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Sneaker Drawings

Drawing of fave red sneakers!!! Love art <3

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Shepherd's Shame

Shepherd’s Shame

The wolf with his evil trickery,

And his bloody bitter history,

With sheep cannot be trusted.

For he had an abyssal hatred,

A feeling deep as the ocean,

Of the sheepdog and his devotion.

Wolf comes stealthily in the morning,

Sheepdog barks a loud forewarning.

Shepherd screams a terrible “Shush!”

And imprisons the sheepdog with a push.

Then the shepherd goes to sleep,

Abandoning all the innocent sheep.

The wolf runs out from the dark wood,

And gobbles sheep like no one ever could.

The sheepdog imprisoned in his cage,

Watched on helplessly at the carnage.

The shepherd dozing through the wolf’s deceit,

Allowing the angelic sheep’s defeat.

Then suddenly the shepherd awakes,

And roars like a million earthquakes.

“Why ever did you not protect my flock?”

The sheepdog answers, “How about the lock

You chained me with so willingly?”

Shepherd glares at him chillingly.

Leaders around the globe today,

With fame and wealth are led astray.

Practicable advice they heed not,

Revealing to enemies their weak spot.

Tragedy knocks at the citizens’ door,

Then leaders are silent no more.

Instead they furiously blame

Activists for their own shame.

DIY Sneakers

DIY Sneakers
Watch this tutorial on my YouTube channel!

Self-portrait

This is a visual arts assignment my teacher assigned to us. We had just learnt a new drawing technique: cross-hatching. Basically, instead of shading in just one direction with your pencil, you shade one direction and then do it in the opposite direction. For different values, space the lines more apart and leave more space in between them, which means leaving more white. When you look at the whole picture from afar, (see right for example) the light areas look light and the dark areas look dark.

So here are the steps for drawing your self-portrait.

1) Take a nice photo of yourself. It can be smiling, crying, bored, excited... Whatever you like! Be creative! You can even make a funny face.

2) Print your photo out. You can enlarge it so it's the exact size you want. I recommend this method if your spacial skills aren't perfect. You won't need to resize it when you are drawing. Some people like to use mirrors, but personally, I think drawing while looking at yourself in a mirror is a bit hard.

3) Start by drawing the outline of your face in 3H pencil. Then draw the outline of your hair (if you have hair).

4) Add facial features, also in 3H pencil. Remember the eyes have to be far apart enough, and the mouth has two lips! You don't have to shade anything yet, just draw the general outline.

5) Add shading by cross-hatching. Start with light colours first, then dark colours. So that means first shading with H pencils, then B pencils.

6) Add hair in the direction it flows in.

7) Refine the outline using a 2B pencil. Add shadows around the edges of your face.

Ta-da! You're done! Have fun drawing.

5)

Wall Art

I got my inspiration from painting in a Starbucks cafe.

So, since my apartment is going to be renovated, I've decided to have a little fun before those hammers knock down those wonderful, white walls.

So here I've used my wall as a canvas, and a friend of mine gave me a huge tub of black acrylic to draw on the wall with. Mind you, acrylic dries really quickly, so don't make mistakes because it can be rather frustratin

g to have a huge splotch on your wall. You can draw on your wall even if your home is not being renovated, but make sure you do your outlines in pencil first, or you will spend the rest of your life staring your mistake in the face.

Okay, so here's my design. It says "Pure Joy" because that was what I was feeling at the moment. On the top, hearts dangle from the sky; and at the bottom, which you can see here,

features a huge stalk with a wiggly stem and huge leaves. Exotic flowers grow from the ground, and a bird hovers above it all. As you, my brilliant readers can see, the bird is my profile picture as well. I liked it so much that I've begun to use it all over my blogs.

Words of warning: make sure you put newspaper on the floor because the paint may drip. I also had a hard time doing the bird details (i.e. the tail, wings, legs) as I was using a rather thick brush. So bear that in mind.

Other suggestions for wall art:
1. Use spray paint instead of acrylic and a brush. (REALLY make sure you cover the floor first.)

2. Stick pieces of coloured/ patterned paper onto the wall to create a collage effect. (note: don't use newspaper, it doesn't stick well and the ink runs.)

