Virgil

In my last post, I promised I'd show you the new member of Maranda's zoo... Here he is!
This is Virgil. He is approximately 5 months old, half an inch thick, and about 2 feet long. He is a light grey and slightly pink corn snake. Don't go thinking that I went out and bought a snake, because I didn't. I have come to be Virgil's caretaker through some sad and odd circumstances.
My good friend lives with her parents while she tries to find a job. She also has a... pet problem. She tried to move out once and promptly got a little orange kitten, and only about a week later was forced to move back in with her parents. Her dad is EXTREMELY allergic to cats, so she could not keep the kitten. After he was rehomed and she was at home for a while, she, you know, bought another pet that her parents did not want in the house.
So one day she contacts me and asks, "Will you take care of my snake for me?" Of course I was stoked and totally cool with it. When I asked how long I would be the snake's caretaker, she basically said, "well, until I can move out", or something along those lines. Very vague.
I'm really grateful to take care of Virgil. He's a great little critter, totally cute. But I can't help but feel sorry for him. When I got him, he was in the grubbiest tank in the world. It was dirty and foggy and had worn-out duct tape stains. The old under-tank heater had what felt like sticky soda stains on it and I'm fairly sure it was the culprit of an electrical fire some time in its life. The tank was filled with sand. According to snake enthusiasts, keeping a corn snake in sand is the equivalent of keeping fish in a tank of root beer.
I did some research and changed his tank around.
I work at a major pet store chain, and sadly, I see a lot of irresponsible pet owners. People will come in and see the snakes or lizards and say, "Wow! What a cool animal! I know nothing about it but it's cute so I will buy it." And then they come in two months later and whine about how their pet was "unhealthy" or "sick", when they really were just slowly killing their animal by not doing research and not taking care of their pet properly. I once even got a phone call where someone asked if "we did de-clawing for dogs". Why yes, and while I'm at it, I'll rip out YOUR fingernails, too! Sound ok?
Ok, ok, I'll step off my soapbox.
All in all, Virgil is now in a happy, healthy home. He's a bit jumpy and is easily startled, but he's warming up to me. He also does this very cute thing...

The moss hut* I got for him has a hole in the top, and he uses it as a little peep-hole quite often. It's often too cute for me to handle and many gooshy oogly-goo noises seep out of my mouth.


*Moss hut= half coconut shell + clump of moss. Very difficult, I know.

Necessary Evil

Lately, on Facebook, some friends (and others) have been involved in heated debates. This is my response to it.



Making a tough decision-- to change your mind, to prevent a travesty, to save yourself-- does not make you a monster. It does not make you a beast, unholy, or immoral. Sometimes life calls for hard decisions. Understanding that some evils are necessary is fundamental to understanding each other as human beings. Life is hard, and we often make decisions we do not want to make.

It makes me SO sad that we continue to argue about certain topics (abortion) as if the issue is black and white. It is really not black, white, or red. It is grey. Grey. No one can be correct and there is no right answer. I don't care if your science says you're right or your religion says you're right. I don't care.
I just want us to understand each other.


But I guess that just isn't going to happen, is it?

What I'm Doing

Hello, all!
In the life of Maranda, things are looking up at last. I've told my parents of my plans to finish my first half of college and then move into my boyfriend's house in order to take a year off and build a portfolio for an art school. (I'm thinking Digipen now, sound cool? yeah!) They don't seem keen on it, but I feel better with them knowing the truth. If it's anything I hate it's keeping things that are important in my life from the ones I love. It drives me insane!
That aside, I'm also very excited about school. My classes are about as liberal-artsy as you can get. Yoga, poetry, design, and French. Whooo, man, you definitely can't tell what I'M majoring in, eh?
In my world of art, things are going as usual. I'm working on some new stuff for an art show on the 25th. Here's one! Left my camera at Stark's, so here's a really disappointing webcam shot. Oh well, it's not even done. Here ya go anyway!


