It's almost banner time again...

Since 2010 the St Michaels Art League has sponsored an annual banner program. Members paint something relating to the theme "Celebrate St. Michaels" and the banners are hung along our main street from April - November. (For more on the history of this program see last years's January blog "Newest Member of SMAL.")

I have painted a playful crab almost every year - a friend named him "Mikey" since he is a St. Michaels crab. It's an annual challenge for me to decide what Mikey is up to each year. I began thinking about Mikey last summer as I watched our main street fill with tourists - all shopping in the quaint stores in our village. Thinking that many of the shoppers are women, I decided that Mikey needed a shopping friend.

This year I am introducing 'Michaela.'

Keeping with the theme of celebrating our town...I thought of all the events that are offered throughout the year: the Chesapeake Bay Maritime Museum, Daffodil Festival, Wine Festival, ArtHunt with its ice cream treats, Fall into St Michaels and Christmas in St Michaels.

Michaela would have her hands full of shopping bags!

I did a quick sketch and played with different size bags.

This was the basic idea...a happy shopper.
Then I started to obsess about the bags...size, color, logo...

I just painted the hat on this one and then tried various bags...

OK, why even paint the hat? Just need to try bags... (although, I did have fun painting the ribbon) Several tries later...

Getting closer to what I want although that purple bag is pretty bad and that Halloween bag needs some work, too!

Now the thing is...I had painted this so many times (probably 8 or 9) that I am not sure if this next one is the final one! I had so many on my computer... and I have already turned over the final version to a friend so I don't even have it to see which one it was!

Is this the final answer? The original artwork will be on display at the library in St. Michaels for the month of April and the banners will be hung on the poles along Talbot Street by mid-April. Hope I'm not too surprised!