Too soft!

Another Goldilocks sketch, this time colored in Photoshop.

Goldilocks colored

In an effort to preserve the liveliness of the sketch (see Sarah's comment on my previous post, which I totally agree with) I scanned in the pencil, darkened it and printed in out on watercolor paper. I then painted the sketches with watercolor and added some colored pencil on top. It does preserve some of the freshness but may lack sufficient weight for the printed page.

Character studies for Goldilocks

More bears

"Let's go out for a walk while the porridge cools," said Mama Bear.

Belated Earth Day posting

This illustration was originally created for an article about a college course called Global Warming and Natural Disasters. The color fading from top to bottom represented the slow degradation of the planet, but I also hoped to show some sense of optimism with the windmill, the dove and the fact that the fish were moving toward cleaner water.

Illustration Friday - bicycle

I started out drawing a child in a bike seat, but somehow this little bear took over.

And again

Here's the little girl of the past two days inside before she decides to go out and enjoy the rainy day.

Rainy Day continued

A variation on the theme. 

Rainy Day

One silver lining to our current cool wet weather is that it's probably good for birds finding worms...

Smiles

This little sprite made my day smiling at me from the grocery cart. In full smile mode her face became a series of parallel lines inside a sideways oval.

Illustration Friday - journey

This isn't a new piece - it's actually on my website - but it was perfect for this week's topic. It's a collage of separately painted and pieced paper. If you click on it you can see a little of the three dimensionality.

Daffodils

The daffodils are finally in bloom in our corner of the world so here's a little picture to celebrate their cheerful brightness.

Other versions

Here is the background image (scanned before I added the text).

And here it is with hand written text, using a combination of blue and white ink. I like the way that the hand written letters integrate more closely into the image rather than feeling superimposed. You can click on these (or any images) to see them larger.

Another illustrated poem

This is a version with the writing done in Photoshop. I also want to try hand lettering it so that I can get more variation in the color of the letters. Right now some of the white is hard to read.

Front yard chickens

My small New England town is sufficiently rural that we still have working farms, but much of the center of town looks tidily suburban. I'm sure there are backyard chickens, but I wasn't expecting the sight the other day of some front yard chickens getting fed.

Illustration Friday - bottled

OK, so the grammar isn't quite right, but this is what came to mind for the prompt "bottled". I mostly nursed my kids when they were babies, but when my third was an infant she wasn't growing as fast as she should and the doctor recommended a supplementary bottle. I remember the very mixed feelings of being glad that my husband could be a part of this wonderful process and the strangeness that it wasn't me feeding her.

Happy Spring

This is a piece from the archives, a collaged greeting card design, in honor of somewhat warmer weather and the promise of spring. It's supposed to reach the 60s Fahrenheit here tomorrow.

Dogs

Here's the finished version. I wasn't happy with the boxer in the upper left hand corner so re-drew her. Isn't it a great poem by Marchete Chute?

Work in progress

I'm working on another illustrated poem. With luck I'll be able to post the finished piece tomorrow.

Coming home from the library

When you have so many good new books that you can't wait to get home to start reading...

Illustration Friday - duet

I went with something more decorative this time.  This is done in watercolor with a little marker.

Her favorite color?

I met this young lady when she was out for a walk with her dad.