Manic May!

Oh May, you really have been a manic and crazy month!

May was filled with me not knowing whether I was coming or going, feeling like I had no control over anything (seriously, from my work, personal life, future and even my own emotions/sanity!) and it was... difficult. The thing I like to remind myself of at these times is that I have actually survived this month!

But it hasn't all been bad, I spent time with my partner just laughing and trying to forget the world, we did our 12 mile walk that my feet and legs are still recovering from! But I could never regret such a wonderful day out in the sun. I have never appreciated ice lollies so much!

We also did a lot of baking this month, I'm sure my waistline won't like it but oh it was so good! And besides it was my mums birthday so we of course had to have cake... ;)

I officially registered as Silly Badger Designs this month which blew me away a little. My baby is growing before my eyes! Even though I have been suffering from horrible art block throughout this whole month.

But I did get my little wren and her finch friends designs completed and finally made those brooches I've been talking about for so long. It's always a good feeling when you finally do that thing you've kept putting off and then you're left wondering why you left it so long in the first place... ah the human mind is brilliant at times!

I also made better packaging for my jewellery items that feature my logo and leaf design. It's amazing how much happier I am with these than I was before.

I'm not trying to look too commercial but at the same time I like them looking clean and I guess at the same time I don't have to worry about them getting lost or damaged any more!

Pet portraits were also listed on my Etsy shop, something I've been meaning to do for a long while now! I guess this month was filled with projects that have been waiting far too long.

That includes joining pinterest!! You can find me HERE although please remember I am very new to this... I'm worse than an old person when it comes to technology and social media... I have spent too much off my life off in day dreams or roaming outside to be too savvy with this.. oh that's so bad to say at my age! But I am trying ;)

As I mentioned earlier I did suffer from lots of art blocks this month. Now that might not seem too bad until you remember that art is how I make my living so having a block can end up being a spanner in the works. And of course because I can't draw I get flustered which just leads to me still not being able to draw... it's a vicious cycle unfortunately! I know it's partly down to me working too much. I will spend more hours than I should working each day (it's currently 5 minutes to midnight as I write this now!) and when I'm not working I'm usually thinking about it and what I can do next.

With the rest of my little world spinning round I seem to have grabbed my work as something I am completely in control of and I now can't let go.

I'm not sure if this is a common thing for people just starting up or whether it's just me but I know for the sake of my sanity and my work, I need to get a better work/life balance. You know, have fun and relax without someone having to physically force me to!

So throughout June I plan to actually have time to myself where I don't work! I also plan lots of work too! :P I'm hoping to get more in to pinterest over the next few weeks as well as actually updating my website! It's in need of an update as it's hiding back in last year, back before so much happened!

Etsy will also be getting a freshen up and hopefully some more items will be added! and most of all, I really want to sit down lots this month and just paint lots. I really miss painting and just sketching in general so it would be nice to just work on art and creating beautiful things! Let's hope for a Jolly June where everything goes well and I finally let go of this illusion of control!

I will admit though, I did fight through the block at one point and came up with a few designs this month. My partner has shown me so many pictures and gifs of raccoons (sorry, trash pandas!) lately that I've become a bit obsessed with them. I found myself drawing this little chap and I think I'm in love with him.

Those little paws just scream high five to me and hey, who wouldn't want a high five from a cute little trash panda! So here's a high five to everyone who got through May! We survived!

I hope you all had a wonderful month and if not, I hope June makes up for it!

The end to a very busy first week of 2016! Gosh that one went fast didn't it!
Well this week has mostly been full of organising, budgeting and paperwork so that's been lots of fun as you can imagine. But I have managed to squeeze in art work and got my first work of the year done!

I decided to play with new coloured pencils I got for Christmas from my awesome mr... I was ever so slightly spoiled with my first experience of Faber Castell pencils.
Now I do a very good go at playing the starving artist. I don't really have that much spare cash and when I do have it... I tend to spend it on silly fun things or takeaway (typical 20 something artist I believe!) so I've never splashed out on this brand because they tend to be a bit more costly than what I'm comfortable with. So getting gifted these was a wow moment, I want to say I was completely gobsmacked when I saw them and the feeling continued when I started to use them.
I can't believe how soft and blendable these beauties are! I think I definitely converted whilst colouring this highland cow!

