Thank You!

To my friends over at Monday Artday, thanks for selecting me as this week's winner for the "Hometown" theme. I submitted these two illustrations below which most of my regular visitors have already seen. What a delightful surprise this morning to read that I won. Again, thank you very much.

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I have not been drawing much. My full time job is keeping me busy. We have a lot of projects being implemented this summer and some dates keep moving so I need to adjust my schedule with the moving targets. I hope to finish my oil painting projects, pigment pen illustrations which I started during our vacation in spring and draw something on my Moleskine notebooks sometime soon. Sometimes when I have not drawn or painted for a while, I forget that I can draw and it takes a while for me to formulate some ideas. So I open my old Moleskine notebooks and look at the trees and just start from there.

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I hope it works again this time. I may draw something for Monday Artday just to say thanks.

Unfinished

I had a story in mind.

I was excited about it.

Started drawing it.

Even left a block of pages

on my Moleskine journal

so I can write

and

illustrate it.

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Then I started finding

the story trite,

corny,

even elementary before I could

write down

the first word.

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Poof!

Weekend Edition

Click on image to enlarge

7:30AM. Coffee brewing. I have my Fiesta coffee mug ready, Tangerine. The house is asleep. I hear my own footsteps. I pick up the papers, the Chronicle and The Wall Street Journal. I write a "Thank You" note from one of my Vincent Van Gogh stationery cards, a gift from my children two Christmases ago. I have my Moleskine, a ballpoint pen and eraser. I always liked looking at a picture that contained the picture of the picture...you get my drift. The coffee is ready, half a cup only and I need to water it down. I shouldn't be drinking coffee at all, but what am I going to use my Fiesta mugs for then?

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Illustration Friday - 100% Not!

I had a different drawing for Illustration Friday's 100% prompt on my pocket Moleskine notebook but I misplaced it once again, so I am using another drawing on a larger Moleskine notebook. These are mandarin ducklings emerging from their nest which is a hole on a tree. Their mother is coaxing them to jump down into the padded forest floor so they can all go to the stream and take their first swim. It is unfinished ballpoint drawing and therefore won't garner a 100% grade.

Illustration Friday - Backwards

Wally Swimming Backwards

Ballpoint drawing on Moleskine ruled pocket notebook. Wally is a Beta fighting fish named after the store (WalMart) where I bought him for $5.99. Wally lives in a fish tank where cuttings from a fourteen year old and eleven year old ivy grow in a hydroponics setting. The ivy cuttings came from plants originally given to me when my son and daughter were born.

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Isabella And The Hen

Ballpoint pen on Moleskine pocket notebook.

Isabella And The Hen

The old woman sat under the mango tree. She looked ancient. Her skin almost looked like the color of a milk chocolate candy bar from years of working in the rice fields. That day Isabella visited the house to give the children oral polio vaccines and Bacillus Calmette Guerin (BCG) vaccines for tuberculosis. She wore a white long-sleeved oxford shirt with its tail tucked inside loose white trousers like those worn by Katherine Hepburn in the old movies. She wore custom-made brown leather loafers, a gift from her eldest sister and a straw hat. She looked so out of place in that poor farming hillside but her other choice was to wear a white dress and pantyhose which she thought was the ultimate torture. She always thought the uniform requirements for public health nurses were so ridiculous. She walked for five kilometers since seven in the morning along rice paddies and irrigation fields because there were no roads leading to the houses. She was escorted by a machine gun yielding constabulary police for her protection. She thought it was ridiculous too and declined his services at first but when he warned her that she could get raped, she stopped arguing. The sun was blasting and it seemed like hell has come down to earth.


