A Stick Figure Questionnaire!

Aaron suggested I draw some boy/girl stick people The Owl's bathroom doors, which need new signs, and I might have drawn too many. In fact, I might not even be done drawing them.

So far I have 5 stick people to choose from for each door and I need some opinions!

Which option do you like best? Would you prefer to see two options combined? Do you hate them all? Would you like to make some of your own stick suggestions for me to draw?

Please Please Please put your votes and comments on the blog here (you don't need to have your own blogger account to do so!) This will help me out a lot because I'm going to post this in a few different places and I'd like to be able to have all the responses go to one spot :)

These are a little rough, even by stick figure standards, so keep that in mind.

That's the end of what I've drawn today. Here are a few other options from past drawings that I think would make fun bathroom door figures, but they aren't actually up for voting cause Aaron really wants them to be stick people and not cartoons. 

The Stick Figure Collective (update 9/24)

I have a great love of doodling while watching shows I've seen so many times that I don't even need to look at the TV to know what's happening. Today I've been iPad doodling to a soundtrack of Arrested Development. (The TV show that is, not the early 90s rap group*).  Actually I've been doing this for a few days, and I've even been taking requests on Facebook and Google+. Mostly I've drawn stick people. There have also been a few unidentifiable creatures. I've posted most of 'em elsewhere, but I felt like they needed a permanent home here on the blog too. My plan is to continually add random pictures to this post. All the lost little drawings who don't fit in their own blog post will live here together in The Stick Figure Collective.

Side note... I currently have 799 blog views, so if you're reading this right now you might be number 800! This is pretty exciting for me. I mean, it's almost a thousand. One Thousand whole views! Wow! Unfortunately I still only have 4 followers. This means that I am not currently famous, and should probably be less excited at the prospect of an 800th view. (I am still excited though because it is a whole round number and those are cool).

Additions 9/24 - I forgot to include this kitty in the original post, and the party spider is brand new : D

So that's all I've got for now. I think. If I find (or draw!) more I'll add them. These go (more or less) in the order I drew them. You can probably tell that at first I didn't really plan on doing anything with them, but by the end I kinda knew I'd want to put them here so I started adding a little extra detail and bits of color.

The girl photographer was requested by my friend Jen but I was so excited about the picture that I forgot to write her name on it. You should totally visit her blog! Especially if you're a creative person, or just love other creative people.

The bookseller is a tribute to my former co-workers at the 'ole BN.

The tomboy in the tree was requested by a stranger on G+, so if you're a stranger don't be afraid to request your own drawing!!

And the yellow thing is... the yellow thing.

*It turns out that Arrested Development is still together and touring. Learn something new everyday!

My Love Affair with the Stick Figure

My love of stick figures began at a young age. I'm pretty sure I didn't come out of the womb drawing them, but as far as my memory is concerned I may as well have. The first type of drawings I can remember making looked something like this:

Giant heads with appendages exploding out of all sides, accompanied by artistic squiggles. Probably with less accurately placed faces. And if I'm gonna put my honesty hat on, it was still pretty fun to draw this way today. 

I went through a brief phase when I thought I might learn to draw things in a more realistic, less stick-like fashion. It didn't last. In the end I couldn't give up my simple stick figures. They're my favorite way of expressing just about anything. 

Since I'm a crazy person who never throws anything away I have some older stick people to share with you! The oldest one I know I still have (you never know what might turn up in an unpacked box) is this:

This masterpiece is on the backside of a Denny's placemat. I know that all the people depicted are friends, and that most of them were there that night, but none of us can exactly recall who's who. We have some pretty good guesses, but to protect the innocent I'll leave the names out. 

Another activity I'm very fond of is labeling things. 

You might have noticed that none of these people have faces. I can't really explain that.

Fun Fact: The girl with the exclamation point is NOT fond of snakes.

Fun Fact #2: That Denny's waiter has hair, I don't know why I drew him bald. He is wearing a hawaiian patterned coat thing. I know it doesn't look like that in the picture, but that's what it is. Trust me. 

After my career as a placemat illustrator, but before my venture into paint blogging, I had an interim position as a white board artist. This piece was commissioned by my friend Katie. Yes, that is a mailman delivering a cup of pee. I can't exactly say why because we don't even remember how this became a joke. My love of labeling is evident here.

This one was a note I left for my husband over at abandonist. There were a few things he needed to do and I felt that a stick drawing would really help him to remember them. 

This is actually two notes in one, which is why it was labeled NEW at some point. I'm pretty sure the part about calling the doctor came first, and when I wanted him to feed the cats the first note still applied so I didn't erase it. My cats are named Kitsu, Maybe, and Sebastian. Maybe and her dirty butt is a story for another blog. 

So, as you can see, I really like stick figures. I even already had a love of MS Paint from back in '95 when I played with it on my Compaq Presario. (I'm on a macbook pro now and I'm using a free app called Sketchbook Express, if anyone has a better app to recommend please comment!) I've also always fancied myself to be something of a writer. I think I might be better at fiction than blogging, but hey, I'm just getting started. 

So it might seem like it was inevitable that I'd find myself here, sitting on my couch for hours on end, drawing and writing, but that's actually not the case. It would never have even occurred to me to do this if I hadn't stumbled upon the blog Hyperbole and a Half by Allie Brosh. It is the funniest most amazing little piece of interweb I've ever found, and I just wanted to make sure that if anyone ever actually reads this they know how crazy inspired I was by her work. It's about a billion million million times better than anything I'll ever write and if you've been living in a cave with no wifi for the past few years you should go read everything she's ever posted right now. 

So you went, right? I know, it was awesome. You're welcome. 

Others reasons why I quit my job include

Opening a restaurant!

This is from my husband's blog :)

abandonist: The Dewar: "Tomorrow I'm supposed to get in touch with someone we spoke to on the phone for a minute at the landlord's office. Apparently he can help us..."

EDIT: For some reason this little tiny post has gotten more attention than I expected so I thought I'd add a little something to spruce it up :)

This was one of the first stick people I drew with my mac. A lot of people seem to think the brown thing is a poop. It's not. It's a worm. If you look closely you'll see that he has a face. I'm not really sure why I drew him, but I didn't want to erase him, so now I have to explain him.