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An uber-realistic pickle illustration. I sat with the fridge open until I caught the right expression.

5 Stars Silly Frilly Grandma Tillie Laurie A, Jacobs Anne Jewett Flashlight Press 32 Pages Ages: 5 and up Inside Jacket:  Sophie and Chloe are lucky that their Grandma Tillie knows how to be royally silly. To their delight, whenever Grandma Tillie babysits she seems to disappear, only to be replaced by a parade of [...]

here is the finished illustration for the story 'a pickle for patty'. to be featured in the october/november issue of 'stories for children' magazine.
is it wrong to say how fond i am of my own little painting here?;) it's that little pippa (the one with the pigtails) that i absolutely just LOVE! so damn adorable!:)
i will post the link to the finished magazine as soon as it is made available to me so you can read the story that goes along with the illustration.
thanks again to rosemarie over at SFC for the fantastic opportunity to illustrate for her magazine once again.

BTW, a print of this is for sale in my etsy shop under the title 'a picnicing we will go...'
http://www.etsy.com/listing/78554000/a-picnicing-we-will-go

what i'm working on this week...
http://theenchantedeasel.blogspot.com/2011/07/pickle-for-pattysketch.html

a pickle for patty illustration for stories for children magazine/e-zine. set to be in the back to school issue. however my deadline is this coming tuesday (the 26th). hoping to be done by friday...
can't wait to start painting those cute little characters!:)

next up...another illustration for stories for children magazine www.storiesforchildrenmagazine.com this one to be featured in their october 2011 issue.
it's about a prissy and pouty little girl named patty porter, her perky friend pippa and pippa's pesky puppy named piper. oh...and a very much coveted pickle;)
lots of alliteration going on in this sweet little story...from the pink pansies on the park path to the purple picnic blanket and the sweet little girls and the puppy.
can't wait to start working on this...:)

Whoo hoo! What a fabulous day, look what just arrived in my Inbox from Cleveland-based comics artist Nigel Dobbyn! Vern and Lettuce (and me, ha ha!) are chuffed to bits to have two more pages for The Pickle online magazine! I'm sending them off to Serge the Ferret to put into The Pickle, but I just can't wait that long to show them to you. Aren't these brilliant?!





I love how he draws the characters, that Vern in the second-to-last panel is even better than I'd draw him. :D And Lettuce, and the mole, and that great mummy cat, and the bunnies...! Happy day! Thanks so much, Nigel!!! **Squee!!!**

I've had a couple friends in America (California and Wisconsin) get in touch to say that You Can't Eat a Princess! has been featured in Parents magazine. Which I'm starting to realise is a very big deal. The American edition comes out on April 14th, and it's published by a different publisher, part of Penguin, called Price Stern Sloan (more info about the book on their website).


Thanks to my childhood buddy Sarah Knofel Mangum in California for sending this!

It's fascinating to see which publishers in other countries pick up my books, and right now it's all happening at the Bologna Book Fair! We're all biting our fingernails hoping lots of foreign publishers will want to buy what's called 'co-edition rights' to publish our books in their own countries. Nerve-wracking! But it's so cool when I get to see them printed in different languages. Here's my blog post and photos from when I went to the Bologna Book Fair a few years ago. You can see what's happening live on several Twitter feed, including #Bologna and #tocbologna. (You don't have to sign in to Twitter to read them, just to post.)

I just had a marvelous contribution to The Pickle fall into my Inbox from ten-year-old Ellie Bennett, whom I met a couple weeks ago at the Bishop's Stortford lit fest. Thanks so much, Ellie, you rock!





(I read it carefully, that's mole problem, not male problem.) There are so many starters for new stories buried in this page! I wrote to Ellie,

I'm so curious about Victoria and what she's doing to help Vern with is mole problem. Poor Cabbage, she might be getting more than she bargained for with the bunnies. And I'd love to see a diagram of The Mole Catch; I wonder if it is a standard mole trap or a bizarre contraption involving tuba soundwaves, or something else completely.

