The title says it all. I finally made more videos on my YouTube channel, despite my voice dysphoria.
Basically the problem is that before my transition I was fine with my voice, not because I liked it, but because I was used to it. When my voice changed (to better!!!), it didn’t change as much as I would have wanted and since then I’ve been very uncomfortable with my voice. I took some singing lessons, because that can help with the overall voice use, but to this day I struggle. I especially feel really self conscious if I have to talk loud. This is new for me. I have always been quite loud and excited person. My voice dysphoria made me more timid. I spoke softly and stayed silent a lot.
A thumbnail I made for the third video. Doesn’t this corner of my studio look nice!? This video will go online a bit later, so better go subscribe to my YouTube.
I have really wanted to get back on track making videos. How I started was from Instagram stories. Knowing that the clips will disappear after a while helped. Then I made some reels (and tried out Tiktok, but hated it). Now I was able to finally listen to myself long enough to make over 20 minute video! I’m so proud of myself.
The videos
The first one I made is about how people in Finland have been asking me why am I quitting comics. Well, I’m not. So this video explains that.
The second one is about the joy I find in making comics. It kind of continues from where I was left on the first video. I could never stop making comics, because they are so dear to me!
I have just made a third one and that’s scheduled to appear on my YouTube channel quite soon. If you have any ideas on what I should talk about on the videos, please drop me a comment! I’m running out of ideas quite fast.
Also I made one almost half an hour video where I talk more about my art process and show my art from my archives. That one is Patreon exclusive for the $10/month tier, where people get to see my beautiful works in process! If you have the cash and want to support me, go see that one on Patreon!
Ps. If you didn’t already notice, I also updated Millenials Kill comic today! You should totally go read it!
Now that I have finally published the tenth chapter of Millenials Kill, I can also publish this blog post! I found the art a few months ago and finished the new artwork today!
So, I found some really old art. At this point I have no idea what it was meant to be, but I assume it was an idea for a comic that includes a band. I had completely forgotten about this so you can probably understand how surprised I was when I found this and read the band name I had chosen.
It was Dead Line!
I had designed Dead Line way before I had even thought of Millenials Kill! This drawing was from around year 2008! Well, I knew what I had to do. I had to redraw the illustration with the current members of Dead Line in my comic Millenials Kill. Here’s the new version.
I kind of found the glitch tool on Procreate and this was the first time I tried it out. It was cool! Though I did erase some of the glithes, because I didn’t want them to cover the characters’ faces.
And here’s also a screen recording of me drawing the illustration. There’s no sound in it, so feel free to listen to your own music while watching it.
Oh by the way, if you liked seeing the WIP video, I post those on my Patreon all the time! I’m always mentioning the Patreon but really, I like being able to survive!
So I have been getting a lot of wonderful (bot) comments on my anti-capitalist queer mafia parody webcomic Millenials Kill. But because there’s just so many, it’s impossible to reply to all my (bots) fans! So here’s a blog post where I reply to the most thoughtful comments that have been repeated several times. I’m so sorry I can’t personally reply to all of you (bots).
