the woods are full of chickens!

Did you know that chickens like to hang out in trees? They do! If you're ever in an area with a lot of trees, keep a look out for chickens. For instance, if you were out walking in the woods, this is what you might see (but only if you're really still and quiet so the chickens get curious and come out):

That's a whole lot of chickens hanging out in the woods! Let's move in a little closer and see what they're up to. Here are a few of the chickens nestled high up in the branches: 

What do you think those chickens are up to? Hmm. Let's look down on the ground and see what a few of the other chickens are doing:

That chicken way in the back looks like it's planning and scheming. Maybe it's a good plan, like for a surprise birthday party ... or maybe it's something more nefarious! What do you think?

Last week I ran across an old sketch of chickens in the woods. When I found out the prompt for Illustration Friday this week was wood, it seemed like time to get out the paintbrushes and do something about those chickens! After all, the only thing chickens like more than hanging out in trees is having people draw and paint them.

In case you're curious to see how the art was created, here are a few pictures of the process:

Step One: Sketch

Step Two: Ink

Step Three: Colored Pencil

Step Four: Start Painting

Step Five: Final Paint And Ink Details

p.s. There's a charity auction for refugee children going on right now. There are lots of wonderful items to bid on, including my painting of several sheep reading (it comes with a copy of my book, EWE AND AYE, and a set of 8 sheep note cards). Click here to bid on the sheep reading painting. If you'd like to see the painting as it evolves, I'm blogging about the process of painting the sheep here.

unusual holidays: tree love, pigeons with cake, and cows

The last few days had even more unusual holidays to make art for!*

Saturday was Love A Tree Day (one of my favorite pieces of holiday art so far):

Sunday was World Baking Day, a perfect day for these pigeons to bake a cake (or find one). This is a sketch from 2012, but I still love it and it fit for Sunday's holiday:

Monday was Museum Day, and another piece of art from 2012. This cow inspired by Stenberg Brothers exhibition that was on display when I worked at MOMA many years ago. I wrote a blog post about this image, the original movie poster that inspired it, and an earlier version of my cow poster.

Today was Devil's Food Cake Day, and this Little Devil Moo loves Devil's Food Cake!

I just realized that three of these four images feature cows.** Go Cows! Moo!

I'm still making art for holidays you've probably never heard of. Please click here to see my art for unusual holidays so far.*

To learn more about my books or see my portfolio art, please visit my website, sruble.com.

* My one month of daily unusual holiday art is almost up! I'll still be making and/or posting art for unusual holidays, just not as often.

** I like to draw cows. You might have noticed. Or not. Cows are fun to draw. You should try it some time, if you like drawing and you want something fun to draw, like cows. Did I mention that cows are fun to draw?