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This piece was drawn in coloured pencils as an assignment for my MATS Bootcamp e-course. It started off as a preparatory sketch in my moleskine, but I got carried away and ended up putting down layers and layers of colour. This was the result, "I Choose to Embrace the Unknown":

As always, I'm offering all the "I Choose" designs monthly as A4/A3 free printables to those who sign up for the Floating Lemons newsletter, so if you want to print them out at home for your personal use, or pass them onto friends, just click HERE to subscribe.

I sketched out quite a few ideas before the drawing above insisted on picking itself as the final. Here are some of them, and the prep sketches that refused to stay preparatory ...

All in all a wonderful nautical exploration. Hope you've enjoyed a peek at it as much as I enjoyed working on the whole project. Wishing you a fantastical day. Cheers.

I took a course from Pattern Observer, called Mastering Your Market, at the beginning of the year, but never had the time to showcase the pattern designs that evolved from it. It's about time I posted them, as it was an excellent course and I learned so much from it.

The patterns I created during class were very different from those I was used to designing - one reason I so thoroughly enjoyed the whole process, as it forced me to think and see from another perspective. Here's just one of them, Into the Woods ...

I was curious to see how it would look on bedding, so of course I made a mock-up from it ... what do you think?

I'm going to play with different colour variations to see how it might turn out, but was very pleased with this final result and a good review from it too. Now it's time for me to really go into the woods with the dogs for our daily walk.

Wishing you a fantastic day. Cheers.

Still working on sketches for my e-course, The Art & Business of Surface Pattern Design Module 4 ... I did some doodles and sketches with geometric, floral, and typography themes in mind.

I'm not sure if the final results below would be considered strictly geometric but hey, I drew grids and shapes and then got carried away filling them up. There are florals there too, so perhaps I managed to work on two of the themes at one go. Oh, and some typography too ...

The second one is still unfinished. I 'work' on it whenever I have time, i.e. when I'm uploading designs onto stores. I used to have a dodopad in high school, and used to colour it in with magic markers, does anyone remember those? These grid doodles reminded me of that, and the whole exercise is teaching me tons about colour, and is fun to boot.

I did some typographical sketches with a holiday theme:

I love playing with text design. And some of you may know that this year I've decided to do a monthly design based on "I Choose ..." as a positive affirmation, that I make available as a free printable to the subscribers of the Floating Lemons Newsletter. It's a hugely wonderful experiment in typography for myself, and these are the ones I've come up with so far, for January till April:

They count as typographical exercises, wouldn't you say? Next month I'll be doing "I Choose Courage", as I'm going through huge changes in my life that require a large amount of deep breathing, and I'll be plunging into a different life and lifestyle. Scary, but also very exciting. I'm thoroughly enjoying the text designs and the affirmations that are emerging, and hope to do a calendar with them at the end of the year.

Meanwhile, I'll be away for two weeks as of next week. I shall try to blog as much as possible, but as it's my dad's 80th birthday that we're celebrating, I may not be able to do that, so forgive me in advance. I'll be posting up at the facebook page, so follow me there if you want a peek at my updates, and to see photographs of whatever inspiring bits I pick up from the United Kingdom and Istanbul (yay).

Meanwhile, have a fantastic week and don't forget to experiment joyfully. Cheers.

Yes, I love studying. So I've just started on The Art and Business of Surface Pattern Design's Module 4, having taken the previous 3 Modules last year and loved them. The e-courses are doing me a ton of good and, if anything, letting me know how much I have as yet to learn about art and design. It's the first week of ABSPD, and I've been sketching Things and Characters. Here's a bit of what I've come up with so far. I'm calling this first one "Cat Blobs" ...

I don't know about you lot, but I really want it on a print and, oddly enough, a tea towel - perhaps even a journal/notebook! The second one was just organic blobs really, and I'm not sure where it came from but quite liked it:

And this final one was an attempt to sketch birds. OK, it needs more work, but I can see a few there that can be improved on and used for something later, what do you think? Any favourites?

I'm not too sure of how that cat got in the bottom of the page, but it probably thought the birds just too good to resist. I'm off to sketch more today, let's see what pops up. Can you tell that I'm thoroughly enjoying this?

WIshing you a day full of pleasant surprises. Cheers.

Am I getting sick of jelly yet? Not at all! Have had a huge amount of fun sketching it, colouring it, changing it around, watching it wibble and wobble away ... it hasn't been easy deciding what to do with it, but I do love a challenge - you can see a few of my prep sketches here and here.