I have been told that this is a slightly amoosing (get it!) self portrait with the fluffy hair and crooked smile... It wasn't meant to but my loving mother decided to claim it was... I guess I do share similarities with these awesome cows :P

 

Next on the list has been a new little project I started. Before Christmas I did a small watercolour painting of British garden birds that I really enjoyed working on. The style is a lot more fun than my others and it was something I really wanted to explore more so I found a small square sketch book that I've had lying around for too long and dedicated it to being filled with British bird illustrations. This will probably turn in to birds of the world at some point but for now I'm focusing on the British variety or at least the species that spend time in this country.

First of was my chirpy little wren. I drew a draft of this cheeky chappy back in December and have been meaning to expand on the idea so it only seemed right to draw him first. It turned out much  better than I'd originally planned!

I used watercolour and coloured pencil here and the outcome was exactly what I wanted.

I liked it so much I decided to get started on the draft sketches for three other bird species. This time the Kingfisher, bullfinch and fieldfare. I just need to get painting them next week! So four down so far! Next will probably include the iconic winter robin and maybe a blue tit.

In other news! I've joined the Etsy Resolution programme! (Anyone else in the UK who is considering Etsy but lacking the confidence/wants to learn as much as possible I can highly recommend joining!) This is a four week programme with mentors and help with setting up a shop, a nice little boost for those just starting out like myself.

I'll admit at first I felt quite nervous and skeptical but you only move forward by taking steps so this is my step. Maybe this time life won't get in the way of opening my shop!

I'm also coming very close to hitting 100 sales on Redbubble which is actually quite exciting! Thanks to the lovely people out there who've already made orders with my designs this year! That was a lovely start to the year for me! Hope you enjoy your goodies!

I now have a busy few weeks getting products created for my Etsy shop! I will keep this updated with that little adventure along with my other adventure... I'm going to be making my own fun little bird book filled with illustrations similar to the above! This is obviously going to take a lot of plotting and planning but it's going to be worth it in the end! 

So much going on right now it's becoming difficult to fit it all in to my organiser! Nice having my life becoming a fabulous whirlwind! Unlike last year I'm in control and loving every moment of this!

Keep your head up, this too shall pass... and you are wonderful!

The rambling post

I am in a good mood. I am in a slightly hyper mood. I just had a very unexpected awesome weekend. It has left me giggly and silly.
I like feeling giggly and silly, it gives you a feeling of joy and fun like nothing else.

The addition of my first coffee in three months has helped too... lots of giggles!!

So this post is more words than pictures.
I've been keeping so much stuff quiet lately and finally I feel able to speak as it's rolling on and ready!

I have mentioned taking a big step forward with my work recently with the Etsy store and now I can confidently announce that I will be running a store by the 26th of June!!
Yes. This coming Friday!
Can you guess how excited I am?? Or maybe that's still the happy/coffee buzz...
So I now have a week of final preparations and finally I can go live! This is a huge step and I'm so so excited to be in this position right now. It's been just over a year since I started this big adventure and I'm now hitting one of the biggest goals on the list, or at least the first big goal.

Don't get me wrong, I'm also terrified and there are a lot of possible negative thoughts involved here but who needs those rain clouds when there are so many rainbows?
One thing I have learnt over the past year is to not think and to just do. The more you think the more negatives you'll find, trust me this works in all areas of life. If we dig deep enough we can find darkness which has a tendency to hide the light. Human brains are funny little things.

So, lots and lots of preparations and organisation will be happening over the next five days and I couldn't be happier!
When you put this much work and effort in to something and rush learn important things it's so nice to actually get somewhere. There have been moments in the past six months where I have been desperate to give up because it can be so life draining and depressing at times but thankfully I have some supportive people in my life who give me a good poke before I can go hide. I could not be more grateful for all the help and support I get from them.

Aside from the whole starting an online shop I also have a lot more projects on the go! This is going to be a busy time and I'm just hoping I can balance everything out. It's a plus and downside to being self employed, you get to choose your hours but those hours can also be insane!

I'm continuing the prehistoric/dino project I have going, this is a personal project for now as I currently have no idea where it's heading.

I'm also hoping to attend some art markets in the future to sell work...
This involves me making a lot more work... everything does so I'm hoping I can balance the making and business sides out better, at the moment they see-saw all over the place!

Even this week with everything else going on I have a few designs to get done that are currently floating ideas in my mind. It's so good to finally get my muse back after those dodgy months!

