Humblearts Journal

All Year Round Book Party!

You are invited to a blog book party over at the Picture Book Junkies.  We are celebrating Alicia Padron's new picture book, I Love You All Year Round.  Stop by today for a chance to win a signed copy of the book.  Alicia has shared her process all week, while PBJ members and viewers have shared what they love all year round!

B.I.C. Club

 I started a new program for our SCBWI chapter called the B.I.C. Club.  If procrastination is your middle name you might find the pledge card and contract helpful.  You can read more about it here. 

Character Sketches

 

 

Two character sketches for a dummy book I'm creating.  I love that process of trying to find your characters - pages and pages of hopefuls "auditioning" for the role.  Here are some that didn't make the cut:

Useful Books for Illustrators who Write

I'm presenting this weekend at our SCBWI meeting on creating dummy books and using story boards to improve your picture book manuscript.

Want to learn how to self-critique your picture book?  Pick up a copy of Anastasia Suen's Picture Writing.  She has a chapter on how to critique your manuscript using a story board.  I highly recommend this book for those talented illustrators who long to write their own picture books.  Yes you can do it!  Another great book for fledging writers is What's Your Story by Marion Dane Bauer.  It's written for teens, but it's a very helpful down-to-earth guide on writing stories. 

Happy Birthday Tomie!

Today is Tomie dePaola's birthday!  Celebrate by reading your favorite Tomie book to a kid. 

Me and Mr. dePaola at the SCBWI Winter Conference in 2007.

Here Again!

Okay, I missed this blog too much.  I miss all the wonderful visitors and having a space to share my work and talk about life.  This blog was always so much more to me than business.  My humblebeads blog is all business.  And I need a place to put illustration stuff that isn't too precious.  Since my humblearts.com website is actually a blog, the first page you see is my current posts. Which makes me very wary of posting anything on there except what I'd want the first thing to have an art director see.  Yikes, that's pressure!  So here I am again with illustration, the occasion craft, holiday goodness and whatever other silliness I'm up to!  Come back to visit often, stop by and say hello.

I'll leave you with an illustration from my first picture book, Conor's Gift from Yeowon Media. 

Moving on

I've decided to keep a blog on my portfolio website, please update your bookmarks.

www.humblearts.wordpress.com

Come by and visit often!

Holiday Open House

Tomorrow I'm hosting a cyber Open House in my Etsy shop.  I hope you'll stop by and see if I can help you with your holiday shopping list.

To celebrate I'm offering free shipping, a special free gift for each customer and surprises that will be listed throughout the day.   

As part of the festivities I'm moderating a Handcrafted Holiday chat.  We'll be sharing ideas, inspiration and holiday how-tos!  Join me during lunch at 12pm (CST). We'll meet in the Red Room in the virtual labs Monday, Nov. 5th.
http://www.etsy.com/virtual_labs.php
You must have an etsy account to login to the chat.

Tomorrow is also the 1st Monday of the month and the Etsy Texas Crafters have great sales in their shops.  Visit their site for details on all their members' specials tomorrow.

Etsy Buy Handmade humblebeads

Sketch-a-day

I get up every morning and sketch.  Some days it's while the kids are getting ready for school, others it's the moments right after they have walked out the door, usually just for 15 minutes or so.  I often sneak back to my book at lunch or while the girls do their homework. I leave my book and pencil right out in the open, so it's always calling my name.  Lately it's been a rash of Christmas memories or how I would celebrate the holidays if I were a squirrel or bunny.  I especially enjoy sketching the memories.  Little snippets of my childhood on paper - just  makes me smile.  Of course, they probably look nothing like my real relatives and the details are those captured by my little kid brain video-recorder, filtered through 30 years of dreams and added in details that make memories so sweet.  Here is one that is in progress:

That's my hippie dad, which is pretty much how he still looks today.  I have many fond memories of him singing to me and my cousins.  Songs made up about our heroic deeds as mixed up cowboys.  Pirate sea-shanties and Christmas carols.  His favorite was the Little Drummer Boy.  I can hear his voice clear as bell if I close my eyes, "pa rum pum pum pum."
Some days it seems I only have those 15 minutes, but I have been making that time and guard it like a hawk.  Little steps forward, but going forward.

Illustration Friday - Trick or Treat!

My critique group did a group postcard for Halloween and this was my little spot art for the back.  I love this little guy, probably because I can relate to the chocolate-induced coma!