The fan (bot) comments:
Thank you so much for your thoughtful comment, Hairstyles! I’m afraid that as my webcomic Millenials Kill (that you’ve commented on) is about organized crime, you shouldn’t search for message boards discussing the same topics. I believe you shouldn’t get feedback on mafia crimes I assume you’re interested in performing. Maybe you should try some other hobbies instead! I’ve heard that the knitting community has a wonderful messageboard you could join! All the best! – H-P
Hello 29 Gorgeous Braided Updo Ideas! I’m very happy you like my writing so a lot! I’m sorry but I think you’re mistaking me for someone else. I have no articles on AOL. I’m also not a specialist on home renovating or building codes (I assume that’s what you’re searching for based on your comment). I’m a specialist in comics, currently studying social sciences, but unfortunately not houses. But no worries, it’s an easy mistake to make! I hope you find your specialist elsewhere! Cheers! – H-P
Hello dear direct lenders! I’m really glad you took the time to leave a comment on your first visit to my website! I’m glad you seem to like my comic a lot! Fans like you are the best! See you around! – H-P
Hello cbdoilreviews! Thank you for your heartwarming comment! I hope you’ve found an enormous source of facts elsewhere, because this is indeed a fictional comic and not an info comic. Try out wikipedia to start with! Cheers! – H-P
Hello gold-ira! My info on this comic comes from my head, as the comic is fictional. Of course there’s some parts that are more real, but for examle, the whole town of Breamburg is completely made up. If you want to know where my inspiration comes from, I am planning on writing a whole blog post about that! But I can list a few here: – Homestuck by Andrew Hussie – Night Mind – Youtube channel – Koirasarja Bob Dimitri – on Youtube – Hannibal (TV-series) I hope this helps! All the best! – H-P
Hello dear Resource! I’m really glad you want to find more of my comic! You can either wait patiently or you can go over to my Patreon, where you can read at least 5 chapters more for only $6/month! I hope you’ll become a long time Patreon backer! Have a great year 2023! – H-P
Very flattering offers
Hello Ervin! Happy holidays to you too my friend! I’m really honored you thought of me with this job offer! This really shows your holiday spirits, as you’re always on the lookout on how to help your fellow netizens. Unfortunately I don’t really have time for another job. My hands are full with studies and drawing comics. I appreciate the offer though! Have a great 2023 as well! Best wishes! – H-P
Hello Bernardine! This is like SO random! You’re not even the first person to suggest this kind of work for me! I’m now starting to think my english skills are way above the average finn as so many people keep asking me to start a career in translating! This really brightened my day, even if I’m not that interested in starting translating. I hope you find someone else to work on the translations! All the best! – H-P
Hello Lucretia! Wow! You’re a third person who thinks I’d be good at translating! I’m so happy you think I seem hardworking and reliable! Thank you and have a great week! – H-P
Award for best comment goes to…
Hello Anessa! Sorry for only showing a part of your very long message (2401 words long to be exact). I assume you sent me this message, as you seem to be somewhat of an anti-capitalist yourself too! I’m always happy to discuss the problems of capitalism with someone who feels betrayed by the system catering to the richest 1%. I also hope you can find help in your faith and bible. I personally really like the part in bible where Jesus goes to a temple, gets shocked by the fact that the temple had been turned into a marketplace and starts flipping tables. Here’s a part of it:
“And Jesus went into the temple of God, and cast out all them that sold and bought in the temple, and overthrew the tables of the money changers, and the seats of them that sold doves, And said unto them, It is written, My house shall be called the house of prayer; but ye have made it a den of thieves.” — Matthew 21:12–13
See how Jesus calls the people selling things thieves? Capitalism as it is didn’t of course exist back then, but the bible verse surely fits our current situation. Though I do have to admit, your long message was closer to conspiracy theories than anti-capitalism. I think you might want to touch grass and maybe go to therapy. Please don’t take this the wrong way. I know the battle against an injust system can be hard, so it’s totally okay to sometimes need some outside help! If a therapist seems hard to approach, you can also try to talk to a minister in your church! All the best! I hope you have a wonderful year 2023! – H-P
That’s all the comments I can reply to for now, sorry about that. If my fans (bots) like this, I’ll be happy to continue replying to you like this! I’m also very sorry for not accepting any of these comments, no matter how awesome they are. It’s not that I hate fans (bots)… it’s not you, it’s me. Anyway! See you!
I was watching a video by Danny Gonzalez about Conspiracy Theories while I was going through papers I have stacked everywhere. He talked a lot about time travel. Among my other papers, mostly art, I found evidence that I am a time traveler myself! (Or an oracle, but I think time travel is cooler.)
So here’s what I found out. I either predicted COVID19 in 2008, or I had already seen it happen in 2020, then gotten back to year 2008, made art about it, gotten amnesia and lost all my memories of my time traveling. Let me show you the proof!
