Insights From The 12 Drawings of Christmas

As you may know, I did a special event in this blog known as The 12 Drawings of Christmas where each day from December 21, 2018-January 1, 2019 I uploaded a new drawing. It’s similar to what I did for Inktober with a few exceptions: 1) I only did 12 drawings over a 12-day period instead of doing 31 drawings over a 31-day period and 2) unlike Inktober, where the drawings have to be done in ink (pencil can be used as an underdrawing as long as the finished drawing is inked over), I permitted myself to use whatever drawing medium I wanted. It helped that this was something I did on my own instead of an organized event like Inktober so I could control what media I wanted to use. It also helped that I only had to deal with doing 12 drawings instead of 31 drawings.

It was pretty liberating to allow myself to use any media that I wanted, in contrast to Inktober where I am only limited to just ink. I’m financially struggling at the moment so I have to limit myself to using cheap pens that I can find on sale at Target and Five Below. These pens don’t really have a wide variety of shades, especially certain colors like brown (which I can only find in dark brown among the cheap pens). Buying something like Copic markers is just not in my budge at the moment. At least with the more media variety I allowed myself for The 12 Drawings of Christmas, I could switch to colored pencils if I didn’t have an ink pen in a certain shade that I needed (such as light brown).

Working on The 12 Drawings of Christmas was basically a more laid-back experience than Inktober since I only had to worry about 12 days. I did one drawing based on a song lyric and one political drawing but the rest was basically fan art. The only real snag were the two-day period where I drew Elsa from the Disney movie Frozen followed by Abbey Bominable from Mattel’s line of Monster High dolls the next day. I drew both drawings based on the dolls that I currently own in real life. Both dolls wore a piece of clothing that was made from tulle and both tulle clothing had snowflakes on them. It was a bear trying to simulate tulle with my ink pens then trying to draw snowflakes on top of that.

The results were worth it, especially since these two drawings face each other directly in my sketchbook, which created a certain kind of unity between my drawings of these two very different females.

After spending two days in a row on relatively challenging drawings, I spent the rest of that 12-day period doing simple drawings based on free tutorials I found on websites like How to Draw Step by Step Drawing Tutorials and Easy Drawing Tutorials. I find that it doesn’t hurt for a trained artist like myself to use tutorials because I could use a refresher on how to draw something a certain way every now and then.

Unlike Inktober I never approached the feeling of being burned out. That’s because I worked on far fewer drawings than Inktober so I only had to worry about creating 12 drawings instead of 31 drawings.

Like Inktober I wrote blog posts about my drawings and I uploaded them on Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, LinkedIn, and Jobcase. The main difference is that I also uploaded the drawings in the off-topic section of this political discussion forum that I belong to. I usually don’t do this but I thought that my online friends could use some cheering up after the recent death of a longtime member known as Moomba so close to Christmas. I got some pretty positive response to my drawings in that forum.

I also got some positive responses from my Facebook friends whom I know in real life. One night I went to a local cafe where one of them asked me in person when I was going to upload my next drawing. That was cool.

I also did a video version of The 12 Drawings of Christmas that I uploaded on to YouTube on New Year’s Day (the same day that I did my last drawing in that series). In case you’ve missed all or part of my series, you can view the video below.

You can also look at The 12 Drawings of Christmas blog category to view the original posts.

Ever since Inktober I figured out how to count “Likes” on Twitter (which I wasn’t able to figure out before so I didn’t count any Twitter “Likes” when I tabulated the original Inktober “Likes” a few months ago). So, for this round of counting “Likes” on the 12 Drawings of Christmas, I was able to include Twitter for the first time along with counting “Likes” on Instagram, Flickr, and this blog.

While I was working on The 12 Drawings of Christmas, I tried to predict which of my drawings would get the most “Likes”. I thought that my drawing of Elsa from Frozen would be the winner because that film still continues to be popular plus I’m still seeing new Frozen spin-off products in the stores (especially toys) years after Disney released that film. I also thought that my drawing of Kizuna Ai would also have a chance at the number one slot mainly because she is a virtual YouTube star who has gained a huge cult following plus I had her along with Santa and Mrs. Claus attempt to emulate that distracted guy meme that has been passed around the Internet for the past year.

I was wrong on both counts. I found out that the first place winner by a landslide was my drawing of Wysa the penguin mascot of the Wysa smartphone app. My drawing of Kizuna Ai and the Clauses ended up in second place but it was a very distant second since Wysa got 90 “Likes” while Kizuna Ai and the Clauses only got 28 “Likes.” (Remember, the counts were based the reactions on three different social media sites and this blog.)

Here’s the complete list of the drawings in my 12 Drawings of Christmas series ranging from the most popular (or most “Likes”) to the least popular (or fewest “Likes”).

