From the Sketchbook...

I haven't had much time to sketch the last few months, but yesterday I went with my sister and five year old niece Jade to get her haircut and do some back to school shopping. The stylist gave her a bob, and we found a vintage style polka dot dress and bow while shopping. Her new look definitely fits her personality and she loved it, and it made me itch to get a pencil and paper in my hands and do a quick sketch.

Cats Sleep Anywhere

Cats sleep anywhere, any table, any chair.
Top of piano, window-ledge, in the middle, on the edge.
Open draw, empty shoe, anybody's lap will do.
Fitted in a cardboard box, in the cupboard with your frocks.
Anywhere! They don't care! Cats sleep anywhere.

This poem by Eleanor Farjean made me smile and think of my own cat, Dino, who does sleep anywhere... his favorite place being on me. But he also likes to sleep...

on a couch,


in a box,


in a box with movies,


on top of a bed,


under some newspapers,


and on the fireplace mantle.


Silly kitty.

Illustration Friday: Wild

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Waiting For Wings

This is the newest addition to my portfolio, although I've had the idea for quite a while. I've always enjoyed drawing bugs of different kinds, which have made their way into several sketches and illustrations. I illustrated the first version of a girl riding on a butterfly a few years ago:


I loved the energy of the illustration, and I wanted to do more with it in terms of storytelling. Because my interest is in children's books it's important that every piece in my portfolio not just be pleasing to look at but also show a story, one that would make a viewer curious to turn the page and find out more.


So I sketched out a world where the caterpillars are waiting for the day when they'll have their wings and their small companions will be able to soar in the sky with them like the older children they are watching from the flower garden.

Illustration Friday: Edge

I'm busy getting my portfolio ready for the SCBWI conference in New York with a few new pieces, but I decided to take a couple of minutes with my sketchbook and ink pen to participate in illustrationfriday.com's word of the week, "Edge". Here are two people having a nice little boat ride, blissfully ignorant of the little birds trying to warn them about the danger ahead. It seemed to me like the kind of scene that would have been in an old silent movie, and it reminded me of a story my grandmother told me about going to the movies growing up and spontaneously bursting into laughter when a horse and stagecoach plummeted over the edge of a deep canyon. She and her friend then slid far down in their seats as grown-ups who didn't find it so funny turned around to give them disapproving looks.




* Click on the image if you'd like to view it larger!