Ellie's friend Heather has also written to say she's drawn a page, so I'll be very curious to see it. Click here if you'd like to contribute to The Pickle! (You'll find submission guidelines on the first couple pages.)

More news, the fabulous Viviane Schwarz just got her first copy of her new book she made with Alexis Deacon. Hurrah! She made the book while we were still sharing a studio, so I got to see her drawing and cutting out lots of little bits of paper and sticking them together. I couldn't believe the way she'd make her roughs; she'd get a blank book cut to the right size and number of pages; then she'd take a permenant sharpie pen and just sit there and draw the whole book - right into the book with the sharpie pen - in about two hours. Of course, the other stuff took a lot of time, but I've never seen someone make roughs like that.



Go have a look at Viv's blog to find out more about A Place to Call Home, and other things like an amazing fish hat her mum in Germany knitted for her and general Schwarzville goodness.

I was wondering if someone was going to ask me about a particular detail in my comic Vern and Lettuce, but until now, no one ever did!

Until ten-year-old Lola Fijalkowska from Worthing sent me an e-mail last week.

Lola wrote: At the start it says all the names of the little bunnys.


...But on the next page, there is another bunny without a name underneath it. And on the page next to that, I can see there is 7 bunnys. Throughout the whole book, it looks like there is only 5. What are the names of these other bunnys?



Well spotted, Lola! I wrote back: When I started making the book, I was creating the strips page by page, and when I did the first page, I didn't really know what was going to happen, or even that the bunnies would play a big part in the book. By the end of the book, I thought I could take out some of the bunnies, but I decided that perhaps Lettuce was babysitting visiting friends or relatives, as well as her brothers and sisters. Just wondering, since you were the first to spot it, would you like to name the other two bunnies?

Lola wrote: I am so excited about naming the bunnies! I've been thinking of lots of names, but I think the best two I came up with were Parsnip and Radish. Do you think Parsnip and Radish are friends with Vern, Lettuce and all of her little brothers and sisters?

I wrote: Parsnip and Radish are fabulous names! I couldn't have thought of better ones myself. Thank you for naming them! I am sure Parsnip and Radish are great friends with the rest of the gang. I wonder what kind of adventures they get up to! And do they live in Pickle Rye or another town? I wonder why Lettuce was bunnysitting them that day. There must be more stories in this. If you want to make up anything about Parsnip & Radish and draw and/or write it for the blog and e-mail it to me, I'd love to post it along with their new names.

And look what Lola sent back!

Parsnip and Radish are the rabbits twin cousins from the city "Vegetable Patch", which is about 3 miles from Pickle Rye. They are both girls. Their mum and dad are called Auntie Rhubarb, and Unka Crumble. They live in a bungalow, so every time Parsnip and Radish vist Pickle Rye, they are very interested with revolving doors and lifts. They may even spend a hour in a lift (with Unka Vern of course, just to see how much he can take it!)!


The bungalow has 5 windows (2 in the attic, 1 near the ladder, and 2 at the bottom) and no stairs. Instead, it has a ladder which leads up to the roof/attic/top floor. The house also has a carrot chimney.

The twins most prize possesions are:
Unka Verns knitted jumper
Lettuce's bike flag
Lifts and Revolving doors - The guide book to the amazing world of Lifts and Revolving doors

Wow. I love this, it's like my comic is coming to life and I'm getting to hear back from the characters, what they really get up to! I absolutely need to see Vern and Lettuce's Guidebook to the Amazing World of Lifts and Revolving Doors. I may have to make one at some point. Maybe Lola and I can both make it, it's such a fabulous idea. So, here's introducing you to the two mystery bunnies in Vern and Lettuce... Parsnip and Radish! (And Auntie Rhubarb and Unka Crumble. Hurrah!)

People of all ages, don't forget that you can have loads of fun over in Vern and Lettuce's world with The Pickle