The Near Hentai Monthly Lady for August 2026 is Sandy Cheeks from SpongeBob SquarePants. I know this series is a cultural phenomenon, but I mostly missed it just due to the age I was when it came out. I had just gotten a bit too old for cartoons, but not old enough to appreciate them the way I do now, so any new shows I didn’t grow up with just seemed really off-putting to me at the time. Add the fact that the show’s initial advertising made it look way more like what we’d call brain rot today than it actually was, and I never really gave it a chance. I did see some of the early/iconic episodes later, and I’m no stranger to the franchise, but I never had the kind of relationship with it I imagine many of you did.

That being said, I do like Sandy. I’ve seen a few artists do stuff I really like with her, and I had fun tackling a different aesthetic than usual for this one. Hopefully my interpretation of her lands well, as I’d actually be pretty open to doing more with her down the line. I toyed with a few potential partners for her. Karen and Pearl are two characters from the show who I’ve also seen used well in fanart I’ve liked, but I went with what I consider the safe option instead. I went back and forth on how exactly to position SpongeBob here, but decided that with the way he moves and stretches in the show I could get away with some liberties I took in order to get Sandy positioned how I wanted.

With this post, NHML nominations for the month of September are now open. For those who don’t know, I’ll run down the rules real quick. Nominations are limited to one per person. You can nominate any female character you want, provided I have not drawn her within the past calendar year (though I prefer characters I’ve never drawn, period). Previous NHML winners are not eligible for a second time. Nominees must also not be from the same franchise as this month’s winner, Spongebob Squarepants. If you violate any of those rules, I’ll let you know, and you can nominate someone else. I know it can be hard to keep track of these things. You may nominate by either commenting in the cBox, commenting on this post, or emailing me (Nearphotison2010@yahoo.com). I’ll compile a list of the nominees in the sidebar of this site, and then on September 1st I will use a randomizer to select the winning character who I will proceed to draw sometime that month. I look forward to seeing who you all nominate this time around!