Past, Present, Future

 Happy New Year to you, from me, sixteen days late!
 New Year's is my favorite holiday because
1.) Looking back at the past year. I enjoy this because I'm a sentimental fool.
2.) Wondering about the upcoming year.
3.) All the new things you can say about yourself. (I'm graduating next year!!!)
4.) You don't have to buy anyone presents. I am the worst at buying presents.
5.) Parties. Sparkling cider. Food. Obnoxious countdown.
 I babysat on New Year's Eve so I didn't participate in any party activities, which is totally fine. I wanted to go to First Night in Downtown Springfield but my cousin went and said it was lame this year. Of course it was lame. The Y.E.S. Troupe didn't perform and that's the only reason anyone goes, right?????? That's the only reason I go!
 Anyway, here are my resolutions. When I say resolution, I mean that loosely. Every time I make any sort of plans, my brain says "Looks like I should everything EXCEPT THIS ONE THING I PLANNED."
Resolution 1: Follow through with plans. (This is some sort of mind-bending, two level resolution on which the rest of my resolutions are hanging in the balance.)
Resolution 2: Write more. Both on the blog and just writing stories.
Resolution 3: General, all-inclusive, "Keep improving in all facets of life"
Okay now I'm going to try to forget that I ever made resolutions. (Can you trick your own mind?)
Have a great year!

A Short Story Relating the Discovery of Pickles

           A Short Story Relating the Discovery of Pickles*

                                                          By Jaycie Hull

            For countless decades, pickles have been tickling the taste buds of the young and old. Where, you may ask, does this angelic soured vegetable come from? What is the story of its origin? I will tell you.

            It began in a small town, with a quirky chemist. His name was Old Fauvel. Old Fauvel was, as the name implies, old. His taste was not what it used to be. Food that used to excite his mouth was now dull and boring.

            Old Fauvel’s wife was a cucumber farmer. The couple had excess amounts of the vegetable. The green delicacies had over run their guest bedroom and were slowing creeping their way to other rooms of their tiny cottage. Every meal that the Fauvels ate involved cucumber. Cucumber Eggs Benedict, cucumber corn mush, cucumber Chicken Cordon Bleu, even cucumber pie! Old Fauvel thought the cucumber was a horrid vegetable and he complained about it at every meal. We cannot blame him, for cucumbers are really a dull vegetable, and with his fading taste buds, it was probably an unpleasant experience for him.

            As we have mentioned, Old Fauvel was a chemist. He came to concoct a mixture of salt and vinegar. This mixture was strong and sour enough for Old Fauvel to taste! He began to pour it over everything he ate, and added it to everything he drank. He noticed that the meals involving large amounts of cucumber were especially pleasing. In fact, he stopped complaining altogether about his wife’s strange cucumber combos!

            Mrs. Fauvel had noticed her husband’s new enthusiasm for cucumbers, and she was very pleased. To show her appreciation, she decided to make something special for him. She sneaked a jar of Old Fauvel’s vinegar solution and soaked several choice cucumbers overnight, with the intent to add them to her husband’s lunch the next day.

            However, fate is cruel. That very night, Mrs. Fauvel was on her way to a dinner party when she was run over by the first tractor-trailer. She died. Old Fauvel sunk into a very deep depression. He did not eat, and when he did, he stayed far away from cucumbers. After three months of this, Old Fauvel decided to move, for he could no longer stand to look at the cucumber infested cottage. While he was cleaning out his kitchen, he discovered a dusty jar in the dark recesses of his pantry. There was a note pinned to it.

   “To My Dearest Fauvel,

            I’m so glad you have become as passionate as I have about cucumbers.

                                                                                          I love you,

                                                                                                 You’re Mrs. Fauvel.”

            We will urge the reader to overlook Mrs. Fauvel’s serious grammatical error. We know that she really meant to be sweet, and was not trying to imply that Old Fauvel was a woman. Old Fauvel, being grief-stricken, did not even notice his wife’s blunder.

Old Fauvel wept for exactly three hours. Up to this point, he had not shed a tear over his wife’s death. Upon coming out of his crying session, he felt his stomach growl. It was the first time in three months that he was hungry. He took one of these cucumbers out of the jar, and bit it.

            The flavor was like fireworks on his dead tongue. Never had he ever tasted anything so powerful – so tingly! The months spent in the acidic solution had transformed the cucumbers into something completely new. Old Fauvel called it a ‘Pickle’. That was what Mrs. Fauvel used to call him on account of his picky eating. To the reader, this may seem selfish. He would have named them after her, but Old Fauvel was unromantic and never called his wife any endearing nicknames.

            From that day forward, Old Fauvel devoted his life to making and eating pickles. Once he had an impressive stock, he ate only pickles. Eventually, his guest bedroom was freed up and he converted his home into an extremely profitable pickle company. We must give him credit, for he did name the company after his wife. “Mrs. Fauvel’s Pickles” set the stage for the booming pickle industry.

