New Thank You Cards in Boju Designs!

Remember this ink drawing I did when I was snowed in over Christmas break?

I really liked it, but I didn't know if it would work well just as a print to frame, so I decided to try note cards!

 

I had so much fun coloring these digitally in Illustrator, and it was so satisfying to see something that I had hand-drawn come to life on the computer.  I decided to go with four different crops and four different color schemes and include one of each in the set. 

You can check them out in my shop here.

What do you think?  I already have some other ideas for cards filling my brain, but I'm curious, what would you like to see as a card?

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Snake Scale Chevron Fabric

Hi everyone!

I was so excited to be able to design a new fabric over Christmas break and enter it in the current Spoonflower contest: Year of the Snake.

I knew I wanted it to be abstract, and once I had the scales placed, I played with different color patterns.  I started with vertical wavy stripes, but then switched to a chevron pattern and really loved the way it looked.  I'm also really happy with the fun colors.

Here's the screen shot of the fabric from my shop, a fat quarter size.

What do you think?

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Sweet Christmas

Andy and I have been having fun, relaxing, and spending lots of quality time with our families this Christmas vacation.

I gave my father-in-law a gift for the family band that I had designed and it was a big hit!  Here's my victory cheer.

 

The dogs were not quite as impressed...

 

We got tons of snow on the 26th and we were all snowed in!



So I spent the afternoon and evening drawing this flower smorgasbord!  It started as a quick sketch to try out my new watercolor pencils, but then I liked it so much I spent a lot of time going back over the outlines, varying the stroke widths, adding a few contour lines and some shading.

How do you think it turned out?  I'm thinking about scanning it and coloring it digitally... I've been wanting to make note cards for my Etsy store- do you think this design would make a good note card or thank you card once I add color?

How was your Christmas?


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i am now an old lady for real

Last Sunday, I turned 29.  !!! 

(We forgot to buy the "9" candle, so actually, I was only 28 again.)

And I have to say, Andy spoiled me rotten.  Rotten, I say!  It was so amazing to have my birthday on the weekend, so I got to choose what I wanted to do for the whole day.  Really, I was like a little kid, it was great!

On the agenda was:

church
out to eat
presents & cake
wrap Christmas gifts
Starbucks
drive around to look at the lights

Here's what I know about being 29.

 Your husband buys you your favorite red velvet cake even though he doesn't like it!

You throw your head back and belly laugh with glee.  See?  I told you I was like a little kid.

 You get way too many gifts; your mom makes sure you don't open hers before your actual birthday; and then your husband says, "Take a picture of me on your birthday!"  Ha.

You take pictures with your cats.  You should be embarrassed, but you're not.

You get reeeeaaaallllyyyy excited about your new laptop!  So much more designing and blogging can get done when you're not sharing the computer with your husband who is taking an online class in the evenings!

Your cat weighs herself, and then falls asleep on the pile of laundry waiting to be folded.  



Thank you, Andy, for the best birthday!  I love being 28 again.







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MIA update!

I have a little breather this weekend, and gosh darn it, I miss my blog!

So I wanted to take a quick minute and update you with some recent things that have been going on over here.  Or should I say 'ova hee-ya'?  Does that make me sound cooler?

Ha oh that reminds me of how I love that song "Cooler than me."  Anyone else?  You think you're cooler than me?  Yeah, you're probably definitely right.

Anyways... gosh I missed my blog.  It's my place to say whatever floats my boat!  Like 'floats my boat.'  Or 'for pete's sake.'  I love that one.  I remember hearing it a lot growing up.  "Oh, for pete's sake!"  What does it even mean?  (Ah, I googled it- and found it's a way to not be blasphemous- http://www.worldwidewords.org/qa/qa-pet2.htm)

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Okay so that was written on Friday, when I was like "oh yeah!  time to do my blog!"  Except for it was a fake out, and now it's Tuesday night.  But here I am, and here's some recent drawings I've done!

We learned 1 point and 2 point perspective in drawing class for our last unit.  I was happy to do something different than still life, but it was a challenge for sure.  I remember in high school art class, the 1 point perspective drawing was my worst grade.  It was actually the exact same assignment as this...

... to draw the inside of any room we wanted... a dream room if you will.  I think I did much better this time around, thankfully!  It may look pretty boring, but it was hours of work, and a couple do-overs. 

And here's the big drawing we did in class.  Mine is a new building we have on campus.  We used black paper, black and white pastel/ charcoal, and one color of pastel.  I really love the look of the monotone, and I'm happy with how it turned out. 

Here's the calculations and planning it took to get this done... I could never be an architect!  It seemed like such a mess in the beginning, and for the life of me, I could not get those windows to be even without measuring them all and then scaling up.  I know there's an easier way... right?

 Also... here's a clue to what my life has been for the last few weeks in my 2D class...

Making a graphic novel.  In a group.  Soooooooooo not my favorite thing.  Yes, I checked this book out to make sure I was even doing it correctly...

So how have you guys been!??  Any other exciting projects going on?




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holiday blog break

Hi everyone-

I''m not sure if I do or don't have any regular followers out there, but if I do, I know I owe you this post!  I have fallen off the blogging wagon the last few weeks, and I'm sorry to say it looks like I'm going to be off the wagon probably until after New Years.  Yikes!

School has been really busy recently, and I know it's going to stay that way for 3 more weeks.  It's been so busy I've been forgetting to take pictures of my projects to show you!  Darn it. 

And then Christmas is coming!  And I get reaaaallllyyy busy with planning, making, and buying gifts for my family and in-laws!  I take it very seriously :)  (I just love giving gifts- sometimes I get so excited to watch someone open my gift I about have a heart attack in anticipation.)

I hope to post here and there in the coming weeks.  Actually just typing this post made me really miss it!  So... maybe I'll be back sooner than I thought... ;)



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fall colors + a train and a bridge

Hi guys!

A few weeks ago, we had an assignment to draw a landscape using gray paper and charcoal.  We had to use the same techniques as in my pumpkin drawing.

I had a couple ideas of what I wanted to draw, but I decided to drive around for a while to check out some spots and see if anything caught my eye.  I knew I would be spending a few hours outside doing this, and wanted to find something good! 

Look what I found! 

How beautiful was this spot?  This awesome bridge goes across the Mississippi River downtown.  I saw this view as I was driving and probably about wrecked my car as I was looking around to see if there was anywhere I could park to get out and draw. 

I ended up sitting in this little grassy median, right as cars were making their way up the ramp onto the bridge.  I'd say approximately five million people passed me on that Saturday afternoon, and each one was wondering what the heck I was doing.  If I happened to be looking up as they passed, we definitely made eye contact as they craned their necks to check the crazy girl out.

But honestly, I could not pass up that gorgeous yellow tree, the train which Andy loves, and the way the shape of the bridge cascades into the distance.  Love!

Here's how it turned out.

And a side by side, or up and down, for my mom again :)

I don't think I nailed it as much as my pumpkin drawing, but I really like it anywho. 

Has anyone else been out driving around to soak up the last bit of fall before winter strikes?

Oh, and P.S. Trick or treat night was freezing this year!  We had easily only half as many kids as last year!  Did anyone's plans get ruined because of the cold weather?




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