Kat Greene Comes Clean

Many moons ago, on a whim, I decided to take an extension course on children’s book writing headed by one Isabelle Holland (the author behind the book version of Mel Gibson’s “Man Without a Face.” She had observed that Mel had been a somewhat difficult human being and that was years before he lost it and showed his true colors to the world). These weekly classes had been a highlight of that year for me: I had been at my most creative, came up with some great ideas, realized I was a better illustrator than writer, and met one of my favorite people in the world there.

There are always people in my life that came and went, some quietly, some not so much. I am grateful that Melissa remained constant in my life no matter where I am. It may have to do with a special bond we have because she named her daughter after a character in a story I wrote for class!

The point I want to make here is very important. There are about a dozen of us enrolled in that writing course that semester, and out of the dozen or so that I am aware of, Melissa was most likely the only one who persisted in her craft long after the class ended and never gave up because…she is now a published author! I was so immensely happy for her and was honored to be let in on what went on behind the scenes and boy, the road to success is not easy at all. It goes to show that if you want something badly enough and work hard at it, you WILL get what you want! Melissa worked hard, and the fruits of her labors are now prominently displayed in bookstores everywhere (including the library right here in Oz!!).

I cannot stress how proud I am of my friend, how impressed I am of her talent, how grateful I am of her friendship, how she always manages to buoy my spirits with her sense of humor, and last but not least, how thankful I am of her support in every aspect of my life. She’s the one who kept in constant touch with me, the wandering gypsy both spiritually and physically, and I love her all the more for that.

I am now in danger of being a blubbery mess, so here’s to you, fabulous Ms. M!

Melissa’s book “Kat Greene Comes Clean” deals with a subject matter near and dear to my heart. Kat had several problems to face, one of which was her mother’s OCD and after it had gotten out of control, she learned that it was okay to ask for help. My own mother had a mild case of it and even though it hadn’t impacted my life too severely growing up, it did make me hyper aware of germs and contamination and it was not a good trait to have when I lived in the Big Apple and worked in a building filled with children who were constantly ill. I was pleased to see someone had addressed this issue in a book because I thought I had been the only person growing up who had to cope with something I hadn’t realized then was a form of clinical disorder. My best friend from way back had only recently admitted to me that my house always smelled like Lysol and bleach, which just goes to show how out of control a problem can get when someone remembers it years and years after.

“Kat Greene Comes Clean” is filled with heart and humor and it absolutely showcases Melissa’s sharp wit and unapologetic observation of life through a child’s eyes. I absolutely recommend this book!

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1580897762/ref=dbs_a_def_rwt_bibl_vppi_i0

 

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My Neighbor Totoro

I’ve done a few Miyazaki based animation characters in the past, but none is as fun as this Totoro set. The idea came about when I received a set of very round dolls several years ago and had every intention of making a set, complete with some Easter egg surprises. But like everything else, life took over and I’ve only just gotten around to making this set. It took a while to hunt down some itty bitty eyes for the Soot Sprites and figuring out the right kind of clay to use to make konpeitō, the little sugar candies Soot Sprites eat. It all came together in the end and here they are!

The problem with making the konpeitō is that they are so darn small! I haven’t had or seen one in years but I’m pretty sure the real ones are a lot larger than what would fit into the last doll. But I managed to find a pair of tweezers with an odd bend that did the trick after several failed attempts! If at first you don’t succeed…look for the right tool that’ll get the job done!

Pee Wee’s Big Adventure

I have to admit I was a more than a little disappointed when the Pee Wee’s Big Adventure project was proposed but I wouldn’t get the go-ahead for some time yet. Pee Wee’s Big Adventure was one of my favorite movies growing up. I think my brother and I wore the video tape out by rewinding the Large Marge scene at least a hundred times per viewing. This was also the movie that, when we were adults, shown to my brother’s potential girlfriend/future wife, we determined that she’s not the right one for him because she’d spent the majority of the movie declaring that she didn’t “get it.” I suppose my brother could not picture a life with someone he’d have to explain Pee Wee Herman to so that relationship had dissolved shortly after the viewing of the film.

Fortunately for me, and possibly even more so for the husband of the man who had proposed this set in the first place, a husband who is once again, high up on the BoBo Babushka leader board (he’s won it once before only to be knocked down by his husband shortly thereafter), covertly contacted me and gave me the go-ahead. It took a while to paint this set because, as always, I had a pile of projects to tackle first. I always ended my long painting day with this set because it just brought me so much joy, as the movie(s) and the TV shows did once upon a time.

I could not stop giggling when Roadblock Drag Pee Wee’s face emerged. That had been my favorite scene in the movie.

The Hubs was away on a month-long mountain bike riding holiday when I was working on this set and because there’s no one there to make sure I take care of myself, I often worked into the wee hours of the morning and discovered something important about myself. I am not meant to be a functioning human being before dinner time! I do my best work after 9 PM. So it was at 2 AM when I realized I needed to add one of the most important elements of the movie in the piece, and that was Pee Wee’s bicycle. I didn’t finish until 5 AM, but man, I doubt I can be that focused to paint this tiny bike at any other hour of the day/night!