Basically everything is coming together in a nice tidy cluster of colour and will hopefully continue like this for a short while at least!
And I'm finally balancing out my work life with my non work life :P Even reading again, something I lost time and motivation for down to there being too much going on, it also helps when your other half is a writer and book fiend. We're a creative pair ;)

So here's to a productive week and a big firework explosion for the end of the month!

New Designs, too many ideas and a mega art block. Again.

So this week I've created two new designs! They are also both now up on my redbubble shop!

I had so much fun with these guys as they're both completely different even though they are done using similar techniques. Ziggy the lemur was sketched and inked traditionally before being scanned in to the computer and coloured. He was so much fun to do and I couldn't help but smile at his smug, cool dude face. He's available to buy here.

Papa bear is a second part to Mama bear (obviously) and is based on a black bear. He was sketched out traditionally before being scanned in and added to a blue background. I'm not sure whether I prefer the more traditional style or the 50/50.
Papa bear is now available here

I'm going to admit after completing these designs yesterday I'm left feeling a little overwhelmed. My mind is racing with what I'm guessing to be too many ideas that I can't keep up with.

I keep thinking about the business sides to things, finances, marketing, research, the list is a long one. 

I keep thinking about promotional things and how I'd love to be involved in an exhibition someday, group or solo. 

I keep thinking about selling prints of my work, looking at how to go about it.

You may notice in those ramblings that I'm missing something quite big out... Creating more artwork.

I'm suddenly realising that I need to build on that. I need to create as much as I possibly can. I need to focus myself on a subject or something similar.

There are so many things I need to do.

These things I need to do aren't horrible though, unlike many people I enjoy most parts of this job. I love the numbers and charts and records as much as the creating,

Just sometimes I get so buried in the business side that I forget I'm also meant to be creating!

And the worst thing right now... I have so much racing through my mind that when I sit down to create something I either sketch something my 15 year old self could manage or I find myself growling at a blank page unable to get what I want out.

Enter my fourth art block of the year! Hoo-ray. I am so pleased.

It's starting to get frustrating when I start getting creative and once I've gotten a few ideas out I run out of ability. The motivation is there, gosh is it there, like a roaring fire inside of me wanting to spend hours with ink and charcoal, making fun colourful sketches of animals and anything else.

I just can't get it out and it's frustrating me along with all of the ideas I have.

Art blocks suck. End of.

So now I'm left sitting here and wondering what I'm going to do. Of course there are a few things that take priority but those are mostly finance related. When it comes to art... I'm lost.

On the bright side the OH is feeding my fox obsession... Maybe I should work on foxes...

Fingers crossed I can start the creative buzz up once more!!

Also! Thank you to everyone who liked/shared my work for the wraptious competition. I didn't make it to the shortlist but some awesome artists did!! Go check them out!

Have a great week!!

Frustration and the thought of giving up.

Yes, it's currently half midnight here for me and I'm writing a post. I never do this.

I nearly gave up tonight. I nearly decided to just give up the art business.
I've become so stressed over the whole ordeal I'd lost the motivation and passion I originally started out with. I've felt sick and tired, lost my muse and just become this big ball of tetchy moo for the past month because it's all just gotten so big that I can't keep up or I hit walls.

Today was probably the worst day. I kept trying to be super positive and within seconds I hit a wall... so I'd carry on skirting around the wall, finding a different option and bang! Another wall. This happened persistently from midday onwards. I had this false, creepy grin on my face trying to hold on to the positives as they were being sucked away one by one.
Tonight... I fell in to despair. I thought I'd lost everything, I was stuck and my positive attitude was buried under a big fat eeyore cloud... which I was wallowing under. Hey, I guess everyone needs a moment to wallow :P
It was only then that I stopped to think what was causing this despair. I'm an extremely stubborn, determined, positive person. I rarely let negatives get me down and here I was, wallowing.

And I spent ages thinking over what was upsetting me, then asking myself why? and on and on we went and then it came to the conclusion.
I've been so wrapped up in trying to turn this in to something bigger, trying to be a better small business that I'd completely stopped doing artwork!
Any artwork I was managing was prints of work I've already made!

I call myself a freelance illustrator/artist and yet here I am not doing any artwork at all, instead I've become a business planner! Don't get me wrong I've done well but that's not what I want to do!
I want to create as well as the more boring stuff that goes along with it and I haven't been doing that.
Since when did being an artist not involve artwork!?
I know that it's common knowledge that an artist nowadays does more paperwork than artwork but I've messed up that balance. Right now I'm just doing the paperwork and it's draining my soul!
My muse must be mummified by now with the lack of creating I've been going through!

