Hezekiah the Rightous King

Hezekiah

Hezekiah was a king of ancient Judah.  He was a righteous king . . . even though his father and grandfather had been wicked.  He restored the Temple and turned the people away from worshiping idols.  He was a follower of Jehovah.   I the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints we believe that Jehovah is Jesus Christ. 

Hezekiah did many wonderful things but this story from the Bible, 2nd Kings chapter 20....is my favorite Hezekiah story.   He was sick.  Apparently with an infection in his leg.   He was visited by the Prophet Isaiah and told that his sickness is unto death and to basically set his affairs in order.   Hezekiah wept and prayed from his bed and reminded the Lord that he had been good etc.  So the Lord sent Isaiah back in to tell him what to do to cure the infection and Hezekiah got like 20 more years.  

I was told by my surgeon in Boston, Massachussetts that I was not going to make it... after a failed surgery on my trachea.   But after he left my hospital room I felt a voice in my mind.   It said basically,  

              "Its OK to go, but if you want to stay I will help you, but it won't be easy."  

I still had a 13 year old boy that I felt needed me so I chose to stay.   I think my young adult daughters needed me too and I certainly did not want to leave my wife,  but I did think of my youngest child.   I had a hole in my trachea opening up to inside my chest cavity.  I SHOULD have died.    But that was 12 years ago and I am still here.  Somehow the Lord had cells grow into the mesh that had migrated and killed that part of my trachea.  So I sill live with a tracheal stent.  But I live and am not dead.   

I like to share this story because it is true and to me it is evidence that the Lord does intervene sometimes and help us out when we are in crisis in this mortal journey we are all on.   He intervened for Hezekiah and he intervened for me as well.   The scriptures make it clear that if you are trying to live  right the Lord is more willing to help you.   But he hears all pleas for help and I think repentance goes a long way towards softening the Lord's heart and getting His help for your trial. 

Now, do I LIKE having a tracheal stent?  NOT!   But I like being alive.   Sometimes the Lord helps us be able to handle our trials in life instead of removing the trial   The way I figure it, when things  go wrong and we have trials or challenges in mortality,  we can turn to God and gain strength and sometimes we pass the test and the trial comes to an end.  Sometimes we get His help to be able to handle the trial.   BUT the trials well come to you sooner or later, so why not turn TO God rather than get mad at Him and turn away from Him.  The trials WILL come so you might as well have God's help to handle them and deal with them. 

NOTE:  The printable version of Hezekiah drawing is found by clicking on the "Religion" or "All Printables" button up top.  Scroll down for new drawings like this one.   Hezekiah drawing is under Old Testament part of the Religion drawings.  

Red Deer

Red Deer

Red Deer are old world deer.  They live in Europe and North Africa.  They are an important food animal for some parts of the Old World.  They are a rather large deer.  They can weigh up to 530 lbs or a mass of 240 kg.  Conservation efforts have helped them avoid extinction in Europe and England.  They have declining population numbers in North Africa.  

If you read the story of Robin Hood killing the King's Deer. . . it would have been Red Deer.  You can see a red deer hiding in the bushes and trees in the below drawing.   This is an older drawing.   

Robin Hood out Hunting

NOTE:  New drawings like the Red Deer are found on the bottom of the list when you click on the "Animals" button or the "All Printables" button found at the top of the page. You will need to scroll down to find the new drawings.    The new drawings are at the bottom of the page.  

Jesus walking on Water

Jesus walking on Water

When Jesus learned that His cousin, John the Baptist had been executed he went up into the mountains to pray.  His disciples took or sailed a boat to the other side of the Sea of Galilee to Capernum.   But Jesus came to them while they were still like 6 km from shore.  They were scared at first.  They called Him the Son of God.  Jesus being the creator of the world could command the elements.  The story goes that Peter went out to Jesus and seeing the waves and wind started to loose his faith and started to sink until Jesus reached out to save him.   I think before we are critical of Peter we need to see how far we can walk on water.   I think Peter was amazing.   

 I want to admit that this drawing should have a bigger ship and probably 12 instead of just two apostles in it.  In any case, it shows the ship and I choose to show a fishing net hanging over the side.  It does not appear to be in the water though.   Jesus and the two disciples' hair is blowing in the wind,  I think I'll do a more scripturally correct version of this event at "Religion" and below the Old Testament list of drawings.   It is also near the bottom of "All Printables".  