Merry Christmas, Craig and Scott! You guys will always be Husbands of the Year in my book!

Bob’s Burgers Halloween Edition

…and Halloween mania carries on! I have recently finished a rather large and really fun horror-themed set and (which will be revealed on and around this most excellent pagan holiday of all time) and, just for fun (and also I have this set of dolls that was the perfect fit for this project), I painted Bob Belcher and his family in costume. Due to the considerable rotundness of this set, I settled on the Halloween costumes the family wore on the episode “Full Bars.”

Here we have Bob in a fat suit, Linda as a mermaid, Tina as the Mommy Mummy, Gene as Queen Latifah in her U.N.I.T.Y phase, and itty bitty Louise as Edward Scissorhands.

Just how itty bitt is Louise?

This big!

 

I thought it would be fun to include the ghost of Francine the Guinea Pig after Bob’s sat on her.

 

KiKi’s Delivery Service

My mother came home from her grocery/video rental run and handed me KiKi’s Delivery Service one day when I was home from college and told me I’d really like it. I had no reason to disbelieve her. As different as mother and I are, she knows me. “The animator is quite celebrated in Japan,” she said and left me to it. Little did I know then that Kiki’s Delivery Service was going to change my worldview completely.

The sweeping landscapes, the storytelling, the insane attention to detail made me a lifelong fan of Hayao Miyazaki and his associates. In the movie the little witch lost her inspiration and found it again when her services was needed. It was inspiring for a young artist like myself and, after I eventually got my own copy, I’d plonk it into the VCR whenever I felt a bit lost in the big wide world of illustration.

This set had been brewing in my mind for years, ever since I found out one of my good friend has named his daughter Kiki after the titular character. It was meant to be a hey-you-have-a-baby present but I felt the timing is a bit off now since the child is currently at pre-school age. Still, it’s something that needs to be done so I spent a bit of time each night working on it. I had hoped the magic had transferred from film into this set while I worked on it. It must’ve done since, weirdly enough, the main doll smelled oddly of baked bread.

As a little “Easter Egg” surprise, I made a broomstick and a radio to pop into the JiJi doll.

The Baby-Sitters Club

As long as we’re on the subject of childhood nostalgia, this one had been rolling around in the back of my mind for a long time now, compounded by the fact that I start each work day listening to the most excellent podcast by two guys discussing the finer points of one of my favorite childhood guilty pleasures: The Baby-Sitters Club books. I didn’t like the movie or the TV series at all, but I was the right age when the first books came out and it was a real treat because the girls in the books were so relatable and most importantly, they were focused and business oriented, something my peers certainly were not. At the time I had to make a decision as to whether or not to enroll into LaGuardia High School for music or Art and Design for art, a choice I knew would dictate my future and I had no one my age to discuss this really important decision I had to make because their futures were more fluid than mine. I felt that the BSC books, especially the character of Claudia Kishi had made me realize that it was okay to know exactly what you want out of life even at the tender age of 13. Looking back, I realized I did make the right decision because, let’s face it, I’d be a pretty mediocre pianist. And unemployed.

I’ve stopped reading the books after I went to high school, which meant I didn’t know who Abby was nor did I realize that Mary Anne had a drastic makeover, or that Stacey McGill’s splashy tropical themed fashion morphed into urban sophisticate. The outfits on this set are based on the earlier versions of the girls in the series.

The first doll is of course Kristy Thomas the founder and president of the BSC clad in her Kristy’s Krushers uniform rather than her other notable ensemble of turtleneck, sweater and jeans. I refused to read “Kristy and the Snobs” the second time because it told the tale of the death of her dog Louie and reading it the first time made me bawl like a baby.

My nine-year old niece and I agreed that Claudia is our favorite because of her artistic skills, creative dressing style, and a penchant for junk food and mysteries. This outfit is straight out of this description from “Claudia and the Phantom Phone Calls” BSC book #2:

I’m [Claudia] wearing purple pants that stop just below my knees and are held up with suspenders, white tights with clocks on them, a purple-plaid shirt with a matching hat, my hightop sneakers, and lobster earrings. Clothes like these are my trademark.

Since I stopped reading the series before Stacey’s style became sophisticated, I compromised by painting her outfit a “New York Black.” This outfit is taken from the description from “Kristy’s Great Idea” (BSC book #1)

Stacey [McGill] had on a pink sweatshirt with sequins and a large purple parrot on the front; short, tight-fitting jeans with zippers up the outsides of the legs; and pink plastic shoes.