3. Get your interior designer to paint the wall a different background colour first, to create a different mood, instead of plain white. But white is fine if you like it that way. Simple. I like simple.

Other than that, make sure the paint you use is not toxic. You'll be breathing it all day. And you would be seriously destroying the environment.

Have fun wall-arting!

Good Reads

"Where you find your next book."

This is a great place to look for new and interesting reads that you probably don't know. You can add me as a friend. My usename is Isadore Monique Engrie.

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Book Reviews

Does anyone want to recommend a book or a story for me to review? You can post it in a comment here, with the book title, author and illustrator. I get angry (engrie) when people forget to mention the illustrator. They are as important as authors: books would not have that spark of life within them if it weren't for the faithful illustrators. So thanks to everyone who draws for readers to understand the book content more fully. Shall we give a shout of praise to the illustrators? Here we go: Hip! Hip! Hooray!

Detective Dialogue

D: So, Miss Esme Mok, my research tells me that your father is your ex-husband’s neighbour, Mr. Mok, no?

E: Yes you’re right.

D: Do you like your ex-husband? And do you like parrots?

E: I never liked him – I mean I have loved him for my whole life. I like parrots too.

D: Why did you divorce?

E: Um...... I hate – I mean he hates me.

D: My research also tells me that you are dating his chauffeur, Mr. Kwan.

E: Yeah, so what? He is loads better than the old parrot-face who didn’t leave me any money. I mean –

D: A witness of the scene told me that you and Mr. Kwan entered your father’s house two days ago, right?

E: Yeah, so?

D: The witness also said that you three entered your ex-husband’s garage carrying a coil of rope, no?

E: We were going to fix his car.

D: With rope? The witness said she heard a squawk, a slam of some kind of door, running water and three beeps. Do you have any explanation for these sounds?

E: Er......

D: I have. You entered the garage, and Mr. Kwan opened the door to the house with his key. The banker’s parrot squawked to warn him, and you strangled it. The parrot cage is dirty, so it explains the dirty fingerprints on the keyboard of the computer. Your ex-husband came running down the stairs, accidentally tripped, and the photos he were holding scattered across the floor. Your dad tied the rope around him, put him in your kitchen cupboard and slammed the door. Mr. Kwan poured wine to celebrate while you tried to erase the security camera videos on the computer. Is this all true?

E: This is exactly what happened.

D: It’s handcuffs for you, lady.

E: (Sprints away) I won’t be seeing you again!

D: Wait!

E: (Cackles and disappears around the corner.)

I Remember...

I Remember...

It was the 24th of December, 2006, a cold, bitter night. Icicles froze on my nose as soon as I got out of the car. We walked with our heads bowed low, me and my family, to the Christmas Party at my grandparents’ apartment.

The warnmth and happy atmosphere greeted us as we stepped inside the door. The glitter banners hung over our heads, the golden candles lit up the house. The towering Christmas tree with its green needles dressed in shiny, shimmering, sparkling, spiral, shooting-star shaped silver baubles of glass. And if you peeped, you could see the piles of presents hiding underneath, all wrapped up in their coats of red, gold and green.

Everyone was smiling, chattering, laughing. My aunts asked, “Hello. How are you? How is school?” My uncles boomed, “Hi there, niece. How’s it going? Played the piano lately?” And my grandparents fussed, “Wear your woolly or you’ll catch the cold!”

Dinner was fantastic. The square table with the checkered tablecloth couldn’t support all the food: the huge brown roasted turkey larger than a football, the salad with the lettuce and tomatoes, the chicken wings, the spaghetti with white cream sauce, the salmon sushi, the ham and egg omelet, the noodles in soup, and of course, the big tub of rice.

Glasses and cutlery tinkled and sang as everyone tucked in. Wafts of food travelled around the house, and everyone had a second helping. Grannie said, “Don’t waste the food, dearie.” And everyone had a third and fourth helping!

Dessert was even better. A wobbling mountain of jelly, a skyscraper of ice-cream and a pool of fruit was put on the table. The jelly was sweet in your mouth, and the ice-cream simply melted on the tip of your tongue. The fruits of different colours: red, orange, yellow, green and white, were a spectacle to one’s eyes and mouth.

