Mother's day candle holders

 We live 15 minutes from a main town, but it really is limited with what shops there are, as well as what they stock. Needless to say I am very quickly learning that I have to be a lot more organised - unless I feel like driving 40 minutes to the bigger shops - which I don't as I hate driving!

Unfortunately I was not organised as usual, so while I planned to paint terracotta pots with Lily for her Grandmother's and Great Grandmother's, we had to settle on these candle holders from Kmart. Which made the zygocactus I bought a bit pointless (yes, I am great at buying plants without even thinking about pots).

Our two year old did a bit of painting once or twice a day until we had enough paint on there (if this pot happens to move into the brush that the toddler is holding,  she is still the one painting right?!). They turned out pretty cute, and we already have our plan for next year, assuming I buy everything in advance!

Woodburned Knife Block

Every time I go to Ikea, there are so many things I want to buy and by the time I get to the register I'm dreading the total. So I mentally take note of all the things I want so I can think about it for awhile before buying.

One of those items was their RETRÄTT Knife Block - an item I don't actually need since I already have a knife set with a block. Plus I wanted to burn a design on it and I wasn't sure if I could due to the lacquer.

Eventually I bought it of course, then it sat on my desk for ages because every design I tried to draw on it just wasn't right. Until I decided to get out my flower stencils and draw a few of those on. Then googled flower drawings and sketched a few of those in the gaps. So I started burning, drawing in more flowers, stems and leaves, then burning some more until I was happy.

Because of the lacquer, my pencil drawings rubbed off very quickly so I had no choice but to draw and burn flower by flower. Ordinarily I like my projects to be perfectly planned, but luckily this one turned out great and most importantly I enjoyed doing it.

Colour-in pencil case!

For Christmas I planned on using fabric from Ikea to make a colour-in cushion for my nephew out of that cool fabric which would be perfect for colouring in. But when I went to Ikea they had sold out. Then last week we went to Ikea again and saw they had a new style of colour-in fabric... but again it was sold out! 

I was in Kmart on Friday where they had the pack of 8 Sharpie fabric markers for $10, so I bought a pack for my nephew, and another pack for myself! (If you want the 4 pack you can get it for $5 from BigW - from 17 Jan to 30 Jan.) Since Ikea didn't have the fabric I wanted, for his birthday I decided I would just buy some fabric to make a plain tote which he could draw on and colour-in. 

Now I'm not sure about you, but I tend to have my best ideas when I am trying to get to sleep at night. Last night I realised my nephew would need a plain white pencil case to put his fabric markers in and also to decorate. 

Fast forward to this afternoon and one pencil case was made with a little drawing from his Aunty to get him started. I really hope he enjoys his birthday gift this year! 

And I had to switch my posts around a little so I could let you know the markers are on sale (in Australia)! 

Items I am thinking would be great: 

Pillowcase

Canvas shoes

Cap

T-shirt

Wallet

Lunchbox

Tote bag

I've had a little play with my set of fabric markers and the only thing that I don't like is that the yellow, orange and pink markers are fluro. I expected it since they are marketed towards teenagers, but I'm hoping they will bring out a bigger variety of fabric marker colours!

Blobby Scotty Dog

I wanted to share my latest "blobby" drawing with you. This one features the silhouette of a Scottish Terrier.

For this drawing, I tried to do my "old style" but I don't think I like it. I really liked the look of it with the female silhouette so maybe it has something to do with the simplicity of the base image.

This drawing will probably need to be redone in the "new style" before I can decide if I like it!

Blobby female figure

After finishing my fox blobby drawing I decided to edit the female figure I blogged about previously.

While editing I realised how much my style has changed over the years. As you can see, originally I didn't try to make even outlines, I was making them as much of a feature as the blobs themselves. While editing this drawing I noticed that I was still trying to even up the outlines! 

For my next drawing I will try my hardest to do it "old style"...

Blobby Fox Drawing

It has been awhile since my last blobby drawing so I decided it was about time I finished this fox one. I think he is rather cute all curled up, but being the first detailed image I opted not to do my usual white edge with black blobs. I'll have a play with it and see what works, but for now I am happy with how it turned out! 

