#7QT: Reading, Writing, and Drawing

-- one --

Everybody not going to Edel, stand up and say "hey-oh!"

That's it?  Really?!

As for the rest of you, OMG, have fun for us!  I'm so jealous.  Charleston!  (Any other Southern Charmed fans out there?)

-- two --

We finished listening to {Little House on the Prairie} and are now on to {The Sword in the Stone}.  This is a mad favorite of mine, since I am an Arthurian enthusiast.  But it stands on its own as a pristine piece of literature for the ages.

I'm not going to be homeschooling any time soon, at least not Afon, but this book would be ideal as both a model and a tool for home education.  "Eduction is experience, and the essence of experience is self-reliance" says Merlin.  Wow.  Just think about that for a minute.

And White's knowledge of natural sciences is so thorough and the opposite of boring.  I mean, I liked Biology in high school, but man, if Merlin were teaching it, I might not have gone on the English major track after all, that's how good it is!

White's insights as an Arthurian scholar are really profound as well.  And if you like folklore and fairy tales, you'll not get a better explanation of what fairies are than out of the mouth of Robin Wood in The Sword in the Stone.

This was my professor's copy of Malory when he was in school at Oxford.  It's one of my most prized possessions!

-- three --

I hope that if you are here, you know Tolkien wrote much, much more than the stories of Middle Earth, though no little can be said for the masterpiece that is The Lord of the Rings.  But did you know he was also a talented illustrator?

I've found that people were much better at drawing before the age of television and modern entertainments.  I think it was just natural for the childhood era of drawing to extend further into adolescence and beyond because there weren't as many distractions.  I'm just conjecturing here.  But I've been fond of Tolkein's illustrations ever since purchasing a book that document some of the letters from Father Christmas he wrote for his children.

Now this new book is out with new-to-me pictures that are really fascinating; they remind me of Blake's etchings, and that seems fitting, somehow.  You can read up on {Tolkien: Artist and Illustrator} {here}.

-- four --

It makes me want to start carrying a sketchbook with me everywhere.  I did it in Rome, along with my camera, and now I have a beautiful record of my four months in the Eternal City.  I'm not a great artist, but I'm very fond of the Pre-Raphaelite school and of modern Japanese manga style.

It's my own take on Alice, in Wonderland!  (Suki is my pseudonym for anything fandom.)

-- five --

It's just one more thing that needs prioritization.  While I have small children, blogging is a great channel for creativity because there is no physical product that Afon can tear up and therefore has to be carefully minded and put away out of reach.  Even when I did draw, I was terrible at filing and organization.  I usually just kept all my most recent pictures in a grubby pile by my bed with my art things and then went through them when they got to be too numerous.  I hated when anyone moved or otherwise touched these piles, too, because then I wouldn't know where to find them!

-- six --

So it's probably crazy that I've got this little {Etsy shop} selling hand-lettered quote cards and prints, but I do so enjoy it!

-- seven --

A much speedier outlet is collecting bits of inspiration and things from what I've read and jotting them downing a notebook.  This is called a {commonplace book}, and this is mine:

It's a Moleskine, of course, and Afon helped make it very pretty with some pen marks of his own.  I'd like to get some sketchbook versions of these, too.  If anyone is interested, I'd be happy to custom make them some, and we can go round Etsy.

Joining Bonnie this week for {7 Quick Takes}.