Halloween Makes Me Happy

Aside from the fact I enjoy drawing Halloween-type images on store windows so much that I'll do it for trade, I just like the idea of changing our persona and becoming a fantasy character.

If you're an adult, you probably imagine that Halloween is for kids to gather lots of candy and run around a safe party situation or a protected neighborhood.

But I think Halloween is a fun time to dress up and do something entirely different for an evening.

(you can click on the picture below if you'd like to see it bigger.)

Plant MORE Trees

Kailua-Kona has cleared up, the volcanic VOG has gone because the volcanoes are quiet now. The trees are happy again and the extra rain that the volcanoes brought are making fruit bearing trees really a happening thing. People like trees so much that they will pay me to draw trees on their window here in Hawaii.

But the rest of the world has been experiencing fires. Summer fires have been really bad, destroying thousands of acres - and it's still  burning out of control in some places. Even a rainy place like the Amazon is burning out of control.

Trees are the main way our planet breathes out oxygen and converts it from carbon dioxide. What will happen for the whole world when so many trees are now gone?

The only way I can imaging the world could be saved is for us to get busy and plant trees. Plant trees and nurture them so they grow up big and strong and don't die from pig or cattle damage.

On the way into Kamuela on the northern end of the Big Island, there's evidence of an interesting way to plant trees to keep the seedlings away from cattle damage. Inside of a wooden post, a seedling is planted on the top. Curiously enough, the roots go all the way down through the center of the post to find the ground underneath where the post is fixed. The green leaves of the baby tree is kept away from the cattle being able to nip at it.

How Long Does It Last?

I Know You Say They're Temporary, But How Long Do Your Signs Last?

This business opened more than ten years ago. They were located right along the highway in Kamuela, with a window that faced the road. With a generous size for their slices and at very reasonable price, they needed a sign to get people in the door for lunchtime. Since I was a customer, I traded for food.

It was a yummy trade!

Their sign would have looked even better over the ten years they had it if they hadn't have set some tress in front of the windows that scraped the paint off over time. In some ways, the "distressed" quality on the letters made the place look as if it has been there forever, so it wasn't all that bad of an image.

Hawaii Has Cats and Gardeners

Where I live on the Big Island of Hawaii, there's lots of people who garden. There are many cats that probably were once tame that have gone feral here. There's also lots that either escaped or were abandoned by people who moved away. Every once in awhile, businesses will adopt a more friendly-type "shop cat" to intimidate the rodent population and act as a mascot.

This place I made a mural for, they had a nursery, even though they also sold other things and services. There are so many gardeners here in Hawaii who always want to buy plants! This business was temporarily using one of their storefronts as a store-room, so they had me do a mural on the glass and include portraits of their animals. They had a charming big Orange cat who posed for me in the window...

I love kitty cats. Wish I could be a "Cat Lady" and have ten of them at once!

Acid Rain

Here's a sample of my ability to write lettering on windows. I know mostly I show the artwork here, but some people count lettering of signs and sign-making as a form of art.

Here in Hawaii, (especially on the West side where the shape of that side of the island "traps" the volcanic air,) our windows have to stand up to VOG. It's a brand of volcanic smog. It can become sort of oppressive if you live in it all the time, although the tourists don't notice since they're visiting temporarily.

If your business or home windows face the right way, it's windows are permanently etched with this tiny onslaught of glass particles in the VOG. So on the windows that get this damage the worst, businesses find my signs to be a way of hiding the damage and advertising their newest innovations to stay in business.

Good for me! But makes me thankful I don't live in Kailua-Kona.

Affectionately Yours

Here's the frontage of a Credit Union I did for Valentine's Day. Strangely enough, the red I used exactly matched the red color of their newly installed ATM before it was there! So being decorated went nicely with their image that month.

Most people wouldn't imagine that a Credit Union would celebrate Valentine's Day. But Hawaii is different. Because of the (legislated!) spirit of Aloha here in Hawaii, people are really into affectionate displays.

After all, even guys wear flowers in Hawaii on their shirts, not just women in flowered dresses. You can give flowers to a guy if you're a woman and the guy won't necessarily assume it's an intimate communication, but just a beautiful sharing of what's in your garden that you'd have as a gift for others.

If you'd like to see the details of the doily and hearts, you can click on the picture and see a larger version.

Creativity

Logic says, "the only time another way is necessary to seek out is when current ways are blocked." I know ways to be more creative. Creative ways are "unexploited alternatives," usually in addition to "tradition." So a creative person looks for alternatives, even when there already exists serviceable answers.

I found that formally studying thinking skills has been the most useful to me in developing the ability to communicate my creative abilities...and to invite them to happen with others. There are more thinking skills than mere "Critical Thinking." (There's Parallel, Lateral, Strategic and Design thinking, off the top of my head.)

Many people are defensive about creative ideas - they "defend" against them when the ideas come from other people. Some people, strangely enough, defend against new ideas when they come from themselves! Just because someone hasn't thought of it, doesn't mean a better way of doing things or a new invention is not there waiting to be discovered. One of the ways to present a creative idea: Present the idea in a way so that the people you're trying to convince imagine the new idea is THEIR idea...

Remember, when a creative idea arrives, it's usually funny - laughable funny!

What might make you more creative is noting moments when you could have an alternative that hasn't occurred to you yet. To get that block out a period of time to wonder about it while you do something else. My name for this is "Productive Procrastinating."

Our tolerance for unknowns and feeling ambiguity is a BIG factor in our ability to be creative!

My favorite blog about thinking skills is: Thinkibility.com  Check it out! 

Also as a treat, I'd like to tell everyone the most creatively useful book I ever read on the subject of creativity. It was written by a photography professor. It's titled "Playful Perception - Choosing How to Experience Your World." By Herbert L Leff, Ph.d. (Waterfront books)

Turns out that the little exercises in this book apply to changing your attitudes and ability to see new possibilities toward any purpose you'd like to consider.  (In addition to it's purpose of being better photographer.)  This is another skill creative people use. They can take the lessons of one field and apply it to another field...that seems totally unrelated.

What do you know about that you can apply to another field?
What's your tolerance level for unpredictability and things that are yet to be decided or full-grown?
What creative thing have you already done that you're proud of having done?