Art Drawing - Heart

After getting frustrated at how long it was taking me to edit my latest blobby drawing, I started researching (yet again) for a better, quicker way. And finally I have found the way it gets done much nicer and quicker!

Yes it has still taken 2 days of editing - partly because I am not used to this fancy technique and partly because I am a perfectionist. The old way makes all the white lines the same width, the new way makes all the edges nice and smooth.

So far the smooth edges win over perfectly sized lines.

This new drawing is a heart since my husband thinks a big rectangle drawing looks silly on a t-shirt...

My drawings up until now have really been based on filling a whole A4 page so I think it looks a bit strange having a whole lot of blank space around the image. It isn't strange when I focus on creating these drawings for t-shirts, the problem comes when I think of how the drawing will look on my wall.

I guess I am just going to need to make borders to go around every drawing, specifically for my wall!

I will be adding this drawing to my CafePress store: http://www.cafepress.com.au/krydasu

Love Silhouette Art

I have finally finished my love silhouette pen drawing (in my head I still call them blobby drawings). 

The original hand drawn picture was started about 5 years ago. Unfortunately I was handraising a baby peachface at the time who decided to poo right on my drawing. Because of that bird I started the drawing all over again. 

It was only November 2011 that I decided I would take the drawings and edit them in photoshop. Now that I edit my drawings, every time I smudge a drawing, mess up a line, my arm gets bumped or a baby birds poos on it, it isn't such a big deal because I can fix it later.

So I reveal to you my love silhouette pen drawing...

Love Silhouette Pen Drawing

Do you see it? I have added this drawing to my CafePress store on some shirts and some bags. But I have a feeling it isn't obvious enough for people to notice without being told to look for it.

Either way, I love this drawing. It has taken me the longest time to complete it but I just love asking people to tell me what they see.

And as long as I love my art, that is all that matters. (I wish I was that confident!)

Art Drawing - Female

After posting about my moon cat pen drawing that I uploaded to Cafe Press, I thought I would share with you my first ever commissioned artwork!

While I was still in high school I was working at a restaurant on Friday and Saturday nights. After my shift finished I used to call my parents, then wait for them to pick me up. One night my boss saw me drawing my blobby drawings while I waited and she asked me to paint one of the female figure to replace the artwork in the women's bathroom!

It was all very exciting for me to have someone like my art so much they wanted to pay me to do a drawing for them.

Female Figure Pen Drawing

These drawings used to finish a lot quicker as I used nikko markers, however as my drawings got better the bleeding of ink into the paper was frustrating. Now I use gel ink pens with my no bleed paper which is the reason it takes me so long to complete a drawing.

I drew so many of these drawings when I used the nikkos that they covered a section of my mum's wall, luckily she liked them being there!

Art on T-shirts

I don't know if anyone is aware, but there is a great site where you can upload your art to be printed on a huge list of items - eg. t-shirts!

http://www.cafepress.com/

I have made my own store on Cafe Press, however I have found it a little confusing so far. Add to that I have only edited one of my pen drawings so far, my store is a little uninteresting!

I affectionately call my drawings "blobby" drawings. One day I will think up a far better name for them, unfortunately until then "blobby" has stuck!

My blobby drawings are all done using black pen, normally on my special no bleed paper - it does still smudge which really bugs me. Once I have finished my drawing I scan it into the computer so I can clean it up. The actual drawings take me months to complete as I cannot make myself focus for more than an hour at a time. On the opposite scale, the editing of the images takes me about 4 days as my old job involved a lot of photo editing - I find it easy to spend the day staring at pixels until it is perfect.

One day I hope to find someone who can teach me a faster way to edit these drawings, until then at least I get it done eventually!

This is the first drawing I have completed editing and added to my Cafe Press Store:

Moon Cat Pen Drawing

I only have a few different women's shirts listed at the moment, but you are welcome to take a look at my store: http://www.cafepress.com/krydasu

I hope you like my drawings and hope to have more of them ready to show you soon!