After stuffing ourselves on the table of food, we played games such as “hide-and-seek”, “What’s this?”, and “guess the presents”. Grannie and Gramp made sure everyone left their house jolly, sweaty and of course, bloated as a balloon.

“I will never forget that Christmas party night, on which we celebrated at my grandparents’ house.” I say, lost in my dream. Sis, who is standing next to me, stamps her feet and comments on the weather, “Brrrrrrrrr! It’s getting cold and Christmas is just around the corner. I wonder if Grannie will host a Christmas party this year…”

My Favourite Room

Dear Crystal,

I hope you are looking forward to coming to my house for the sleepover. We will be sleeping with the cat this time in the bathroom, as my room is being renovated at the moment.

The bathroom is my favourite room in the house. It’s cosy and sweet-scented. It has a door but no windows, and exhaust fan, a sink, a pink bubble bath tub and a shelf on which I put my soap and kelp. The bathroom is also where my cat sleeps, eats and drinks. The floor is made of peach square tiles, and it is suitable for our sleeping bags on which we will sleep on.

I recall one time when I was inventing potions in the bathroom. I mixed together some blueberry bubble bath and perfume, then added butter and melted sugar. The result was perfect! Even my kelp swayed to the scent of the potion ……Suddenly, my cat came in and slurped all of my precious potion! I didn’t mind but was more worried about the cat. Luckily, my cat didn’t die, and the potion even made my cat grow larger!

I love the bathroom and I hope it can always stay as my laboratory. Sadly, it will be renovated next year, so I will have to keep it in my memories. I look forward to meeting you next Friday, so I can show you my newly-invented Sparkling Sizzling Shimmering Spiral Shooting Stars Strawberry-scented Soap.

Love, Isadore

P.S. Attached is a picture of my favourite room.

Fairytale News

I like fairytales too! But they have to be real. So here's a fairytale news article that I wrote in Primary 6.

DANCERS FOUND SMUGGLING DRUGS

One of the twelve dancing princesses has been caught by the police. They found her smuggling drugs into Fairyland on a boat.

This incident happened on Monday morning. Witness Mermaid Ariel said, “I was swimming near Fairy Beach when I saw Princess May row a boat with wooden barrels filled with poison. I quickly phoned the police. They came just in time and caught her red-handed.

Policewoman Ella Declared, “This incident explains it all! A lot of suitors were found lying dead on the castle floor holding golden goblets of wine. The reason was because the twelve princesses had put poison into their wine!”

Prince Charming, who had managed to stay alive and married the youngest dancing princess, exclaimed, “I didn’t know that my wife was so treacherous! I am filing for a divorce immediately!

Princess May and her sisters are now imprisoned in their own castle’s prison. They will go to Cinderella Court on the 5th of May, the same date as Princess May’s birthday. A new law is also in force now: Thou shalt be executed if found holding dangerous goods.

Hair

Hair

Flowing river

Provider of shade

Like a Viking helmet

As smooth as a silk scarf

Safer than concrete roofs

Lovely long locks

Hair

Coca-cola Myth

The Myth of the Coca-cola Bottle (Told by the Kalahari Bushmen)

One day, a zebra was walking in the desert when she saw a lump in the bushes. She walked closer and saw a baboon lying there. His face was severely damaged and there was a large gash on his shoulder. The zebra called softly, “Hello? Baboon, do you hear me?”

The baboon appeared to be unconscious, as he just murmured softly. The zebra felt sorry for him, so she rolled him into the shade, away from the glare of the sun, and went home. She told her sisters about him. They just laughed at her and said, “Why would you want to care for a baboon? He is wounded already and will not be of much use.”

The zebra replied indignantly, “I don’t think so. I will care for the baboon myself.” And so she did.

Every day, she spent her time picking the juiciest leafy greens and fed them to the baboon. Still, the baboon did not stir one bit, but continued sleeping instead.

One day, as the zebra was busy collecting herbs for the baboon, something heavy fell onto her head. “Ouch!” She cried. “What in the world is this?” She examined the thing carefully and concluded that she had not seen it before. She rolled it back to her sisters and asked for their advice.

Her sisters just scoffed and said, “Huh. It’s just a bit of hard stuff. First you go care for a baboon and now you bring a hard thing home. Typical.”