Content warning: A disturbing drawing of a murderer clown and a victim with blood ahead
Proof of time travel
In this artwork we see lady liberty covering herself with a cloth (=mask) and she’s trapped inside a bubble with the weird shape that doesn’t resemble anything else than this…
Photo from: https://www.cdc.gov/media/ – PHIL ID #23312
How do we know it’s lady liberty? Well see the colors? It’s white, red and blue! The colors of American flag! It could also be Croatia, United Kingdom, Iceland, Norway, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Paraguay, Dallas, Labuan, Rocha, Sorbs, Federal Rebublic of Yugoslavia, Serbia and Montenegro, Republic of Crimea, Espiríto Santo, Fort Smith, Gaugauzia, Kayin State, Khahassia, Mannheim, Mindanao, Liberia, Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur, Sabah, Schleswig-Holstein, Valledupar, Turov, Serbia, Russia, Slovakia, Slovenia, Transnistria, Maracaibo, Bydgoszcz, Manatí Puerto Rico, France, Iowa, Cabo Verde, Costa Rica, North Korea, Thailand, Cuba or Hawaii (and there’s even more options here) because they share the same colours, but let’s just go with the most obvious answer, USA.
So what about this artwork? Is this COVID19 too? (Art from 2008 again.)
Clearly this creature is shaped like the COVID19 virus and it’s breathing! COVID is a respiratory illness, so breathing is a clear symbol for… breathing! But wait, there’s more!
This one predicts the stock market crash after the COVID19 lockdown in 2020. And the artwork is from 2008!
As you can see, the woman’s dress is made from the stock page in a newspaper. There’s blood dripping from the top of the artwork, but the blood turns into spores, that look like COVID19 viruses (yet again!). The red color on the bottom of the page looks like a fire that’s going on somewhere in the distance. The fire symbolises the destruction COVID19 did to the stock market. The woman also seems to hold a glass of alcohol. That probably symbolises the alcohol people drank during lockdown while getting pantsdrunk. Or maybe it’s not alcohol, but blood!
Other predictions
Being able to predict COVID19 alone isn’t that impressive. A real time traveler would know so much more! So here’s some more examples of things I have predicted with my art!
Here’s a weird one. Seems like a completely normal drawing of a mermaid, right?
WRONG!
See the text hidden in the waves? “Pahuuden makkara” meaning the evil sausage. This is a prediction of the poisoned sausages of York in 2019! And the artwork is done in 2005!
How would you feel if I told you I also predicted the controversy behind the 2020 Froot Loops Toucan Mascot’s design change? Well I probably didn’t, but look, I made a lino print of a toucan in 2002! Close enough!
This artwork from year 2003 predicts a hit movie from 2014! Over 10 years after this piece was made, the movie Sharktopus vs. Pteracuda hit the box officed with a storm!
Now I assume you’re eager to hear my actual thoughts behind my own artworks. If you’re an intelligent human being, you probably guessed this was all just satire, so let’s go through the real ideas behind the artworks.
Lady Liberty and COVID19
I had just gotten new aquarelle pencils and learned that you can do all kinds of tricks with them. Tricks like scrape pieces off of them on wet paper! The “virus” on the first art piece is just me testing out how the pencil works on wet paper. I then decided to draw a sketch of a woman next to it. They are separate drawings at this point. But they look like they belong together, so I draw the bubble around them and add similar scraped aquarelle pencil on the woman’s cloth to make them match. That’s all there is. Two separate pieces on same paper to save paper.
COVID 19 virus breathing
That’s not COVID19, that’s pallosiira. It’s a character of mine based on an isopod species living in Finland. Also it’s not breathing, it’s sucking! For some reason Pallosiira sucks.
Market crash lady
The reason I used stock market page for the dress was that I didn’t want the dress to have words. It was the only page that had enough stuff other than words to cut out the dress shape. The background is yet again just me testing out the aquarelle pencils.
