Tindaisies

Left: Original drawing and Right: Pancake doll based on original drawing

Aunt Lucille

Lucille is the aunt in the infamous Baked Spaghetti Casserole story.  Lucille’s fingers are separated with black thread, in keeping with the quality of the simple line drawings that inspire me to make these dolls. Lucille came together yet easier than Harold, but her hair was a real challenge. Harold Wideman’s and Alice O’Grady’s hair were sewn into the seam that joined the back of the head to the front.

Back

With Lucille, because her beehive hairdo is piled on top of her head, the back would have been bare, which I found unacceptably odd. Four tries later, I arrived at a very simple solution.

Aunt Lucille's Baked Spaghetti Casserole

Here is the baked spaghetti casserole. I used variegated orange embroidery thread for the spaghetti and liked the glossy quality to the thread because it looks convincing enough to make around the mouth turn orange, as greasy spaghetti will do.

Hmmmm…..

Harold and Lucille and the Baked Spaghetti Casserole...

Here they are, together. The unfortunate thing is, Harold looks exceedingly uncomfortable. Is it because he has succumbed to the wiles of Aunt Lucille and is worried about Mrs Wideman finding out, or is it because he is worried he will be offered some of the Baked Spaghetti Casserole?

Maybe I should make Mrs Wideman next …!

Cinnamon Buns

Chalk pastel, graphite and Conte  pencils on Winsor and Newton 90 lb hot press watercolour paper

It began last Sunday after I baked a pan of cinnamon buns. I’m always amused at the willy nilly spirals that form from the dough and the over all effect when they are bunched together in the pan.
Then, on Thursday, I read in the news about an Artist fined over inflatable artwork that killed 2. As tragic as that was, the story got me thinking about monumental art work such as that of Christo and Jeanne-Claude and then Robert Smithson’s Spiral Jetty.

I was back to spirals. It got me thinking about cinnamon buns again. No, I didn’t bake another pan, I drew pictures instead:

Spirals - To each their own

Chalk pastel and graphite on Canson Mi-Tientes paper

Eddies - Chain of events

Chalk pastel and graphite on Canson Mi-Tientes paper

Jetties - Cause and effect

Chalk pastel and graphite on Canson Mi-Tientes paper

Alphabet Soup

Contour drawing. Pitt artist pen and ink wash on Cougar paper

There is only one line in this drawing. I glanced at the paper once or twice while drawing this image and that was while I drew the perimeter of the bowl to be sure I was not traveling off the paper (which i did).

I decided that one line was appropriate; it spills, flows and is fluid – like soup.  The bowl has a wide brim with roses embossed around its perimeter (they were fun to draw).

Cougar paper is very smooth and bright white. It’s really meant for printing but it takes India ink beautifully and with the art pen I was able to make smooth lines with good control.  It takes a light wash very well, but you have to know exactly how much and where to apply it before the brush hits the paper because  the paper soaks it in like a sponge.

The soup was made by me and was pretty to  look at;  it had a variety of vegetables, chicken breast and of course alphabet pasta.  I was pleased that I had the foresight to take pictures because if I’d decided to draw from the real thing, there would have been none left  by the time I sat down to work   After finishing the drawing , it occured to me that it might have been nice use Yupo paper and wash with a bit of colour.

Homage to Muffin

Contour drawing, graphite, pastel, coloured pencil and conte on Murano paper.

Three muffins on a plate:  lemon cranberry,  chocolate chip and raisin.

This drawing is for Inspire Me Thursday’s prompt, breakfast. Unfortunately I was late for breakfast as the prompt was for last week… but I did bring muffins.

This is a simple contour drawing. My intention was to draw this in one continuous line, without lifting the pencil, but I added the background later, so I cheated.

So out of the three, what’s your favourite? Mine is raisin.

In the very early 1970’s, my dad had a contract job in Ottawa, Ontario. At the time, we lived just outside London, Ontario, and so he commuted to work during the week and came home on weekends. That summer, the whole family went to Ottawa and camped for a couple of weeks along the Rideau River.

I spent hours hiking and goofing off with my brother and sister. Of course, there was a camp store to which I’d make regular trips to for essential supplies (comics and candy, usually Cherry Blossoms).

