Mid-year's resolution: Every Day In May

French Toast Girl is again doing her annual Every Day In May extravanganza, where she "commits to doing something creative every day in May" - whether it be taking a photo, doing a sketch, writing a page, or finishing a painting. 

Shouldn't be too hard, right? Not considering I should be starting the first draft of my children's book right about now, no. So get ready for some heavy posting folks, and please join in if you like - the more the merrier!

(you can click on this little button in the side bar to see all of my (future) EDIM posts, and see everyone else's contributions in the flickr group here.)

I-F: Theatre

Kids are natural actors aren't they? (and artists, and musicians....)

This one was baked fresh today just for IF. Feels good to do an illo just for fun again.

When I drew this, it was going to be the typical damsel in distress scene, but when I started painting, I realised she was acutally a sorcerer casting spells. Funny when a character tells you what they should be doing!

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Well with some extra time up my sleeves, I have been doing a few things I've been meaning to do for ages, like join Jacketflap. If you're a flappin' and want to be friends (maybe even best friends forever), please look me up here. If you don't know what Jacketflap is, it's sort of a myspace for writers/illustrators/publishers/editors of children's books. I still haven't fully checked it out myself, but it looks good! 

Goodies and tidbits

Ooh it's been a while since I've posted. My blog was getting lonely. sorry, blog.

I was just finishing up a few bit and pieces of work - a few small textbooks illos, here is part of a rough sketch for one:

These were in B&W which was great timing for me. I'm about to start writing/illustrating the dummy for my book, and it feels good to get back to basics, review the way I work, start from scratch. Nice to work in B&W and think about showing form in light and shade instead of colour.

so until I have something other than 'work' to show you (soon, I hope!) I will show you some lovely goodies I have picked up along the way:

Paige's new book The Little Green Pea

Lovely, sweet, wonderfully loose illustrations Paige! well done.

And I also picked up this little guy from Paul at Trianglenose, affectionately called El Muerto, but dubbed Miguel by me. I love his cheeky little grin. And I also love Paul's funky little striped cat too - too cool!


Plus... have you seen this stop motion animation using photos? or this one using paper cutouts? Both worth a look. The first so fun, the second so crafted, really incredible. Enjoy!