I adore dwarf pufferfish, Carinotetraodon travancoricus. They are the only true fresh water puffers and the smallest, at only one and a half inches long at the most.
The look one of these little firecrackers can deliver is stunning like nothing else! They are intensely curious, totally aware of everything around them. Their eyes can move independently from each other, like a chameleon’s, and they hover in the water ever so precisely, like little sci-fi spacecraft.
Or like hummingbirds sipping nectar from flowers.
In this piece, I wanted to convey the dwarf pufferfish as fairy creatures. They are tiny bright sparks of awareness patrolling their environment – and they see you!
I’m using the crayons to make soft shadows and sharp light, keeping the colors very vivid.
Sadly, dwarf puffers are becoming rare in their wild habitat in Kerala, Southwestern India. Breeding these little guys in captivity is a great alternative to wild caught so we can enjoy them in our homes as well as keep their wild population safe.
One year for my birthday, which I share with my twin sister, our dear friend gave us a little black and red fish in a bowl. We named him Dragon. He was full of spunk and curiosity, always coming over to peer at us through the glass. I was quickly smitten and began to research all I could about this little life form given into our care.
Dragon was a betta splendens, one of the species of the gourami family of tropical fresh water fish. He deserved a bigger tank, a filter, and a heater, which we gave him. He thrived with us for nearly three years.
That was the start of my obsession with aquarium keeping. Even though my research has taken me from pea puffer fish to African cichlids to panther groupers and beyond, bettas hold a very special place in my heart.
I am very excited to have another one in my life — my twin is gifting me one very soon!
To celebrate these fish, I am trying to capture a little of their beauty and striking personalities in my artwork. I’ve been working with Crayola crayons, which is tremendously fun. It’s challenging to get the crayons to blend smoothly and ever so gratifying when I can manage to get a transparency effect. The colors are so bright and bold!
Red Betta, Crayola crayons.
This is a continuation of my crayon portraits of betta fish. Click Fish to see the other pieces.
I made a drawing of a train for my dad’s birthday card this year. He loves trains.
This is the drawing, which I made using crayons. I’m really enjoying figuring out how to layer the colors and make “misty” effects with these Crayolas. So much fun!
Here is the card design which I made in Photoshop, with helpful input from my husband. He has excellent ideas! And his wonderful head is full of puns, so those all went on the inside of the card.
I made these series of drawings as birthday gifts to my sisters and my good friend. They all appreciate out of the ordinary arty things, so I just drew what I felt like drawing. I made slight alterations in Photoshop to give them texture and color.
My beloved’s favorite family of animal is corvidae, which includes crows and ravens. They are phenomenally clever and also have a delightful sense of humor… Traits that my beloved possesses in abundance himself.
His intelligence, playfulness, and graceful strength always makes me think of another animal that I adore — the orca.
Ever since I met him in 2015, I could get lost in the windswept energy of the lively, free-spirited, force of nature that is Nick. I tried to capture a little of this feeling in my artwork and I ended up making this series of drawings for him as gifts each year.
This was the first one that I drew for him. I drew it in my sketchbook leading up to the first time we met in person (we corresponded through email for the first couple months of our courtship). He loved it and put it up in his bedroom.
For Nick, pencil in sketchbook
The second one I drew for his birthday in 2016. We were now officially a couple and we were overjoyed! I used charcoal so I could get the darks very dark.
The Joy of Us charcoal on pastel paper
This year I drew one entirely with crayons. I really wanted to create something bold and surprising!
Out of the Mist, crayons on watercolor paper
Green happens to be his favorite color so I added hints of green here and there, but it’s a fun change to make pieces almost entirely in gray scale. I plan to continue adding more in this series in the years to come.
It’s finally October and that means: Halloween! It’s my favorite holiday. The eeriness, the fall colors, that chill in the wind, the suspenseful feeling of something about to happen, the candy… I love it!
One of my favorite things to do to celebrate Halloween is make a bookmark with a spooky theme. Reading scary stories in the fall evenings, all wrapped up in a cozy blanket, is one of the best things! And matching a bookmark to the mood is fiendishly fun!
