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The last weeks I can't seem to find the time to make a new illustration for monday artday, wich is a shame because I really like the challenge this week (and last week) So I'm posting an oldie I made last year as a christmas card, wich features my Icelandic horse. I hope I can make another drawing because I also live with three kitties and three chickens..

When I was in fourth grade, my new best friend, CK, told me she’d read every single Nancy Drew book in the series. I was impressed and mentioned this to my sister. Big mistake. She copied my friend and checked out a couple of Nancy Drew books from the library and loved them. Next thing I knew, she was working her way through the series, one book at a time.

Well, that was it. No reading Nancy Drew for me—I wasn’t going to be like my sister. That was something I was sick of. Even though my sister is older, my mother bought us the same outfits at the same time and we had to wear them on the same days. We had the same haircut. Even when we weren’t dressed alike, people stopped us at the playground to ask if we were twins.

No, there’d be no Nancy Drew for me. I had to find my own sleuth. That’s how I discovered Trixie Belden. Here are the first few sentences from book one: “Oh, Moms,” Trixie moaned, running her hands through her short, sandy curls. “I’ll just die if I don’t have a horse.”

Oh, my gosh! Trixie wanted a horse; I wanted a horse! We were the same! Trixie instantly became the It girl for me. Trixie met that girl Honey who owned horses. In fifth grade, I groomed horses on weekends for my school librarian. Trixie wore jeans and went outside a lot, and even though she was older than me (she was thirteen), she seemed like a real girl, like someone I could be friends with.

I’m whispering now because I don’t want Trixie to hear this: I did sneak a few reads of Nancy Drew, but I didn’t like it. At eighteen, Nancy was too old and too sure of herself. She could doctor people up, skin dive, trick locks open—how did she know all this stuff? Trixie was more like me, discovering things along the way.

In recent weeks, I’ve read the first few Nancy Drew books. My gosh! These books are good—something is always happening. There is no down time in a Nancy Drew book. I like Nancy, shh! And I think it’s funny how each book references Nancy’s past mysteries by title and foretells the next mystery by book title.

I’ve also taken another look at Trixie and I’ll tell you what—Trixie is still my It girl. And I still want my own horse.

My secret (one, anyway!)is a talent for drawing that I stored away long ago, in an old farmstead on the coast of Maine, when my children were born and life's demands escalated.

It would escape the secret hiding place every once in a while, through a quick sketch to help with a project, a drawing to illustrate an idea when teaching, or doodling during important (for whom?) meetings. I'd capture it, after a fashion, thinking all the while of a day when I would release it for good.

I let me secret out last fall, with a sketch of one of our horses - Grand Vision, aka 'Joe'. This one here is #2 of a series I'm evolving. The freedom feels great - who knows what lies ahead?!

By David Ezra Stein Simon and Schuster 2007 I'm not going to pretend I wasn't disappointed, but you can only be disappointed if you have expectations. The problem is that I really liked Stein's first outing with Cowboy Ned and Andy and it was hard not to want more of the same. This time around Cowboy Ned and his faithful horse Andy have hit the end of the dusty trail in Abilene. After a

I did a local sketchcrawl here in Phoenix AZ the other night, and here's one of mine:


I could/should have spent the energy drawing it in the computer instead, but it was fun to pick up a pencil for a change.

It's funny how using technology will effect how your draw.

I now try to draw vectors with my pencil, and it's just how I like to think of shapes and characters now. However, I always want the perfection of vectors in my drawings, and I can never get it tight enough. (Just how it is)

I drew this because I'm throwing together some ideas for my next project, a Halloween Alphabet book.

Steam Crow Press