The worst thing here is that I'm meant to be making lots of designs for a future project... I should've started by now. Well, I should be at least halfway through by now! Instead I haven't even started the thing!

I guess it's a lesson to be learned. There needs to be a good balance between business and creativity. I had that balance but for some reason I lost it... I got so wrapped up in designs and products that I kinda forgot to actually make more designs!

So, the business side of things is on hold for the rest of this week so that I can catch up on all of the planned work I have!

I may mope and threaten to give up... usually because a small part of me is desperate for a break but I'm too ridiculously stubborn to give up.
I'm as stubborn as a hamster trying to fit broccoli in to it's pouch!

Cool as a Cucumber.

So the past two weeks have been rather intense. I'm currently tackling something bigger than my usual commissions, which are still open by the way!
It's something I don't really want to go in to too much detail with at this current moment but it has been full of so many ups and downs. Roller coaster is putting it lightly, if this was a roller coaster design I'm sure it would be almost impossible for anyone not to throw up!

So it's been crazy. I'm sure I've made that clear. I'm now at the stage where if anybody tells me I'm doing this as an easy option I'm gonna dump an ice cream cone on their head!
You can tell it's been an experience :P

But on to more important things. I got so flustered that I lost my art buzz, I literally couldn't draw anything without wanting to screw it up in a ball. I was just lacking the ability to come up with ideas. My creativity bar was drained to dangerous levels so I decided to cheat.

Some people see colouring books as a childs thing. I can promise you this is a silly thing society has created. Too many people give up their creative side because it's for kids or they don't believe they can draw. There is nothing stopping anyone from drawing or colouring.
Colouring and creating is proven to be a stress reliever, not enough people realise this or use it to their advantage.
I'm an artist and own these two amazing books, because sometimes you just want to colour between the lines ;)

So if anybody out there, artist or not feels like getting colourful I can highly recommend these two books. The first Animal Kingdom by Millie Marotta and the second Secret Garden by Johanna Basford. They are both gorgeous books to look through with amazing artwork and the designs are for kids and adults alike. And besides, who's to say what you can and can't do when it comes to creativity? ;)

When I'm stressed or hit a block, working in these books for half hour breaks the frustration cycle, it allows me to create without thinking too hard and it does get you to relax.

So go on, give them a go!

After a week of not being able to work I also spent an evening doodling anything that came to mind or that was around me, it's a good exercise to try when suffering from a creative block. I gave myself an hour to go crazy and filled three A4 pages with random things from crows to this guy.

So now, back to the crazy week ahead! It's going to be a big one!!

Have a great productive week full of happy!

Mondays...

Today has not been the most productive, nor the most creative or exciting... I'm blaming this on a busy weekend which has left me feeling extremely knackered!
I'm not complaining, it was an awesome weekend, I'm just using it as a bad excuse for my sorry lack of work.

I have however played around with this sleeping beauty and he's now uploaded to my redbubble shop!

You may recognise him from last year when I entered him in to the Ohh Deer cushion competition. He needed a small bit o tweaking and I made him a more foxy red than he was before and am now much happier with him. He's currently available on everything.

I've spent so much of today starting sketches before tearing the pages out of my sketchbooks in pure frustration. I get an idea, try and go with it and then don't even get past the ugly sketchy stage, my heart really isn't in it today. I've been more in to working on previous works and getting them right.

It's really frustrating when you just can't muster the motivation to get ideas on to paper, they're not give up days they're just... blank days. 

They're annoying but they don't last forever and with all the work I've been churning out lately I have nothing to feel bad about. I just need to take things slow and actually enjoy a day where I'm not run off my feet... or more to the point there isn't steam coming out of my fingers! :P

Looking back over the past month I've realised that I'm slowly developing a style that's very focussed on nature and colour. It's the first time a theme has really begun to show itself and the whole traditional lineart followed by digital colouring makes life so much easier and is actually lots of fun.

I'm hoping to focus more on birds over the next few weeks, I'd taken a break from them and I'm really starting to miss the feathers! So I'm hoping to update this kinda thing...

A made this a while back for the background for this blog, gosh that was a while ago now! I'm really happy with the designs but I'd prefer the sketchy pencil outlines I'm doing now rather than the clean digital inking I've used here. I'm also loving doing repeat patterns so these will be another thing to focus on!

And then the reappearance of this baby...

