Marshmallow Peeps

I've always enjoyed those sugary, marshmallow confections called peeps during Easter. Come to find out that peeps are loved by many after watching CBS Sunday program. 1923 - Sam Born the founder of Just Born, a candy company, discovers Amish folks that produced the peeps by hand in PA. He buys it and then the rest is history. Now peeps are produced on a mass scale. Approx. 700 million will be consumed this year! Visit the Just Born website. There is even an artist that creates his work exclusively by using peeps Peep Show, and a documentary that will be out next Easter about the following of the peeps.

Sketches for Three Girls

I've been working on a project for myself, a storyboard for a Korean Folktale called "Three Girls." The original title was "Three Little Girls" but I motified it and wanted to draw little older age group. I've finished the entire storyboard but I see some panels that aren't working for me so I will be redoing those. Here are a couple of sketches.

Roz Box

I am a such big pastel dork. I had to share my lovely box, that holds the majority of my pastel collection. The box is made by Jackson Richeson, comes with 4 trays that holds my Rembrants, and Nupastels. The price is right and the case is nice durable metal. Excuse my drafting table mess.

Pastel Journal

I just signed up for a subscription of Pastel Journal for a year. I happened to pick up a newstand copy that had some good articles that relate to pastel work. Out of curiousity I emailed their editorial and asked if they had every or planned to run an article about some of the wonderful children's book illustrations that have been created by illustrators that work in pastel ie Chris Van Allsburg, Mary Grandpre, and Vivienne Flescher. Just to name a few. Well, the editorial promptly replied back and said they had been thinking about doing such an article, and they had been in talks with Mary Grandpre. Unfortunately her current schedule makes it impossible, but hopeful it will be something they will be able to feature at a later date. I hope it is during my subscription. If they do I will post a synopsis.

How Conference

I found out that I got the greenlight to attend the HOW conference in Chicago this year. The overall focus is design at these conferences, so most of the benefits will apply to my day job. But I did notice a general session that I am very excited to be attending. "Fusion: Word and Image" Marshall Arisman is the speakers and he will be exploring the processes of writing and illustration, showing how to fuse words and images into one cohesive design. If you are interested in learning more about the conference visit HOW Conference.

Folktales

I've always had a fondness for creation and origin stories. I had a dear co-worker mention a creationism story for the Utila Islands located out by the Bay Islands, Honduras. I've heard it is quite a beautiful region. Many people visit for the amazing underwater life and coral. You can dive with huge whale sharks that are like the size of a bus. Whale sharks are quite friendly. Anyhow she was doing some research on the culture for an editorial piece, and it is said the islands were created when 2 older sisters wouldn't share their turtle soup with their younger sister. So she went and started looking for her own turtles for soup. As she stepped out into the Caribbean Sea, an island would spring up from the spot. The last island was Utila where she happily found tons of turtles for soup. So when she mentioned this folktale, I had to go looking around online for more details. It was a tough one to find, but a wonderful book on Amazon.com called "Fearless Girls, Wise Women, and Beloved Sisters: Heroines in Folktales from Around the World" by Kathleen Ragan, it contains numerous folktales about women and girls that make you say "You go girls!"

Children's Illustrators Blog Ring

I am so excited that I've been invited to join the Children's Illustrators Blog Ring. Wonderful things seem to happen in 3's for me. The cute dog on the unicycle is how you can visit the fabulous work of the other illustrators in the group. I feel so honored to be included!