It started as "I have nothing to do while Stark plays a card game, so um... here's a bird I guess. Whoah yeah let's paint it!" Most of my best pieces start out with little to no planning and evolve as they're done. Hopefully this one's no exception.
I'm also working on another crazy collage dead animal sculpture. People seem to like them for some reason. :D The link is Tally, my first one. I still need to upload Furlough and Agatha. For another day!
Best of all, this news comes to you with great joy.
...
...
pause for dramatic effect...
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I QUIT THE DELI JOB!
Yes indeed! I worked my little tail off and got two interviews: one at a pet store and one at a craft store: two places I adore to be. The pet store gave me a job first so that is where I am headed to. I'm a dog bather. =D Well, starting in October anyway. The location is perfect, the hours work, and I get to spend all day with dogs. It's a win, win, win, win, and possibly win situation.

So that is where I stand and I promise to have some new art updates up soon. Thanks a bunch for reading. :3

There Will Come a Day When We Transcend Our Pain

...until that day, take it easy on yourself.
--Weezer

Hello, readers!
Many things to tell you and little time to do it. To make things short I shall count the ways. (Somehow I am reminded of Rodger Rabbit at this moment. One one thousand, two one thousand...) Anyway.

•My partner in crime Stark and I have turned Dice Sprites from a cute hobby to a serious money-maker. Conventions, super-intense crafting sessions, and a fridge full of food are in our future. But best of all I get to see him giddy with artistic inspiration because of his newfound passion: sculpting. Art is meant to be shared and I am happiest when I see his eyes light up with a new idea or when he hugs me tight exclaiming his excitement for our future.
•I still don't have my own computer. I'm coping well borrowing Stark's laptop and mom and dad's super-fancy desktop.
•I went to DragonFlight convention in Bellevue this past weekend and made a lot of new Sprites, which I shall share presently. Many thanks to my good friends Jean and Rob for the table space.
•Lastly: I will no longer be known as Kirai. Kirai was the name I used when I drew Anime fanart. Now I am just Maranda Cromwell, comfortable with my true identity. To be completely honest, the name Kirai never sat right with me. I always assumed it because I was "stuck" with it when I decided to sign my art with it when I was 14. It means "hate" in Japanese. At this stage in my life I am over hate and I am over trying to fit into a niche that I don't fit into. I'm giving up my facade and using my real name: my real self.


And now, Sprites!



















See? We've been busy. If you want to learn the stories of all the Sprites seen here and a sad incident with a Fumble Monster, click here to visit the Facebook album.

There is other news, but for now I will keep it at this. I will be busy changing everything from Maranda "Kirai" Cromwell to just Maranda Cromwell.
Thank you again for reading. :3

Good News Bears

It's always a delightful feeling when
A) your fingers smell like fresh lavender
B) your boyfriend is coming home soon from a long trip
C) you got some new awesome things at the thrift store
and D) you earned 3x as much money selling art and manning a booth than one week's work at your crappy real job.
This is what I am going through now and I couldn't be happier. (Ok, well, it would be nice if my boyfriend was home NOW, but he's having fun and coming home soon anyway. <3)


Cornucopia Days was a huge success, if you hadn't gathered that already!
I had a lot of fun hanging out with Sandy and my friends who popped by to visit. Also, Chubby Kitten was my wingman the whole weekend. Here he is watching my purse while I grub out on ice cream. He fits perfectly inside my folding chair's cup holder.

Something else happened this weekend, too: and by "something" I do not mean "watching Sinbad Legend of the Seven Seas twice in 3 days", but it is rather along the lines of "a gift that made me feel more amazing than any gift has".
An old scraggly looking guy with missing front teeth bought one of my prints. He was cordial and polite and I liked him, even though he looked like a drugged-out ex-hippie who played wild-stringed guitars on the sidewalk. After he bought my print he left and came back a short while later with a little plastic bag.
"Here, a gift for you. Some of my art."
Inside was a black leather belt. Simple, stiff, with an unassuming silver buckle. But on the other side...
I nearly cried. This guy, a perfect stranger, went out of his way to not only support my art but also gift me this wonderful, touching message. It's people like him that reassure me that there are good people left in the world.

I'm extremely grateful to be surrounded by such interesting, kind, generous, fun, and loving people. This weekend also marks a huge step in my quest to become free from my job at the deli and another step towards my budding art business. I'm excited for the rest of my life.

