I Did the Thing!

Hey guys!

   Yes, I have done the thing. If you don't know the beginning of the story, click here to see that post.

   Well, if you did read that, you know that I entered two drawings (one pencil and one pen-and-ink) into the localish fair, and that I signed up to do a demonstration.

   Yesterday I did just that! I was surprisingly calm (thank you God!) and packed up printed out pictures to draw, pencils, everything I would need. Dad packed the food (since we would be there from 2 to 6, meaning 4 straight hours), I listed to Peter Hollen's cover of Baba Yetu all the way there, and we made it safely.

   Let's just get straight that I don't really like fairs. Actually, I think I've only been to a few when I was pretty young, so I couldn't say much about them before now. The sound of kids screaming combined with the buzzing of rides, the shady teenagers continually flipping their overgrown bangs out of their faces and always hanging on their significant-other's arm, and the smell of animal exhibits are not appealing to me.

    But I wasn't their to see the sights. Inside the long building, before we went looking for the superintendent, I went through the 'fine arts' exhibits. Adults, young adults (older teens), little kids, and finally 'youth' (younger teenagers).

   Immediately I looked for my stippling, and found it with a '1st' on the tag.

   Then, on the same wall, my pencil drawing of Rachel McAdams was labeled '1st' with a blue ribbon next to it.

   I beamed, having not expected a blue ribbon. But then I noticed something peculiar. In the group of entries, more than half of them were placed 1st. Then the rest were 2nd, and only a couple were 3d. I suppose some people look at that as 'everyone's a winner', but I find it a hallow victory. I mean, if everyone wins, no one wins, because there's no real competition . I was looking for the 1st, 2nd, 3d, and the rest would be honorable mentions. But only a few had ribbons, which made me feel better about the system of judging.

   What do you do with ribbons, anyway? Hang them on your wall or something? (I never thought I'd have to ask this)

   I also noticed another pencil sketch, of (and called) Amy Pond. Man, I wish the girl who drew that was there when I was. It was a great sketch, too.

   After quickly looking to where I had placed, we found the lady who was in charge and she gave me the choice of two tables, one next to someone else (a guy with a bunch of model aircraft) or one all by itself in the middle of the hall.

   I picked the one next to Mr. Aircraft and spread my drawings around. The guy wasn't annoying or anything, it's just that because different people came by at different times, he had to tell the dumpster story one too any times, and that was annoying.

   Mom and Dad went off to enjoy the fair, and Willow stuck with me (since she decided that she doesn't like fairs at all).

Willow, the every cheerful, helpful, and uplifting spirit.

   Look at that, she's looking up sarcastically at my caption :) Anyway, she was good company as I started to finish my first drawing.

   I had been working on this drawing of Mason (Aidan Turner) for a while, but had never gotten around to finishing the background. But now was the perfect time, so I whipped it out and started on completing it. This is the end product, a bit sloppy, but I like it, though it still needs some work.

   One of the things I found is that when drawing in a warm environment, your hands can get rather sweaty. Which means when you try to smear the pencil led for shading, it sort of sticks to the page more, so you can't get it off when you want to, and it's uneven. It gets all over your fingers and hand. But as my teacher had told me, I ripped a piece of clean paper and put it on where my hand rests on the page, and the led didn't smear there like it normally would. Basically, it prevents this...

   After that I started a brand new drawing of a photo I pulled off of the internet. It was also a bit sloppy, but I'm going to try and fix it up sometime soon.

   And then I started another, this one fanart. It's of the Winter Soldier and Cap's shield (not yet colored, of course). I didn't get to finish it, by the time I had gotten halfway through, it was already six.

Me drawing the Winter Soldier...

 

   A good number of people stopped and looked at the drawings I had displayed and commented on them. Since it was senior day, the nice old people said how they liked it. A few asked how old I was. One thing I learned from this is that from now on I'm going to stop and tell the demonstrators how I like their stuff. It feels really great to hear what people think, and it's sort of disappointing if they don't say anything.

All in all, it went really well. Thanks to you guys who encouraged me on this, it was real helpful :)

Post again soon!

Sincerely,

Darrion

Family Photos

Hey everyone!

I suppose I shouldn't say "it's D again", since this is my blog... I always say that on The Call, so it's kind of a habit :)

   Anyway, I've got some pictures I've taken (and edited) over the summer... just a few, but I thought that you might like to see 'em anyway :)

That's me, as you probably already know. I didn't take this, or course, Willow did. I don't normally need glasses, but for the outfit (Tenth Doctor cosplay) it was an edition.

 Willow at the pass lookin' cool :)

Willow again... smile! In case you didn't already know, Willow is my older sister.

This is my dad! I took this at the pier, after we had dinner at a restaurant for his birthday.

