Moving On

So long blogger, it's been lovely, but, you may have noticed, you're not as popular as you once were.
I like to socialize, so I'm moving on to a bigger party. If any of my old friends want to find me, they should drop by tumblr, where I'll be hanging out until something cooler comes along.

Eclair - Children's Book Illustration

I haven't been doing much personal illustration because a lot has been going on in my life the past 6 months. Not the least of which is that I'm now illustrating a children's book series by M. Weidenbenner. The first book is called Eclair Goes to Stella's and it's about a little girl whose parents need to leave her and her sister with their grandmother, Stella, for a while. Clair is super-duper, not-at-all psyched about this and tries everything she can to get out of it. But, Grandma's farm has it's perks, so she may yet be swayed.

It's not finished yet, but when it's available on Amazon I will certainly be posting a link.

The Thirteenth Tale

I know I've mentioned my love of Patricia McKillip's many, many books, but one of my other favorite authors only has one book so far.

Diane Setterfield published The Thirteenth Tale in 2006. I discovered it a few years later and I've been loving it ever since.  It's a gothic mystery novel and a book-lover's book.

I don't even know how to tell you how much I love this book, except that I'm not afraid to over-hype it at all, because it can't be done. My sister says the story is so good you forget it had to be written, constructed by a human author who decided what would and would not happen. It just is. 

Reaching for a Star

Reaching - 8x10 Print

My latest print from Fairy Land. I originally drew the outlines of this fairy for an entry in a t-shirt design contest, but I didn't like her for that, so I turned it into a colored illustration. Usually I go for a darker theme when stars are involved, but I thought I'd shake things up and do a light pink color scheme. I never planned on printing it, but I posted it to my personal facebook page and immediately got requests for it, so I printed some up and now I'm adding it to my etsy shop.

Drawn to Tomorrow

Here's that sketch all colored in! I'll get some prints made soon, you can contact me via my etsy site or my facebook page if you would like to pre-order.

Oh Baby!

I love cute party supplies, so when  my good friend announced she was expecting I staked out my claim to throw her a baby shower. I know some people complain about pinterest making everyone go over the top, but really all it did was give me a project idea and inspire me to buy cute straws. The last bit may have happened anyway when I passed by them in Target.

The garland is something I've had around for a couple christmases - I made it into a pregnant-lady crown because my friend loves stars and anything with a little shimmer.

 

I made strawberry and peach kabobs with goat cheese. Because almost anything is better with goat cheese. I also made some without because I know a very few people who don't like goat cheese, but none f our guests disliked it, so I guess I could have made them all with goat cheese. I also had summer sausage and cheddar kabobs, which were almost as tasty.

 This flourless chocolate cake with almond whipped cream does not look like much, but it's phenomenal. If you don't believe me you'll just have to try the recipe for yourself. I've made it three times and each time people raved. I'm not such a wondrous cook that I think any praise lies with me. It's the recipe. Try it. You'll die happy.

Instead of  awkward games that have people sniffing the insides of diapers or eating baby food blindfolded, I decided to have us decorate onesies. Now, some people use puff paints and tht's what my horrified friends thought I was planning on doing. But for the sake of my carpet and to have a better chance at adorable, I have us cut out cute cloth shapes and iron them onto the onesies.

I bought one of those coordinating fat-quarter packs and a couple packages of steam-2-seam (more info and ideas here). It didn't matter if people just cute out the cute shapes on the fabric and arranged them or if they had their own design in mind - all the onesies came out 100% adorable and everyone had fun!

Happily Ever After Children's Literature Festival

So after a not so profitable (but super fun) day at South Bend's Art Beat last Saturday, I've signed on to be at the Happily Ever After Children's Lit Fest this coming Sunday (August 25, 2-6 in Niles, MI). It's a fundraiser to help local families adopt children with special needs.

I really hope to adopt some day and I've seen how good it can be when families open their hearts to adoptive children, so I'm really excited to be a part of this. The tickets are $7 (kids 4 & under free) and there will be several children's authors there, children's books and children's games. I'll be donating a percentage of my sales to the cause and I'm providing a coloring page too. I'll post it on the blog afterward for people who couldn't be there. It should be a fantastic day, so if you're going to be in the area come on out!

Update: I actually won't be there, I just now realized I double booked myself, but there are still going to be lots of fun things happening and it's still a super good cause, so you should check it out!