Killer Clown
This is fanart for a horror movie I saw.
Saimaa Ringed Seal
My teacher told us all to draw an animal. I chose the easiest one.
D&D podcasts
I was a tabletop rpg nerd as a teen. This is just fanart for a game I played.
Evil sausage mermaid
I was going to send this to a teen magazine under the pseudonym Pahuuden Makkara, but accidentally also put my real name on it! So I never sent it in.
Toucan
Yet another piece where someone else told me what to make (an animal) and I chose the simplest one.
Ford Mustang
It’s just a horse.
Sharktopus movie
I was obsessed with sea monsters at one point. It’s not even a sharktopus, but my point was to show that if you just squint your eyes enough and dig deep enough, anything can be a prediction of almost anything.
Did you like this post? Meybe you’ll like my other posts where I talk about my own art process in a more serious tone! The tag Art-Analysis is where I store my ramblings of my own art and the process of making it.
I’ve been to a lot of conventions. The first convention I ever went to was Nekocon in Kuopio in 2006. I was just a visitor back then, but nowadays I’ve been doing all kinds of things in conventions. So let me write some of my best lesser known convention tips for comic artists!
I’m not going to tell you all the things other people have already said a million times. I have in fact organized a wonderful collaboration ebook called Making Money from Webcomics, that was made in Saari Residency in Finland by an international comic artist group!
Cover illustration by Eelis Nilukka
You can read this PDF ebook for free from the Helsinki Comics Center website here. I feel that I don’t need to repeat everything said in that ebook.
But I have some small tips that aren’t mentioned as often. I have been to conventions in Europe and in North America. All of the tips don’t work in every convention, but I’ll just write them out anyways. Use them if you will.
1. Get an orange or yellow high-visibility jacket or vest
Why? Well, conventions are often full. Like really REALLY full. If you want to go from place to place fast, wear a high visibility vest. People will assume you’re on your way to fix something and they will give you space. This won’t work if the vest is on top of a cosplay though.
2. Convention tickets cost too much? Host a panel!
Many conventions give out free tickets to people who do some kind of a programme. If you feel like you’re dumb af and can’t talk anything intelligent, host a panel. Invite people who can talk about things to it. Your job is just to ask them questions and make sure everyone gets equal amount of time to reply. I have often gone to a convention where I have an artist alley table, but the table plus the tickets to get in are adding up! So I host a panel or do a lecture about something relevant to the convention’s themes. That way I get free ticket for myself. I often share the table, so my table mate has to take care of the table while I’m doing the panel, but other than that it’s pretty simple. Also, some conventions give you free food if you host programmes!
(I also have to add, if you want to become a memorable comics artist, doing talks and programmes helps on that too.)
3. Make your business cards as stickers
I used to have normal business cards and after every convention I found them in the trash cans around the area. I had paid to get them printed! Next time I printed more, I printed circular stickers with my website and social medias instead. I never saw my business cards in trash cans anymore. I did sometimes see them out in the wild! Like in bar bathroom walls or telephone poles outside. But that’s just free advertising!
(Some say bookmarks work too, but I personally throw those away just as much as business cards.)
4. If you want to network, volunteer at the convention
Interested on networking? If you’re a total beginner and you don’t know anyone I suggest instead of trying to mingle with the cool kids in the bar, just volunteer at a convention. You get access to the greenrooms and backstages where you get to be the person the cool kids are so happy to see! The guest of honor needs a pen? You’re the volunteer who gets it for them! You also get to mingle with the other convention organisers while you’re on your break. Besides, if you don’t know how to approach people, it’s way easier to start a conversation when you’re carrying a pile of chairs together with someone than if you have no common goal at all.
(If you’re afraid that the cool kids would treat you like a lesser person or as someone not worthy of their time because you’re “working for them”… don’t worry. The actually cool people don’t do that. And the ones that do… They’re not the ones you want to network with. If they don’t treat the staff right, you really think they would help a beginner artist out? Not gonna happen.)
