And fun was had by all...

Have been having a fab time with friends in Montreal and family in Boston. Lots of good food, good drink, staying out late (one night with no sleep at all -- my 3 and 5-year-old nieces couldn't quite understand why Auntie-K needed nap time too) and genereal fun and mayhem.

In illustration news, in Montreal I got to meet wonderful illustrators Susan Mitchell (aka Sweet Pea), Paula J Becker, and Suana Verelst. It was great to have a face-to-face with these inspiring ladies, and to see Susan's work space. I was the lucky recipient of one of her lovely felted softy bunnies, and some of her illustrated Xmas cards which I will show you at some point.

I was also put to work in my time in Montreal and did a mural in my friend's soon-to-be baby's room. some photies:

And yesterday we went to the Eric Carle museum which was as much fun for little ones as it was for me! It was great to see some of Carle's original collage work, along with his amazing linoprint work I had fogotten he did.

They had spotlights on artists Leo Lionni and Lisbeth Zwerger - always great to learn about new (to me) illustrators. Zwerger's work was incredibly detailed - some pieces were so small!! one was about 3in x 3in. and she uses some amazing perspective in her work too.

While I was checking out the exhibition the littlies were having fun in the art studio making their own collages or in the library reading from the amazing book collection. fun had by all :-)

Staying in Boston until Thursday when I'll head to LA for the conference.. excited!

every day in may : day nine

I FINISHED MY MURAL! 

I'm very happy with it.

The most challenging part was the japanese kanji symbols. I had to practice beforehand, and then completely tensed up when I went to do the real thing. I was sure I had botched it, until I got down from the ladder. It looks fine. Big tick off the list with this one - phew!

I did do some editing of my children's book too. Not a Jour d'Editing Majeur, but Moyen at least.. more tomorrow.

And here is a pic of some editing companions: a lil snack in a lovely moroccan bowl from Fes, and a nice cuppa in my favourite mug from Mozi given to me by my buddy Rachel. Don't know why I had to take this picture, I just really liked the two of them together.

Hope all you other every day in may creators and followers are having fun - see you tomorrow!

every day in may : day seven

Today was a sometimes frustrating but ultimately fun day of doing a second mural in my house, this one for the entry. You can see my first one in our living room here.

Whereas the living room is moroccanny/spanish, the entry has a real japanese feel to it, so I came up with the idea of doing a cherry blossom mural:


The kanji characters say 'welcome' (kan-gei, I think) - the mural greets you as you enter the house and directs you towards the kitchen, the heart of the home.

I thought (wishful thinking!) that I'd be able to get it done today, but I didn't calculate the redesign factor. I had already come up with a design, printed it out at the right size...

cut it down, got it onto the wall and realised (after some convincing from my husband) that it wasn't quite right - it was tooo big...

the next one was toooo small...

but this one was juuuust right....
that's it in place. After this photo was taken I transferred the design to the wall, so now I'm all ready to paint! Though when I'm not sure. Hopefully I can steal some time this weekend...