Week 2 of The 1 Month Daily Drawing Challenge (I'm Alive!!)

If you're surprised that I even made it this far, trust me when I say I'm more surprised than you, by more than a desert-stranded platypus. In fact, I actually stopped counting and just yesterday my brain went, "Hasn't it been more than a week already?" And guess what? My brain apparently worked. I have actually made it past Week 2 and I'm already in the midst of Week 3 when I realised I should probably be doing a weekly report/round up. (Probably because my genius self thought I decided to start my week on a Tuesday - because who says we can only start on Mondays, right? Any day is a good day :) - but I actually started on a Sunday... Close enough I guess...) ANYway, prepare yourself to be blown away! (Really, some days are quite... um.. liberal) Here goes...

Let us begin with... Day 8! (or should it be Week 2 Day 1? Same thing right? Actually, if I just continue adding to the number it would get pretty satisfactorily big, yeah that's good enough motivation. Day 8 it is) This here, would also be the beginning of my fascination for this particular egg laying mammal-which-I-stupidly-thought-was-a-bird-that-gave-birth-do-not-judge-I-have-not-taken-bio-in-a-long-while. Still, this not-bird is really really special and I was quite tempted to adopt one as a pet even though my home does not have a river suitable for it to live in (but read this sentence in full present tense anyway) I also found out that baby playtpuses (some times called platypups, isn't that just adorable?!) (wait does the word platypuses even exist? Is the plural of platypus just platypus?) ok wait, I digress. Baby platypups are adorably hairless and flubby. Ah... makes me wish Australia would ship more round the globe and share these adorable fluffs. Actually, I might just go ahead and retire as a platypus in my next life. Sounds like a plan... (Also, this one is green in honour of Perry. If you get this reference, good job, go befriend my brother. If you don't you're missing out.)

If you have a weak heart, or just don't particularly enjoy gracing your eyes with butts - or giraffes for that matter, but(t) I suppose that's not the main point - then you should do yourself a favour and skip this one. Day 9. This day was a crazy one. A lovely friend of mine suggested drawing a giraffe, and since I was taking suggestions from folks, I really couldn't say no... I did commit an atrocious crime though I shall admit. Giraffe's aren't normally so fat, in case you don't visit the zoo very often and need a refresher. But(t) if you're gonna draw a booty, no harm drawing it extra round and wide right? (P.s. have you noticed my kinda rainbow colours going on?)

On Day 10, I redeemed myself and proved my less-than-questionable taste in friends a little by taking a suggestion from a much much more sensible buddy. To this day, I still really like this piece! Shouldn't all otters naturally exist in such lovely lilac and blue hues? And gosh are they shiny. See, not all my acquaintances are off their rockers. Some have pretty good taste in designing vibrantly shaded creatures. (I am also sitting here trying to pretend away the fact that I have already taken the suggestion to draw a gravestone shaped drink with two curly straws. Very specific. * regrets * ) Let's just keep looking at how shiny this otter is shall we?

Oh gosh Day 11. If you have any booty-sensitivities, give this one a pass too. Turns out, zebras should never EVER be watermelons. They work better as crossroads. Do not under any circumstances ever try to convince a zebra to pretend to be a watermelon. I still cannot believe I brought such a round, hilarious (read hideous) watermelon zebra into this world. I hope future scientists or archeologists don't find it when zebras and I are both extinct. Green and pink sounded like such a good idea... until I forgot zebra stripes look like watermelon stripes... * sigh * the problem with poor planning... MOVING ON!

Ah this one is less painful. In fact, I am quite proud of Day 12's creation. It almost makes up for the atrocities I have subjected this world to the day before. Here, is a portrait that I'm reallyyyy proud of. The likeness is quite striking. Except the chin. Eh, mistakes are good too, it will remind me to get the chins right in future (also, totally not editing it after I considered it "done" because I was lazy. No no, it simply would have felt like it was cheating. Yes totally not too lazy to take out all my pencils again at all) Who knew chin shapes make such a big difference? One good thing about self-portraits, as I said before, is that at least if you mess up, you only have yourself to blame, nobody else will come after you with pitchforks and demands for a refund. Bonus, you can actually tell where you messed up, because let's face it, we are all vain creatures who spend plenty more time looking at our own faces than anyone else's. In conclusion, draw more self portraits :) that is, until you get really sick of seeing your own face and start wondering if it's worth the risk to draw someone else. Oh yeah, also, this piece is my first graphite piece in this challenge, partly because colour pencils got a little boring and partly because why not? I was gonna test my new fixatives the day after anyway, so this was technically a random practice piece to use as a smudge test for the fixatives. If you're curious, yes the fixatives worked, this piece is no longer smudgy (thank you fixative creators)

Day 13... I think back fondly on this day to remember it as the first day I truly let loose and messed with my art in all ways possible. As you can probably tell, this looks like an entire horde of kindergarten kids harassed my sketchbook with their latest sticker collection. Well, that would be mostly true. Except it would only be me (and my brother and the help of a few choice stuffed toys) and the sticker collections are about a decade old (plus minus a couple years) I had a good load of fun and nostalgia though. I was contemplating whether to share this or not, or even call it art at all. But then I decided, anything can be art if I say it is, and it is very special to me so to me, it can be a work of art. Childhood memories... All the stickers I have unceremoniously horded. But I mean, who didn't have a sticker hogging stage anyway? No shame! This is me in all it's kiddy essence, you're welcome world for the view into my childhood universe.

Anddddd we actually made it to the last day of the second week! Yayyyyy * applauds for myself politely from this side of the screen * Day 14 (what pleasure to see this number getting bigger so steadily) Here would be the start of my other animal obsession I have not gotten over. Hedgehogs!!! They are so floofy underneath. Ok clearly, I am an insensible animal lover, but hey, when you're drawing lots of them for over a week, you can't really help it. My Christmas list now has platypups and hedgehogs on it. Not that the list exist, just saying. Still, this one was a little challenging. The spikes obstinately refuse to be anything but decidedly not spikey and the fur stubbornly stand their ground at being a darker shade of white than they were supposed to be, but still. At least it didn't turn out like a durian! (My dear brother, that was not meant to be a jab at you, honest. But did you really have to let me pick such a difficult creature to draw? You should have stopped me, but its too late now XD)

Et voila! We made it!! What a breeze! I'll admit, some days, I really do find myself at a loss (aka "Why do I feel like I've drawn everything that I could possibly draw?" aka "My brain cells are imploding with animal images" aka "Why aren't there more cutesy animals to draw?") but eh, getting suggestions from random people actually do help me feel more inspired and ultimately come up with pretty cool pieces. They don't feel entirely like my creation or "art" art kinda art, if you know what I mean, but maybe all artists don't always feel like they are creating masterpieces. It doesn't make these drawings any less valuable (even if they are technically not drawings or paintings) It's all in good fun and I suppose that's the beauty of it all. Why else do we create amirite? Come forth Week 3, I am not afraid! (in fact, I have already defeated half of you and it's gonna be in a pretty enjoyable way too) Actually, by the time I'm posting this, it's aloha week 4 (and a half) :') Till then! (hopefully soon)

Love, Cuix