wake up you sleepy head

Maybe I've not had much time to blog of late, but now comes the reward for all the technical illustrator hours I've been working - payday, whoop! And given my new v early starts, I reckon making my bleary-eyed mornings chirpier is a totally sound and worthwhile investment no? I could do the obvious here and add a link to Pretty Things, but what the hell, I'm listening to King Creosote on a loop at the mo and on a mission to spread the word.

going global

If you've noticed I've been a bit thin on the ground lately, that's because it's week two of full time work. These days it's mostly taking all my energy to get up in the morning and that's despite not even working a full week last week! Hard to believe I did this before for almost 15 years - I must have had way more energy in my youth...

Anyway, I've gone global how exactly? Um, truth be told, and obviously not counting my one night of inexplicable and since unrepeated popularity in France, I guess it's actually more Italian American. Having (somewhat alarmingly) found myself regularly video conferencing with Houston courtesy of the day job (who knew I could do corporate?!), in addition to dispatching another Blessings print to Pittsburgh I'm also planning what will be a well-earned trip to Venice in the autumn and mulling my submission for the upcoming Italian exhibition.

There's nothing quite like a deadline to get me moving (let's face it, it's practically the only thing that does), so it was fabulous to get an invite for the 2011 I Colori del Sacro exhibition, remember Beltane, above (oh, and the Jumis Tree almost ran)?. For 2011 the theme is air and I have until September to submit so plenty of time to start thinking about the illustration (I must, absolutely must not leave this until the end of August to put pencil to paper).

what is not but could be if

Some sneaky previews of the latest illustrations for Juno, hot off the drawing board. I have promised the editor I will hold fire and not post them in their entirety (alongside the versions that nearly were but now are not) until the upcoming issue has hit the stands. If they look a teensy bit familiar, I guess sometimes when I'm in certain frame of mind it's safer not to stray too far from the path.

(When I was mulling on a title for this post, this was the song on repeat in my head).

homegrown

Ooh, getting quite excited now but eek! trying to juggle my last few precious days before I start my full time job on Monday. As well as frantically trying to finish my current freelance work, I figured I'd try and give myself a head start on the mess created by my resident house trolls (if I'm messy now, things can only get worse once I have less free time). The plan was to do a room a day but, as usual, things haven't gone quite to plan... Still, I did manage the kitchen, and I'm super chuffed with my sprouting aubergine plant (mmm, aubergines). I also have one whole strawberry! Go green fingered me.

In between times I hit fabulous Edinburgh with J. He was totally taken with the Scottish parliament building, especially when I was compelled to ask a handy policeman the way to Our Dynamic Earth (it's through that gap in the wall behind him if you're ever trying to find it!).

Weirdly, the freelance work seems to have picked up again which means I may have a busy summer in store, but just off the phone with my new boss and apparently my first task on Monday morning is a coffee with her. I think I'll be able to handle that...

[Weekend edit: Bizarre... Il semble que je me suis du jour au lendemain une sensation en France!? Je voudrais bien savoir pourquoi? Encore, je l'aime... Un très agréable week-end! (and excuse my horrible French).]