Cherry Blossoms were made by Lowney, Hershey now makes them but they still bear the Lowney logo. Cherry Blossoms consist of a maraschino cherry and gooey syrup surrounded by a chocolate, peanut and coconut coating. They are intensely sweet and sugary.

The nice thing about getting a Cherry Blossom is that when you’ve eaten it, you still have the box that it came in. I kept my boxes and stashed my found treasures in them – stones that caught my eye, beach glass, shells, coins, butterfly wings, anything small enough to fit in the box. Sometimes I made houses out of them, covering them with paper on which I had drawn bricks, window frames, and doors. Then, when they were covered with the paper, I cut doors and windows into the sides of the box. I had 12 little plastic trolls from a caveman village and they came camping with me. They lived in Cherry Blossom houses while we camped and I set the houses up as a village on the ground, using rocks and twigs as landscape props and drawing roads into the dirt. It’s amazing that I never lost one troll.

Oh, one more thing, naturally I had to buy a Cherry Blossom to draw this illustration and naturally I had to eat it. Now I’m wondering, what shall I do with the box?

Bubble and Squeak is a dish made of Sunday dinner leftover mashed potatoes and green vegetables. You dump the potatoes and cabbage, brussels sprouts, cauliflower or broccoli into a bowl and mush them up together. Then tradition dictates that you fry them in the roast’s drippings in a heavy frying pan although butter or oil works fine, too. You have to press it into a cake in the pan and flip it once the bottom browns. The bubble and squeak is ready when both top and bottom are browned and the mixture is heated all the way through. Serve it with sliced, cold leftover roast and chutney.

It’s called bubble and squeak because that’s the sound it makes as it fries.

Bubble and Squeak

Not far from the capital of Mozambique
Was a village renowned for its Bubble and Squeak
The chefs who were part of this vegetable clique
Bought the finest ingredients from a veggie boutique

There was also a village that liked to cause trouble
They said that the dish was called Squeak and Bubble
Their potatoes were dug from among weedy stubble
Their cabbages grew among old tractor rubble

Both villages declared their recipe best
I’ve sampled them both and I have to attest
Wearing a blindfold I would not have guessed
The cliques from the troubles or the best from the rest

Happy Wordless Wednesday!

Another graphite and charcoal drawing, this one is also 3 x 4 inches, drawn on BFK Rives paper. This is just a play on the term “pieface.” I am finding that photographing these drawings works better than scanning.

Before digital photography, I remember documenting my work by taking photos with slide film. You had to tell the film processors that you wanted the film uncut and unmounted. The film came in a little cardboard roll and you had to cut the film yourself. Then you mounted them by hand, blocking the surrounding backgrounds with silver tape, then snapping them into plastic mounts. A light table made the job a lot easier. After they were taped and mounted, you had to get out the typewriter to type the details of the image which you did on mini labels which were then affixed to the bottom of the white side (not the grey side!) of the slide mount.

I know it sounds quaint and old, but then I come from the era of 8 track tapes too. (I particularly recall my best friend’s mom blasting Boots Randolph in her ‘74 Dart Swinger)

Sometimes people think they do a good job of veiling what they really think but you can read a their face like an open book, or can you? Some people are just plain difficult to read no matter what they say and what their body language says. I think Mrs Whats-Er-Face in the above drawing is one of the latter.

This is a return to making tangible images in traditional media. I drew this with B, HB, F and H pencils and charcoal on BFK Rives paper. The image is 3″x4″.

It’s hard shifting to different media but I miss making drawings and paintings I can hold in my hands and look at. Giclee prints can be lovely, but I sometimes feel something is missing because the directness of working on the actual surface is not there.

This is a very quick, very silly cartoon I drew about a year ago.

When you’re a kid, you make sense of the world either by trying to figure it out for yourself, or by believing what wiser, older adults tell you…

When we were kids, my siblings and I thought those floaters you get in the front of your eyes came from eating too much cholesterol. Therefore, this drawing is a nod to all those childhood myths you either fabricated on your own, or a wives tale some well meaning adult told you.

So, here’s the story to go with the cartoon:

For anyone who came by here because they put “baked spaghetti casserole” into a search engine box, I am sorry I don’t have a recipe for you. Maybe one day I’ll even post one!

It appears that baked spaghetti casserole will never die.