Gumball Machine

Or should I say DICE MACHINE. AWW YEAH
My friend Jessie is super cool and is collecting dice to fill her cute little antique gumball machine with. She then commissioned me to do three Dice Sprites to be playing on it. I think the little triplets came out good! They're very silly.






In other news, I'm going to be selling a bunch of my art (and Sprites!) at a local street fair this weekend! Man, I am excited as all heck. I took some of my new art to the printing place and got some small prints made. I love hanging out with the print guys, too, they're just very personable and honest people. I packaged the prints at Browser's, my favorite shop, and I finally got to see Greg again. He's kind of like the grandfather or really cool uncle I never had. Growing up with no grandpas, that's kind of a big deal for me. Greg is awesome. Sadly I am not working in his booth this year, but I am going to be working for a nice lady named Sandy at her new little gift shop that moved in next door. Her store was quaint and cute, and she was very nice and excited to have some help for the fair. Not only am I going to be hanging out with fun people in beautiful weather, but I'm also getting eight dollars an hour PLUS anything I earn from my art. Cornucopia Days is probably my favorite thing about the summer!
If you live around the Kent, Washington area, be sure to stop by and say hi. :)

A Brief Update

Hello, 3 followers and X anonymous viewers!
Lately I've come down with a stomach bug, or something. Either way I am feeling pretty achy and not-wanting-to-stare-at-a-computer-screen-for-too-long, but it felt right to dust off my blog and say something.
School is piling on the work all of a sudden, work's massively understaffed so I've been getting more hours, and the only thing that's keeping me going is the promise of a beautiful relationship with my wonderful boyfriend and the boundless compassion and love of my parents.
Now I shall drown my sorrows in ginger ale and soda crackers. Hoorah!
Hopefully your life's not in a rough patch as mine is.

Giving a Big "Screw You" to Art-Hating Taggers

For the past, oh, five years or so, I have been paying frequent visits to a neighborhood book store called Browser's Books. They're a used book store that also specializes in fantasy art like Amy Brown, Stephanie Pui-Mun Law, and my old art teacher Rob Carlos. If it weren't for the awesome people at Browser's (Greg, Kathi, and Rob) I would likely be only half the artist (and human being) I am now. Those guys are such an awesome part of my life. I love going to hang out there, chatting with Kathi and listening to one of Greg's many zany stories about his life.
On the back wall of the building, Rob did a really cool mural of a dragon and some fairies reading books and just recently, this happened to the mural.

When I first saw this photo on Facebook my mouth dropped open in shock. How anyone could have the nerve and destructive mind to destroy such a cool piece of art is beyond me. I practically grew up looking at that mural, and now this!
Immediately, Rob, his wife, Kathi, and Greg organized a giant re-painting get together, sort of a community event. All sorts of people showed up: friends, fans of Rob's art, patrons from the store, and me! I had to be a part of the re-painting, being an artist and devoted fan of Browser's.
Instead of re-painting the old mural, though, Rob pumped out a whole new idea almost immediately after the unfortunate tagging! Here's his original sketch of the mural:


He did this so fast, and set to work on it early on Saturday. Since Rob is a painting machine, he pretty much got most of it done before I got there at 11-ish.
But I had a different job to do!

Greg gave me a small space to paint a little dragon next to the back door. I was extremely excited about it and after a short preliminary sketch I set to work on a little dragon. Everyone seemed to enjoy how smiley and happy he was. He's been fondly dubbed the "Guardian Puppy Dragon", though I think "Dandelion" is a cute name. Everyone was saying how he's guarding the building from being defaced and acting as a really cute "graffiti deterrent".
Here he is!

I started with a black outline and some lighter shadows, then went over it with a really thick and awesome yellow color. Purple accents were a must, as well. I am very happy to have contributed to this big slap-in-the-face to the taggers who defaced Rob's mural.

Here is a photo of the mural, all completed and wonderful!

Everyone who worked on the main wall got to paint their own butterfly, too. How poetic, am I right?
Also, my friend Bri painted a dragon along with mine! They're BFFs, totally.

CUTE, RIGHT, OH MY GOSH.
Anyway!
I am glad that I could share this wonderful artistic community event with the world. Thanks to everyone who helped on it, and especially thanks to Rob, who is an amazing, dedicated painting machine who took the whole thing very graciously and even-tempered.