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Goodnight Moon Tribute for world book day!

Yesterday I started a new semester at The Des Moines Art Center, teaching teens fantasy art. I've taught there for over a decade now ( O_O ) and I tried something I've never done before! It was super fun too, at least it got more interaction and conversation from the teens than usual.

I made three categories: symbol/animal/fantasy figure

There were ten in each category, folded up and placed in three cups. The kids divided a large sheet of drawing paper into eight sections and then drew whatever I pulled from the cups. Finally they picked one they liked and elaborated for the final.

I didn't draw with them during the eight, but I did sit and draw with them during the final. My personal favorite was

leaf + rabbit + elf

I’m really just having way too much fun here.

What is SkADaMo? Why this is SkADaMo.

A quite lively discussion has blown in from space on a friends Face-postcard about something I forgot because it went a completely different way in short order and is now a history lesson on indigenous peoples.

It was said the “Native “”American”” people” were here first and that they claim to be “Indigenous” and that they have their traditional stories to back up their claim to properties etc.

That got me to thinking (usually leads to minor disasters) that just because someone in your past lived some place and told creation stories doesn’t always mean you have any more rights than the guy who was born there after you lost the battle, in my case way after.

I know, growing up, my mother used to tell me, when I asked how I got here that I came from heaven and perhaps, if I’m a good boy, God will give me land there again though I think he may balk at the casino I want to build even if it is to take all the sinner’s money or credits or what ever the currency of his realm is.

And further more if in the past there was only one super continent, Pangaea or what ever they really called it, then we all have a claim to everywhere cause we are all descendants of the original inhabitants and I’ll bet a dollar to a doughnut there aint anywho who can tell me where they thought they came from even after the break up.

I thought perhaps we are all from Mars via the Pleiades star system but had to leave cause the Marshonians wanted the place back so we moved on as they had come from the Hercules system to Mars first.

To send every one back to where they came from is stupid, you can’t fit that many people on Ellis Island let alone grow enough hemp there to have a trade economy with New York.

I don’t know the answer other than if we don’t start being natives from “EARTH” the little grey men will boot us out and wipe out the myths of our origins from then to eternity.

It’s a race none us may win …

By Rebecca Lane

The Hitchiker’s Guide to the Galaxy by Douglas Adams

I listened to the audiobook version narrated by Stephen Fry. With his hilarious accents for all the different aliens I enjoyed it far more than if I’d read it. I’m glad I finally know why the number 42 is so important.

The Sense of an Ending by Julian Barnes

Beautifully written, this story centres around memory, reflections on the past, and the regret that comes with age. The first part recounts the narrator’s school days and idealistic expectations of life leads and then jumps ahead forty years when he is an unexceptional middle-aged divorcee, still learning about the past.

The Count of Monte Cristo by Alexandre Dumas

The first book I read on my Kindle — one I’d struggle to lift in print at over 1,000 pages! This book has everything — love, adventure, rags to riches — but it’s the story of betrayal and revenge spanning a lifetime that I found so fascinating.

Rebecca by Daphne du Maurier

As haunting as its reputation promises, I loved this eerie story of a second wife trying to deal with the suffocating presence of her predecessor and the mystery that unfolds.

When God was a Rabbit by Sarah Winman

I thoroughly enjoyed this funny yet touching story of family life and the impact external events have on these vital relationships. It also includes a talking rabbit, which sounds odd, but it definitely works.

Rebecca Lane is a Commissioning Editor in Reference & Dictionaries at Oxford University Press.

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 Rabbit's Snow Dance

Rabbit loves the winter. He knows a dance, using a traditional Iroquois drum and song, to make it snow--even in springtime! The other animals of the forest don't want early snow, but Rabbit doesn't listen to them. Instead, he sings and dances until more and more snow falls. But how much snow is too much, and will Rabbit know when to stop? A hilarious fable!

If you liked this, try:
Bear has a Story to Tell
Goldilocks and the Three Dinosaurs
Chloe
Snowmen at Work
Brave Squish Rabbit

One of several ideas that popped in my head for this weeks Illustration Friday prompt, “Sight”.  Check out the site (Ha ha!) and see the many other illustrations!