Juno

The Juno illustrations for March. One took a couple of days, one a couple of hours - and I

think the quick one is definitely my favourite! Spontaneous is sometimes better, I guess...

Hamish homework

Jack got his nursery school bear home for the weekend - a huge responsibility! He took it very seriously on the first night, with lots of kisses and cuddles and long, whispered conversations to the bear. He even introduced Hamish the bear to his teddies, Sid & Brian.

We took the bear for a walk on Saturday but then forgot about him completely - he spent the night in the buggy in the porch (oops!). There was a lot of making up to do on Sunday...

Part of the responsibility was to write a letter 'from' Hamish to the other children, which the teacher reads out in the story corner on Monday morning when the bear is returned to school (aarghh, and I had the Science Festival deadline looming!!!). The illustrations are from the letter we did - easier to draw doodles of the events than try to make a quiet weekend sound exciting!

Also, I'm not quite sure if this has developed into a full blown imaginary friend, but Jack seems to be 'talking' to an invisible someone called 'Carrot'!

magnifiscience

Echo the Bat (above) for the Fife Science Festival. There are eight panels telling the Scottish story of the evolution of ultrasound.

I hate January

It's the longest, coldest, most miserable month. Really. I'm always sorely tempted to leave my Christmas lights up until I see the first green buds of spring to cheer up the greyness of January. Most days it's been hard to tell when the day ends and night begins; I feel like I haven't seen sunshine for weeks.... So, I'm hibernating... and drawing... and waiting for spring. Roll on.

the graveyard book

Ooh, how exciting, a new book by two of my favourite collaborators - Neil Gaiman and Dave McKean. It occurred to me today, when speaking to Jackson, how unsurprising it is that authors are inspired by their children. Apparently the germ of the idea for The Graveyard Book appeared when Neil Gaiman used to take his 18 month old son over the road to the graveyard to ride his tricycle. (He lived in a flat with lots of stairs and no garden). It lay dormant for a long time before emerging. While speaking to Jack today he told me "polar bears would like to live in trees".... it got me thinking....

lantern walk

The 'lantern walk' illustration for the winter issue of Juno.

I'll be attending the 2008 Royal Mail Awards for Scottish Children's Books on Tuesday 18 November (not as a nominee unfortunately!!)

dabbling

I had a wee shot of a friend's (very expensive) camera at the weekend, took a pic of Jack, then went at the original in Photoshop. The original is at the top, my effort underneath. I think it's quite cute...