Painting

I've always wanted to  paint, but starting was the hardest part. In America, good, quality acrylic or oil paint is expensive, and then you have to buy the brushes, the canvas, everything. It gets complicated. And for someone like me, a teenager in a third world country, how was I ever going to be able to LEARN how to paint?

My mom met an artist at a craft fair, and he agreed to teach my friend and I how to paint. Little did we know. 

First, where do you get your canvas? 

You learn to stretch it yourself. Our teacher got canvas cloth, wooden frames (although the ones in this photo aren't the proper wooden frames; we fixed that later), and...shoe tacks. You nail the canvas onto the frame, stretching it as tight as you can. 

Next, primer. 

We bought a bucket of white water paint, added a little more water, and wood glue. We coated the canvas, and then we were ready for painting!

Unfortunately, to buy one tube of 'cheap' acrylic paint is crazy expensive, so we got to make our own. We got oil house paint from the store - red, yellow, blue, black, and white. We opened them up and set them on the coal pot (sorry - no picture) until the paint began to boil. We broke plain wax candles and removed the wick. We then added those to the boiling paint, stirring until the wax had mixed in completely.

Taking it off the fire, we set the bucket of paint in water so that it would cool, constantly stirring. After that, we let it sit...and thicken!

It may not be the best paint in the world, but we've done pretty well with it. Three months later, we still have plenty of paint, and the paintings far outweigh the costs of the materials! 

My teacher wanted me to start with a flower. 

I'm very happy with the result! 

Since then, I've painted quite a bit - we do lessons every Saturday. I don't have photos of all of my paintings, but here are a few of the recent ones. 

'Bold' is the word for this one. Thankfully, that's what I was going for. I painted the whole background first, and then the tree and the elephants. 

I am super happy with this one. Normally I'm a pencil artist, so I'm used to black and white shading. I found this one immensely satisfying, even if it did take forever! I'm estimating around fourteen hours, but I didn't keep track. 

Also pleased to announce that I SOLD it. Like, someone asked me if they could buy it and they actually did. :D

Holmes

Well, all the puppies are gone, save one. It's sad, but I'm very happy that we found homes for them all! I was really worried for awhile. 

Anyway, this one, that I called Holmes, was the first to go and left back in December. His new name is Bailey, and he's doing awesome in his new home! He was by far the most laid-back puppy of the litter, and so sweet and friendly. :D

Done in black crayon. I'm not fond of the background, but you can't erase crayon, so. :P

Puppies

This post is actually really late. We have puppies...ten of 'em! And they're already six weeks old. :P

Before the puppy comes the mom. Beatrice is my baby (one of them, anyway).

She's half Great Pyrenees, half Border Collie/Australian Shepherd mix.

We're not quite sure what the father is, but some kind of hunting dog. 

So I checked out a book - 'The Dog Owner's Veterinary Handbook.' I read a few chapters of it. Then, maybe a week later, we figured out that Beatrice was pregnant.

So I read the whole section 'Pregnancy and Whelping.' It was very in-depth and I really enjoyed it.

The morning started with Bea getting herself stuck under the wash house (an outbuilding that we use as a toolshed but call the wash house). We had to dig her out because she had evidently forgotten about her massive stomach. Once we had gotten her out, she paced around for awhile.

Well, wouldn't you know, I found her less than an hour later under the back porch with three babies. We moved them to her whelping box.

I won't gross you out with details, but I delivered the rest of the puppies, and happily saved the lives of three of them. I definitely recommend that book. 

In the picture above there's actually only nine puppies...that tenth one came as a bit of a surprise. I guess they all did, in a way.

The pictures below were taken a few weeks ago.

This one doesn't have a nickname, but he is definitely adorable. Has a little more of a hound look to him, especially now (but I don't have any more recent pictures)

And this one's Barbossa - he's all white with that one dark patch over his eye. He's very friendly and loves to cuddle - and eat. 

I don't normally play favorites, but this is my favorite. Nicknamed Gandalf. He is gorgeous and friendly and so sweet. Besides, it's not every day you get a mix that looks like this! He's the only 'true' gray in the litter, plus the biggest. Isn't he just so stinkin' adorable? This is a more recent picture of him (actually only taken a few days ago. :3 He's HUGE. Look at those paws. 

And this is Mademoiselle. 

She always wants to be held and cuddled and is always the first to greet me when I walk in the door. She and her sister look very similar but her sister (Penguin) is slightly bigger, sweet but more enthusiastic, and has more white on her belly.

I don't have any more 'single' pictures, but here's a few group ones.

Holmes is another one that we've nicknamed, but I don't have a specific picture of him. He's a shy little brown hound. <3

There are more puppies than those that I've listed, but they're unnamed or I don't have pictures. :)

But aren't they all so ADORABLE?

NaNoWriMo

We all know what that means. And if you don't, you're about to figure it out. NaNoWriMo comes creeping up on me every year. Six months beforehand I think, "I'll just start outlining now, and then I'll have a whole story ready to be written by November!" Ah, yeah. So I said. Never actually happened...funny how that works.

So the goal is to get 50,000 words in one month. 30 days. 

This is my fourth year, so of course I'm going to do it. I hadn't actually written a novel since LAST NaNo, but whatever. It would work out.

We left on the 30th of last month on a trip, and we're still on that trip. My birthday happened on the 2nd. Thus, I didn't actually get started until the 4th, thousands of words behind.

Day before yesterday I had a wordcount of 2,000 words. I decided - two thousand words a day would be great.

I reached 4,000, after laboring over it for hours.

The first part of NaNo, for me, is the worst. A lot of people get stuck in the middle or trying to figure out the perfect ending. No, I have trouble getting started.

Yesterday was even worse. We were going to a meal with some friends and a conference afterwards. We got home, and Jake had to get his wordcount done. He didn't finish until late, and I had fallen asleep. I had written 500 words out of the 2000 that I needed to get done.

Today looked up! I finally got my writing down. I started out the day with some Word Wars; I managed to get 2,000 words written in 45 minutes.

This evening I shall return to the grueling effort, but there is hope there now. 

This year is by far my worst year, and my busiest. I doubt there will be any finishing early as before, but I WILL finish.

I will.

Benedict Cumberbatch

You know me, I'm always forgetting. I was supposed to post this two months ago. I saw that Benedict Cumberbatch got engaged, and that reminded me - oh! I have a drawing. :P

I'm reaallly happy with how it turned out. It took forever, though, because of all the dark shadows. And his hair. *groan*

Anyway. Ten hours of work in graphite. Size 9x12 inches. 

On another note I've set up a Redbubble account here. Benedict Cumberbatch is NOT for sale, because I couldn't get the scan to cooperate. The paper was yellower and all the pencil marks are prominent in the picture. Any suggestions?

I only have two things up on Redbubble so far, but I'll soon get more up and also set up a Facebook page! :)

Man o' War

I saw a picture of Man o' War. I was bored. So, I drew it. It only took about thirty minutes, maybe forty-five. :) Black crayon on sketchbook paper.

Audrey

A portrait I did for a friend. :) I'm really happy with how it turned out - her hair especially.

The dress was really hard, especially the elastic on the front. I had already drawn the daisy design on the rest, so I couldn't exactly fill it in black. I had to put the pattern in there. :P It turned out better than I expected it to.

And her nose. I'm notoriously bad at drawing noses, but this one worked out perfectly! It's an odd thing to say, but her nose is one of my favorite parts of the whole drawing. :D

Anyway, it's graphite on 9x12 inch Bristol paper.

Mreow!