Mary Anne’s first makeover consisted of her getting rid of her braids, but in “Logan Likes Mary Anne!” BSC book #10 she got permission to buy a new outfit for her first ever school dance with the titular Logan Bruno and this was the ensemble, with the help of Claudia the fashion maven, that was described:

Then Claudia handed me [Mary Anne] a full white skirt with the words Paris, Rome, and London, and sketchy pink and blue pictures of the Eiffel Tower, the Tower Bridge and other stuff scrawled all over it. She matched it up with a pink shirt and a baggy pink sweater. I would never, ever have tried on that skirt, but with the shirt and sweater it looked really cool. In the shoe department we found white slip-ons with pink and blue edging that matched the pink and blue in the skirt.

Dawn’s outfit as described in “Mallory and the Trouble with Twins” BSC book #21:

Dawn was wearing this cool oversized (really oversized) blue shirt. One of the coolest things about it was that it was green inside, so that when she turned the collar down and rolled the sleeves up, you could see these nice touches of green at her neck and wrists. She was wearing a green skirt – and clogs. I’d never seen a person actually wearing clogs, just photos of people in Sweden.

Jessi’s outfit, also from book #21:

Jessi and I looked dull, dull, dull. We were both wearing jeans. Jessi was wearing a T-shirt that said You are looking at perfection. And she was wearing running shoes.

Mallory’s outfit from “Hello Mallory!” book #14:

I threw on a pair of jeans, a sweatshirt that said I’D RATHER BE WRITING MY NOVEL, and a pair of sneakers.

This was a fun one to paint and certainly took me on a long hard stroll down my formative years. Every now and then I would catch myself wondering what had happened to these girls since we’d be roughly around the same age, but then I’d have to remind myself that they’re fictional characters.

Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious

Growing up, I thought Mary Poppins was the most magical movie I’ve ever seen. I didn’t exactly have a nanny, but I did have a baby-sitter named Ross who was in high school and had a mullet and a full beard and, upon discovering my mother used to be a piano teacher, made demo tapes of his drum solos and make her listen to it. This experience made me wish I had a magical nanny even more, especially after Ross took off on my brand new dirt bike for a test run before I even had a chance to. Looking back, he’s actually pretty awesome, but when you’re 8 and barely spoke English, you want someone like Mary to come home to after a long tough day at school with a song for every task and not an intense 20 minute drum solo on side A of a cassette tape.

Naturally, I’d want to capture a little piece of my childhood in the form of nesting dolls. Unfortunately, due to the pile and piles of projects sitting in my sweatshop at all times, I had the set boxed at the bottom of the stack for a year, then, after I got a chance to sketch it, it sat there for another year. Yet another year passed before I was able to sit down and study the hats the characters sported in Jolly Holiday and got it printed. The entire set took a shocking 3 months to paint from start to finish since I was only able to work on a tiny bit at a time. But it’s finished and tonight I will have cake to celebrate.

I’d thought originally that the toughest one to paint would be the carousel. It certainly took the longest, but I suppose, after a full day of painting, I daresay I was on autopilot and can’t really remember the entire process!

A Belated Christmas Present

Due to a huge amount of projects scheduled, bad Auntie Ms. Irene wasn’t able to send my niece and nephew their Christmas presents until January. Yes, they call me Auntie Ms. Irene. I feel bad, but I was told their Christmas tree was laden with presents enough to ease their pain from Auntie Ms. Irene’s seemingly callous neglect. I painted the two of them at their current age and added little trinkets to symbolize some of their milestones that year.

It’s somewhat bittersweet to learn that my niece has outgrown her Disney Princess/Frozen obsession and her favorite color is no longer pink but black. My nephew has joined a soccer team and has been tasked with the job of a goalie. Together they’d moved to a new house, something I was able to identify with when I was their age. Merry Christmas, kids!

Girl Power

There’s one good thing I like about the newer Disney princesses. They’re misfits and strong-willed, they kick butts, and they get things done. After being snottily told by my downstairs neighbor that I was weird, I feel like I have a few things in common with some of these princesses. If I’m not weird, I wouldn’t be who I am, would I?

This collection of Disney Princesses is for a little girl turning four. I sincerely hope she will see beyond the pretty outfits and gleaming castles and learn to be just as fierce and independent as these ladies!

The Goonies

How’s this for a 80’s nostalgia? The Goonies!

This set features Sloth, Chunk, Data, Mouth, and Mikey. Boy, painting this set brought me back. My childhood was all about biking all around town and getting into all sorts of trouble. Even though I grew up in Flushing Queens, there’s the Fresh Meadows Park nearby that kind of gives the illusion of being in the wild if you ignore the traffic noise and the diesel fumes while you’re pretending to hunt of prehistoric animals or treasures in there. It was as good a childhood as one could get growing up in New York City. Years later, when I was teaching kindergarten in Manhattan, I was shocked and sadden to find that one of my favorite kids didn’t know what a forest was. Luckily in second grade they’re taken on field trips to Alley Pond Park, which was also near where I grew up so I was mollified.