There's a couple of new things happening in the studio these days. First of all, I've temporarily moved into a lovely office at The Met Agency while I do some technical illustrations for a few weeks. Secondly, I volunteered to help co-ordinate a free family day event in our local community. Here's the poster - if you're in Edmonton, pop on in and I'll paint your face for you.
Our Growing Up Exhibition through TREX (via the Art Gallery of Alberta) is currently up at my old elementary school - the Alder Flats Elementary School (the art is making it's way around Alberta in various settings, mostly schools). I made a quick visit to grades 4, 5 & 6 and loved the questions they had for me. It was such a treat to have my art hang in the town I grew up in!
There have always been several things in my life I can't seem to shake. One of them is, you know... doing the "green thing" (recycling, using cloth diapers, etc) and the other is saving money (I'm otherwise known as Mrs. Cheap-o). Luckily, though, sometimes being a cheap hippy has it's upside. I'm throwing a clothing swap! It's just a little shin-dig at my house - ladies only (sorry boys) in February. What happens is guests will bring some no longer wanted gently used clothing, dump them in a beautiful heap of splendor on my living room floor and once everything has been sorted, guests will take some new pieces home to love and cherish. The remaining clothes get donated to a local women's shelter (and last time I hosted an event like this had 16 garbage bags left over) - and I had an entire new wardrobe to waltz around in. Fabulous! Can't flippin' wait.
Here's my poster, which I will allow anyone to take from my site and turn into a poster for their own event. Just add the date and address and let me know how it goes! (Okay, if you're going to print it, please email me first for a larger copy. I'd just hate to have my drawings printed at a quality so ugly that it made my doll look like a lego person. In fact, if you ask nicely enough, I'll add a date and address on there for you - just pass on the "green" love!). 
Here's January's colouring page. Sorry I'm late! Feel free to print this, pass it on, colour it, use it for your classroom, local library, playgroup, whatever! Email me for a larger, printable version.
Here is my final Tools for schools illustration - C for Clothing. Finished! It was pretty hard to piece together after I scanned it. Whew... now, onto paying work (after the sketchbook project and this it feels like all I've been doing is charity & personal work for months).
Details:
It's over. The sketchbook is finished! That little brown craft moleskin, with it's rather thin pages and 40 double spread pages of blank could-be-anything starkness has graphite scribbled on everypage, new covers of illustration board secured on each face and contact details inscribbed on the inner covers. Daunting. But finished. And I'm so darn happy about it.
Cover details:
Back Cover:
It's over. The sketchbook is finished! That little brown craft moleskin, with it's rather thin pages and 40 double spread pages of blank could-be-anything starkness has graphite scribbled on everypage, new covers of illustration board secured on each face and contact details inscribbed on the inner covers. Daunting. But finished. And I'm so darn happy about it.
Cover details:
Back Cover:
I had a commission this holiday season. A man requested a portrait of his wife with their dog, Hiccup. What a fabulous name for a dog! Pet portrait commissions come to me almost every year around Christmas. I wonder if I should start marketing myself as a pet portrait artist? With the busyness of the holiday season, however, I actually forgot to scan the final piece, which is too bad, because it involved some heavy-duty carving and looked kind of neat. Next time!
Here are the two photos I took of it in progress:
And the sketch (which I scanned, whew - got one thing right!)