The constabulary police rested under the house shed and talked to the farmer. Isabella was hot, thirsty, hungry and tired. All she wanted to do was give the vaccines and leave. She did not know these people, did not care much for her work as she was forced to do it as part of a licensure requirement. She figured there was not much she can do for them. They were poor and destitute and she cannot save them from their misery. The farmer’s wife came out with her toddler straddled on her hips. The children in nearby houses started gathering around, staring at her as if she was an alien from outer space. There were about a dozen of them ranging from toddler to preschool ages. Some did not have pants and she saw that they were not circumcised. They had snot on their noses and had protruding abdomen. One of the children had a cleft lip. There were flies everywhere and Isabella kept brushing them away as they flew in front of her face. She was miserable and hated to be there.


Then more adults joined the gathering. They were looking and staring at her yet none of them spoke since they obviously knew she was from out of town and may not speak their language. The old woman was obviously the elder and the other adults waited for her to speak. Isabella thought that it was the polite thing to introduce her self, explain her objective, complete her task and then leave. She quickly glanced up the mango tree and noticed that its branches were heavy with the weight of green fruits. The tree was full of them. She looked at the crowd gather around her and flashed a big smile at everyone baring her pearly white teeth. Then she turned around to the old woman faintly smiled without showing her teeth and bowed her head. Isabella’s mother always told her to bow at her elders, give them a respectful nod. At times like these, Isabella became uneasy and insecure and for her defense she used her hands. She fidgeted with her hands and through the years learned to control them. So she stood in front of the old woman nodding her head as she placed her right hand on her chest. In her best attempt at the vernacular, she greeted the old woman a good morning and introduced herself. Thereupon, the old woman asked Isabella where she came from. That day, she came directly from the health clinic but that was not what the woman meant. Isabella stood straight and clasped her hands in front of her and told the woman her province of origin. So everyone knew she was Ilonggo.


Isabella learned to speak the local language but she was not very fluent. Her mother spoke that language and her classmate was from the same province. The group was very impressed with her attempts to communicate in their language but found her accent humorous that Isabella told them that henceforth she will communicate with them in her own language and see what they come up with. Quite surprisingly she managed. They all managed. Isabella set upon examining the children and gave them their vaccines after a lot of assurances that the children will not become blind, will not get sick, will not lose their hair and every other heresy and false beliefs which she had to gently and sensitively explain as untrue. She jotted down the name of the child with the cleft lip and talked to the mother about getting it repaired for free at the provincial hospital and assured her that she will make the arrangements for hospitalization and visit them at the hospital. She treated open ulcers, instructed the older children not to wait for their mothers to remind them to take baths. Then she played a game of pikyaw with them.


Her work done, the women started asking her personal questions, her age, about her family and whether she had a boyfriend, to which she politely answered without telling much; but when they asked her if she liked their home province, the conversation turned into a new phase. Isabella loved the place, with its pristine beaches, its unadulterated towns, the kind and humble people, its mountains with thick woods, the rice fields, the shores lined with mangroves and the giant mackerels and other fishes brought fresh directly to the market from the boats. The old woman motioned her to sit beside her. Isabella found out that the old woman was only sixty years old, three years her mother’s senior. The woman had tuberculosis. She was treated at the sanitarium. They talked for a long time with Isabella mostly listening to the old woman. She talked about her childhood and the Japanese occupation. Isabella and the little children listened intently.


As the sun was getting hot it was time to leave for another site. The old woman asked Isabella to join them for lunch. Isabella dreaded these invitations. She was afraid to eat in public places after a terrible bout of amoebic dysentery. She politely declined. As she gathered her equipment and bag, she found several pens and pads she received from the drug representative at the hospital. She gave the pens and the pads to the little children. As she said goodbye, the women asked her how she could carry her gifts. “Gifts?” Isabella thought. She turned around and the people have gathered a chicken with its legs tied up, several bunches of plantain bananas and a basket of mangoes. Isabella did not accept but politely thanked them. She accepted four bananas and on her walk back to town, she and the constabulary police ate them. The constabulary police told her that the people must have really liked her. She asked why he thought such and he answered “They offered you the only hen they had.”

