How about Mario driving...

How about Mario driving...

"Do you want to do all the detail?" he asked after he picked a pretty complex scene of Mario driving. "You don't have to if you don't want to." He went on, "You just have to draw the road and the water. You don't have to do the mountains."

I was up for the challenge today. We hadn't spent much time drawing scenes and I was interested in doing this one. I went ahead and drew the road, the water, the mountains, Mario, and Pac-Man. I spent a lot of time on this one and enjoyed the process.

When he saw it he asked, "You only drew these two?" Although he was correct that I had omitted the other drivers from the original, I was a bit stunned by the response. I brushed the negative feelings off quickly. He moved on too.

"Where's my name daddy?" (I love it when he calls me daddy.) I didn't answer, allowing his eyes the time to scan the drawing. He found it and noticed the "V" on Pac-Man's kart too. Victor Karts. What a fun game that would be!

Maybe rocks with penguins on it and water...

Maybe rocks with penguins on it and water...

That's the kind of guidance I get sometimes. I can't say that I'm nervous anymore hearing these general requests. But it's still quite a challenge to find something I think I can draw and then do a decent job of drawing it. As I've mentioned before, I don't really consider myself an artist. I'm simply copying a reference drawing or photo. It may sound cheesy, but I truly do believe that I can do anything well if I believe in myself. Practice helps too.

I wasn't sure this one was going to turn out well. Sometimes when I get started, its not clear how it's going to take shape or if it will ultimately look like what I set out to draw. The reference drawing was a good one so that helped me today.

"You're the best drawer in the whole world," he declared. "You know why you're the best drawer in the world? Because you tell yourself, 'Alan you can do it.'"

I can only hope that he learns to do the same for himself each and every day.

How about if my name is going down a drain...

How about if my name is going down a drain...

He woke up early this morning which means I had more time to get things ready. I had in mind to do something more creative with his sack today, but I didn't know what. I asked him if he had any ideas.

"How about if my name is going down a drain," he said. That really blew me away. "What a fantastically creative idea," I thought, "What if his name did go down a drain? What might that look like?" I immediately had a picture of it in my head and the project took on a whole new turn.

Why just write his name if I could draw something where his name was a part of the picture? What a cool idea! I loved that he came up with it on his own. I'm not an artist and my entire bit of art training comes from my 8th grade art teacher. I was a little nervous to draw something, especially with a Sharpie, but I figured what the hell. I know the perspective isn't quite right, but I really liked the way this turned out and so did Victor. He thought it was cool how his letters are depicted.

"Tomorrow," he said, "I want my name on a hat!" This project just got more interesting.

The Daily Snack Sack Project Begins

The Daily Snack Sack Project Begins

My 6 year old son Victor has quite simply made me a better person.

I take him to school every day and my morning walk with him is the highlight of my day. Our morning conversations are extremely fun too. He often wakes up chatty and full of thoughts.

Part of the daily routine is packing his lunch. He started kindergarten this year and the rules are that a morning snack has to be packed separate. For some reason it didn't occur to me to use a reusable bag for his snack like I do for his lunch.

I bought a stack of 100 classic brown paper lunch sacks from the local grocery store. I hadn't seen these things since I took lunch to school 30 years ago. Of course, his name goes on the bag and like most parents I wrote his name on the bag in basic print every morning. After a few weeks of this, it felt a bit dull to simply put his name on the bag in the same basic print so I began to think of new ways to write his name. I started with embellishing basic print techniques, creating different variations of block letters to spell his name. After a few days of this I decided to make it a daily project. I would challenge myself to come up with a unique way to print his name on his sack each and very morning.

This is perhaps the 20th bag I had done. I felt creative here using a bit more than just block letters, exploring the idea of incorporating some art work in with the letters. Here the letters are floating above and below the water and I drew on both sides of the bag. I didn't tell him I was going to do this and didn't even ask his opinion. When he noticed it, he didn't get the effect at first. It's not very good and I didn't do much to make the "water" look realistic. But he liked it and I knew the coming days would yield something new and interesting every day.