Knotty

I made a fun Valentine treasury for Etsy. Go check out the sellers - they have some cute stuff!

I am "stylish"

...well, apparently my blog is, anyway!



Thanks to Sandy, at sandygrafik. Her blog is truly lovely, and her art is to die for! I just love her girls.

As these types of awards go, it works like this: I have to list 7 facts about myself and then name 10 blogs I think are stylish.
Since I haven't done anything like this in a while it sounds like fun! Ready?

Facts first:

1) I have lived in Washington state my whole life except for two years I lived just outside of Frankfurt, Germany in the 80's.

2) If someone gave me a free vacation anywhere in the world I would go here:



or here:


3) I am, more often than not, a lucid dreamer. And I always dream in color.

4) This would be my dream job:


or this:



5) My dream car is this one:


6) I am not afraid of snakes.

7) If I could have dinner with one celebrity of my choice it would be this guy:




Now for my list.
I love these blogs, they are stylish, sweet, sassy and just plain cool. (If I've named you, you don't have to play...I just want people to know how cool you are!)

Abigail Halpin Illustration
Amanda Raquel Worr
Ces and her dishes
Cori Dantini makes...
white octopus illustration
ugly yellow
Shirley's Illustrations
Melissa Liban Illustrations
Krista Hamrick Illustration
Jeannie Lynn Paske's Obsolete World

Some of these are old friends and some of them are new obsessions. Go check them out!

She missed the Sketchbook

Do you think she's sad about that? SAM thought she looked sad.
Personally, I'm not sure if she's a ghost or what she is.
I think I'll include her at the back of my own book, though.

Illustration Friday Theme: Chicken

'Nuff of the serious stuff.

Hope

Despair is ugly.
it smells bad
and it's shoes don't fit.

it clutches at you with ragged
chewed-nail hands
to weigh you down
down
down
...............down

Despair is also a liar.
(pants on fire)
it says "I'm just tired today"
or "I'm just a little sad,
I'll be fine tomorrow..."
But it won't go away.

it wants a drink
and dinner
and a bubble bath
and your best teddy bear
and before you know it
a sleep-over turns into a week
is a month
is a year
needs a restraining order.

and then Hope come to your door.
it is not loud
it is not flashy
it sneaks in on silent little calico cat feet
and leaves
one

little

light

in the corner of a
big

dark

room

but Hope is strong
it is powerful
and Hope tells Despair to
get thee behind me

Hope sways
and Hope swings
Hope flutters by on
butterfly wings

Hope sings
and Hope shimmers
let it in when it knocks.
Hope rocks.


For Lille Diane, thanks for starting such a wonderful project!

Wanna participate? Go here.

Adios Sketchbook

So, it's all packaged up and ready to go in the mail tomorrow. (It has to be post marked by Saturday. Nothin' like waiting til the last minute, eh?)



...sigh...



I'm kinda sad to see it go. But I've decided I'm going to make another one, 'cause I'd like to have my own copy for keeps.



Sometime in the next couple weeks I'm going to offer the pictures in a limited run of prints.





I'm not sure what Etsy shop. I'm going to be re-doing everything here pretty soon. All of the shops, Etsy, and Artfire and everything. On top of work! Phew!



So I'm gonna be busy. Oh - and check out the Project tour dates, maybe they'll be coming to a city near you!



But I'll be around.

Okay, I lied...

I decided that I needed some kind of segue from sea to sky pictures. So Mouse is going to have himself a dream. "After all of his hours searching the deep waters Mouse dreams of flying." Or something like that.

This is that segue piece:

Mouse's Final Dive

...and he found the Octopus' Garden!






Mouse just may stay a while...I would!

This will probably be my final piece, end pages, for the Sketchbook Project. Especially since I have to post mark it by the 15th, and I still have to figure out exactly how I'm going to print and bind the dang thing!

It's definitely been a fun challenge, and I thank you all for your input and kind words regarding all these pages. I started with one thing in mind and kind of veered off course, but I think that's just fine.
I may have to re-visit some of these pages and flesh out Mouse's story a bit more. I've grown rather fond of the little guy!

And we have...

...a winner!

Last night I enlisted the help of Secret Agent Man and we picked a wiener, I mean, winner, for the giveaway.

[drum roll here]

Pseudonymous High School Teacher! Yea!


I hate her because she lives in Hawaii and I don't.
I love her because she's awesome and has followed me a long time. (For whatever reason I can't quite figure out...) And one of these days I'm going to call her up and say, hey, can I come camp in your backyard?
And she also has a lovely blog - so go visit!

So, thanks to all who played along.
If you didn't win and really, really wanted to, I'm sorry. But stay tuned, because I'm going to have another giveaway once I get this Sketchbook Project project done, for one of the art pieces that's going in the book. So keep watching. I know it's not as groovy as one of MoseyDog's rings, but since her stuff is still phenomenally priced, you should all go buy something anyway.

Don't Forget...

...if you're interested in my giveaway, you have until the end of today to leave a comment either at the end of this post, or this one. Winner get one piece or Mosey Dog's fabulous hand painted jewelry, of their choice!

Just because I love you.
So leave me a comment and I'll pick a winner sometime later Tuesday, and announce the winner on Wednesday.

In the meantime - happy Tuesday! Hopefully I'll have another Sketchbook picture to post in the next day or so.