I smell Bird Seed! ATC – 2.5″ x 3.5″ Watercolor ans Sharpie

“The important thing is not to stop questioning. Curiosity has its own reason for existing.”
– Albert Einstein

Copyright Beth Parker Art 2012

I smell Bird Seed!  ATC – 2.5″ x 3.5″ Watercolor ans Sharpie

I didn’t have anything new to show you today, so I grabbled a little squirrel from an ATC swap I was in a while back.

I’ve already been out putting graphics on a Semi.  It’s smouldering hot, so any outside jobs have to be done before 8:30 am.  I have done one outside job every morning this week.  Next week promises to be just as hot.

My heart goes out to the people in Colorado, Utah and Florida.  Fires and floods are so awful!  There are fires in Utah that are getting very close to Delta, the town I went to high school in.  They have already evacuated the nearby town of Oak City.   We used to camp out in the Oak City canyon when I was young.  I hope everybody will be okay.  I still have very good friends there and they are pretty scared.  I also lived in Denver and Alamosa, Colorado when I was a kid, so the fires are all around my old neck of the woods.  Be safe out there!

About Albert Einstein

The brilliant physicist Albert Einstein became an international icon for his groundbreaking theory of relativity. He was born in Germany in 1879 and began his seminal work while at the Swiss Patent Office. He later fled the Nazi regime, moving to the United States to teach at Princeton. In 1921, he won the Nobel Prize. He declined Israel’s invitation to become its president, saying he lacked the necessary people skills. He died in 1955.

It’s so Hot at these Heights! – 3″ x 4″ Inktense and Sharpie

There are many ways of breaking a heart. Stories were full of hearts broken by love, but what really broke a heart was taking away its dream – whatever that dream might be.
–Pearl S. Buck

Copyright Beth Parker Art 2012

It’s so Hot at these Heights!  – 3″ x 4″ Inktense and Sharpie

The word of the week at Illustration Friday is Heights.  Susan (Surob) at WetCanvas posted a photo of a squirrel, all sprawled out trying to cool off on a hot day.  I thought it was perfect for this week’s theme.  Check back tomorrow for another one.

Are you wondering what Inktense is?  Inktense pencils are like watercolor pencils, except the color is very intense and after it is dry, it’s permanent, like ink.  Here is a photo with part of the sky still in the pencil form.

Copyright Beth Parker Art 2012

Today is the 20th anniversary of Signs by Beth, LLC!  I can’t believe I’ve had my sign shop for 20 years.  I should be celebrating somehow.  Can’t celebrate with the hubby because he has been wanting me to retire for the last 10 years.  My business is the thing that keeps me away from him.  I can see what he means, but it’s still something to be proud of.  WoooHooo!  There!  Celebrated. 

Heights - Illustration Friday

I had to post the photo again, because when Facebook picks this up, sometimes it posts the last photo and I didn’t want the half done sky to show up on Facebook. 

Pearl Comfort Sydenstricker was born on June 26, 1892, in Hillsboro, West Virginia. Her parents, Absalom and Caroline Sydenstricker, were Southern Presbyterian missionaries, stationed in China. Pearl was the fourth of seven children (and one of only three who would survive to adulthood). She was born when her parents were near the end of a furlough in the United States; when she was three months old, she was taken back to China, where she spent most of the first forty years of her life.

In 1910, Pearl enrolled in Randolph-Macon Woman’s College, in Lynchburg, Virginia, from which she graduated in 1914. Although she had intended to remain in the US, she returned to China shortly after graduation when she received word that her mother was gravely ill. In 1915, she met a young Cornell graduate, an agricultural economist named John Lossing Buck. They married in 1917, and immediately moved to Nanhsuchou (Nanxuzhou) in rural Anhwei (Anhui) province. In this impoverished community, Pearl Buck gathered the material that she would later use in The Good Earth and other stories of China.
More on Pearl S. Buck can be found here.

I Smell Birdseed!

“A day of worry is more exhausting than a week of work.”
– John Lubbock



I Smell Birdseed! – 2.5″ x 3.5″ Watercolor ATC

“I’m Sigbert the Squirrel.  The thing I like best about spring is BIRD SEED!  I smell BIRD SEED!!  Where’s the BIRD SEED?  Sorry about all the shouting.”

This little ATC went to Sue in Australia.

About John Lubbock

John Lubbock, the multifaceted British banker, statesman, and scientist, was responsible for the institution of England’s monthly Bank Holidays, sometimes referred to as St. Lubbock Days. He was born in 1834 in England. Growing up, he learned science from his father’s friend Charles Darwin. He coined the terms Paleolithic and Neolithic to denote the different Stone Ages, and he wrote the well-regarded books Prehistoric Times and Ants, Bees, and Wasps. He died in 1913.

Squirrel Eats the Pigeon’s Lunch

“The golden opportunity you are seeking is in yourself. It is not in your environment, it is not in luck or chance, or the help of others; it is in yourself alone.”
– Orison Swett Marden

 

Squirrel Eats the Pigeon’s Lunch
4″ x 6″ Watercolor on Indian Village handmade paper

I loved this reference photo.  There really was a pigeon in it, watching the squirrel eat.  Of course, they we both kinda gray, so I had a little fun with them.  The background was a big tree trunk, so I sent them on an adventure in the country.  Isn’t art fun?  We can do anything our little hearts desire….. and get away with it! 




I just wanted to show you a little bit of history.  This Tastee Freez has been open in Eufaula, since 1956.  I just lettered the windows this morning and it got me wondering about the history, so  I called City Hall to get the date it opened.  Of course, in a couple weeks it will open up as Just ‘Wingin” It, but I am proud that nobody has had the nerve to remove the nostalgic Tastee Freez sign.  Our little town wouldn’t be the same without it.

About Orison Swett Marden

Orison Swett Marden, the American writer who is considered the forerunner of motivational authors, wrote an average of two books a year from 1894 to 1924. He was born on a New England farm in 1850. During college, he worked in hotel management. He then used his seed money to buy a resort in Rhode Island. Wanting to inspire people as he himself had been inspired by British author Samuel Smiles, he began writing books like You Can, But Will You? and founded Success Magazine. He died in 1924.