Illustration Friday - Hat

Olaf the Boy Gnome hiding from Little Brownie Isabella. Ballpoint drawing on Moleskine notebook

On this image the hat is having only a cameo appearance since I am still obsessed with trees and woods. Yes, the hat is worn by none other than the brave Girl Scout Leader who on this beautiful and sunny day took her Brownie Troop for a day camp and hike. Little Brownie Isabella who liked to be at the end of the line, looked for all the creatures she can find in the woods. Being that she is afraid of lizards and other creepy and crawly creatures, her attention was focused on the two lizards chasing each other on the base of the tree trunk. Who knows they may jump and crawl inside her uniform. Alas! she saw something more interesting - a little shoe! She thought it may be a doll's shoe but when she picked it up, it was made of birch bark. Her leader told her to hurry up or she will be left behind. Isabella wanted to take the shoe but remembering her mother's advice "Do not take anything away from the woods, leave it the same way you found it", she dropped the shoe...


...much to the relief of Olaf, the boy gnome. Although he was eighty years old, he was still a little boy since gnomes live for four hundred years or more. Gnomes are very quick, know how to keep away from danger. They are smarter than most humans. However, Olaf was still young and as it was his turn to make candles from beeswax, he had to go out in the daylight to melt the beeswax in the sun. He was not accustomed to the bright and harsh sunlight and therefore had to wear sun goggles, just like the Eskimos. He tripped when he ran for cover among the ferns as soon as he heard the footsteps and peanut butter and jelly smell of the little Brownies.

Leave nothing but footprints.

Take nothing but memories.

A Gnome Wedding

A Gnome Wedding

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The woodland gnomes are getting married. Gnomes get married when the moon is full under the bride's Birthday Tree. After the ceremony, the wedding party goes to the couples' home which has been built and furnished many years before the wedding. The house is located under a tree. Gnomes have three trees: The Birthday Tree, The house Tree and the Granary Tree. Gnomes grow to be more than three hundred years old. They get weaned at age thirteen. I read all of these from my gnome fact book. :-) Hahaha! Humans could learn from gnomes like being smart and industrious, for example, and not having so many children they can't afford to raise and then expect government handouts which the socialists just love to happen to increase their power base. I think gnomes are libertarians.

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I actually just wanted to draw a woodland with a herd of buffaloes and a lot of animals.

Parasite

I want to say a lot of things but I suppose I should just shut up and draw or paint. I wonder what gnomes think about global warming, being able to live over three hundred years. Can you find them? They are everywhere.

If you notice, the little baby bird is so much bigger than its mother. It's a parasitic cuckoo . It's mother had earlier swallowed the egg of the titmouse and replaced it with her own egg. The titmouse incubated the egg not realizing that it was not hers and finds herself with the enormous task of feeding a baby bird ten times its size. Cuckoos believe in the notion that it takes a village to raise their children.

Trick Or Treat - Pumpkin Pie

Part VI of 6 - Pumpkin Pie

Carina was a nervous wreck. She feared being pureed and baked into a pumpkin pie. Alas she grew up in Iowa where the lady who brought her from the grocery store paid tax. In Iowa you have to pay tax on pumpkins unless you eat them.

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Happy Halloween!!!

See my other Illustration Friday Tricks or Treats:

Part I – Cyril Finds His Head

Part II – Genetic Reengineering

Part III - Assimilation

Part IV – Crossing The Border

Part V - Falling

Trick Or Treat - Falling

Her mother warned her "If you keep on going to the edge, you will fall". She was getting big-headed and thought she can do anything she wanted. The trees on the edge were beckoning with delicious fruits and rather than picking the low-lying ones from the trees in the center, she opted for the extremely far out to the left. As she grabbed a big juicy fruit she tripped and fell right over the cliff, into the sea, down to a bed of rocks below. The treat turned out to be a trick.