Cooper the Yorkie

Cooper the Yorkie

Hi folks!  Sorry there have been no posts for a while.  We fled to the East Coast of the USA to get away from the smoke out West.  There are a record number of wild fires burning out West and neither my wife nor I could handle the bad air.  We are staying with friends near New York City.  This is their Yorkie Cooper.  He is a very loveable and loving doggy.   

Life of Jesus Christ coloring pages Part 1

Today I am in South Carolina.  We fled the smoke of Utah and the western USA   So today I am
re-posting some of my previous drawings of the life of Jesus.  My extended family here in South Carolina have just moved here and their furniture and their printer/scanner has not arrived yet. So I can not scan any of my new drawings.  I have a few  new drawings ready to go but they will have to wait.  There are many New Testament drawings on this blog.  Click on the Religion button to find these drawings.   I will not do all of them now.   So this will be Part 1 of the life of Jesus.   Remember that none of these are new drawings. 

So, this will remind you of some of my previous drawings of the life of Jesus.   He was the most important person ever to come to Earth.  He was half God so he was able to pay the eternal price for our sins so we can one day return to live with Him and our Heavenly Father. 

First we will see the drawing I did of Jesus creating the Earth.  This happened when we all lived with our Heavenly Parents in our pre-mortal life.   Jesus, under the direction of our Heavenly Father created the Earth for us to come here to be tested.   The following is my opinion only, but I think we probably helped some too. . . with the creation of the Earth and its life.   

Jesus creates the Earth

Angel Appears to the Shepherds

Mary and Baby Jesus

Jesus as 12 year old at the Temple

Jesus and Joseph working in carpentry shop

Young Jesus near Jerusalem

Jesus is Baptized

Jesus calls His Apostles

Jesus teaches about Forgiveness

Jesus went up into a Mountain

Jesus heals the Lepers

Jesus heals a Sick Man

Jesus calms the Storm

I will re-post more later on a later post.  This will do for now.   But all my New Testament drawings are available to print at the Religion button at the top of the blog.   

Fairy, Dryad, and Meremaid

Remember that the printable versions are found by clicking on the above buttons.  Also, new drawings are at the bottom of the lists.  I also need to let you know that I may not be posting for a while.  My wife and I are considering going on a road trip to escape the smoke of the western USA.  Big fires in California are smoking us out.   

These drawings are based on two beautiful young ladies I met over the last week or two.  And one drawing is of my niece, Madeline.  Sara is drawn as a tree fairy or dryad.  She is a young woman from my neighborhood.  She recently returned from a Spanish speaking LDS mission.  Krishna was the sister to the groom at a wonderful wedding my wife and I attended last weekend.  The wedding was at the Tracy Aviary in Salt  Lake City.  Krishna, like Laurel and I, was walking around the aviary to see the birds.  Its a pretty cool bird zoo.  The swans in the first picture are drawn from the swans I photographed at the aviary.  Madeline, my niece is fluent in Mandarin Chinese because she went to Taiwan on her LDS mission.  The drawings are a pretty good likeness of the young women, but it is difficult to capture such beauty in coloring page style drawings. . . and consider that I draw with a fine point marker that is not erasable.   Of course, Madeline is a brilliant artists that could draw a detailed self portrait much better than this one in the time it took me to draw this non-detailed coloring page. 

Tree Fairy or Dryad named Sara

The fairy is Sara.   She is a tree fairy or dryad.  She protects her tree and the forest from danger.   The flowers in the bushes bloom better when a fairy is around.   So maybe Sara is a flower fairy as well.  Or maybe she is just a flower fairy in league with the forest's dryads to help protect the trees.

Mermaid named Krisna

(Drawn is cartoon style with exaggerated head.)

The mermaid, Krishna, is a lover of flowers.  She is obsessed with the land. . . kind of like Ariel.  But Krishna loves the natural world on land.  She likes watching the animals and plants. on the seashore.  Here she had crawled up on the beach to pick a daisy off the shore.

Dryad named Madeline 

(Drawn is cartoon style with exaggerated head.)

