My little sister, Stella, has a birthday coming up. I also have over 30k fragments (300 fragments -> 1 diamond badge -> a 1-month core membership) just sitting there. You can see where this is going.
Draw a nice picture of some of my sister's favorite characters this month. And I'll award it a diamond badge so you get that sweet core membership.
A core membership offers special customization features. You'll also be able to change your username if desired (just once, so get it right the first time).
I can give out over 100 1-month memberships. If you know anyone who might be interested, feel free to share this!
Requirements
Your picture(s) should be:
Nicely drawn, with time and detail (not just a quick sketch)
Your own work (not AI or a dollmaker)
In color
Including 1 or more characters from Stella's Doll World
Rated PG, not sexy or violent
Fun! Something cute and/or funny for her to enjoy
Simple background? Beginning artist? Not so good at hands? All of that is fine. My sister isn't picky.
Post your picture in the comments here. When I see it, I'll give it a diamond badge, granting you a core membership. I'll be checking regularly all month.
Now, let's talk about those characters!
These dolls live in a giant Lego mansion in Stella's room. She loves telling silly stories about their antics.
Evil villains live next door and cause constant problems for the good people. Stella keeps changing her villain characters, but Becca is a permanent villain.
Characters marked with blue () belong to me and characters marked in pink () belong to Stella.
Some themes Stella has enjoyed lately include:
One character carrying another
Shipping Ping and Grace
The Fang/Song family drama and Beth's woes
Becca (intentionally) and Sneaky (innocently) causing mischief
People chasing Becca away
Ocean and Luke adopted a ridiculous amount of children. (They're currently at 7.) I'll focus on Stella's favorites.
Parents
Ocean, a therapist and loving mom, is the family caregiver. Her husband is busy with work but loving.
Drawing them: Ocean is tall with a medium build, strong muscles, and 2 freckles. Her hair has a gray/white streak due to aging. Luke is balding, muscular, and super tall. (The drawing below is from the past. He's now balding with gray at the temples.)
Mia
Mia Rainbow is profoundly gifted at magic, which has given her a bit of a responsibility complex when it comes to protecting her family. She's autistic. She loves clouds/the weather, the woods, and her family.
Drawing her: Mia is short with a slight frame. She likes the color blue and skirts/dresses.
Keiko
Keiko Rainbow is a young woman with Down syndrome who loves rock music, being active, and dessert. Loud and brave, she will threaten to bite anyone who messes with her family. (That worries her mom.)
Drawing her: Keiko is chubby and super short with a port wine stain (birthmark) shaped like a flower on her face. She wears purple glasses and likes to look cool.
These newer characters and their family troubles have captured Stella's interest. Mrs. Fang is homophobic and controlling, while Mr. Fang is distant. Beth Song is his illegitimate daughter.
Ping Fang
Ping is a geeky, shy, nonbinary autistic young adult who cares for their two younger sisters. They like tech, the outdoors, rock music, and cybersecurity. And Grace Piper.
Drawing them: Ping is tallish and androgynous, with a slight but muscular frame. They wear blue glasses and have subtle freckles (which you can draw or skip). They mostly wear dark colors.
Mingmei Fang
Mingmei is a high-energy lesbian with an intellectual disability who loves to have fun. Her interests include singing and dancing. The golden child growing up, she feels she knows best and isn't above meddling in Ping's love life.
Drawing her: Mingmei wears hearing aids and has a medium height and build with a freckle on her chin. She can be creative with her hair and makeup.
Beth Song
Beth is bookish, highly sensitive, and anxious. She's an autistic trans lesbian with an intellectual disability. She survived a horrible car crash that killed her mother. Now, she works at the local library. She loves her stuffed animals, and unfortunately, Sneaky the cat does too.
Drawing her: Beth is short with a slight build. Like Ping, she has subtle freckles on her face. Her clothes are often delicate and feminine.
