Happy Lunar New Year!

Happy Lunar New Year! Here is a piece I did for Time for Kids magazine. I'm celebrating by eating alot of my mom's food....she came over a few days ago to stock my fridge with lots of yummy Chinese food.
Things are busy here as I am managing work and also some wedding-related things...which is only a few short months away now. I've been hand assembling my invitations for the past few days and I can't wait to take pics and show it off here (the fruits of my hard labor!) but I will have to keep it private for now.

Anyways, I hope I will keep up with the blogging but I've been distracted with so many things going on personally....and sometimes wonder how much of it I should share here. Ever since I quit my job 3 years ago to become an illustrator full time, I've been focusing on my career. This is one of those years where I need to focus a little more on my personal life/goals. And hopefully, I can share a few things as I go along. More later!

My First Graphic Novels-Stone Arch Books

I was feeling like I had nothing interesting to blog about lately and then this package came yesterday.
I worked on these two graphic novels for kids last year- T-Ball Trouble and Lily's lucky Leotard, written by Carl Meister, published by Stone Arch Books, both are available now. The designer did an amazing job with the cover....I love the look of them.
I've dabbled in comic books personally on my own but doing this job gives me a whole new appreciation for graphic novel artists out there. Each panel is a piece of art in itself...thats a whole lot of work.
There has been a trend of comic style/graphic novel format in children's publishing. Its alot of fun to see and I hope it sticks around for a while.

Updating my portfolio

So I was looking at my coroflot account and my portfolio needed some serious updating. Funny how I haven't been posting much work from various jobs lately...I've been working though! Digging around my "2008 illustration jobs completed" folder, here is some art for an educational book called Kitty Breaks the Bank.

It is about a kitty who saved up money in a piggy bank and goes shopping at the mall.

She looks and looks, but couldn't find anything to buy.

She goes home in tears. But in the end, she gets a hug from her mother...and its free!

This job was the perfect match for me- I love drawing anthropomorphic animals and store scenes.

Inspiration while on Vacation

Over the Christmas break, Math Boy and I stayed in an awesome hotel in San Francisco's Japantown called Hotel Tomo. I first heard about this hotel through Tokyo Bunnie's blog, and I was sure I needed to go there. I didn't get to take a pic of the entire room (above is a pic from their website.) But that is what the rooms look like, so modern and quirky with a Japanese pop art mural in each room. Everything about this hotel was fun and fresh.

This was the mural in our room. LOVE!

This was the hotel info booklet they had in the rooms. Check out their logo!

The interiors: ooh! Illustrations! Yay!

And look- these are suppose to be the "do not disturb" signs:

There were alot of fun little details in this place that was great eye candy for me. It was a good balance of quirkiness and playfulness without feeling childish. I love places like this. I want to go back already!

I've been a good lil' chicken this year

Some eye candy and inspiration from Sarah Kelly aka Spadazzle...Thank you, Sarah! She is so generous in sending me all kinds of to-die-for goodies from Japan...like a my very own Kawaii fairy Godmother! :-) I'm really speechless. Here are a few things from it:

I know its already January, but really- can you resist this tofu santa plushie?!

tofu disguised as a reindeer?

Kawaii heaven....
The perfect calendar for me.
Sarah's awesome collage work- I especially love the piece on the right which is an actual mini canvas with wonderful textures.
She also told me about Design Festa...which is an art and design festival in Tokyo that is held twice a year....Can we all say a "wahhhhh I wanna go! I wanna go!" She sent me the oh-so-tempting brochure for it. It is definitely a goal I'm shooting for. I won't be able to go to the one in May...but maybe the one in November?!? I might possibly overdose and explode from all the inspiration there.

Thank you again, Spadazzle! I treasure everything you send me. I'm one lucky chicken!

Prezzies!

I've been getting so many lovely gifties...thanks to Ellen Crimi-Trent for sending me one of her fabulous chickies for my Christmas Chicken Tree. Woohoo! Check out her tree full of them! I love it, Ellen- thank you for being so thoughtful and thinking of me :-)