Tree fairies that are very close to their tree are called hamadryads.  The hamadryad will actually die if their tree dies.  So they are good protectors.  Here Madeline is a dryad lovingly holding a branch of her tree.  Her bow is leaning up against her tree and she is wearing her quiver of arrows.  

Spinosaurus Fishing for Sawfish

Spinosaurus after a Sawfish

(new drawing)

Spinosaurus was a unique Theropod dinosaur.  New discoveries in Morocco are indicating that Spinosaurus lived much like a crocodile.  They had sensors on the end of their snout to detect fish movement...even in murky water.  Their nostrils were high up the snout so they could stick the snout in the water to detect fish and still breathe.

Spinosaurus Close Up

It appears that they probably mostly walked on all fours.  They lived near the water and probably ate fish the majority of the time.  This top drawing is a new drawing of Spinosaurus swimming underwater and catching a prehistoric sawfish.  Spinosaurs lived in what was a delta like area of a river with many rivers as the main river emptied into the ocean.

B 24 J Liberator 

(Allied Bomber)

The first Spinosaurus found was destroyed by allied bombs during World War II.  The museum where it was housed was across the street from the Nazi headquarters and when the Nazi headquarters were bombed the museum was hit as well.  A fairly new documentary about the discovery of the latest Spinosaurus fossilized skeleton in Morocco is very informative.  It is called Bigger Than T. rex.  I highly recommend this video. 

Spinosaurus with Hatching Chick

(/This is an old drawing and the nostirl is to far towards the end of the nose.)

Although Spinosaurus lived near the water and could swim. . . it hatched its chicks on land. 

Spinosaurus goes Fishing

This drawing is now considered more accurate with the shorter back legs.   

Amasa Lyman

Amasa M. Lyman 

As a Young Man

Amasa Mason Lyman

Middle Age

This post is about my ancestor Amasa Mason Lyman.  He was an early pioneer of Utah and
Southern California.   Amasa was a Latter Day Saint apostle.  He went on over 14 missions.  He settled San Bernardino, California.  He was one of the most popular speakers in his day.
He was among the small percentage of early Mormons practiced polygamy.  Amasa had several wives and 36 children.   He was a great colonizer and pioneer.

I went to the Amasa M. Lyman Expo this past week.  It was very interesting to learn about all the sacrifices that my ancestors made to colonize the Western United States and establish the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints.  Since we consider this church to be the Kingdom of God on Earth we honor these great men and women.

The last few years of his life Amasa was disaffected from the church he loved.  He appeared to his daughter and eldest son ten years after his death and said he was tired of wearing his black boots.  His son, Francis Marion Lyman was the president of the Quorum of 12 Apostles.  Francis spoke with the president of the Church.  Joseph F. Smith.  President Smith said "I believe Amasa has worn his black boots long enough.   Francis Marion Lyman was baptized as proxy for his father.   All of Amasa's blessings were returned to him.   Maybe Amasa was blessed for all the good he did for Heavenly Father's church so he did not have to suffer more than ten years.  I don't know.  But I do know that Amasa Lyman was a great man and many many of his descendants are active in the Church he helped establish.  .   .  (including me).


Today I am posting the drawings I did at the Expo of Amasa Lyman and his wife Lydia.
Lydia Partridge Lyman was the last wife Amasa married.  She was 24 and he was 40 when they were married.  Two of her sisters were previously married to Amasa.  She lived a challenging life.  She was a seamstress and helped settle Oak City Utah.   Her son, Edward Leo Lyman Sr. used to go up to the mountainside and set juniper stumps on fire to sell the charcoal that was made to the local blacksmith.  This helped support the family.  His son, Lydia's grandson, settled Delta, Utah in 1913.   The town was originally called Burtah.   Lydia lived a rather short life.  She contracted severe Rheumatoid Arthritis at a young age and she died in her early 40's.  Her son cared for her but she was in so much pain that she could not even be touched near the end.  She had to be carried in a sheet.  She was buried by her husband who had already passed.  They were both buried in the Fillmore, Utah cemetery.  By the way, Edward Leo Lyman Jr. is my grandfather.   I was raised on a farm near Delta, Utah.

