illustration for a friday

so, i know its been a long time... a super duper long time, but yes, nevermind all that.
it's been a funny ol' summer, but its all over now and time to get serious about... well... everything.
so it is with all these good intentions and what not that i have made my first entry to illustration friday.
j u g g l e j u g g l e j u g g l e j u g g l e j u g g l e j u g g l e j u g g l e





yes. juggling is bound to end in tears.
weapon.x

show time

it's show time!


Last night was the opening night for the degree show at uni. so having finally finished all my work, handing it in and setting it all up ready for the private view, it was time to kick back a little, have some much earned fun, and admire all the work on display.


my business cards... [with thanks to jimbo for sorting me out with some of the delicious card from his work...!]


and their neat little holder for my board...


and i know i need to photograph them more proffessionally, but just for now, here are some pictures of my finished books. hoorah!










i am really pleased with how they truned out, they're far more lovely than i had hoped, which is very good news indeed. this project has been super stressfull at times, and so much more demanding than anything esle i have ever done, but i have enjoyed it so much, and have created something that i can be immensely proud of, so yes, it has most definitely been worth the many sleepless nights worrying. It's been suggested by my tutor, and two of my past tutors that i approach a publisher with the books, and that seems like rather an exciting opportunity, so i must get looking into that a.s.a.p.
i suppose it makes sense, seeing as the whole reason i came up with the concept was noticing the lack of any sort of self-help information for teenagers with depression especially in this sort of format... so maybe this could be part of the solution... who knows! it's good to dream big right..?!

so yes, now it's all over. time to put everything i have developed over the past 4 years to good use. i have been so caught up in all this work that i forgot that that was easy part. now the real stress starts. time for me to get a job and make something of myself. I need to get my portfolio sorted, get my website up, and start hammering out job applications. yikes! it all seems rather scary... but exciting at the same time.

ive been meaning to put this picture up for a while, but for some reason or another havent got round to it. this was a very early concept for the book, but i'd quite like to find something else to do with it because i think its rather fun...


and in other, more random news, on my walk in to uni today, i got rather lost. reason being, the field en route had been mown and the path was left completely hidden under 5 or 6 inches of cut grass. [in all the 4 years i have been here, i have never once seen this field be mown...] but yes, this meant i was left to wade through the field [in flip-flops i might add] trying to guess where was safe to tread. goodness. when i finally reached the other side, i had to stop and pull all the grass out that had got tangled up in my shoes, and between my toes. deary me...!


and that is all for now, more to come soon, im sure.
weapon.x

yikes! only 1 week left now and my pile of work doesn't seem to be getting any smaller despite my best efforts.
im beginning to go a little stir crazy sitting at my desk for silly amounts of time, but its nothing that obscure scandinavian electronica can't remedy... oddly enough.
anyhoo, all of the activity pages are now complete. so my task for the next few days is to get everything ready for printing, and then of course to bind it all up nicely.
but for now, i shall leave you with a few more activity pages.





[the reason for the gap in the bottom left hand corner of the right hand page is that there is a small envelope of magnolia seeds that will be attatched to the page after printing...]







weapon.x

busy busy busy

busy busy busy i have been.
and i continue to be...
so a quick post. just a few more pages from my fmp.










tata for now. ttfn.
weapon.x

so once again, its been a while, but i have been rushed off my feet with work. i have 25 days left of my degree and intend to use them wisely...!
the pictures above are for my final project [the creative self-help guide/journal] one of the "activities" i am promoting is a healthy diet, and the benefits that come with that in terms of physical and emotional well being. and below is the page devoted to this theory:



and here is another sample page detailing the benefits of keeping a journal:



and i still have sososo much more to do. but we will get there in the end :o)
best get back to it..!

weapon.x

its been a lovely lovely easter, super sunny an' all that jazz. the 2 week break has mainly been dominated by uni work, [an update to come on that soon...] but i did manage to find time to have a scout about in farnham's finest charity shops and find mysef lots of goodies :o)
these chunky colouring pencils came tied up in a pretty ribbon which was rather nice and have come in very handy for my work.
the bracelets/necklaces below are made up of wooden beads in the shape of faces and hearts and apples and carrots. sadly they only had one of each left in the shop or i would have bought more. but yes, they are rather lovely even if the bracelets are extremely small... but then again, i suppose they werent designed for 22 year olds to wear...!


and ofcourse theres the usual reems of fabric...!
i lovelovelove the brown, yellow and orange spotty one. im just biding my time until all my work is done and i can make lots of wonderful things with all these lovely patterns...!


i bought a book of stencils from pullingers, 'family stencils' to be precise. there's a mother, a father, a brother, a sister, a dog and a baby! i've been messing around with them a bit... drawing over them and colouring them in and so on... and then copying the results onto fabric... this family isn't quite normal, but i like it all the same...!