The zebra was miserable because her sisters had ignored her. She took the Hard Thing to the place where the baboon was sleeping, and cried.

Suddenly, a deep voice behind her said, “What in the desert are you crying about?”

The zebra jumped but relaxed quickly. “You’ve healed! You must be tired. Here, let me give you my leaf.”

The baboon replied in the same deep voice, “No, child. I have no need for a leaf. I am the Great God Pan. You have showed me compassion beyond all measure. You saved my life by not letting me get burned by the sun, and cared for me for a whole month.”

The zebra replied shyly, “It was nothing really.”

The baboon said, “You are a kind-hearted and modest zebra indeed. I shall grant you this gift.” He held out a thing to the zebra.

The zebra exclaimed, “Hey! I have something identical to this!” She brought the Hard Thing to him.

“Go,” He said, “To the cluster of trees behind this bush, and stick these to your head.”

The zebra obeyed and suddenly found herself taller. Her neck had grown a lot longer and her legs were no longer sturdy. Her stripes were stretched into blots of spots. There were two hard things growing on her head.

The baboon transformed in a burst of light, into the Great God Pan, with light shining around him. “Hear, child. The Hard Thing is actually the fruit from the tallest tree in the Heavens. It is your reward for your care, and it is now part of your body. You are the ancestor of all the giraffes. This hard thing will always come to those in need, to remind them of the time the first giraffe cared for the Great god Pan.”

***

And so, that is why the Great God Pan sent this Hard Thing to us Kalahari Bushmen. In this time of drought, hunger and thirst, the Great God Pan wants to remind us that we should not only care for ourselves, but care for others as well.

Carbon Price Essay

An essay I wrote during the summer holidays last year.

What is carbon price?

What is carbon pricing? Carbon Pricing is a method of reducing greenhouse gas emissions nationally. When greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide are released into the atmosphere, they cause global warming due to trapped heat. Greenhouse gases come from our everyday activities, such as the electricity we use in homes and offices are produced by burning fossil fuels. Placing a price on carbon can involve taxes, subsidies or an emissions trading system. According to the Australian Government, carbon pricing is the “most environmentally effective and economically efficient way to reduce pollution”. In a nutshell, carbon pricing is putting a standard pricing system on the national carbon emissions.

Why do we need a carbon price? Currently, polluting is “free” (if you don’t count the cost on our environment). Putting a price tag on carbon emissions means forcing consumers to pay for every single tonne of carbon pollution that they release into the atmosphere. In this way, we control and stabilize the concentration level of greenhouse gases in our atmosphere, thus saving the environment.

Why choose carbon pricing? Why is it effective? There are many measures that a government can take to insure the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions: Carbon pricing, carbon dioxide storage, replacing burning of fossil fuels with renewable energy sources, regulations and standards, organizational change, and education.

Firstly, people actually think before they use money. Money is hard to earn and people will think twice before wasting electricity on unnecessary items at home or in offices. If there is a price on carbon, people would wish to save their money, so they would take the precaution not to consume too much electricity. Secondly, carbon pricing is a method of reducing carbon emissions without paying on the government’s part. Other ways, such as carbon dioxide storage or replacing burning of fossil fuels need high technology. This will need money to produce satisfactory results and reduce the amount of greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere.

Then what are the disadvantages of carbon pricing? Nearly every aspect of economic activity results in greenhouse gas emissions. To have significant impact, carbon pricing will need to be used in all fossil fuelled economies, or else business firms and companies will just move to another location in order to “escape” paying. Greenhouse gases emitted in a country without carbon pricing will affect people in other carbon pricing countries. For this we need an international standard for carbon pricing, which can be costly and very hard to accomplish. Placing a carbon tax or emission-trading system will increase the cost of electricity and will decrease the competitiveness of business companies which use a lot of energy. This could result in an unwanted economic and financial outcome.

Currently, carbon taxes are discussed in the United States of America, Canada, New Zealand, Australia and other European countries. Some programs have even been implemented. The question is: Is an international carbon emission pricing system just a dream for eco-friendly countries, or is it possible in our near future?

We can all help by reducing carbon emissions, whether our country has a carbon price or not. We can cut down our electricity usage by buying eco-friendly products, such as light bulbs that use less electricity. We can also turn off electrical appliances when they are not of much use. Every single little move we make towards reducing carbon emissions will help to our global goal of saving our environment, our energy sources, and our future.