5. Network with the staff
The previous point works the other way around too. People who are working in a convention are VERY motivated to make the comics scene a better place to be in. They are the people you want to hang out with. The cool famous comics artist might be a cool person, but everyone is already trying to get something out of them and that gets tiring. That’s why it’s not always worth it to try to force yourself in on their inner circle. I know a ton of people who in one year are organising chairs and the next year they’ve published a comics anthology.
6. What conventions get you the best sales?
How to choose the convention that has a better chance to get you really good sales on your comic books? Check out who are the main guests! If all the guests are actors, don’t even bother.Selling fanart of the characters they play might work really well, but your original comics aren’t going to be a hit. If there’s a lot of comics artists as a guest on the other hand… that’s the convention you want to go to! The visitors often choose the events they attend based on the guests, so you need to choose the events you go to based on the people that are going to be there. You need comic fans to sell comics. Movie fans don’t buy them as much.
7. Apply for a travel grant
I know that about 45% of my audience is based in USA. This might not be for you, I’m sorry. But I also know that about 40% is from Finland and 10% from Sweden! This is for you. If you go to a convention in another country, especially if you go for the first time, you probably won’t sell much. No matter how much your friends who have been there for years tell you they sell so well and they make same kind of stuff as you. They sell well because they’ve been there before. They have established themselves as a part of that community. If you’re going for the first time you might very well make so little money that it doesn’t even cover your travels!
So apply for a travel grant. When the grant pays for your travel expenses you’re not going to be in as much pressure to sell a lot and you can concentrate on building some new connetions.
(Tip to Finns, sorry for the moon language: Kun kirjoitat apurahahakemuksen, älä kirjoita siihen että menet coniin. Coni on lainasana, joka kuulostaa epäammattimaiselta. Käytä vaikkapa sanaa messut, tapahtuma tai festivaali. Esim: Haen 2000€ matkaan ComicCon -sarjakuvamessuille Puolaan.</moonlanguage>)
(Another extra tip for everyone! To make it easier to get grants, email the convention and ask if they can send you a PDF invitation! It can look like anything, as long as it at least pretends to be official. A paper like that makes the grant foundation believe that your trip is well planned and legit! Basically every convention I’ve asked has been happy to write me an invitation.)
8. Volunteer in your local comics organization for better networking
Okay so this is a networking tip again. But let me tell you this works! I have been volunteering for the Finnish Comics Society long enough that I eventually became a board member and then the chairman. That job is not paid, it’s still just volunteering, but with more responsibilities. But I gain so much from it! First of all I get to know everything happening in comics, I get to go to every event ever, I get invitations to art exhibition openings and so on. But for networking it’s amazing.
This has just happened to me recently. I went to a comic con and saw very interesting art on a table. I went to talk to the person behind the table. They replied to me, but it wasn’t really a conversation. They wanted me to buy something and leave (not very good networking from their end). When I mentioned them I am the chairman of Finnish Comics Society, the person even got up and shaked my hand! Suddenly I was worth networking with! I have to admit, I didn’t like the attitude, but I understand if the convention has been long and you can’t bring yourself to be as excited about every person you meet. This artist was actually very wonderful, they were just tired from the con.
This helps me a lot outside of Finland too, because people often know about Finnish Comics Society, but they definitely don’t know who I am. So just having that thing they recognize, me being a board member, helps us connect in some way!
9. Start a mailing list
This isn’t only a convention tip, it’s an all around great tip for any comics artist. Start a mailing list, because on social media you can’t be sure who sees your posts and who doesn’t. I use Mailchimp for my mailing list, but I actually just started by sending a lot of emails from my own personal email! It doens’t have to be anything fancy, main point is that it’s a direct way people are sure to get the information on where you’re going and what are you doing!
