When I Was a Kid

    When I was growing up, I doodled all the time. I was constantly drawing something. Anything. I went through Crayola markers monthly. I was always begging for new colored pencils. I adored drawing.

     I wasn't super creative about the content of my drawings, however. I began thinking last night about what I remember drawing often and I narrowed it down to only 11 subjects. I even went through my 8th grade sketchbook and found some actual proof, along with some doozies that made me question my upbringing. But it was mostly funny to see what 14-year-old me was thinking about.

     Let's start with my discovery of real music. I had grown up mostly on Christian music- not that there's anything wrong with it, DC Talk were the bomb, but sometime into my early teens I was given a Beatles CD and I was never the same. I began to branch out listening to other well-known artists, and in that search I found Sir Elton John.

    I was impossibly good at memorizing music lyrics. I always learned something better when there was a song to help me remember it. And since this was the days of CD players, and I was in school, I had to rely on my head to "listen" to the songs that I loved. The contents of my 8th grade sketch book were almost entirely drawn during my final period study hall. So most of the time I was bored. So bored that this was the result:

I don't know why. I just don't know why. 

      I had no clue back then that I would now be a graphic designer. I was just trying to deal with braces and frizzy hair. I don't know the story surrounding this next photo- all I  know is I don't think it would be a huge success. 

Who is Jared? The Subway guy? Has he been around for that long? I have so many questions. 

      I'm sure most children has their go-to scenes when their parents told them to "go color". Really you can only draw multi-colored squiggles for so long before your parents wonder what kind of brain damage you suffered and you need to move on to something better. Mine drawings came down to the following: 

Every kid drew the corner sun. Mine got squiggly lines because I liked to think UV rays were happy rays. 

It always had the hole. Always. 

Not only did I draw this flower. I think every girl I knew drew this flower. I always wanted to get every petal perfect. As you can see I don't care anymore. 

The palm tree varied over the years but it was always a constant. I might have even thrown a corner sun in there with it. 

I loved the Powerpuff Girls. A lot. I was particularly fond of Bubbles. Which is weird because I usually don't like blondes (sorry). As you can see I still have the ability to draw her likeness with astonishing realism. *note: her left eye got struck by a lazer from Mojo Jojo and she's really insecure about it so stop staring at it. 

CATS. I've always loved cats. And you almost couldn't be my friend if you didn't love them too. I always gave my cats tails with personality. This one I call Zazzles. I think you'll find he's quite zazzy. 

One trip to the Scottish Highland Games and I was obsessed with this flag. I don't think I ever drew it proportionally correct. But that didn't keep me from trying, yo. 

I have pages and pages of pillow designs. I'm not sure why I wanted to sew my own pillows, but I never learned to sew and most of them are pretty ugly. 

I was not a fan of the typical star that children drew. You know the one where it's all one continuous motion and there are lines EVERYWHERE. No that didn't fly for me. So I decided I was going to draw them the real way. Except that's actually pretty difficult. So they ended up just looking like happy stars. And I was okay with that. 

The only reason I can think drawing lots of tornados is okay is that they're relatively easy to draw. Squiggly lines galore. 

Particularly the flags hanging in my classrooms. I almost never attempted the American flag. There were too many lines and stars. But the Christian flag was perfect. I have pages and pages of these flags. They were probably the thing I drew best. 

"I pledge allegiance to the Christian flag and to the Savior for whose Kingdom it stands. One Savior, crucified, risen and coming again, for life and salvation for all who believe." 

For eleven years I said that pledge every morning. Christian school gets into your bones. In a creepy invasive way. 

I will leave you now with retarded Simba. 

What did you used to draw when you were a kid? Leave a comment! 

Amish You

       The Amish are, as my mother would say, "in vogue". There are all sorts of reality shows on television these days depicting Amish youths going wild in New York City or Amish mafia members walking angrily through a field. All are staged. Props to "The Learning Channel" for propagating lies to the American public for the sake of entertainment. In the spirit of posting a slew of pictures about currently popular trends, I thought I would feature some of the best Amish jokes the internet had to offer. Why are the Amish suddenly so popular? I haven't the foggiest.

         I have a friend who is a fan of my blog who requested I post more content because he is greedy. Since I've been out of town and haven't had time to work on much of anything, I thought I would whip up something quick to appease the masses/this one person. Josh Hostetler runs the slightly-satirical-but-never-questionable blog known as Amish Hipster. I enjoy his posts as well as our interaction on Twitter. Since I needed something to post, I'm not necessarily featuring Josh in today's post (because he's already too popular), it's more of a shout out. Winky face

So here we go...every decently funny Amish joke I could find:

The power was knocked out at my house a few weeks ago. I had to use the bathroom Amish style and a selfie was necessary to capture the moment. 

"Sorry, Pops." *deuces*

I am aware that's a picture of a Puritan...but what if it wasn't?

Double entendre alert cause dang he's got a sweaty pit. 

I especially enjoy this one because 256 is a Huntsville, AL area code. 

I hope this is legit, because this Elizabeth girl is onto something. 

         If you want more information about the Amish, you should probably go read a book because television and the internet are full of lies. Except for this blog. I am not a liar.

The Cats Are Taking Over

I've noticed something lately...

People are REALLY into cats.

More than normal.

I have proof. Below are photos screen capped from the Urban Outfitters website of cat shirts that are available for purchase. And this isn't even all of them. THERE ARE MORE THAN THIS.

Most of these are just plain ugly. I mean, I like cats, but not THAT much. I prefer shirts like this:

RAINBOW TIGER. With half his head missing :(

Note: These are only shirts from Urban Outfitters. I didn't do an image search. I didn't even bother Googling "cat shirts". I knew they would be at UO. 

I also enjoyed what my "previously viewed" turned into. 

Fake Band Covers Part 1

     More than five years ago I began playing a game with my peers. Any phrases that came out of our mouths that sounded odd were immediately deemed as a "band name". I began keeping a list of these names on my phone and to this day I have an entire list of front-and-back names at my disposal. Some of them are fantastic, others I couldn't possibly imagine the context surrounding those words being said, but they are all winners in my book.

      Being a designer I was looking for a small project that I could do on my own time to sharpen my skills. I decided having so many band names without album covers was a shame, and I got to work. I knew quickly that these would be simple, with one or two images topped with the band name. 

      Keep an eye out for the next part in this series. I have 100+ fake band names so there's no telling how many of these I'll do.