Lydia Partridge Lyman

Vegaceratops

Vegaceratops

Vegacertops was a Ceratopsian dinosaur from what is now Alberta Canada.  It had a rather square frill and it had many small horns along the top of the frill.  This horned dinosaur had a nose horn that was small compared to other Ceratopsians like Styracosaurus or Centrosaurus.  Its nose horn was comparable to the Triceratops small nose horn.  But Vegaceratops had no eyebrow horns. . . just little bumps.  The name Vegaceratops means wanderer horned face.  It is referring to how Vegaceratops looks like a close relative from Southern Utah named Kosmoceratops.   The Vegaceratops was identified as its own Genus back in 2001.  

Vegaceratops was up to 20 feet or about 6 meters long.  So it was not a small animal.   It lived in the Cretaceous Period, but not at the end when Triceratops was the biggest Ceratopsian.   Vegaceratops lived 84-72 million years ago.  

As I have mentioned before, the flowers are not a mistake in this drawing.  They have found evidence for flower pollen and therefore flowers on flowering plants dating way back to possibly even before the dinosaurs.  The tree is not a palm tree.  Look very closely and you will see it has cones . . . like pine cones in it.  This tree is a conifer like pine, spruce, and fir trees.  It is a cycad.   

Vegaceratops toy by Safari Ltd.  

Photo from Safari website. . . although I could have taken a photo of my toy dino.  

The Vegaceratops drawing was done from a toy like that pictured here.  The toy is made by Safari Ltd.  The Safari toys are dense, high quality and are absolutely wonderful  They are hard to damage.  They are what I consider to be museum quality replicas. . . all be it very small replicas.  My grandkids love playing with my collection.  I have around 70 or their quality animal toys.  I highly recommend these toys.  I buy them at museum gift shops mostly.  

Printable version of the above new drawing is found by clicking on "Paleontology" button up top.   Then scroll to the bottom of the Mesozoic section.   New drawings are always at the bottom of lists.  The new drawing is also at the bottom of the "All Printables" list.   Older drawings are further up the lists.  The below drawings are all older drawings from previous posts.  

Triceratops Mother feeding the Kids

Styracosaurus feeding on Ferns

Centrosaurus Duel

Flower Fairy at Work

The flower fairies help flowers bloom.  They also bestow their gifts to add sweetness to the scent of the flower.  A flower that has been visited by a flower fairy will attract far more pollinators to the flower.  Bees and flies are attracted to flowers with a sweet scent so the flower fairy makes those flowers smell even sweeter.  Flowers pollinated by beetles have a strong musty or fruity scent and so the flower fairy will add to the strong scent.  So a flower with the added boost from a flower fairy will have a far stronger scent.  You might notice this on a rosebush.  Often only some of the flowers have the strong scent.

Flower  Fairy bestowing her Gifts

The above flower fairy is adding her special gift to the roses.  She is using a small branch from a living tree as her wand.  Flower fairies do not want to hurt any living thing so she magically removes the branch without killing it.  As long as she is holding the branch she is using as her wand, the branch will stay alive.

The below flower fairy is the same one as above.  Now she is returning the small branch to the tree.  As she puts it back on the tree her magic fuses it in place and it immediately grows a couple of new leaves.  In fact new leaves grow in many parts of the tree.  It is the flower fairy way to say thank you for the use of your branch.

Flower Fairy restoring her Wand to the Tree

So if you like the smell of flowers, be aware that the sweetest and strongest smelling flowers have been visited by a flower fairy.  See if  I am right.  Go smell a flowering bush like a rose bush or even a marigold planter.  You will see that some of the flowers are sweeter or stronger than the rest. . . proof of the existence of flower fairies!

Jesus as a Young Man

Jesus as a Young Man outside of Jerusalem

This is the only new drawing on today's post so it will be at the bottom of the "All Printalbes" pages or at the bottom of the New Testament section of the "Religion" section.  

Just click on the above buttons to find the correct drawing to print and color.  

I think that somehow this drawing looks a bit like my nephew Sam.  

We do not know what Jesus did as a young man before he started his official ministry at age 30.  There are some stories that say he traveled to various parts of the world.  We do not know if those stories are true.  But He WAS a young man once.  Perhaps he worked in his stepfather's shop as a carpenter.  If he did certainly his work would have been exceptional.  I think he probably traveled to Jerusalem on the Passover or on feast days.  We know he did that as an adolescent.  Remember how he went to the Temple and taught the wise men there.   Being the Son of God He was wiser and knew more than they did.   I suppose that as a young man he may have traveled to Jerusalem on business to sell furniture or maybe pick up a load of wood.