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See my other Illustration Friday Tricks or Treats. This week will feature a new post until Halloween:

Part I – Cyril Finds His Head

Part II – Genetic Reengineering

Part III - Assimilation

Part IV – Crossing The Border

Part VI – Pumpkin Pie

Trick Or Treat - Part IV

The trick is to cross the river when the moon is obscured by clouds. It is a matter of survival, if one does not know how to swim, that is if he or she does not get robbed by the coyote first, in this case he is a chayote (Sechium Edule), a thorny little green squash from a clinging vine variety. The calabazas are hoping to cross the border without getting caught by the border police. The treat is being able to live in the United States of Curcubita and enjoy the benefits, to which most Pepos think they are entitled. The added treat is being considered victims by demagogue Molepepos in Congress who want to correct the injustice directed to the illegal calabazas of not being granted citizenship for the simple reason that one has safely crossed the treacherous border and desires to live in the US of Curcubita. They are calling it the Dream Act, a facade for amnesty and a way to increase their support base. If the calabazas are even luckier, Pepo Hillaria may become the first truly self germinating squash to be elected president and she has proposed a $5,000.00 bond for every child born in the US of Curcubita. That is even a greater incentive for these calabazas to cross the border for they are known to bear many calabaza offshoots. In the meantime, Turbina, Yokohama, Ficifolia and the others have to wait ten or more years because they obeyed the laws and immigrated to the United States of Curcubita legally. If you don't understand this post, consider it a trick.

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See my other Illustration Friday Tricks or Treats. This week will feature a new post until Halloween:

Part I – Cyril Finds His Head

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Part II – Genetic Reengineering

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Part III - Assimilation

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Part V - Falling

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Part VI – Pumpkin Pie

Illustration Friday - Trick or Treat: Assimilation

Harold Chin wanted to play outside with his friends but his mother wanted him to finish his abacus lessons. He already had to endure the embarassment of looking differently from everyone else and his Mother insisted that he wore the black suit and slippers of his garden of origin. He wanted so much to fit in but his mother insisted he was different, special and should be proud of his heritage.
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The Case Of The Hyphenated Curcubita

Mom:

"Be proud of your heritage."

Harold:

"I am proud of my heritage Mom but I am also a Curcubita."

Mom: "

No, you are a Curcubita-Moschata and don't you forget that."

Harold:

"Who cares? I'm still a squash, just like them and we all end up becoming pumkin pies."

See my other Illustration Friday Tricks or Treats. This week I will feature a new post until Halloween:

Part I – Cyril Finds His Head

Part II – Genetic Reengineering

Part IV – Crossing The Border

Part V - Falling

Part VI – Pumpkin Pie

Illustration Friday - Trick or Treat (Genetic Reengineering)

Against his parents' wishes, Pepo was intent on marrying Turbana.

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See my other Illustration Friday Tricks or Treats. This week, I will feature a new post until Halloween:

Part I – Cyril Finds His Head

Part III - Assimilation

Part IV – Crossing The Border

Part V - Falling

Part VI – Pumpkin Pie

Illustration Friday - Trick Or Treat

After years of searching, one autumn night, Cyril finally found his head.

Ballpoint drawing on moleskine ruled journal.

See my other Illustration Friday Tricks or Treats. This week I will feature a new post until Halloween:

Part II – Genetic Reengineering

Part III - Assimilation

Part IV – Crossing The Border

Part V - Falling

Part VI – Pumpkin Pie

Illustration Friday - Grow

Ballpoint pen on Moleskine journal.

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Young Isabella planting a tree. Her Mother told her, "If you want to live longer, plant a tree." Isabella did not get it until she became a grown up and one day after their Mother passed away, while sitting with her sisters in their Mother's garden, they looked around and saw themselves surrounded by the trees their Mother had planted.

Moles, Moles on Skin, Mo-les-ki-ne and Giving Thanks

Two moles on a hill with two moles on their skin. Ball point drawing on Moleskine journal.

On the left is the negative effect of the above drawing. My son told me he preferred the negative image because that's how moles see anyway. Well, I don't know how moles see but I like the image so it stays. Click on both images to enlarge.

Giving Thanks

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This is from Carla. There was no logo so I just made the above logo. If you go to her blog and find out who she is, you will see why I am almost speechless. A Phenomenal Woman herself, an accomplished and brilliant artist and a beautiful woman. Thank you Carla!

