September is Coming Soon! Original Pen and Ink Illustration

I drew the above illustration for a calendar printed for Thomas Jefferson University Hospital to give to blood donors. I did the entire calendar, from cover to cover, and I will be featuring different illustrations from it. The Director of the Blood Donor Center told me that it was one of their most popular incentives and that the entire print run of 500 was completely given away during that month! They saved a copy and put it in the hospital archives, and I was stunned and delighted by the honor.

This page is for September, and I tried to capture the spirit of the month by illustrating the traditions of back-to-school (with the books and the paper lunch bag on the right) and also the start of football season, both in schools and on the professional field. I drew this with crowquill pen and ink on smooth-surface bristol board. I hope you enjoy it!

Image my original work. Click to enlarge for detail!

More of my original art:http://www.allsortsartbyali.blogspot.com/2014/12/a-portrait-of-cheetah-wonder-womans.html

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How I Knit without Knowing How to Knit

Ever since my grandma taught me how to knit when I was a little kid, I have always enjoyed knitting. However, since my grandma lived about 3,000 miles away, she only ever taught me the one stitch, and despite having purchased several books on how to knit, I still haven't been able to figure out how to knit for real--I still just kinda do that same stitch, with the sole variation of the "pulled-out" rows (in picture, above), which is actually the SAME stitch--I just do it twice on each loop.

Not only do I not know any other stitches except for the one (and cast on and cast off, of course), I also don't know how to follow patterns or make complicated shapes--I basically just make flat things. They can be long, skinny flat things called scarves, or big wide flat things called afghans.

To avoid having my knitted items be terrifically boring, as an expanse of one stitch can certainly be, I have discovered the wonderful world of specialty yarns. I use special textured yarns, variegated-color yarns, and I even cut yarn into short sections and tie the ends together, letting them hang out for a "fringe" effect. And that's how I can knit without really knowing how!

Above is a scan of one of my knitted pieces. If you look closely, you can see it's all the same stitch, but the different yarns make it look way more interesting!

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