close encounters of the fur kind and world elephant day

Today is World Elephant Day, a day to bring attention to the plight of Asian and African elephants and help to protect them from the dangers they face. Elephants need our help. One thing you can do to help is to create elephant art and share it on social media (use the hashtag #elegram). The Nature Conservancy is asking for 20,000 handmade elephants and is working with donors to match your artwork with at least $150,000 to work with partners on the ground to protect elephants. You don't have to be an artist. You can doodle, make a sculpture, use cut paper, or any other art materials. More details here.

This is my baby elephant for World Elephant Day and elegrams (it's a 2" x 2" painting I did a few years ago that I still love:

 The Illustration Friday prompt this week is: pointy.

The chicken wouldn't be quite so alarmed if the aliens didn't have pointy ears and teeth, which remind her of storybook wolves. The aliens have pointy teeth (the better to eat you with), and pointy ears (the better to hear you with), and if you could see them, they'd most likely have pointy tails too (the better to thwack you with).

Or maybe she's just the chicken who cried wolf.

This is from one of the new portfolio images I did for the LA SCBWI conference last week, and also from a story I'm secretly working on (though since I mentioned it just now, I guess it's not so secret anymore).