Ollerina

Birthday party

Easter at my sisters, crazy noise levels, and a birthday party for Ollie.

After spending time with his big cousins Ollie knows more about biscuits and chocolate than ever before. He is hooked on the playstation 2, playing "xx tricky," which is what he calls SSX tricky and he thinks a nintendo DS is called a cooking momma that you put nintendogs into and it's got a cool pen.

My Koziol fruit bowl made a brilliant cake plate. Our wheat free cakes were brilliantly decorated by the kids. My cool cake cases were not so cool because the cakes stuck to them.

Ian's mom  saved the day providing the cake. She had made a fruit cake for my mom so I pinched it. A bit of icing and some cherries later and we had a really sweet birthday cake.

Unfortunately staying at home to make birthday pizza meant missing a trip to the roller drome in Herne Bay. 
The Roller dome is on the end of the pier with a huge window to over look the sea. There was no one else there so everyone got to skate around an empty rink watching it snow at the end of the pier. How cool!

This leads me on to another cool Kent snow story.

Ian used to live in Whitstable when he was a student and there is a pub called The Old Neptune right on the sea front near.

It was very close to christmas and Ian and some friends were in the Neptune having a drink.
Someone was playing the piano and people were singing, (this is not something that happens a lot in England unless it's in a film but it did this time).
One of his friends decided to go home but shortly after leaving they returned
"come outside and look at this," they said. The whole pub went outside it had snowed so heavily that the whole beach was covered in snow and it was snowing. A snowball fight and lots of running around ensued until they all went back inside for more singing.
I love this story, it's so romantic and though it didn't exist at the time I always think that The Decemberists brilliant sea shanty song 'The Mariner's Revenge Song' would have been the perfect song to sing on that night.

A new batch of paintings

I have been working on some drawings to make cards and prints to revamp my Etsy shop and the time has come to start painting.

I am trying to limit my palette and add more depth, all this thinking is making me slower than usual, sore head, poor me!

I am also getting to grips with painting in photoshop ( I've been using it for quite a few years but not to paint in.)

It's a bit of an experiment and learning curve at the moment so I thought I would put up pictures of the various stages.

The is the story of Off the beaten path, that's what it's called at the moment.

If you've got any better ideas let me know.

Reworking the painting in photoshop this is a close up of the girl, my mom and sister think she looks like a middle aged witch? Too many opinions, help! Not sure where it is going yet, to be continued...

Ready to scan in.

Painting the main character, I quite like her.

Just started blocking in the background.

Ollie's easter basket

I was supposed to finish Ollie's Easter basket for his first Easter but I finally managed it for his second. All I had to do was add ribbon and make a little gingham lining, I cheated on the bunny.

It's a bit of an advert for Green and Blacks courtesy of Quality Save having it at a bargain price.  Everyone got to have some although it didn't stop us eating the rest of the kids eggs when the good chocolate ran out. I have to ween myself off now.

Camillia d'Errico my new favourite artist

I have been buying everything i can find by Camillia d'Errico  because i absolutley love her work.

The print in the middle is now on our wall it's brilliant, shame my photo flashed it out a little.

The Postcards books are great,  the comics are great, the sketch book is great (her black and white work if just genius.)

what can I say she draws so well I am totally inspired. 

I read the Avril Lavigne's make 5 wishes even though I brought it for the art. I wanted to lend it to my niece because Avril Lavigne and Manga are two of her favorite things but it's a little too old for her. At first I thought somebody give the girl some prozac, just kidding I'm prefer my natural remedies and exercise. But I don't think I can remember teenage angst, I must have blocked it out. Once the little demon arrived I really enjoyed it and I think I will have to get no 2 even though it's illustrated by another artist.   

She has a very easy to use website where you can see her work and buy some of this stuff.

Camilla d'Errico Homepage

Etsy addiction

The problem with Etsy is that there are just too many good things on it.

My second purchase is from France and is some yummy artwork by artist and Illustrator Anne-Juli Aubry her Etsy store is Annejulie's Garden

her website is at www.annejulie-art.com

I got a cute little package with some postcards, a bookmark (which will be very handy because I read books two pages at a time these days. imagine the turned pages on that) and two Alice in wonderland badges all very lovely and very nicely presented. She has tons of work so she must be a very busy lady. I'll be taking inspiration from her lovely colour work and the way she paints with so much atmosphere.

Ai Yamaguchi, a treat for me

We took a saturday trip to the comic shops and Magma (a great shop in Manchester) it sells art books, prints, magazines designer toys and moomins (I do love the moomins).

I was looking for Nightmares and fairy tales issues 19 - 23 because they are illustrated by my new favorite artist Camilla d'Errico these comics are proving a challenge to get hold of ( I will be writing more about Camilla d'Errico when my package from her website arrives.) (mmm... I have been doing a lot of shopping lately.)

I didn't come home empty handed though because I treated myself to this book of 30 postcards by Ai Yamaguchi from magma it's also on Amazon.

I love her work. I thought I would take some inspiration from her lovely graceful  ladies.

I have just done a quick search for Ai Yamaguchi but I can't find a blog or website for her so if anyone knows more let me know. I did find out however that her graceful ladies are inspired by ladies of the night.

ImagineFX rocks

On a recent expedition to Borders I bumped into a friend that Ian works with, Paul Dolan. (Me and Ollie were on one of our late night trips to meet daddy from work it's our meeting place, books, a cake and wearing Pajamas home in the car, that's Ollie not me wearing the Pj's.)

Paul suggested I take a look at ImagineFX and not just because he had a piece of work in it, I have put a picture of it above it's no. 14 (the boy can really draw) if you want to look at his website it is at www.pauldolan.com

I have never picked up a copy of ImagineFx before maybe because I have never considered myself a fantasy artist. But I am really sold, there are loads of great artists inspiration and workshops. The March issue is celebrating Frank Frazetta's 80th Birthday (the god father of fantasy illustration) why I never knew about this guy I don't know but I didn't discover Arthur Rackham until I left art school so there you go.  The only trouble is now I want (no need) all the back issues especialy the manga one last month and i really want the fairy one but that's sold out so it will have to be an ebay search.

Etsy goodies OuOu's so cool!

I got my first Etsy purchase through the post last week (this blog,flicker,etsy thing is all new to me.) 
I got some very cute cards from an etsy artist called ouou she also has a great blog .
I just love her little characters sharing coco on a cold winters days with their monsters and I can't wait to send the year of the rat card to my baby bro (who isn't actually a baby anymore but I am afraid he is stuck with the title being ten years junior.)