A Letter to the Head Mouse

Again here is a composition that I didn't even know I wrote! It was back in Primary 6 when we read The Tale of Despereaux.

Mr. Cheddar Cheese

Most Very Honoured Head Mouse

Gray Street, Mousington


Dear Mr. Cheese,
I am writing in response to the announcement made on Saturday. I am a lawyer who lives in Fur Street, and I have read about Despereaux Tilling’s story in the Mousy daily.

Firstly, I would like to accent on my strong disagreement of your decision. Your verdict of punishment for Despereaux is against the law. As it is clearly stated in The Ancient Book of Law for Castle Mice, all children are free of rules and laws.


Secondly,
I would also like to report a case which happened before you were promoted to Most Very Honoured Head Mouse. Hovis Celery, Junior Threadmaster of Spool University has committed a similar crime to Despereaux’s. I, therefore, kindly request that you take this into account.



Thirdly, I agree with what you would describe as “egregious acts”, that Despereaux had done. However, he is really a nice, cheerful fellow. He is top of the class, which I know because I have talked to his teacher. His imagination leads him to the library to read books. I’m sure that you simply cannot punish a mouse for reading books to improve his grammar.


Lastly, I would like to remind you that humans are not at all dangerous. Despereaux listened to the human king play music and the teacher told me that his music grades went from an A to an A+! And (I am sure that you do not want the mouse community to hear of this) I would like to remind you of the past. You know for sure that I am talking about the time when you were a baby mouse happily frolicking in the Princess Pea’s mouse cage!


I have expressed my concern quite straight-forwardly, and I hope you will think it over and agree with me. Please reply promptly. Thank you very much for your attention.



Yours sincerely,

Isadore Hole
Senior Lawyer, Castle Ltd.

Fur Street, Mousington

1 Jordan Road (old campus)

I don't even remember I wrote a poem like this. Way back in Primary 5, our teacher forced us each to write a poem on our school. Her name was Miss Koo. She left the year after that. I never saw her again, but I still remember that her shoe came off one time when she was walking into the classroom.

I really like DGJS,
The classes there are fun.
English classes are the best,
Miss Koo is number one.

I have a friend called Chow On Yan,
We always play with Madeleine.
She can make a really pretty fan,
For waving on Sports Day, cheering us to win.


My other friend Rachel,
Who’s bottle often leaks,
In her red satchel,
While the teacher speaks.

Faithful friends and challenging Chinese class,
Are rocks in the bottom of my heart,
There, forever they will last,
Like cherries on a tart.

The Doherty Song

We have a horrible science teacher who says and does mean stuff all the time. His laughter is even worse than his words. It goes like this: Hu he hu he huh.

One day we were boiling rose petals for natural indicators. I was the last group representative to collect the rose petals, so I gathered what was left on the dying stalks and walked back to my group, dumped the petals in the beaker, and started the Bunsen burner. Then HE came round and scolded me for putting too much petals in. What was I supposed to do? Throw them away?

Then when the experiment was finished, he walked around the groups and stopped at my back. He said, "Well... Your indicator looks nice. The colour is deep enough." Then I was so mad and said, "I thought you scolded me for putting too much in! And now you say it's good!" Then he realized what a contradiction he had made and said, "Oh... Oh right. Yeah. Throw it down the sink, then." And he strutted off.

So this is a song I wrote to cool off my anger. It's sung to the tune of The Lazy Song by Bruno Mars. Enjoy! Mind you, you might get angry after singing!

Today he came around and spoiled my day.

Just when I was about to say,

"I didn't put much anyway."

But he says throw it down the drain,

I would rather throw him out the lane.

I’m gonna hate his nose forever

‘cause I’m so mad.

He said, “Throw it away,

that's too bad."

But hey that just makes me sad…

We can pour sulphuric acid on his big spikey hair,

Throw away our goggles, causing him despair,

Until he plays fair…

Oh yes I said it, You heard it, let’s fight injustice!

I’m not happy.

Mr. B Doherty: pH of wee.

I’m not happy.

Doherty, say sorry,

Or you’ll see…