Happy Birthday, Little Sis!

Today is my little sister's birthday! Happy Birthday! I won't say how old she is, but today is a big one. I gave her a card tonight at a family dinner. From her reaction, I think she liked it. Here's the front:

And here's the inside - it folds open from the top:

Newtown Pippins!

Today’s the day I’ve dreamed of

For at least a dozen years

I found some Newtown Pippins

At the farmer’s market here!

It’s my favorite kind of apple

And they’re really hard to find

I tried one in Seattle

And it almost blew my mind

It’s tart like apple cider

And it’s just a little sweet

And even old George Washington

Grew orchards of this treat

But since I had that first one

I’ve been looking for some more

But as a heirloom apple

They’re not sold in any store

I even tried to grow one

In our little backyard here

I bought the tree and planted it

It didn’t last a year

So this morning when I found them

Well, it really made my day

And so I think I’ll end this poem

And eat one right away

Return of the Monsters!

Yup, once again not a lot of time to draw so I went with another page of monsters. I think I have a pretty good excuse, though. Tonight our youngest daughter is staying overnight with a friend, so we decided it was time to give our oldest daughter "The Talk". Now that I think about it, maybe a picture of some birds and bees would have been fitting...

End Of The Road

Another one-color drawing - this time in orange!

Pulchritude

Would it be rude

Or misconstrued

To make a case that ‘pulchritude’

Has been imbued

With meaning you’d

Not expect it to exude

It sounds so lewd

So crass and crude

You might expect it to allude

To nasty food

That’s being chewed

At least that’s what I might conclude

Perhaps a mood

Depressed, subdued,

Where sordid thoughts always intrude

You mope and brood

Your attitude

Makes you a most unhappy dude

Yet ‘pulchritude’

If truth’s pursued

Means beauty bold and ballyhooed

Like hair, shampooed

Or dawn renewed

Extremely pleasing when it’s viewed

The Grim Beaker

So, I've been wanting to do a picture of Beaker from the Muppet Show for a while, but I wanted it to be unusual somehow. Tonight I did a quick search for words that rhyme with or sound like 'beaker', and the word 'reaper' was on the list. Of course, that naturally led to this...

Tut

On November 4, 1922, Howard Carter and George Herbert discovered the tomb of King Tut. Today a news report (promoting an upcoming documentary) claims he died because of a chariot accident and a botched embalming job caused his corpse to spontaneously combust! It's stained glass-style just because I felt like it.

Baninja

Here's my take on a ninja banana.

The Cave

Yesterday I enjoyed using a simplified color scheme so much that I thought I'd try it again. This time I'm catching up with a drawing challenge from last month - the cave of your imagination. As I envision it, the cave of my imagination would be vast, but not dark. There would be many layers, nooks and crannies to explore, filled with countless shining ideas - some, of course, brighter than others. Some of these ideas could be arrived at easily while others would take some effort to reach. A persistent fog would also be present, sometimes almost transparent and revealing spectacular vistas while other times so thick that you wonder if there are any ideas left at all. Luckily with time and dedication, the fog will always eventually clear.

Prime Meridian

Happy Prime Meridian Day! In honor of the spirit of exploration this represents, I'm trying something a little different today. I wanted to try drawing a picture with only 5 shades of the same basic color (lighter to darker), plus white. This is what I came up with...