I send emails about once a month or two months. I never send affiliate marketing links or spam. That’s not the point here. The point is to send people package of information on which cons you’ll be in, what comics have you published and where to read them!
I would also suggest getting your own website, like this one that I have. I have been posting my comics on Instagram and Twitter for a long time, but I have noticed that it’s actually really hard to browse through all of them and read them on one go! So that’s why I changed my old portfolio website into a blog oriented website. People can actually read all my comics, I can put alt texts in them!! (That hasn’t been a feature on Twitter since I started posting there, it’s very new.) I can make up my own categories and people can search through them based on that! It’s way better than having them all in one feed on Instagram where it’s impossible to organize them into categories.
Also, Millenials Kill wouldn’t work on Instagram at all. It needs to be read one chapter at a time, not panel by panel or page by page.
So those were the convention tips for comic artists! I hope they help!
I just realized many of these convention tips for comic artists were about networking. This is because I have personally found networking to be very difficult but at the same time one of the best things to help me further my career in comics. I have gotten almost all of my paid jobs in comics because I talked to someone who then told me about an opportunity I would have missed otherwise. I rarely drink alcohol, so networking in a bar is not for me. I’m also quite bad at small talk so I need a common ground with the person to be able to talk with them. I hope these tips help you too, because I have had to spend 10 years to find them and finally be able to network!
This whole post about convention tips to comic artists started from quite a weird place. When I get anxious, I tend to start cleaning. That’s what I’ve been doing a lot lately as I’m waiting for the results to come in from the University I have applied to. As I was cleaning, I came accross a huge pile of convention badges. Ever since my very first convention I have saved all the badges from the events where I’ve been either on the artist alley, volunteering, as a speaker or as a featured guest of some sort!
The badges were in a horrible messy pile, so I decided to film the process of me untangling them and talk about the different events I’ve been to. If you want to see me talk about the conventions I’ve been to, here’s that video!
Ps. I often do lectures on how to make webcomics into your career, which includes this kind of talk about convention tips! If you’re interested in getting me to your event/school/organization to do a talk, you can contact me through the contact form on my About page!
My emotional abuse comic, I Survived Him, is definitely one of my favorite works of my own. I’m especially proud of the art in this one. The comic is now available on my itch.io again! But before you go get it for yourself, I want to tell you more about it and show some of my favorite pages.
I Survived Him was made in 2020. Even if it is a comic about emotional abuse, it doesn’t describe the abuse in detail. The comic begins from the moment the abusive relationship was over and the story describes the process of letting go and healing. I want to show you the first scene of the comic.
I don’t often make autobiographical comics about such tough subjects. Portraying myself as the victim in my art isn’t really something I want to do. I very much believe in the theory that one can change the way they see themselves by controlling how they talk about themselves. Of course one has to be realistic, but I don’t want to unnecessarily dwell on the negative parts of my life. Making a comic takes a long time and if I were to make a comic about something very traumatic, I’d almost have to relive the trauma for months on end! I’m totally not up for that! No way! What I can relive is the healing process.
This comic was drawn in 2020, now that I reread it in 2022 I felt powerful, I felt at peace and I felt strong! I have survived this and I am proud of that. When I finished the comic I still felt scared, and some days I still do, but it becomes rarer every day. I love seeing this comic and remembering how far I’ve come.
The Art
I told in the beginning that I was especially happy with the art on this one, so here are two pages from my absolute favorite scene artwise.
On the first page’s first panel you see me laying on my face in a bottom of a rocky pit. The pit is drawn on normal paper with ink markers and pencils, but that me! I drew myself on a piece of used napkin! The two illustrations were then combined on Photoshop. I love how I used the drawing material to really show the desperation.
And the rocky pit… man, that’s one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever drawn. I love it. I also love the combination of pencil and ink. All the illustrations that illustrate my memories are drawn on pencil only and I love it.
As said, I’m very proud of this one. I think this comes only second to Life Outside the Circle. It might be a good idea to later write a blog entry about the medias I used for that one too… I love the art on Life Outside the Circle!
