Christmas Print Shop - Now Open

Seasons greetings...well almost.  With Christmas just about upon us I've opened a small print shop selling handprinted cards.  You can find them all here: click to enter shop

Each card is printed by me and they're available nowhere else.  There's also gift wrap.  What more could you need?  So if you're looking for something a little different this Christmas then these could be just the thing.

This card highlights the joys of proud winter waiting staff.  

Eager to please and highly professional, these penguins deliver puddings with pride.  Approximately every third Christmas one of the waiting staff loses his or her temper, and puddings have been thrown.

Days without incident 1067...

Nature documentaries may have convinced you that penguins are naturally suited to warm weather but my lack of research tells me otherwise.  They are known to wear scarves year round, and extra long scarves towards December.  The penguins bearing banners run throughout the land spreading the news that winter is coming and that it is time to reach for the extra long scarves once more.

See above for the plight of the penguins.  Thankfully polar bears love to knit and due to their complete lack of a sense of scale their scarves veer towards the extra long.  Sadly since penguins and polar bears live so far apart the postal fees are extortionate. 

More prints, less seasonal, coming soon...

So long!

My tooth was pulled out today so I made this to cheer myself up later, when the anaesthetic wears off.

A Bear Called Paddington

Those lovely people at the Daily__Doodle have set the challenge to draw a Paddington Bear.  Now Paddington and I don't know each other too well, except that we used to live practically side by side.    In Stepps village, the one next to the one I grew up in, there was a Paddington Bear in a house window, come rain or shine.  In rain he would wear his wellies and coat, in sun he wore a sombrero.  He was there for 26 years.  People would send Paddington postcards.  I don't know if Paddington is still there, but it was very nice to know he was so nearby.  You can read of the thieves that stole him in 2006 here and of his triumphant return here  Despite our close proximity for years, I haven't seen him for a while.  Apart from a lunch together at Paddington Station (where my burrito was eyed as suspiciously as his marmalade sandwich.  In the end we agreed to disagree) and a vague memory of the many other Paddington's I'd seen over the years, the real challenge of this is to create a Paddington of your very own.  For me, he still looks like Paddington.  I read a worded description of this little bear from Peru, unable to resist the prospect of his duffel coat (which I believe he buys later) and this is what I came up with.

These are the original sketches.

I've really grown to be fond of my pencil outlines and so the challenge in colouring the artwork is deciding how much of that outline to keep.  If I was screen printing then it'd be none, which is perhaps why my finished image is a mixture.  Below were my alternatives.  I like to play around with images, print them out so I have a hardcopy, stick them on the wall and stare at them.  I can soon pick a favourite.

Full outline

Coloured outlines 

He doesn't look quite like the one who used to live next to us, but he's close enough.

These are my black and white Paddington's.  The outline hasn't been tidied too much, I think it suits him to be a little bit scruffy.