lil catchup

Remember when I used to write my blog as if it was a diary? Regularly? With all my news. And weather updates?

Yeah. I don't do that anymore. 

I mean to.

I just don't get round to it.

And then it's like that friend you haven't spoken to for ages. You know that if you call them it'll take all night to catch up. And you haven't got all night. So they're actually not really a friend anymore.

Soz blog.

I'll try harder.

Promise.

Maybe.

This is what I've been up to. Make up your own words.

spring dog trick

Dog: Sees sun shining outside. Taps on door to go out. 
Dawn: Lets dog out, returns to desk. 
Dog: Goes out, realises it’s freezing, taps on door to come back in.

TEN MINUTES LATER

Dog: Sees sun shining outside. Taps on door to go out. 
Dawn: Lets dog out, returns to desk. 
Dog: Goes out, realises it’s freezing, taps on door to come back in.

EVERY DAY IN SPRING.

For the last 11 years.

In other news we have lived in this house for 19 years this week. NINETEEN YEARS!!

messing about

The biggest problem in my illustration world right now is that I bloody love Adobe Illustrator but it's crap when you fancy a bit of texture.

I know everyone raves about procreate, but honestly, it does my head in! I'm not one to design what I want then spend hours drawing it. Exactly the same as the sketch. I find that really boring. I'm more of a MakeItUpAsYouGoAlong sort of girl. And Procreate is useless when it comes to moving stuff about and changing colours and tweaking shapes.

So I'm trying to find a solution.

This is me drawing all the body parts in Procreate then zapping them over to Illustrator via Photoshop and playing around with them from there.

Surely there must be a better way?

stuff I posted on the gram...

 International Women's Day last week...

And My lovely niece leaving us to move to Hong Kong to teach people to ride horsies...

ordinary weekend

We had a lovely weekend doing ordinary stuff. Stuff that we just take for granted.  But stuff that I tried to appreciate a bit more this weekend. Because the poor people in Ukraine would love to be doing ordinary stuff. Yet there they are, living in fear of their lives and having to flee their homes with whatever they can carry.

It seems somehow wrong to be doing ordinary stuff when that's their reality. 

february 22

 This was February...

Now.....spring??

#standwithukraine

I will never understand why, when you get such a short time on this planet, you would want to spend it inflicting pain on other people. I just don't get it.

22.2.22

Happy twos day!

weather chat

It's been very weathery here in the UK this weekend.

Storms down south. Snow at home. Wind and rain practically everywhere else. And, as luck would have it, sunshine in Whitby. Which is where the other half and I were for the weekend.

Actual sunshine!! Happy days!

toothbrush chat

Does anybody actually like a bamboo toothbrush?

Oh my god, I bought one because they look nice and it felt a bit more eco than my usual plastic.

But I HATED it!

It's like that similarly eco situation where you find yourself with a wooden fork from a takeaway and then you can't even eat the food any more cos the bloody thing makes you cringe when it touches your tongue.

It's the work of the devil.

So I've gone all out and bought myself an electric toothbrush!

I'm wondering why the hell I waited till I was middle aged to do such a thing. It has revolutionised my life!

*sponsored by Oral-B

**jokes

february so far....

We've had a lot of rain... a bit of sunshine... some valentines love and a bit of random tiger pattern making.

I went to Birmingham the first weekend and to Tynemouth the second.

I got dragged into the Wordle obsession, illustrated some books, met up with people I haven't seen for 2 years, and woke up in the middle of the night a few times in order to book my yoga and pilates classes.

year of the tiger

Woohoo! It's February!

AND it's the Lunar New Year. The year of the tiger.

I'm basically stealing it and having it as my new year too because, in case anyone didn't know this about me, I'm not much of a January fan.

I've gathered together 10 tigers from previous posts for a little tiger new year celebration.

Happy New Year folks 🎉

STILL January....

Well here we are.

Finally.

The last day of the longest month.

February is right around the corner. 

It's the shortest month. 

And I'm going away every single weekend in February.

Woohoo! 

Also....the youngest is now well into the process of applying for uni in September. This would mean that basically my dream of going away for the whole of January is now a potential reality... I may never feel the need to moan about January again. 

Be pleased. Be very pleased!

Pics from the last week....

another monday in january...

How many Monday mornings can one January have????

Five it turns out.

And this is only the fourth.

Keep going.

still January...

Nothing that exciting to report really...

I've been working on some cool characters for baby products and a cute series of board books.

Took the eldest back to Newcastle and had a splendid day out.

Multiple yoga classes.

And I drew more stuff in front of the telly...