"Keep on swimming, swimming, swimming." as Dora would sing in "Finding Nemo".  This illustration has some inspiration from that movie, mostly the friendships and the lyrical ways water moves us around.

     My entry to this weeks IF Word of the Week!.  Been busy and absent, however, today I am back!

Feeling Good Movies and drawing...

Been working hard to keep good attitude and so I have been going through the tissue boxes with my movie choices, all of them great movies, all of them deep in spiritual character.  The last one I just wrote is called, "Listen To Your Heart" -a really feel good movie, so bring tissues.

As such I have been also thinking of doing a risk, by putting it out there, I am going to listen to my heart; I am announcing the creation of a drawing class to be held in Ventura, on Main Street in California.  I will provide a one hour class to anyone, all ages may attend, to teach you how to Draw.  You walk away with a drawing, which YOU DREW. No materials needed, except you and your good attitude.  $5.00 at the door, no reasonable donation refused, no one will be turned away.  I am following my heart, and that is to draw, so let me show you how easy it is, in just one hour.

Comment here, back to me, to be included, as I will be private messaging true wanna-be artists. To be included to where and when, make some noise at me.  I am counting on you and your desire to learn how to draw, so don't be shy, even if you just like this comment, you're in. There's more to come.

Check out what I have drawn in under an hour here.  Now I cannot promise you that you will achieve the same results, but maybe you will, you will have to show up to draw at my class first for this to happen.

IF Word of the week: WINGS

What an appropriate word for the first month of the year.  It carries so many meanings, mostly the feeling of freedom, release and happiness.  To soar and glide through the air is such a feeling of release.  And then there are the wings of an angel, and this month has seen too many of these with all of the shootings on schools specifically as this takes the lives of innocents and lives that have yet to begin their journey's of wonder.

I respectfully submit to Illustration Friday, my drawing of wings titled "Deco Wings' as I vaguely remember drawing it back in Junior college and discovering the fun of the Art Deco period, a world transformed following visits to Egypt by explorers  (the 1920's), seeing the art from a place where Gods walked the Earth and then these modern visitors brought back this culture and called it Art Deco.

May all of our dreams be carried on the backs of wings, so they can soar and travel to places we only hope to see knowing one day we will get there.

Glow for me, Girl.

Wow, just under the wire and this is my submission for Illustration Friday's word of the week, "Glow".

Get your glow on, girl and the sounds of Led Zeppelin come to mind.

Cropped from an unpublished work for a contract job, this is my take on the essence of glow.  The creature is a hummingbird and the book is inspiration focused.  The colors resonate the core of glow as it is a gazing word.  A word I associate with extended long looks.

Enjoy the glow!

12-21-12, my snow submission to Illustration Friday.  I hear it's snowing in the mid US.

It's a TREE kinda day!

So the word is TREE.  I immediately knew I had a drawing, again done long ago back in the 90's, but I really like the drawing and then I got to thinking about trees, because I know I have to go find the drawing somewhere on my computer....  I also got to thinking about the illustration I was going to post, I also got to thinking about this blog and what I wanted to say. I do a lot of thinking, it is important to think before you speak or write, makes for a better step when walking or talking.

I realized trees allow us to have paper.  I am sure they go kicking and screaming on this one, but I am really glad man made this happen for us, because paper is one of my most favorite materials to use for many of my creations.  I can make just about anything from paper. And I do, that is, make lots of things from paper.  My best friend tells a story about when she watched me  make an entire concept box for my day time job, completely out of paper and then come back and show her the finished product the next night when we hooked back up at our night job we shared together.  She thinks I am amazing.  I just think paper is amazing and I am just really lucky to have this ability to make paper into cool stuff.

But I really have to hand it to the trees of the world.  They are truly awesome.  Trees can live a long time, withstand a lot of abuse and make new trees to grow underneath them and populate the world with air and paper of course.  (Paper is a man made item, trees do not volunteer for paper duty.)

So I honor the Trees out there.  Thank you for showing you can do double duty as paper, though I know would prefer not to be paper… (LOL) Thank you Trees for growing, giving me shade, a place to climb and see far away things from a great vantage point high up in their branches and just being awesome. Oh, and thank you for the beauty you have brought into my world, you look great, sound great and smell great, no matter where you grow. Here is my picture to honor trees on IF.  My tree.

Illustration Friday Backside

LINK.

You, like I, may not have done the due diligence to understand what waters we travel, before we jump in and start sailing.  Like me, you may be an explorer who just slaps on a backpack and runs willy nilly out into the world, not knowing what or who you may run into.

Then, when you start to slow down, the glee of that first step tells you "first steps" need some grounding here, you know, when you realize how important it might have been to have done the due diligence first!

The good news is when you do slow done you discover, hopefully, some rather impressive, or shocking or even better, WONDERFUL  stuff, like I just did!

So, since I only launched this blog yesterday and I am doing everything I can at this exact moment before slapping on my explorer backpack again to head out to enjoying the fun of running around the wild blue wilderness…click the link here or above and see what the power of one did for me! Impressive. IF you only could.

Thanks Penelope! You are awesome.