angry penguins

I believe that's what you call a chilly reception...

I dream of sleeping

Illustration Friday - BREEZY

At last! at last! its finally autumn...

Illustration Friday - CELEBRATE

Just what I always wanted, a birthday fish!

Kooky Owl

really I dont know what he's on, but clearly things are going a little craaaaazy...

Vampire Racoon

BLACK BIRD

I've started using collage again to create images, it's ridiculously time consuming cutting out all the pieces, especially with a small person trying to grab everything off the table while I work, but it's not just the process that i'm enjoying... it's great to see how images change with techniques, now I want to re-do lots of drawings in collage just to see how they turn out.

as yeti

not the best but not the worst - the drawing tablet experiments continue...

killer monkey with wallpaper

Guess who got a mini drawing tablet from Santa and is now trying to work out how to use the darn thang... yup that would be yours truly. I am hoping that future efforts eclipse this half assed one.

and another thing...

I don't know about you, but i've always thought owls seemed the type to be highly opinionated.

Illustration Friday - OPINION

Call her a traditionalist, but it remains Vicki's opinion that you should never be taller than your Christmas tree.

fa la la la la... la la la la

yes this really is quite insane, but who said robot's didn't want to decorate for the holidays?

ILLUSTRATION FRIDAY: Pretend

no matter how hard Debbie protested that she was a monkey, she wasn't fooling anybody with that stick on tail...

ILLUSTRATION FRIDAY: Pillage Power

Toord Fjord may look stoopid but believe me that Viking is a real WISE-ASS.

Illustration Friday - SUGARY

Granted it's not exactly a literal depiction of the topic of the week, but I thought there would be plenty of other illo's with candy and cakes all over them so I went for an image with full on sugary colour pallette instead... this is my nightmare image of the kids after too many sugary treats before bedtime... screaming, raining tears and bouncing off the walls.

Illustration Friday - PACKED

Clearly not my best entry but forgive me and do please cut me some slack, I am now drawing with a 5kg baby in a sling in front of me in 10 minute snatches, so the fact that I got anything done for this weeks challenge is for me a minor miracle! I hereby promise to try harder to get my groove back, as soon as I get two hands free...

little things for little people

For me the 'nesting stage' of pregnancy everyone talks so much about didn't really kick in until the last two weeks before Maxwell arrived, which of course left me severely under-organised and panic struck - where were all the things i'd planned on having done... the nursery wall paintings, the hand printed sheet sets, the original outfit making etc etc? Clearly I had been in denial until the OB said "it's time to induce" and then of course there was bugger all time to get much of anything done. I did however manage to turn a few drawings i'd been working on into some customised 'onesies', which was great because it made me feel like i'd made an effort to ensure he'd have something a little bit different from the other little widgets in baby blue and pretty pink at the Freemason's.

The first try was a bit of a wobbly gingham robot inspired by Bender from Futurama...which was all machine stitched... but as I didn't have any iron on backing so we had to go 'free form' with mixed results.
I think this is the most successful probably due to the hand embroidery of the felt onto a more solid fabric, although the polka dot robot below is really quite charming in his own 'special' little way.

Thankfully we've had some warm weather over the weekend so Max got a chance to wear them before he grows out of them - they all looked great especially combined with his red stripey pants...

Actually overall I was pretty happy with the way they turned out given how difficult it was to bend over my uber belly to work the old Janome -i'm thinking of doing more fabric 'drawings' once Max and I sort out some kind of schedule that let's me get more than a half hour to get things done, people keep telling me it will happen.

eventually...

SEE I REALLY HAVE BEEN BUSY!

Ok sorry first up to all that have visited looking for new drawings and finding nada, zilch and bugger all - I have been ridiculously busy with my other job, other blog (handmade life) and now have whipped out a brand new son Maxwell Otis... so please forgive us. The good news is that now i'm on maternity leave for a few months, hopefully between feedings, walking up and down the hallway, and nap-times i'll be able to pull a few new drawings together as well as feature some great stuff by other pencil pushers i'm currently infatuated by... well that's the plan anyway - let's see what happens...

Oh and a special shout out to little Lara Radford-Ifrate, keeping the dream alive with her top drawing of Me, Max and a stack of building blocks... top job!

illustration friday - moon

and sometimes at night,

by the light of the moon,

nigel would myseriously levitate.

illustration friday - poem

haiku for snowbound lovers:

who feels the coldness

besuited by throbbing hearts

big ears and pink cheeks