My husband bought me a new pen (because an artist can never have enough pens) so I tested it out by drawing some of the people that died in The Dyatlov Pass incident. The story intrigues me and I'm thinking of drawing a comic out of the incident. Here are the drawings from my sketchbook along with my new pen:
The pen isn't exactly what I was looking for, but it's not bad.
We went to the comic shop over the weekend and I was very inspired by all the interesting graphic novels there. It got the wheels spinning in my brain. I studied the different styles and media the artists decided to draw their GNs with. Interesting. Some of the stories are interesting and others aren't. It's surprising to see what gets published. I was soaking all the information in.
My son found the latest Plants Vs. Zombies graphic novel and read the whole book in the store before buying it. He loves those books and will read them over and over. I wish I could find chapter books that he loves just as much. He doesn't like books that most boys his age like, so it's extremely hard to find books for him to read for school. Since he doesn't like Harry Potter, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Magic Treehouse, Wings of Fire, Percy Jackson, and doesn't want to read Goosebumps on his own, I had to do more extensive research on books for boys who don't like to read. Since he's in middle school now and they are going to read more serious stuff, I'm having him read Ender's Game for a half hour every day. So far, he thinks it's boring, but we're just getting started. He thinks all the other books I mentioned are boring, too.
He likes humor, but we have not found chapter books as funny as the Big Nate comics that he loves. I love Big Nate, too, but reading comics won't help his writing skills when he has to write essays and has to know how to write paragraphs. After reading Big Nate comics for a year for his reading log at school, I discovered that he didn't know how to write a paragraph for an assignment at school! He didn't even know how to indent!
If Ender's Game doesn't work out, I'm going to try to introduce The Hunger Games to him. One of his friends doesn't like to read chapter books either, but according to his mom, he's showing an interest in The Hunger Games. It's a take-it-or-leave-it attitude toward the books, but at least there is a spark of interest instead of no interest at all.
The reason why I chose Ender's Game for him is because, besides humor, my son likes reading about battles. Percy Jackson has battles in it, but apparently not enough for my son. Ender has to use his wits to do battle mentally and physically. My son specifically likes monster battles. Ender fights aliens, so I'm hoping he takes to this book. Fingers crossed. I personally loved this book when I read it, so I'm partial to it. If he doesn't like this book then I'll recommence pulling my hair out.
I think there is a big need for funnier chapter books for middle graders. Whoever can pull it off is going to hit the jackpot. My son isn't the only one who thinks chapter books are boring. I've talked to other parents and they have at least one child like my son. Boys and girls.
I'm looking forward to the Mayweather vs. McGregor fight tomorrow. I told my husband about it and he's fascinated with those fighters. He has been watching videos of them all week. Our sons have been training in MMA since they were 6 and 4 years old. Not for the sole purpose of fighting, but for self defense. My husband is a martial artist with a black belt in karate and we have friends who are MMA fighters. So, naturally, we're rooting for the MMA fighter, McGregor, but Mayweather has an impressive 49-0 record. It's going to be a very interesting fight.
I almost forgot to mention celebrating the solar eclipse. Since the glasses were sold out, I made a solar eclipse viewing box and was able to see it with that. It's too bad it wasn't a total eclipse in my area, but it was still exciting to experience. I pointed my camera toward the sun without looking at it and took about 20 "blind" pictures hoping to catch the eclipse on my phone. The best photo out of the bunch had a metallic orb in it. Some people think it's the international space station, but that thing is rectangular, not oval shaped. The object did not appear in the photos taken a split second before and after the photo. Other people caught orbs in their photos and videos as well. There is a good video on YouTube that a couple recorded during the eclipse. They caught 3 or 4 orbs in their video.
Okay, that's it for now! Over and out!
I hope you had a good week!
Check out the blogs below for your reading pleasure and please visit our hosts' blogs:
Lexa Cain: http://lexacain.blogspot.com/
L.G. Keltner http://lgkeltner.blogspot.co.uk/
Tonja Drecker http://tonjadrecker.blogspot.com/