next post should make Mr. Churchill feel more comfortable.
The “ladies” in this instance are my nieces. I have four. Two are baby twins, the other two are four and six. They live about 90 minutes away. A while ago I was drawing mazes, and Ashlyn, the four year old, wanted to know if I could draw her some more mazes and send them to her in the mail. ”What kind of maze do you want?” I asked. ”Princess Mazes,” she said. I said that it would be no problem, but I forgot shortly thereafter. Then a few weeks later, Ashlyn chided me over iChat that I had not yet mailed her a princess maze. This weekend I got to work.
I’m not really that experienced at princess-type-strawberry-shortcake-like color schemes, but I gave it the old college try. Incidentally, my wife heaped more praise on that silly castle than on anything I’ve ever done. Alissa and I are going to print this out and laminate it, and mail it. I still have to do the Princess Clementine marker topper, which I’ll probably post later in the week. I also might make the maze harder so that she enjoys it a little more.
I’m posting a lores 8.5 x 11 version that you should feel free to print out for the little ladies in your life with maze-needs.
I thought I’d end with the lyrics to “Oh My Darlin’ Clementine,” but it’s a super creepy nightmare of a song.
EDIT:
I added a more difficult maze. Actually, it might be a little too difficult. Poor Clementine.
Some years ago I wrote a treatment for a children’s book that detailed a boy’s imaginary journey while he sat listening to an orchestra in a concert hall. The lady in the seat directly in front of him starred in his daydreams as a recurring damsel in distress. Like a lot of what I wrote at Portland, this story got tossed around, excited some interest, and wound up in a folder. A few weeks ago, I decided to use some of my spare time to illustrate a bit of it.
I know nothing of the imaginary life of girls, but I feel that boyhood fantasies are on the whole ennobling. There does exist the occasional revenge fantasy, and many daydreams center around popularity and possessions, but I think it is solid fact to assert that boyhood fantasies aspire to virtue more than adult fantasies. I suffer no delusions about childhood. I don’t think that humans are born in a state of innocence, and anyone that deals with children knows they are as selfish as any creaky-boned degenerate. But it is undeniable that the prepubescent boy’s perception of women is so incomplete as to be positively innocent, and so innocent as to provoke grand and gallant desires. Furthermore, a young boy’s yearning for the heroic is so intense that it consumes him like a holy passion. I think the prick of these noble feelings is never as keenly felt as when one is a boy.
The obvious stumbling block for any boy wishing to channel the moral exuberance of Galahad is the boy’s lack of resources. I have a memory of a daydream from third grade in which masked men attacked my elementary school. For some reason I was alone with a pretty sixth grade girl–a girl I didn’t really know except admiringly from afar. Unfortunately there was no way I could go toe to toe with a masked gunman. It was too unbelievable even for my imagination. My grand heroic gesture was to grab her hand and run down the hallway always correctly pointing out the exits. I soon exhausted the dramatic possibilities of the chase scene, so I added a turning point. I may have only been in third grade, but what I lacked in fight, I made up for in my ability to take a bullet. This caused the gunmen to choke with remorse, and the six grade girl wept profoundly as she realized that our three year age gap could not quench the fire of admiration that burned within her chest.
You’ll notice that the boy in the illustration is at war with snowmen. They are both threatening and easily defeated. This makes them the perfect daydream nemesis. I have no way to help you tap into your grander more heroic self except to leave you with the anthem of the International Order of the Knights of King Arthur as printed in the 1907 classic, The Boy’s Round Table: A Manual of Boys’ Clubs Explaining The Order of the Knights of King Arthur. Soak it in, and do great things:
By communion of the banner, Crimson, white and starry banner,
By the baptism of the banner, Children of the Flag are we.
By our bright cross-hilted sword-blades,
By our flashing, heav’n-bathed sword blades,
By our circled, comrade sword-blades,
Warriors of the King we be.
Comrades, hail the Cross that leads us,
Comrades, hail the Grail that beckons,
Comrades, hail the War that waits us.
Knights of holy chivalry.