DRAWESOME

Title: Drawtober 13th Australian Raven
Australian Ravens are found all over the country. They are (usually) completely black, except after a year old, when their eyes turn white. Only once, in over 50 years, have I seen one with a single white feather. This isn't that one. They're quite a large bird, apparently, compared to their American cousins, when Elizabeth Moon came over some years ago and we took her birdwatching she was gobsmacked with how big the ravens were and quite distracted by them when we were trying to show her more, to us locals, unusual birds.

They're smart, of course, and handsome birds. They're of particular importance to Nyoongar people, being one of the moieties - Waardong the Raven, and Manatj the Corella - Waardong must marry Manatj, and Manatj must marry Waardong since the Nyittiny - the cold times, the time before anything existed.

There's a lot of them in the suburbs, and you will often see them investigating builders' leftovers in building sites.

And hear them. Arrrrrr aaarrrrrrrrrr aaar AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRR!

Anyway, drawn using a very pretty Diamine ink, Upon A Star, and the funky glass nib from Teranishi.

Title: Drawtober 8th


Well the prompt this time was 'Mug' which we do have in profusion here. It's still cool enough - in fact we had nearly 12 mm of rain here overnight that the prospect of hot drinks still has definite appeal (although who am I kidding, we drink hot tea and coffee all year round).

I got rdm to choose what he thought was the most interesting mug of the ones in the gaming room, and this one was the one he chose. It's one that followed him from his parents' houses to end up here eventually. He thinks it was obtained from some pottery down in the South West. It's been salt glazed, with a wax-resist design of dragonflies, and has a partner mug in the same glaze, with a more abstract design. It's seen a lot of mahjong, boardgames and also RPGs since I met rdm in 1987, and consequently it, over the years.

I had two new things to try out, my untried Van Diemens Ink August 2024 and my just arrived Pelikano Stardust. This pen arrived with an gratifyingly huuuuge cartridge filled with boring blue, so I emptied it and after a thoughtful struggle of which ink, put the August 2024 in.

And started drawing away, all done now, so here we are.

Title: Drawtober 7th. Bottlebrush Tree

Content Notes: Caution! Your plant may not be my plant, so be cautious what you're eating and rubbing on yourself.

Drawn with a Kakimori dip nib for the Pelikan Apricot Achat, Pyrite and Rose Quartz inks, and with a Pelikan Twist for the Aventurine. Blending the Aventurine and the Pyrite with the Kakimori was very easy and I really liked the effect and the shade was very close to the leaves in the sunshine.

So, today's prompt from this list https://goss.dreamwidth.org/file/1625739.jpg is Sunflower. I'm roughly working through it for this year's stab at Drawtober/Inktober because the drawesome community on Dreamwidth is pretty cool. But, most of them are in the Northern Hemisphere which is not where I am. So I'm playing fast and loose. Today's prompt is Sunflower, and the closest thing to me at the moment sunflower wise is this plant which I'm growing on my verge. It's commonly known as pigface. Overseas it's called sea fig. It flowers about now and the fruit will develop through Kambarang and continue to ripen in Birak.
But It is a relative to a naturally occurring species, which some of the Nyoongar people call Beyen. It's an important plant to them. So I'm calling this Beyen-mokiny - similar to a Beyen. You can certainly eat the fruit of it, it's very nice! It's said you can eat the leaves cooked, maybe raw, but I haven't tried them. Wild Food in Australia said they were yucky but the fruit was great. Another use is it's great for burns - spread the pulp of the leaves on a burn and it acts in a similar way to aloe vera. Better in my experience, it's better. The endemic one is pink, the introduced one is yellow, but can have pink and apricot tones, I hear it crossbreeds readily with the native one.

So there you go.

Title: Drawtober 1 Nasturtiums in Kambarang
Artist: leecetheartist 
Rating: G
Fandom: n/a
Characters/Pairings: n/a
Content Notes: Drawn with a Kakimori dip nib using J Herbin 1670 ink. Here in South Western Australia we are entering our warming part of the year, of our 6 seasons 'Kambarang' is the most well known, and loved, for its profusion of wildflowers. I hope to get out there and draw some of them for you during this event!

Nasturtiums are not native to this country, and indeed can be quite invasive in some places, but here in my front garden they suppress weeds and have warm colours from pale yellow, to very deep red.  They are starting to become less rambunctious, a sure sign that the warming weather is on the way.

I don't think I've viewed this ink in sunlight before, it seems to have some chameleonic properties.

Er, what number challenge is this? If Admin could tag or let me know? Thank you!