Grace Piper
Grace is a sensitive, caring soul with a beautiful soprano voice. She loves music, flowers, and pretty dresses. (Think Christine from Phantom of the Opera.) Grace has a crush on Ping but is nervous about making a move.
Drawing her: Grace is beautiful, a little short, and quite chubby. Have fun with pretty hair, jewelry, and lacy outfits if you'd like. Her favorite color is pink.
Evil Becca London and Her Cat, Sneaky
Becca is the greedy, mean #girlboss next door. She runs an online potion business. The most powerful ingredient? Human tears. Preying on people's fears and insecurities is her specialty. She'll stir up trouble as much as she can so she can magically collect tears, but if Keiko threatens to bite her, she'll run away.
Drawing her: Becca is fashionable and tall-ish with a slim/medium build. She has subtle freckles. Sneaky is blackish brown with yellow eyes and sleek fur.
Becca trained her cat, Sneaky, to steal from the neighbors. Sneaky thinks this is a fun game and that the neighbors like to play chase. She likes stuffed animals (hers or from the neighbors), treats, and being petted.
You are also welcome to draw:
Mary Rainbow (sister to Mia and Keiko) is dating Mingmei. She has Down syndrome.
Christy Rainbow (another sister) is a cute, energetic kid who likes playing pirates and coloring.
Alan London, Becca's cousin, is a chill guy who likes baking and family.
Zack London is Alan's little brother who has a naughty streak. He plays pranks sometimes. He also plays with Christy.
Noelle is Ocean's sensitive sister. She has a sweet 4-year-old son, Teddy.
Here are some memes and comics about their adventures together:
Draw something you think is fun, silly, or cute. If it makes you smile, it's likely to make my sister smile, too.
Upload your art to deviantART and share a link in the comments to make sure I see it! This offer is good until the end of March.
I'm excited to see what people draw! And I hope the participating artists will enjoy their 1-month memberships!
My sister is getting a new fake name. I’ve been considering it for a while, and when I proposed the idea to her, she liked it.
Here’s why:
I chose her old name decades ago, back when she was less communicative and too young to understand abstractions like privacy on the internet. So she never got to choose what it was.
Her old name is a little too similar to her IRL name. As I search for permanent and stable employment, I don’t want employers to find out that I’m autistic and rule me out without giving me a fair chance. My sister is also entering the adult world, and she has the right to determine what gets shared online; a breach of my privacy wouldn’t be good for her either.
In celebration of us approaching adulthood milestones together, I offered her the chance to choose herself a new fake name. She took it.
I drew up a list of potential names that I thought she’d like, while telling her that she could go beyond the list if she liked. I wrote the meanings of each name on the side.
And as soon as she read “Stella (star),” she loved it. Didn’t care about the rest of the list.
My sister has always loved stars. She has a hoodie with a huge glittery star on it. She likes it when people tell her she’s a star or a rock star. She likes space, Star Wars, and Star Trek. And if you see her in person, you’ll notice she can light up a room.
My sister is 100% a Stella.
I asked her if she wanted a middle name too. She glanced at the list and said May. A month in Spring when the weather gets warmer and school comes to an end… I can get why she likes May.
Well, my lovely readers, it’s pretty simple:
I’ll be doing my best to call my sister Stella from now on.
You’ll notice that past posts now refer to her as Stella instead of her former fake name.
Don’t feel bad if you refer to her by her old name. If you’d like, you can copy your comment content, delete the comment, paste it into a new one, then change the name and post it. And if you can’t, no big deal. She’s had the old name for almost a decade so it’s not going to be erased from the internet entirely.
I appreciate how lovely and kind everyone has been, respecting my privacy and putting up with my weird secrecy. It’s good people like you who give me hope for a better world, where someday disabilities are not seen as barriers to employment and people can be more open about who they are.
It’s a world I’d like for all of you. And in all of you, I see such amazing potential.
Thank you for listening and caring. Stella and I are glad to have people like you in the world.
This post will be edited once dA offers a decent journal editing UI.