So where can you get this comic?
I have a store on itch.io. The emotional abuse comic is $5, but you can choose if you want to leave me a tip. It’s up to you! I always try to keep my comics accessible to most people, so the tipping helps a lot in keeping the comic price fairly low.
Please note, despite this blog post having alt texts for more accessible reading, the ebook doesn’t have that.
Zero waste lifestyle can most of the times be pretty inaccessible for low income people. But in reality the low income people are already living a zero waste lifestyle like no tomorrow! This zero waste comic is about just that. An anti-capitalist look into the lifestyle and it’s problems.
I made this comic back in 2019 still being quite new to the zero waste idea. I have lived frugally and quite sustainably all my life. It hasn’t always been because of my sustainable life values. Mostly it’s been due to my working class background.
For some time I had to take the comic off of the internet, because the platform I used for my web shop started doing crypto/NFT business. I don’t condone that, as that is absolutely not sustainable! But now I have finally added the comic back online, this time on itch.io! You can get it here:
And here are some preview pages if you feel like you’re not sure if it’s a good purchase yet:
Actually… Why wouldn’t you think it’s a good purchase? It’s absolutely free! You can of course leave me a tip (and I’d really love if you could), but that’s not mandatory.
Maybe one more page to really convince you this is the zero waste comic of your dreams!
This comic has gotten some raving reviews! Such as this one:
“However, it uses a lot of space to blame environmental distress on politics and ostracize viewpoints.”
3 star review on Goodreads
If that’s not what you want to see, don’t read it. The book is first and foremost about the political change we need to both help the planet and make life fair to low income people. I wouldn’t name a comic “Not #ZeroWaste, I Just Grew Up Poor” if it wasn’t about the unfair resources we all have. A general happy zero waste comic isn’t titled like that.
Other zero waste comics?
If you like this type of content, I suggest you go read my newest adventures in sustainable living, meaning my No Buy Year -comics! Yes, you heard that right, I’m not buying stuff for a whole year.
Ps. Despite these pages on this blog post having alt texts, the comic PDF is old and doesn’t have those. So it’s not readable with any kind of a screen reading device.
I think I’ve seen like a million Youtube videos with this title. But guess why there is so many videos on this subject? Because it is that easy to grow infinite basil! If you’re a beginner in any kind of plant related sheningans, basil is the way to go. Here’s a comic that will show you what to do!
And that’s how you grow infinite basil! When your newly planted Basil plant becomes big enough, you can just start the process all over again. Basil is a great plant for this, because it grows roots very easily, but if you’re not a lover of basil, you can try other similar-ish herbs too! One of the easiest ones is mint! Mint is very aggressive when it comes to spreading. In our kitchen the mint had actually hopped onto the basil pot right next to it’s own pot! It had just grown one very long stem and then developed roots at the end of that stem so that it can root into the basil’s pot!
If you want to read more comics about gardening tips, check out this post where I tell how to grow plants from the fruits you eat!
At the end of this post I’d like to remind you that you can join my mailing list. I email people once every other month about things relevant to my comics. No affiliate marketing or other unnecessary consumerism!
And again, big thank you to my Patreon backers, who make free comics like this possible!
This comic is my lovesong to the Finnish spring. Or a hate song? Love-hate-song? I don’t even know, I think me and Finnish spring have a bit of a toxic relationship.
This comic was actually made a couple of years back, because this spring has been way easier and more straightforward!
Also as a non-english speaker I have to point out, do you see how in my comic May comes before April? Yeah… about that. I was meant to say March, but I always forget March is the third month. March sounds like Marraskuu to me, and Marraskuu in Finnish is the November! Here are the months in their respective order in Finnish (with literal tarnalations in english in brackets) for those who are interested in this kind of useless information:
See how all the month names describe the month some way? Either the work done on a farm that month or what the month looks like! Fun fact, tammi, as in January, Tammikuu, also means oak. But in this case tammi doesn’t come from that meaning, but from the meaning of a central pole that was believed to hold up the sky and make it rotate in Finnish folklore (taivaantammi). I’m pretty sure oak also got it’s name from that central pole. After all oaks are very sturdy, big and beautiful trees that could be imagined as the pole that holds up the sky!