I also made this a while ago, back when I was better at backgrounds that foregrounds. I absolutely love this piece, it's probably one of my favourites from the past few years but and there is a but, I'm not completely happy with the buzzards so I'm hoping to go back and recreate these beauties and actually make them more interesting. If this goes to plan I will be offering prints! 

Gosh I've rambled so much today! That just shows how with it I am not!

Hopefully my mind will be back to it's normal motivated, butt kicking self soon and I can churn out even more work!

Have a great week!

Smile!

The sun is shining, the birds are singing!

And we went to the woods. It's a very rare occasion when I get to take my big flump of a pup to the woods which is awful given how much he loves it. No matter how bad you feel, seeing your dog light up with pure joy is one of the best feelings! 

So we took to the road and found his favorite woods and had a good long walk surrounded by nature and laughs. Trust me, when you spend time with my dog you realise that life is for laughing at!

So after the most refreshing walk and flumps splash around in a pond it was time for home and work!

Well, at least work for me... the flump got to be lazy and sunbathe for the rest of the day when he wasn't clambering on to my lap for hugs and kisses. I love it when he comes to distract me :P Who could resist the huge teddy bear! 

Anyway! 

I had the idea for a sunny summer idea for a set of three designs. I had the first idea of a bear as I seem to be having a bit of a bear moment lately and then added a wolf to the mix... the OH then convinced me that a mountain lion would be an amusing addition to the mix!

So of course, I wanted to draw these guys wearing sun glasses... cos who wouldn't want a grinning wolf in sunnies?

The original plan was to have the three linearts completed by Friday... what happened was I sat down at my desk for a good few productive hours and now as the picture below explains have all three linearts completed!

This is obviously a huge bonus to me and means that I can have them digitised and coloured by the end of the week instead which then in turn lightens my mega work load!

Seriously the to-do list is constantly growing and never shrinking (I secretly love this)

I'm also very glad that I was convinced to do the mountain lion, she may be my favorite of the bunch... although the grinning wolf is close...

I just had to do something cheerful and bright, the constellation series is of course colourful but lacks the brightness I'm after so this is an extra addition.

Once these are scanned and coloured they will have a whole new life and I can't wait, it's taking all of my will power not to pull an all nighter to do it! 

Just have to remember, sleep is good... Family will also kill me if I burn out :P

The sunnies designs will be available through my redbubble shop by the end of the week and during May something big will be happening.

I'm going to be expanding and if all goes to plan will be offering signed prints of my work so if you're interested keep an eye out!

I am also considering some limited addition prints with something extra... all shall be revealed soon!

So if you want to get your paws on my designs keep a look out in May when shiny sparkly things will be happening!

Have a beautiful week and make your own happy! :)

More stars!

It seems I have become almost obsessed with the stars right now, spending hours looking at the constellation app on my phone, doodling as much as possible, studying galaxy images... I'm not sure what's gotten in to me!

But two more constellations have been added to the mix, this time Chamaeleon (the chameleon constellation) and Vulpecula (the fox constellation)

These were fun but I seemed to lose my technique halfway through and ended up having to lighten them up a lot before adding the stars and animals. Luckily these are done in watercolour, a quick wet brush and towel and paint is lifted with ease!

The thing that drove me insane whilst working on these two was not doing a red fox, painting him blue/purple felt ridiculously wrong! You can see the small splashes of orange where I was desperately wanting to add something :P

These guys will be scanned soon and may end up on my redbubble page :)

And on the mention of redbubble I've added Ursa Major and Corvus to my shop! I have to admit Corvus looks fab on so many products, my favourite has to be this cushion!!

If you're interested in my designs please use the link to my shop at the top of the page! :)

I also managed to complete my raptor designs! And was lucky enough to recieve a surprise voucher from redbubble so me and the OH have ordered our designs for free!!

I'm super excited for them to arrive!

It's always an amazing experience to see your work printed on to a product, whether it's a print or a tshirt. I love it, I love the buzz of joy that zooms through me :)

So the moment these tops arrive I will probably be bouncing off the walls!!

I will be posting more about my raptors before the end of the week including the designs and a bit of an explanation to why they are appearing and taking over my life.

I also have a rather huge project planned which needs to be started over the next few months to be available by the end of the year to early next year, this is currently all I can say on the matter, you know.... just to be annoying!

Now, the sun is out, the birds are singing, I've hit my limit of work for the day! Time to go relax and enjoy the world!

Have a wonderful day!