please bear with me

Ah. Things are going a bit cockahoop over here. I'm trying to motivate myself to start working properly but keep getting distracted by business matters and phone calls. I'm sorry I've not drawn anything for you yet this year. I promise better things next week.




For now, here's a lovely shop I discovered this morning, selling vintage and French furniture and homewares: Little Paris. Yeah, I'm on a bit of a window shopping binge at the moment and dreaming of having a house to decorate with things I can't afford :-)


I did splurge on a few things at Christmas for the husband, though. This vintage 1950s laundry box, from Country and Chic on eBay, was meant to be the hamper for all the food gifts I got him, but sadly it arrived too late because of the snow. He got it last Saturday instead, as a Ukrainian Christmas present (he's half Ukrainian and we had the whole family over for a traditional feast).

Have a marvellous weekend, all! x

Neon signs

Today, after seeing this image from Emma's Design Blogg I'm obsessing over vintage neon signs. Yes, I should be working, but I just can't help myself! I would love a small, relatively subtle one for the kitchen or somewhere just for a bit of kitschy fun, but they aren't cheap! Here are a few I found for sale on the internet:




Oh, and I love that array of knives!

Ikea Toy Stories

I illustrated a Facebook app for Ikea, called Toy Stories, just before Christmas. It's an interactive children's book game using five of the toys that are sold in Ikea stores. Basically, you pick a character and a story, and then you write the text to go with the pictures of each story. You can print out the story to keep, to colour in, or you can just save it for later. The husband wrote a hilarious one (at least I thought it was hilarious) for the jungle story.

It's got a few glitches in some of the illustrations but otherwise it's OK. A bit bright for me, but I enjoyed drawing it all the same.

A New Year

Last year was pretty crazy. The husband decided to make a career change. We sold our house, moved to Wales, and are still trying to find somewhere to settle. It was a year of upheavals and uncertainty. Our hope for this year is that we find a new place to call home. That's all I want. A proper home.

These two photographs have been taken from some properties for sale in South and West Wales (nowhere near where we are looking to buy!). Isn't the first one in a perfect state of dilapidation? Call me crazy, but I think it's gorgeous.

Happy New Year

How was your Christmas? Mine was OK - nothing mindblowing, but good in its own way. Did the usual family stuff, then saw friends for New Year before heading to London to redecorate my old flat. Now I'm exhausted...

I'll be back and blogging again from Monday onwards. Have a good weekend, all.

Merry Christmas!

I'm signing off from here for the rest of the year. I want to thank you all for stopping by and reading/looking at my silly ramblings and pictures over the past twelve months. I hope you have a wonderful holiday, and I will see you back here in the New Year! Love, Karen x

Envelop cushion and napkins

I just thought I'd mention here that the toile pattern I drew last week is now available on a cushion and a set of napkins at Envelop. I've never bought anything from Envelop before, so I can't vouch for the quality of the print reproduction or the fabrics used, but if you are interested, please visit my Envelop shop and take a look around. The pillows cost from €19.99 and a set of four napkins costs €19.99, with a handling fee of €0.99 per order, and free shipping.

the weekend

We went for a drive in the snow yesterday. It hasn't come down too heavily here, but it's enough to turn the landscape into something completely different. Even things that are familiar to our eyes have become somehow new and magical. I love how the snow reveals the shape of the landscape more than the usual covering of grass does. The photo above is of Ruthin.


Moel Famau (photo by the husband).


On the road to Corwen (photo by the husband).


Llangollen.


The railway station at Llangollen.


The view from the Horseshoe Pass coming home.

toile pattern

I've been making more patterns today. Just for fun. This one is a kind of toile with some sad looking deer and hungry birdies as well as apples, cherries and some bushes.

Have a lovely weekend!

Distracted

You know how it is around Christmas time. I get s***loads of work in, and then I distract myself in the quieter moments with fun and games such as going to the post office, chasing estate agents, freezing my tits off in the house...

Here is a hypochondriac cat who thinks he's got every disease going. It's just his character, he can't help it.

Later today I'm off to Lidl to stock up on canned goods before this predicted snow comes in. Happy days.

My brain is fried

Good morning! I'm so sorry. I have been a bad bunny this last week or two. On the positive side, I've been away earning me some money, which is quite useful, I think you'll agree. On the negative side, I haven't got much to tell you about because I've been holed up in my desk space for days with little stimulation. Let me see...

1. My fingers are still swollen like hams.
2. I've been sneakily shopping on eBay for all sorts of wonderful things, including brown parcel paper. Yeah, it's that interesting around here.
3. We went to Manchester on Saturday to have a proper look around. What a fabulous city! It's the closest thing to a mini London I've seen yet, with great vintage clothes shops and wonderful things to eat. We had lunch at Oklahoma cafe (facebook), which was also a sweet gift shop full of quirky things like Japanese paper balloons and amusing teatowels.
4. I still haven't done Christmas cards. The picture above is one drawing I've rejected, incomplete.

Oh dear...

Skoda Yeti wins some prizes!

Just found out that the Skoda Yeti campaign that I illustrated last year has won three awards at the DMA Awards. It won gold for the automotive and online categories, and a silver for art direction. Well done to all the lovely people at Archibald Ingall Stretton for a great campaign - it was great fun.

OMFG

Things have got really out of hand here. I'm inundated with work, panicking about lost hardware, trying to sell a flat, nursing chilblains on my fingers* whilst trying to draw, and just cold, cold, cold. Sorry I've been away. It looks like it will be like this for a while - I got less than three hours of sleep last night :-(

*my dad delicately likened my swollen fingertips to hams. It's not pretty.

30 years

Yup. It's my thirtieth birthday today. I'm officially grown up! How do I feel? No different really - it's kind of nice to be in your thirties, I think. I feel like my life is pootling along nicely - I have a wonderful husband, I live in a beautiful place (the house is a little lacking but we will remedy that soon, I hope!), and I have an amazing family. I feel incredibly lucky because of these things. My career is going OK - looks like this Christmas will be manic again - and I hope that I'll never give up trying to improve it.

Things have gone a bit crazy round here. It's the usual 'when it rains, it pours' thing with work - three jobs at once, two of them big and lasting until the new year. I am a busy bee right now, but it's all good fun and I'm always much happier when I'm occupied with work. So posting might be a bit lighter around here until next year, but I do hope to find time to keep drawing things to make you laugh.