Jesus as 12 year old at the Temple

Jesus and Joseph working in carpentry shop

Optimus Prime fan art

Optimus Prime standing

My grandnephew loves Transformers.  He asked me to draw this first picture for me.  The previous time we were in Wyoming he had me draw Optimus Prime in truck form.  So, these are certainly NOT exact drawings.   Still, they are not bad.

Optimus Prime truck form

Both  pictures can be found in printable form by clicking on the top buttons. . . 

Click on either "All Printables" or the "Fantasy, Myths, and Circus"  button.  

The Transformers movies have made 1.46 billion dollars in the box office in the U.S. alone.  If you adjust the money made into 2018 dollars the movies made 1.77 billion dollars.  That info is from Box Office Mojo.

Box Office Mojo also lists the unadjusted gross from all the movies worldwide.  It is a staggering
4.385 billion dollars.  It is one of the most successful franchises of all time.  That amount of money does not even include the millions made in marketing of all those Transformers toy action figures and video games etc.

Some people scoff at these movies...but you have to respect a movie franchise that has been so successful.  Transformers Movie Franchise is the 17th most successful movie franchise in the history of movies.  Those movies employ lots of people and help the economy.   I think we go to them for the spectacular special effects and animation that looks so cool on a big screen.

My criticism of the last Transformers movie is that they seem to have forgot that many kids go to these movies.  There was a lot of unnecessary profanity that did nothing for the plot.

Ichthyostega and Sea Scorpion..First Land Animals

Ichthyostega

So, although not well adapted for walking on land, this small animal could walk.  It may have been one of the first vertebrate animals to walk on land.  The sea scorpions were probably the first animals to walk on land many millions of years earlier.  If you look closely at the drawing you can see the gills.  The gills are above the front leg and slightly forward of that leg.   Ichthyostega had gills like a fish but a head like an amphibian.  It had a fin on the tail but legs for walking.  Of course its legs could also be used for swimming.   It is considered a transitional species in the evolution of vertebrates.   This drawing shows a very low tide where some of the reef life is now above the water line. This could be a sand bar or on a beach in an estuary where fresh water meets the sea. Ichthyostega lived  in the Late Devonian and was one of the first tetrapods.  Tetrapod means 4 legs.

The below photo is from the awesome Wyoming Dinosaur Center in Thermopolis Wyoming.

Ichthyostega model

This first sea scorpions lived millions of years before the Ichthyostega.  The few plants on land that I drew  evolved in the Ordovician Period.  This drawing is set in the Silurian or Ordovician or Devonian Periods because sea scorpions and placoderms lived in all those periods.  The placoderm is the fish that is under attack by the sea scorpion.  Placoderms were early fish with armored heads.  Note that the sea scorpion is on a rock. . . AKA on land.  The sea scorpions had curtain lungs and could passively breathe oxygen from the air.  They also had gills so they probably spent most of their time in the ocean.  

Sea Scorpion catching a Placoderm

Hyena Cub

Hyenas are found in  most African ecosystems.  They are biologically more closely related to the cat family, but they behaviorally live more like members of the dog family.  They are in the same order as both felines and canines.  That order is Carnivora.  They have a reputation for being cowards, but they are generally not.  A pack of hyenas will drive a pride of lions off a kill.  That doesn't sound like cowardice to me.   I love the movie The Lion King. . . but maybe it gave hyenas a raw deal.  However, lions and hyenas do fight over territory so them being natural enemies is a fact.

Hyena Cub

The spotted hyena are more social and live in large packs.  Spotted hyenas kill most of the animals they eat while striped hyenas are mostly scavengers.  Hyenas have incredibly powerful jaws.  They can crush bones and even horns and hooves.  Hyenas eat both small and large animals.  The young are called cubs.  My grandniece Josie asked me to draw her a hyena cub.  This is a spotted hyena cub.