Yet again, huge thank you to my Patreon backers who make free comics like this possible. You’re the best!
Summer is approaching very fast! (Well, depends where you live. Maybe where you are the summer has already arrived.) What summer means to me is foraging wild plants! I use a large variety of wild plants for food, seasoning and even medicine! But storing the herbs can get hard. Especially because we live in an apartment building! That means we just don’t have enough space in our freezer (even if we have a separate chest freezer). I have solved that problem by storing most of our herbs by drying them instead of freezing! Here’s a comic that shows you perfectly how my house is filled with herbs all summer long! (Psst, after the comic I’ll give you a list of my favorite wild plants that we go foraging for and what I use them for.)
I think now’s the time to give you a link to my Patreon.
The wild plants we forage the most!
Here’s a list! (Finnish name in brackets)
Stinging nettle (nokkonen) We use a lot of stinging nettle! It’s nutricious and can be used like spinach! We especially make salty pancakes (crepes?) with it. We eat those with lingonberry jam! It can be used for mutliple things, like tea, but because there’s a lot of plants that are basically only good for tea, we don’t really waste stinging nettle for tea.
Rosebay willowherb (Maitohorsma) We collect the young leaves before the plant flowers and we prepare them by first withering the leaves and then rolling them and then fermenting them a bit before drying it. This technique is used for some of the best teas in the world and it works amazingly well with rosebay willowherb leaves! It’s called hiostaminen in Finnish.
Goutweed (vuohenputki) We only collect this early in the spring, when basically nothing else grows yet. That also makes it easy to spot. It’s the only thing that grows! We either eat it fresh as a salad or we use the same preparing method as willowherb to make it into tea!
Common yarrow (siankärsämö) We gather the young leaves and just dry them. They are a very good seasoning for casseroles!
Meadowsweet (mesiangervo) We gather meadowsweet leaves for tea and ferment them the same way we did with willowherb, but there’s more to meadowsweet! We also collect the flowers and dry them. They have some pain relieving substances in them, so when I start getting a headache, I just make myself a meadowsweet tea. Despite it’s sweet name, the tea with the flowers tastes absolutely disgusting (the leaves taste better), but it heals my headache! I also use this as a flu remedy, though then I put in other things too… Some for getting it to taste better, some to make it more effective.
Dandelion (voikukka) Dandelion roots are wonderful in a vegetable casserole! But they’re a pain in the ass to dig out and even more of a pain to clean, so we don’t use them often despite me loving their taste. But if you do gardening and you have to dig them out anyways, don’t throw them away! Eat them! (They work well in a blended vegetable soup too!)
I think that’s all the ones we use a lot… and dandelion that I’d love to use more, but I’m lazy. Besides these we use a variety of other plants too, but not as much. Here’s some more of them: rowan leaves (pihlaja), ground-ivy (maahumala), clover (apila), juniper (kataja) and spruce (kuusi). There was some more too, but the translating site I used didn’t have translations for them. Also this doesn’t include wild mushrooms or berries we pick when we go foraging.
Want to learn more about foraging? Or something else?
If you’re interested in learning more about foraging in Finland, just ask! I’m always open for new comic ideas. It’s way easier for me to know what kind of stuff you want to see if you just tell me directly. Also if you’re interested in reading more about the foods we prepare at home, here’s a link to my previous post about kombucha!
Ps. This comic was brought to you by my Patreon backers! Yes, they pay to get access to some exclusive materials on Patreon BUT they also make it possible for me to use less time to uphold capitalism and more time to do educational comics and posts like this for free! Big thank you to all my Patreon backers!
