About a month ago I wrote about a children’s workshop with Maya Bisineer of Memetales.com that we co-designed. In a nutshell, her website is a platform that supports downloadable kid’s books (I hope they’ll make a template for an iPad app!) and has the potential to offer supporting materials like crafts, games, and activities as well as fun merchandise.  Adults can even easily use the site to compile children’s work into a book.  What a great way to showcase their efforts- and yours!

Memetales certainly is developing into a great resource  for  teachers and parents and children’s authors/illustrators like myself, who want to distribute materials in addition to traditionally published books. Currently there are no StickFiggy items for sale here, but I’ll be sure to let you know if things change. In the meantime, it was great to do a little teaching and drawing with local children. The kids seem to get the idea of StickFiggy really fast and they don’t seem to mind at all that he doesn’t have the traditional eyes-nose-mouth. It is so funny to watch them get excited about “finding” him in the drawings! So take a peek at what our Grins & Frowns workshop is all about!

Enjoy that? You can also see the new video made from the Bedtime for StickFiggy comic!

Poll for Bedtime for StickFiggy: do you like…?

(a) more words to the story.

(b) the amount of text is about right.

(c) I don’t like to read at all.

Feel welcome to share your opinion by adding a comment or emailing!

THANKS!

Jane

StickFiggy pure & simple

Sketching is talked about in art classes and schools like it is the end-all-be-all. I really resisted it for a long time. But…it turns out to be not only important, but often the really fun part.

Sketching is the time when you don’t have to deliver the perfect performance. It is not exactly a rehearsal, as you might not even know what you will be doing. It is more  the dreaming and playing part. To me, it is the chance to get back to what it is like to be creative as a child. You just do it. And you CAN do it because your hopes and dreams ARE NOT dependent upon your creation. Whew- the freedom! How ironic that by letting go of creating “worthy” work, we can actually access that magical ability to just 1/2 will 1/2 watch something into being. By being really IN the imagination, an artist who sketches actually feels that they ARE their characters, or that their characters ARE real and just need you to help then get a form that others can see. Otherwise, in the non-sketch mode, it is easy to feel totally mechanical and disenchanted.

Do sketch and do use the morning! Thanks to the book The Artist’s Way!!!! For those of you who have read it, that practice of morning pages is how I got sketching again!

FOR THE CHILDREN –  A SPECIAL NOTE TO PARENTS, TEACHERS, BABYSITTERS ETC.

If you observe children and see how they engage with art and sort of space out- cherish this and let them know that  what they are doing is important. Even if the dog they drew looks like a log, if you saw them focus, praise it. They probably are seeing so much more in their picture anyway.

If they weren’t really engaged, well, then it is less vital and they know you shouldn’t be framing it up anytime soon. Don’t worry, they know….I know they know because I remember knowing!

Please pardon the few blurry ones as it was my first go with SlideShare.