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"September brought the Inspirational Blogger Award, given to me by Ces. I'm not even sure where to begin to describe why this was such a honor. Ces is a woman whose capablities and talents are only matched by her true warmth of spirit. She is a talented painter, a magical storyteller, a wickedly witty illustrator, a clinical analyst, a supermom, and completely lovely lady. I had the pleasure of meeting her very briefly last summer at KJ and JB's Yart Fair, and I instantly felt like I had always known her. I only hope I will have a chance to spend more time getting to know her better at a future gathering. Ces gets my Phenomenal Woman Award."

...and my dearest friend KJ used this one on me. I am perplexed because as a "rules" person, only I am supposed to give this award once a year, but thank you KJ for being thoughtful and I do not want to hurt your feelings by declining it, although technically, this award is for me to give to others. Everyone needs a best friend like KJ.

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"She's my best friend. She makes me laugh, she amazes, she challenges, she uplifts, supports, questions, reflects, and creates, sometimes all at the same time. I'm grateful to many deserving creative inspirational people in my life, but Ces is in a class by herself. So I am hereby and herein presenting her and her blog with the first annual Ces Class By Itself Award. I'm not sure it's proper to give this award since she is the originator of it and I don't have it myself to pass on, but as far as I am concerned, that is the smallest technicality."

This One Is For The Birds

Ballpoint and Colored Pencil on Moleskine Journal.

Night Vision

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It's Hunting Season.
Get out of the house.
The animals are there for a reason,
Except here, don't click your riffle, just your mouse.
Revel in awe while you watch the hawk grab the lizard
How it wishes it can fly away like a buzzard.
Be careful when standing underneath the tree,
The snake might grab you and not set you free.
See the turtles march in unison,
While the geese fly in V-formation.
The bucks are bared for now
Unable to hide their crowns even if they bow.
This flu is affecting my brain,
I can stop the rhyming only like I can stop the rain.
At last you can see my pen strokes reveal my compulsion,
With details like this it’s quite an obsession.

You may think it
And want to mention.

I already know it,

No need to bring to my attention.

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Extreme Moleskine Doodles

Swan Lake. Ballpoint pen on Moleskine notebook.
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Yesterday, I was talking on the phone with my friend about starting a new blog to publish all of my Moleskine notebook doodles. I thought about calling it "Extreme Moleskine® Notebook Doodles." How coincidental, today's topic for Illustration Friday is "Extremes". I am posting this image above as a perfect example of extremism in doodling. However, before I go on I would like to address the differences among the following terms and why I call several things that look the same or similar, differently.

These are drawings:

These are doodles:

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How did I come up with labels for the above images? They are all drawings after all and I used them to illustrate a concept. Read the meaning of the following words:

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Doodle: to draw or scribble idly

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Draw: to cause to move in a particular direction by or as if by a pulling force; pull; drag (often fol. by along, away, in, out, or off).

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Illustrate: to furnish (a book, magazine, etc.) with drawings, pictures, or other artwork.for explanation, elucidation, or adornment.

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Based on the above definitions, the images are all drawings except when I doodle, I draw idly. It is therefore not in the act but how I feel during or about the act. I also would like to add that when I call an image a doodle I start with a blank slate, have no idea what I will draw, I start with a line and then go from there. I realy do not know what I will end up with after all the spaces are covered with ink. I also am not in a hurry to finish the drawing. I doodle while waiting (for my flight to Kansas City, on the plane and back, and in bed to make myself fall asleep with the today's Illustration Friday post). Whereas, what I call "drawings" are images that I start with from an idea or concept.

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If I drew this image as part of a preconceived idea I would not have created this tree with more than than 5,000 pen strokes. How did I know it was more than 5,000? It's all because I am in bed with the flu and all I could do is rest and doodle, so I have all the time to count my pen strokes. This tree is a part of today's Extreme Doodle. I will have to rethink about starting a new blog, perhaps, I may just create a new label.