            Unfortunately, Old Fauvel died a year and a half later from cardiovascular disease. It turns out that pickles are very high in sodium and you shouldn’t eat them at every meal.

                                                                                                                    The End.

*Not a True Story

Find Me in the Forest Part 2

I redid 'Find Me in the Forest'. The first one didn't sit right with me. I don't know. It's like when you think one decision is right for you, like moving to Nevada or something but then you visit Minnesota and you're like, "Yes this is it." Art analogies are so relevant to life.
One thing I've learned, at least for me, is that you can't push art. I wasn't trying to redo my picture, it just flowed naturally. I was trying to create a sequel when I made the first one, and I ended up not liking it as much as this one. I think there's another life analogy in there somewhere.
I've also discovered that I get inspired when I'm supposed to be doing other things. Usually when I have another art project to do, my rebellious imagination decides to think of some really cool ideas and I end up getting totally sidetracked. That's probably not a good thing.
*Also* I've never done antlers before. They probably would have turned out a lot better if I had looked up a reference picture.
Speaking of which, I have a deadline coming up...

Find Me in the Forest

Sequel to Meet Me by the Sea. It took me about five hours! I'm hoping to do two more but I haven't figured out what they'll be. Have a great Thanksgiving weekend!

Experiments in Prints

 Yesterday something exciting came in the mail! My first print!! I've tried making prints before by just going to an office store, but the colors always print faded. :( So my sister, who is an amazing photographer, took a picture of one of my pieces and we ordered a print of it. It's 8x10 on a matboard. It's really cool! There are somethings that we could improve on, and we'll keep experimenting with different pictures. :) Hopefully I will have several different pieces in print form ready to sell! Isn't that exciting? I'm excited!
There it is! It's currently hanging in my room! I feel so professional.



Besides that, I've been working on some other stuff to turn into prints. I drew that^ the other day. It took alllll day because of the sweater! But it was worth it! I love sweaters! And fall. This season has been so much fun so far and I'm so excited for Thanksgiving AND I'm going to abruptly stop talking now.

Hello, All! It's been like, two days since my last blog post after a summer of blogging silence. Hopefully, this means that this Fall I'll be a better blogger. Actually, what sort of pushed me back into this blog was the fact that every time I uploaded some art on Instagram, I felt really bad. It feels sort of narcissistic, which is not what I want to convey. I just really really really really love art, and I want to share it with other people. HOWEVER, someday if I become an Illustrator I'm going to spam up whatever social media site is popular with pictures of my art.
 Guess what? I didn't even share my last blog post on Facebook and it got 14 pageviews. Albeit, 6 or 7 of them were from me. Random!
 Moving on, this is a piece I did yesterday. I was trying to decide whether to do a forest-y painting or a hipster-y painting. I've been wanting to do a hipster painting lately since that is such a big thing and I think hipsters are cool (although I am not cool enough to be one...or am I not not cool enough?) , so maybe that will be coming soon. Anyway, I am a sucker for foliage and floral, so I went with a forest-y painting.

 

 This was actually my first time to do a flowered crown. A lot of the artists I follow on Instagram have been doing them and it seems to be a trend in fashion. I didn't think it would turn out very well, but I'm moderately satisfied. I should learn how to draw more flowers though. It would help create a more diverse arrangement.
 And yes, that is a picture of my feet. It was to show how small the picture was. Anyway, look at the pictures and give me some feedback! They are a little dark because I took them with my iPhone. Also, I cannot for the life of me figure out how to change the font.

Back To School

Hello, All! It certainly has been awhile... I don't think I've posted all summer. For awhile I had seriously considered abandoning this blog; I actually sort of did and started another. However, I let that drop to. So somewhere out there in the vast Internet world there is a blog with one post. I wasted space. :( oh well. Another reason I wanted to drop this blog was because every thing on here is really not very good art at all. Even from my last post, my style has changed a lot (like, seriously, the necks? They make me shudder.) I'm always learning new things and constantly looking back and seeing all the flaws in the pictures I once thought were amazing. So I know in a few months or years I'll look back at the pictures I draw now and think they are terrible. Which makes me wonder if everyone else can see the flaws when I can't. But several people discouraged me from abandoning this blog, saying that it was a good way for people to see how I've grown and changed in my art. So I guess that's good as long as you, the reader, take into account that every old post on here is that - old. And that every new post is a step toward improvement.
Another reason why I let the ol' blog fall by the wayside is because of Instagram. It's so easy now to instantly share photos of my art and add a cool filter... But I can't post all the time or I'd probably lose all my followers.
Okay, so, now for some art. I know everyone's going back to school, so of course I had to do a scholarly piece. Now, I'm doing this on my phone so I don't know how to make the pictures go between the words...or any idea how to put t hem in order. I am not blog savvy. So just look at them.  P.S. feedback is greatly appreciated.