The assignment for my MATS class was to create a jelly illustration or pattern to go onto fabric, and as I'm still polishing up my pattern design skills, I decided to turn my hand to that. It's now done and submitted, and here's the final piece as well as, under that, the pattern that I produced from it.

Can you see it on aprons and tea towels? I can! I've enjoyed this so much that my next step will be to wish up a couple of patterns that will nicely coordinate with it. Meanwhile, however, my own home is in chaos as the main rooms are being painted, so I'm camping out in one of the guest rooms and ignoring the mess till I can get back in there to sort it all out. Another week or so I'd say. All part of the huge changes that are coming up, which I shall share with you as soon as everything is confirmed and completed.

Until then, there may be a few quirks and trip-ups where blogging is concerned, so thank you for your patience (in advance). Have a delightful week. Cheers.

I'm working on a few different projects at the moment, all in progress, all squeezed in whenever I have a few minutes free. Here's where I was at the beginning of the week:

I'm glad to say that I'm pretty much done with the "I Choose to Fill Myself with Positive Energy" text design for the April free printable (for subscribers to the Floating Lemons monthly newsletter of course!), and I'll reveal all when the time comes. Meanwhile ...

I went a completely different direction with my Jelly assignment for MATS Bootcamp, and have managed to totally confuse myself. Should I go with something more along the lines of last weeks sketches, here, or stick to a slightly more geometric rendering of jelly moulds, as above? argh. We shall see. I may have to sketch a lot more jelly before deciding.

Meanwhile, here's the progress on a sketch I'm doing that will, perhaps, end up as a Thinking of You card up at the Two Smiles for HP (Hewlett-Packard) site.

I drew it, scanned it in and decided to experiment with some brand new digital pastel brushes that I purchased from Kyle T Webster. Oh my, I love them. Now that I've been deprived of Corel Painter (it just will not work since the last OS update and I don't want to invest and buy the upgrade only to discover that doesn't work either. I was, needless to say, hugely disappointed) these, along with his real watercolour brushes, are making digital painting a delight once more.

Here's a quick peek at what I've done so far ...

I'm using them exactly as I would my pencils on paper and there are layers and layers of colour being built up. Still have a way to go as yet, but I'm quite pleased with the way it's turning out so far.

Back to work! Wishing you a wonderful day loving what you do and doing what you love. Cheers.

I've been working hard this week on some of the many changes that are going on behind the scenes in my life. But managed to take time off to play with the watercolours and marker pens. Painted a Tree of Hearts - no idea where that came from but enjoyed myself in the process - and then began work on some sketches for MATS Bootcamp, an exploration of jelly!

Am not sure where the tropical fruit jellos, or cupcakes or mice came from but I had fun with them. I'm trying to capture that gorgeous translucent gloss of the jelly and I may have to continue with watercolour now and see how that develops.

I'll leave you with an oldie tune, let me know if you remember it!

Jelly on the plate, jelly on the plate, wibble wobble, wibble wobble, Jelly on the plate.

WIshing you a day full of inspiration. Cheers.

Some of the students from my wonderful Make Art That Sells class decided to get together and hold a Blog Parade, thanks to Linda Tieu, and I'm honoured to be a part of such a talented group.

I've been struggling these past couple of years to get my business up and running. The first year was difficult and hugely disappointing as I depended on the wrong people. My bad. It set me back, and not only did I have to start all over again, but I had to pick up the debris left over from that big mistake. Still, I refused to get depressed over it and carried on, strengthened by my love of what I'm doing and faith in where I'm going with the business.

It's not an easy thing, getting the right-brain creative side to work hand-in-hand with the left-brain business side of things, but I'm now getting help from a good friend who has the professional background and is whipping me into shape, as well as direction from a brilliant e-course I'm taking at the moment, the Right-Brain Business Plan.

Apart from that, the classes I've taken this last year have been an incredible boost to my art. I feel as though I'm still searching for a 'style' and the journey, full of adventurous experimentation, is absolutely wonderful.

So my latest piece seems particularly apt for this Blog Parade. It speaks for itself.

There's a lovely, positive energy in the air, and the support of fellow students is a bonus I hadn't counted on and consider invaluable, even though haven't yet had the time to fully engage with everyone in the groups. I'm hoping to participate more, very soon!

Meanwhile, head on to Gabriella's site next, and enjoy the blog parade!

Wishing you a wonderfully creative day. Cheers.