First Place: Wysa the penguin.

Second Place: Santa, Mrs. Claus, and Kizuna Ai.

Third Place: Partridge in a pear tree.

Fourth Place: Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

Fifth Place: The Grinch.

Sixth Place: Abbey Bominable from Monster High.

Seventh Place (Tied): Krampus taking Donald Trump away and Olaf the talking snowman from the Disney movie Frozen.

Eighth Place: Elsa from the Disney movie Frozen.

Ninth Place: Christkind.

Tenth Place: Baby New Year.

Eleventh Place: Nutcracker.

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The 12 Drawings of Christmas Day 5

Merry Christmas, everyone! I thought about drawing Santa Claus for today but I had already drawn him just a few days ago and I wanted to draw something different focusing on one of the less-known Christmas present givers. Today I did a drawing of the Christkind, an angel who delivers presents to children on Christmas Eve. (The name literally means “Christ Child” in German.) In many parts of Germany and Austria children believe that it is the Christkind who delivers the presents instead of Santa Claus.

Even though the Santa Claus imagery can be found all over the world, there are people in some parts of the world who have rebelled against it by insisting on believing in the Christkind instead of Santa Claus.

When I was in the second grade my school did a unit in December called “Christmas Around the World,” where I was briefly exposed to other figures who brought gifts instead of Santa (such as Befana and the Three Kings). That was the only time that this subject was even discussed when I was in elementary school. (By the way the Wikipedia has a list of all of the Christmas and winter gift-bringers listed by country.) Last year I went to the Christmas Village in Baltimore on opening weekend, where I got my first-ever glimpse of the Christkind, who was brought over from Nuremberg, Germany to help with the Christmas Village’s opening ceremony.

It was pretty refreshing to draw something different for Christmas Day. I hope you enjoy it! 🙂

Since today is Christmas Day, I’d thought I would once again embed an animation that I did last month called The Gift of the Dinosaur. I originally made this animation with the expectation that it would be shown on the video screens of the Greenbelt Makerspace that are located in the front windows so any passers-by would see it. Except the video screens currently aren’t working and no one has found a way to fix them so my animation was never shown. Anyway, here is The Gift of the Dinosaur. Enjoy!

Christmas Village in Baltimore, November 25, 2017

So I ended up spending the Saturday after Thanksgiving in Baltimore. I originally intended to spend the entire time at the annual Christkindlesmarkt that was held at Zion Lutheran Church. But then I got stuck in a horrible northbound traffic jam. I reached the North Linthicum light rail stop and I had to wait a bit for the next light rail train. I transferred to a Metro subway train and I had a long wait. So I managed to make it to the Shot Tower Metro station and walked through the area. By the time I made it to the church I only had 45 minutes left to enjoy the sights and sounds of Christkindlesmarkt.

As I left the church I took a photo of this magnificent cloud formation that was over by Baltimore City Hall (which is literally located just a few steps away from Zion Lutheran Church).

As I was walking away from the church, I couldn’t help but take a picture of this sign for an apartment building that should be of interest for anyone who knows anything about Edgar Allan Poe.

As a consolation for not spending as much time at the Christkindlesmarkt event as I would have liked, I decided to hop on the next Charm City Circulator down to the Inner Harbor, where I went to an annual event that’s similar to the one at Zion Lutheran Church except that it’s bigger—Christmas Village in Baltimore.

It was the opening weekend for this event and it’s currently running on a daily basis until Christmas Eve. (This year is the fifth year that it’s operating.) I took a lot of pictures while I was there.

The next photo shows the Advent wreath. The electric candles were dark when I was there because Advent wouldn’t begin for another week.

The woman with the long golden curly hair and the gold clothes was the Christkind who came from Nurenberg, Germany to help with the opening ceremony of the Christmas Village in Baltimore.

There was live entertainment inside of the tent.

There was a variety of stuff available for sale.

I was there on the first day that the Christmas Village in Baltimore opened for the first time. Even though most of the lights were up, the Christmas tree was dark because the tree lighting ceremony was scheduled for the following night, which I wasn’t able to go to.

As I walked away from the Christmas Village in Baltimore towards Harborplace, I saw these signs pointing in the direction of the place I had just left.

I ate a bratwurst platter with sauerkraut for dinner while I was there. The only other purchase I made was a pack of lavender scented incense that I bought from the Käthe Wohlfahrt area of the tent, which sold a variety German handcrafted items ranging from tree ornaments to nutcrackers. (I don’t have any pictures from that area because it had a “No Photography” sign posted on the outside.)

So after I left the Christmas Village in Baltimore I headed over to Harborplace, which I’ll write about in my next post.