last night we had a BBQ at the house. it was nice to have the original coxbridge meadow gang back together again. paul and i bought some plastic plates and cups, all for under £3 [cheapcheapcheap!] especially for the occasion, and they almost managed to match the table cloth that i fashioned out of an old bedsheet... we cracked open a silly amount of glow sticks and had a wonderful time illuminating the garden with them.



as for now, its still super hot, and i am very much enjoying the benefits of an electric fan.
weapon.x

oodles and oodles

its been a busy couple of weeks, so this post may be a little on the bulky side...
last thursday it was dickie's birthday, and on monday, it was lucy's, and below are the cards i made for them. dickie's is on the left, and lucy's is on the right. the reason that the second one looks like the jolly roger is due to the fact that she had a pirate themed party, which was most excellent fun... but more to come on that in a bit....





for dickie's birthday present, thanks to lucy's sewing maching expertise, lucy and i made him a laptop cover with a matching sleeve for his ipod nano. sadly, we both seemed to be rather lacking in any particularly masciline fabrics, so the end result is not very manly...! but its still the bast laptop cover ive seen...;o) its all padded inside to keep his computer nice and safe and warm...!



as i was saying before, lucy had a wonderful pirate themed party, which was made even more wonderful by the fact that everyone made such an effort with their costumes and looked very piratey indeed. lucy made a jolly roger flag and her and russell made an excellent skull and crossbones cake. and there was even some blood red rum [lambrini] punch complete with floating eyeballs. we even had name tags with our very own pirate names on. excellent stuff!



and last, but not least, i went up to york with paul on monday and whilst wandering around in malton, i stumbled into a funny little shop that sold practically everything you could ever imagine. from pyjamas to frying pans. it was mostly rubbish, but i did manage to find these two nice little bundles of fat yards of fabric. one set of gingham and one set of plain, each nicely tied up with ribbon. lovelylovely. and also, whilst shopping in the beautiful knitting shop in farnham, i bought this small jar full of pretty buttons. very nice indeed!



and that, as the say, is that.
the end.
weapon.x

as you can tell, ive been busy making lots of lovely little origami stars. 100 infact. someone taught me how to make them back in secondary school in a maths class i seem to remember, but whilst out shopping on monday, i found a little pack complete with 100 strips of paper and a booklet detailing how to make them and suggestions as to what to do with them.
ive put mine in a jar, a rather large jar, and my aim is to fill it. maybe i should impose a deadline... but yes. this was what i was doing unitl stupid o' clock last night.



my friend has been going on at me to make him some sort of cover for his ipod for a while now. and seeing as it was his birthday last week, it seemed only fair that he should get one. and of course, i made one for myself while i was at it! his is the black and white one with the red lining, and mine is the green one with the horse shoes on. he seemed to like it so yes. success!



lots more to come, as soon as the weekend is through.
weapon.x

so ive been doing lots of work, or trying to atleast, but ended up going waaaay off point... and whilst on this little tangent i had much fun playing with projection and stencils and.. yes. but now i need to focus again. focus.focus.focus.
so yes, that is all for now, back to work i goooo...

lots.and.lots.and.lots...!
yes, this is a rather large update today...!

last sunday we had a spur of the moment group bowling trip which was super fun! i was a little rubbish though... lucy (darn that juice) did exceptionally well, quite the little bowling star she was!
of course as with any bowling trip, the clown shoes were the highlight...! but lucy and russell got special orthapedic looking ones which were the source of much envy from the rest of us!



ooohhhh and my moo cards arrived. hoorah! lookie lookie:



theyre so lovely and small! i just keep getting them out to look at them. yu-uh-uummmm!

yesterday lucy came over and we had the most wonderful time hunting through all the charity shops in farnham and the kids craft section in tesco, oh and peacocks too! we found many treasures, including some pretty fabrics, 3 super cheap patterned bags, 4 chick shaped egg cosies [2 each!] some funny little easter stamps and ice cream shaped bubble blowers. nice nice nice!



i also found this fabulous cardigan in one of the charity shops:



what an excellent find!
and speaking of excellent finds, i found this lovely crotched rug. i've wanted one for aaages now, and i was expecting it to be super expensive, but imagine my joy when i found out that it was only £1.99! crikey! it is a little tatty and im not sure about a couple of the colours, but i love it all the same. and its huuuuge!



and thats just about it for now... in other news, i had to post off my work for the ycn awards today. scary stuff. so i got it all wrapped up in brown paper and sent it off ready for inspection. heres hoping eh..?! i wont hold out too much. but all the same it'd be nice to be featured in one of their wonderful books.



the.end
weapon.x