Bunny under a Bush

Bunny under a Bush

This cute bunny was drawn for my grandnephew.  The bunny or rabbit is NOT a rodent. They are in the Order Lagomorpha.  They generally have larger long ears than most rodents.  They have large powerful back legs for jumping.  They often live have burrows underground.  They include Hares, Rabbits, and Pikas.  

It was recently discovered that perhaps rabbits and all the Lagomorphs had a common ancestor with the rodents around 66 million years ago. . . about the time dinos went extinct.  

If you look at the bush you may notice that the leaves are not symmetrical.  This is not a mistake.  The artists. . . me. . . is a retired science teacher and I know some about botany.  There are some plants with asymmetrical leaves.  So their leaves are not the same on both sides.  Symmetrical leaves ARE the same on both sides.  Some plants have symmetrical leaves and some plants have asymmetrical leaves.  

Cloudjumper or Stormcutter

How To Train Your Dragon is a great set of movies.  They include 1 and 2 and How To Train Your Dragon 3 is set to be released on March 1, 2018.  The movies to me send a message about being different and being handicapped.  We are all individuals and need to follow our own dreams.  Also, we should not sink into despair when things go wrong and we are injured or somehow become physically less than what we once were.  For that matter, people born with differences that are called disabilities are still people with a lot to contribute.   I live with a trach tube and you can bet that it feels different.  But in the current American society I am treated with real respect.  Thank you to all my friends and family for never making me feel like I was less than other people because of my "disability."  The message from How To Train Your Dragon is to be you and keep being you even when things go wrong.   I love these movies.  I can hardly wait for the next one in March.

Cloudjumper or Stormcutter

My niece Maddie asked me to draw her Cloudjumper toy.  I think this dragon's design is brilliant!  It has a double pair of wings that when flying flap opposite patterns.  That is rather intriguing.  Cloudjumper is also called Stormcutter.

Flower Unicorn has a Snack

Unicorn...Flower Unicorn makes a Fairy Friend

This drawing is based on my grandniece Maddie's  toy unicorn that she named Flower.  It appears to be a foal or young female unicorn, not an adult.   The unicorn in my drawing is meeting a fairy and being offered an apple. . . so they are both making new friends.  To me a fairy being friends with a unicorn makes sense.  Both are widely written of as being creatures of light or good magic and rarely or never creatures of dark magic.

Flower the Unicorn Toy

Harry My Friend

My friend Harry passed away a few days ago.  His funeral was today.  This was an amazing man.  He was a very good man in so many ways.  His life was all about service.  He and his wife fostered 145 babies who were in the foster care system.  He was very knowledgeable about the Gospel of Jesus Christ.  He was also very intelligent.  He was a top lawyer.  He was a history buff.  He was a veteran of the US military and he was a member of the US Air Force Band.

 Harry's family includes adopted and natural born children  but they were all his kids to him.  He was an amazing disciple of Jesus Christ.  Disciple means that he was a follower of Jesus.  Harry was also a Stake Patriarch ...which means he gave special blessings to members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints to give us guidance in our lives.  We call those Patriarchal Blessings.

Harry at Bryce Canyon National Park

His son let me know that Harry loved Bryce Canyon National Park in Southern Utah.  I also love that park.  It is an amazing place.  I drew Harry at one of the Bryce Canyon overlooks.   The background is based on a photo I took this past May.  (The drawing is BASED on the below photo but it is nowhere near exact.) 

Bryce Canyon in May

Harry in the Spirit World

The second drawing is of Harry in Heaven or as we call this temporary place of rest, the Spirit World.  I know our Savior is welcoming him and I can picture Harry  reaching out to greet other spirits who he was able to influence in his mortal life.  This second drawing is Harry but as you can see, he does not look 80 years old.  We believe that our spirits (which live in our bodies when we are alive) most likely look quite young.  I figure our spirits look to be around 26 Earth years.  Of course we Latter Day Saints also believe that we lived before we lived on Earth.  So in reality, our spirits are most likely millions or probably billions of years old.  We came to Earth to be tested to see if we would keep God's commandments.  We believe that Jesus is the Son of God and that all of us are sons and daughters of God our Heavenly Father.  Jesus is the first born in the Spirit and the only begotten Son of God in the flesh.   So as I said, we came here to Earth to be tested.  I firmly believe that my friend Harry passed that test.