Since my mom doesn't particularly like getting her picture taken (and didn't like the other picture that I was going to use), I'm using the one of her and dad at the pass.

Yep, this is my brother. He doesn't like getting his picture taken, I don't think :)

Ah! Much better. I took this while he wasn't looking :) He doesn't live here anymore, but he comes for the 4th of July.

Barney! He's my little dog. I love him to death :) though looks can be deceiving...

Cisco (left) and Barney (right) playing in the backyard. I know it looks violent, but they're really just playing :)

Well, that looks like everyone. Except Grandma and Grandpa Lolo... but I don't have pictures of them at the moment.

Hope you enjoyed a peek into my life!

Sincerely,

Darrion

I'm Doing a Thing!

Hey people of the internet!

It's D again. And I've got some news.

I entered two of my drawings in a localish fair, and am going to do a demonstration! Here's the story...

(Yes, this turned into a full-fledged life story. Sorry if it's a bit long, I just wanted to cover everything. And not much happens around here, so when it does, I take full advantage of that. Oh, and I didn't take the picture above. I got it off of Pinterest.)

   A while ago Dad and I were at IHop having dinner for date-night, and we were talking about art. He proposed that I enter some of my drawings into the local(ish) fair. Of course, I said I would have to think about it. I mean, all I'd have to do would be to hand it to some person to hang up on a wall filled with other people's art, right?

   Right.

   A long time later, on the seventh, our art teacher was at our house and I mentioned it. She was concerned that it might have already closed (they only give you so much time to renter), so we checked the fair website. It said that they were open for walk-in entries on Friday night (which was the next day) or Saturday morning. But on Saturday, we were already scheduled to go have lunch with family for our Grandpa's 88th birthday (on my dad's side) at eleven (he's as old as the queen of England, you know).

   So I spent the rest of the day and a good portion of the next refining a drawing I did of Rachel McAdams, which you can see here. Then Grandma (from my mom's side) suggested I also enter my stippling of a grove of apple trees, so I worked on finishing that one, also.

   My mom printed out the rules for entry, and we made a trip to Hobby Lobby for framing (which lasted a long time, and a very confusing one at that) and returned home with frames that we weren't sure we even needed.

   We were planning to head out early the next morning when Dad concluded that it would probably be better if we left right then (late Friday), so I rapidly finished the pencil and pen-and-ink and Mom packed everything we would need into a bag.

   Dad drove me and we had to maneuver the grounds in search of the 'fine arts' building. We found a building where people were going in with their stuff, and a lady asked if I hand three entries (since I was carrying a big bag loaded with everything we could possibly need). I said two, and pulled them out. She immediately stated that 'fine arts' were just around the corner. So we hurried off through the empty grounds (my dad pointed out how strange it felt) until we found it.

   A table with a few young girls and a middle-aged lady seated behind it awaited us, and we found our document to sign and confirmed that we needed no frames.

   The problem was that because the rules were not clear about framing, we hadn't put the lack backing on yet. So we found a table and pieced together matting and drawing. That's when I realized how nervous I was. My hands shook as I tried to write in my date of birth and name.

   After getting very confused with the birth-date system (don't ask) and using a glue stick to keep the matting on the paper, I handed in both entries and filled-in forms to the girl.

   Another girls with chocolate skin and dark hair gave me generous comments about my stippling (which, unfortunately, I forgot to take a picture of before entering). She was very outgoing and encouragingly complemented it. I liked her a lot, though I'm sure that I came off as shy (which I am normally not) since I was so nervous.

   That drew the attention of the head lady, who came over and gave it a look. Apparently, she wa very empressed, because she quickly asked if I wanted to do a demonstration at the fair.

   I, of course, said no. I was nervous enough already, and said how I would be too freaked to do something like that.

   Then, ever-helpful Dad stepped in and said "no, she'll do it." Yep, Dad had his opinion. I wasn't so opposed as to say anything, and it happened so fast. So it was okay that he encouraged me like he did.

   The lady explained that all I would have to do would be sit at a table for a set time and draw. That's it. And if someone came by and asked "when did you start drawing?" or "that's really good!" I should answer with "ten." or "thank you." She also said that I would get three free tickets and a parking pass.

   Since Mom didn't pick up her phone to talk us out of it, Dad singed me up for Monday, the 25th, from 2 to 6.

   Yep, that was it. Now I'm doing a demonstration from 4 hours at a fair that has (I'm quoting the lady) a thousand people come through each day. I don't know weather to be excited or scared. Has anyone done this sort of thing before? I'd love any tips :) I should probably come up with what I will be drawing before hand... huh.

   Anyway, the point is, I'm pretty nervous right now. And if you guys have any tips, let me know! :)

Thanks for sticking with me through this (very, very long) post!

Sincerely,

Darrion