Crayola crayons again. They are wonderful! The brightness of the colors are fantastic! I get a thrill from the challenge of getting these to blend and fade as smoothly as I can. I wanted the vibrant fall leaves to pop forward from a subtle gray leaves/cobwebby background, all within which the glorious spider suspends on her thread!
I hope you all enjoy these and have a spooky Halloween!
I made an oil pastel portrait of my mother-in-law’s cat, Peaches, for her birthday back before I was married to her son. I knew the cat was very near and dear to her heart and although the cat had passed over the rainbow bridge many years ago and I didn’t have the blessing of meeting her, my work gave me a special closeness to her. Looking into those majestic eyes, pouring over the photo references my husband — then boyfriend — smuggled to me, I felt like I had spent considerable time in her watchful presence.
My mother-in-law loves the portrait and hung it in her living room where Peaches can gaze down on everything, like a queen surveying her domain.
Pink carnations are my mother-in-law’s favorite flower.
Peaches oil pastel, 24 in. x 18 in. 2016
I used Sennelier oil pastels for this piece. They are a joy to work with! They glide on so smoothly and blend by the simple act of drawing a stroke on top of another. It’s almost like using oil paints, my favorite medium for two dimensional work. The only difficulty I have with them is getting the end of the stick sharp enough for getting those tiny lines for the fur and whiskers.
At the end of January 2017, I married my biggest cheerleader, Nick. He is the love of my life. He’s also my favorite art subject.
My Nick, oil pastel
This was the most fun I’d ever had making a portrait! It doesn’t quite capture his magic, but even just that tiny bit there in the pastel strokes makes me gaze and gaze at it… Attempting to capture him is the labor of love I am going to relish for the rest of my life! Expect to see more of this guy around here. ^_^
I knew our wedding would be unique. We chose snails and succulents as our theme and it was even more otherworldly than I could have imagined! My family and friends helped tremendously to pull off the most beautifully breath-taking wedding I’ve ever seen. Shout out to my incredibly talented and dear friend, Valkyrie Johnson, who made the gorgeous bouquets and boutonnieres.
Photo by Pamela Palma
All my wonderful bridesmaids helped make colorful paper snails for table decorations. Both my mother and my mother-in-law made cakes. My mother also made my dress, which was so perfectly “me” it’s hard to believe it wasn’t done with fairy magic.
Nick’s music, the first song he ever wrote for me, accompanied me down the aisle. Absolute magic. You can listen to the song by clicking on the title here: A Golden Spiral.
Not only was our wedding beautiful, it was unique and just a bit quirky. The perfect blend of elegance and oddity.
I made personalized snonkeys to go on the scrumptious purple cake my mother baked and which my friend, Priscilla, decorated with modeling chocolate succulents (she’s amazing! She seriously should consider a profession in cake decorating).
Straights’ Snonkey Cake Topper, 2017
I made the invitations myself and had them printed at moo.com as postcards (I highly recommend their printing services). I loved using postcards because I could make a full drawing on the back in addition to the smaller images on the front next to the invitation text.
I drew each image with crayons, scanned them, then made up the designs in Photoshop.
Snail and Succulent Wedding Invitations, Crayola crayons 2017
Here’s a closeup where you can see that funny crayon texture:
Snail and Succulent Wedding Invitations – Detail
And I was able to print a custom sticker at moo.com that sealed the envelopes!
Snail Succulent Sticker, Crayola crayons 2017
After the wedding, I made thank you postcards to continue the theme. Again, I used crayons and had them printed at moo.com
Snail and Succulent Thank You postcards, Crayola crayons 2017
I would like to again thank everyone who helped make our wedding so beautiful. It was a perfect day and I cherish the memories that flood back every time I think of it. Thank you!
And a thank you to anyone reading this. I am so grateful to share all these wonderful things with you! My art is the joy of my life and using it to celebrate the day I united with the man I love is truly blissful.
Here is the card design which I made in Photoshop, with helpful input from my husband. He has excellent ideas! And his wonderful head is full of puns, so those all went on the inside of the card.
Familiar Oddlings 