My desk

Tuesdays #folksyhour on twitter we shared our desks and talked about what we surrounded ourselves with while we worked.
This photo is cutting out all the draws, shelves and tools that surround my desk but you get a better look at the pretty stuff. I never understand how people in craft people in magazine shoots / on pinterest get by with just a mac computer and a vase of flowers! It was good to see many other people from folksy have the same messy desk equals creative mind approach. I just need everything to hand. I get restless and jump from one task to the next so it helps to have everything i need within reach.

As my computer is on my desk where I work I can't help but be distracted by the internet somtime- but it the main tool for developing my designs and it's where I listen to music so I won't ever switch it of... maybe i should have just a quiet time dedicated to just drawing.

On my desk you can see my latest screen design of a moon bear drawn in pen and ink. This is part of a new project i am working on, more news coming soon!

Clown fish

I've been wanting to draw this for a while. When i was on holiday years ago I had a drawing travel journal. The picture (top right) was drawn after a snorkel in a coral reef (I know! It was a dream come true) I remember the coral was a lovely pink and there was a bright orange fish hiding within it. I thought the doodle was of a badly drawn clown fish and that's what I started to do a full colour version of. As it turned out it was a quite accurate sketch of a skunk clown fish (picture below left) But I stuck to the regular clown fish every one knows and lovely thanks to Finding Nemo.

Photos Left: ? Right: Steve Jones

Sheepish

It's a new Chinese year of the sheep! To celebrate I have made a new set of sheep earrings ( thank you to my Facebook followers who helped me pick a design to go with!) I've also gathered a selection of sheep items from other a Folksy sellers. We'll be seeing lambs soon too, spring is on the way. Enjoy:

From top left: 1 : Needle felt sheep . Sheep painting . 3: Sheep knitting pattern . 4: Sheep Journal . 5: Sheep Mobile . 6: Painting on wood . 7: Sheep Card . 8: Sheep earrings . 9: Sheep Photo print .

Animal earrings

These are the latest earrings listed in my shop, I sold them around markets before Christmas, but now I finally got around to photographing them. I'm trying to put more details into the earrings, which is the great thing about shrink plastic - you can add lots of details. Even thought I'd like to move some of my design to other materials like lazer cut plastic or wood, i think I'll always use this plastic too!

Happy New Year!

Happy new year!  This is a good time to start a fresh and treat yourself with money you may have been lucky enough to receive over Christmas:

There is a sale in my Etsy and Folksy shops from today until 19th January 2015. So you have two weeks to use this coupon code at the checkout to get 15% off all my items including the ones that are already discounted and custom orders!

New year always bring new years resolutions. Even though I don't set out specific resolutions I still tend to look back at last year and hope to do a bit more this year. 2014 was great, but there are a lot of things I would of liked to of done and haven't :{ So i made a simple motto for 2015 "do it today!" because tomorrow can't be bothered, lol.

I had a look at this list of new years resolutions to help animals but generally I think if you write down what you want to do with the year and keep looking at it over the next 12 months you should get some things accomplished!

"May your coming year be filled with magic and dreams and good madness. I hope you read some fine books and kiss someone who thinks you're wonderful, and don't forget to makes some art - write or draw or build or sing or live as only you can. And I hope somewhere in the next year, you surprise yourself". - Neil Gaiman

Christmas Cards

I've been looking back through my Christmas card designs, seems I never stray too far from penguins and polar bears. Good job they never go out of fashion?! I think my 2014 designs are a lot more sophisticated ;) 2009 and 2011 cards were on sale at local events before I opened my shop, but gave me my first taste of selling my own work.

I still have some of the holy cards for purchase message me :) Otherwise see either of my online shops for my most recent designs.

Custom made Christmas tree decorations

I've listed a custom made christmas tree decoration listing in my shop. Send me a picture of your pet and I'll make it into a cute hand painted wood decoration, suitable to display all year around!
 https://www.etsy.com/local/shop/TheCatkinBoutique