I'm a finalist!!! In Etsy's Handmade Kids Challenge!

Thanks all! I'm so excited! If you feel inclined, and I hope you do, then vote for me! You can find my work here: (It's the "To Sail With a Whale" print!"

http://www.etsy.com/voter_list.php?room_id=20

The Foundling of Fox Tail Forest

This weekend was so busy! However, I did accomplish getting several illustrations finalized and listed in my etsy shop: GumballGrenade. You can see from the photos that the pictures tell a bit of a story that goes a bit like this, although this is the extremely rough and abbreviated version....

The Foundling of Fox Tail Forest

The story goes a bit like this...a star is abandoned in Fox Tail Forest. It's discovered and bought to a girl from the neighboring village...Who could the star/wish belong to? So she takes the star to Mr. Narwhale. He would surely know.

Well Mr. Narwhale isn't quite sure, but he is very excited to help this little one on her search for the owner of this star/wish. Mr. Narwhale tell the girl to tie the star to his horn and they will take to the sea and begin "a most adventurous journey."

Away they sail and on their journey they discover that the foundling star belongs to everyone. Back up to the sky the foundling star goes. "You Belong Here!" she tells the star.

All of the pictures above are listed in my shop and available as prints. I hope to have a mini book available soon.

Custom Work

The Company She Keeps

The Company She Keeps

"Little witch, little witch,
What company you keep!
Three prowl about while all others sleep.
Ghosts and ghouls await your play.
Then passes another year
Waiting for that special day."

Can I just tell you how much I love Halloween! I love nearly everything about autumn, from pumpkin spice, to apple cider, to dusty corn fields, but I find my self anxious for that one special evening where ghosts and ghouls come out to play! So here is my latest illustration that celebrates one of my favorite time of year! Prints of this illustration are available in my Etsy shop: GumballGrenade. Today I'll be working on painting her out onto canvas!

A Tale of Two Sisters

I painted some angels today. I'm not sure why I'm drawn to the folk art, primitive, angel motif lately but I am. So I've gone with it. One of my little ones namesake comes from the root word seraphim (meaning: angel). So here are the two sisters:

The Timid Magician Continued...

I just couldn't put this illustration down. She just needed to be painted out onto canvas. So I did just that today! Now she's a sweet little 5 x 7 inch acrylic on canvas!

The Timid Magician

Let’s play a little game of magic and pretend.
It’s a performance I’ve practiced again and again.
If you have imagination and patience to lend,
I promise you’ll be surprised in the end!

I was feeling a little inspired by vintage illustrations today. I picked up my pen and started sketching. Here's the progression:

as always available in my shop: GumballGrenade

Paintings in Progress: Halloween and Space

I think it's a misconception that girls aren't interested in space. One of my favorite experiences as a child was going to the planetarium. My dad also helped with this interest by setting up several large telescopes in our back yard and letting my brother and I quiz him about what
wonders were out in space.

Anyway, I had a lot of fun posting my last progression of paintings so here are a couple more that I've been working on this week that I'd thought I'd share. The photos aren't the best because I'm a little rushed on time! My apologies!

The Wild Kingdom

This is certainly no professional camera work. The person in the background snickering is me.

A Nightime Love - Painting in Progress

This is just a quick post to share a work in progress. You can see how the painting evolves. I apologize for starting a few steps into it but it's fun to share either way!








Yay! Almost done...but not quite!

Here we go... this is the final version. The canvas size measures 16 x 20 inches. I probably won't be selling it due to it not being a gallery wrapped canvas. But it was fun to paint and experiment with some new techniques!



Oh wait...it's not done yet. I still have one more thing to do to it.

I'm so in love!

So I promised to share a little about an artist that I simply adore! His name is Fernando Coellar and his paintings are just so very, very, lovely. They are absolutely something to cherish and gobble up with the eye! Here is a link to his portfolio online, but first, and even better, is this link to one of his gallery openings...it's amazing how he puts the viewer into the place of the child! So clever! I love it! The cotton candy, red headed girl, and the masks are my favorites! Enjoy!

http://www.fernandocoellar.com/fcfc.html

A Day in The Studio

There is little more I love than waking up grabbing some warm coffee and heading down stairs to my unfinished basement studio. Normally I work upstairs at the kitchen table. I sketch and digitally color items on my laptop. However, today I wandered downstairs to conquer my fear of painting. It's similar to writers block, only it's painters block. You see I've been invited to participate in an event at a local gallery and I have to have a painting on a 5 x 7 canvas by September. Well most of my work is done digitally and I wasn't able to locate a printer who would print on 5 x 7 canvas. So I freaked out for about two days, not wanting to pass up such an opportunity. I woke up this morning and knew it was time I face my fear. What exactly am I so afraid of? Well, I've though a bit about it and I think I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to translate the digital illustration to acrylics. I was worried I wouldn't be able to get the shading right, or the background colors correct. Even putting the pencil to canvas is intimidating. I guess it's so intimidating because it all seems so final. There's little wiggle room. However, when I do things digitally all I have to do is trash the current layer and move onto the next. At least that's the way I perceived it. So I pulled out four canvases and focused on getting my backgrounds down. I was surprised with how similar acrylic is to watercolor as far as washes go. Then I picked out my digital illustrations and went for it. These are the results. You can see both the acrylic version and the digital version that inspired the acrylic. These prints and originals are available in my shop: http://GumballGrenade.com

Oh and I did have a little helper, BoBo, who needs some credit for managing the cheap paper towel situation. I'm only allowed to have a paper towel if I'm willing to fight for it:

Illustration Friday: Foggy

This weeks topic for Illustration Friday is "Foggy." So I thought the new illustrations I've done may fit in. I've been working to give some of my illustrations a darker, older, worn feel. Similar to the antique style photographs, ttv photographs, and old movies. So here is my submission called "Three Circle the Moon"

"All Hallows Eve is coming soon.
Ushered by three circling the moon!"

Here is another one done in a similar style called "I wait on Every Word":

A bit About the Whale...

You know I have this problem of creating one or maybe two related scenes, but after that I'm stuck! I'm fully aware that there needs to be a total of three to make a series complete (at least for me). I am now on a mission to make sure that there are at least three of a particular theme available in my shop. So can I just say how happy I was to complete the first set of three illustrations featuring the whale / nautical theme! I was so very close to not finishing this series out due to my discovery of an amazing artist (I promise I share more later when I'm in a better mood), who absolutely captures what I want to capture about childhood. Only he captures it in on a slightly different level. So self doubt came in to play, but I overcame it and was able to finish these out on the Fourth of July!

Did you know that the whale is a symbol of creativity and intuition? It's purely unintentional, but oh how my love for the whale has increased ten fold:

I just completed these! And they match this "Whale of a Wish Illustration" :

A bit about Love...

I have to say with all of the amazing artists out there a day can easily be spent, not wasted, on viewing incredible works. However, I've managed to stay somewhat productive! Here's the latest love themed illustration. I think one of the most thrilling parts of love is the anticipation of what's to come. The top is a digital version of my "Come Back to Me" illustration. The bottom one is called "I Wait On Every Word." Both are a vailable in my Etsy Shop: GumballGrenade