I'm Creative Every Day and Pete!

Hello all.  I'm checking in today at Creative Every Day cuz I haven't done so in a while.  I've been busy being creative every day!  So check out my previous posts to see what I've been up to.

I've added a couple new things to my comment section on my blog here, little you might also like boxes and some sharing buttons, figured I'd try 'em out.  Another thing I'm going to try is the poll feature.  I'm going to add it to the sidebar cuz I want to carry on my Pete, He's A Unicorn story, I have the next post in mind, but I want to know if Doris should stay with Pete the whole story or go home because her Aunt Sylvia is visting, thus leaving Pete by himself, hmmm. That's the poll.  After that poll I already have another poll in mind.  If you're like who in the heck are Pete and Doris, read their post here.

Should Pete share the spotlight with Doris?

Pete, He's a Unicorn

This is Pete.  Say hi to everybody Pete.  Now everybody say hi back to Pete.  That's it.  You're all so polite.  If per chance you can't tell, Pete is a unicorn.

Pete is a unicorn that likes to eat sandwiches and potato chips.  He highly enjoys sharing his sandwiches with his friends.

This is Doris.  Doris, please do say hi to everybody. Wait a second, did I hear something.  I did, didn't I?  Wow, you already said hi back to Doris and I didn't even have to tell you. You're so super polite.  Good job.

Doris is one of the friends Pete likes to share his sandwiches with.  Sandwiches are so tatsy.  Do you like sandwiches? Oh yes, you're right, I almost forgot about the potato chips.  Potato chips are yummy too.  Pete and Doris have an awesome time eating their sandwiches and potato chips.

Yes, this post is narrated as if you all were preschoolers. Don't ask me, weird things pop into my head.  Just like this character mash up did.  The paths of Doris and Pete have crossed and I think they enjoyed each other's company. 

Becoming a Children's Illustrator: Part Two

It was almost three weeks ago when I first posted about taking steps to become an actual professional children's illustrator, well, this is my second part.

So, so far I have sent out twenty five packets with my tear sheets.  Which is actually a small number cuz I know I will have to send out WAY more, but due to cost, a bit each week.

Here's what I have learned in my whole sending stuff out etc.

Triple, quadruple (sp?) and more than that checky check to make sure you have your stuff addressed properly cuz you know what, I got one back.  I'm sure I went wrong somewhere because it was a smaller publisher with a parent company and I think I got all confused n stuff on what to put on the envelope.

Also double check with whatever manuel you have that you're flipping through, with online cuz in my book one person's name was spelled wrong and another person didn't work with a publisher anymore.

But I do know people are receiving my packets cuz I got a rejection already!  At least their response time was quick!

So, besides sending stuff out, the other step I have taken is setting myself up an actual work station.  My husband kept suggesting it and I kept saying I was okay sitting at the corner of the dining room table, but let me tell ya what a difference!  It may just be me being all whack-a-do, but I actually feel more professional.  My husband wanted to get me situated all nice like because he says he didn't want me to get carpal tunnel from being all jammed in the corner of the table (I had no arm room), he also said for productivity and eye strain, so he hooked me up with a larger monitor also.  He was actually right, I now have much more room and working goes a lot quicker with two monitors.  He (husband) wants to get me an even larger fancier monitor, but I told him not to get too excited yet, I'm good for now, but I am letting him get me a squishy office chair and bulletin board.

Fore-Warning: Multiple pictures of me below, don't get scared!

See my new set up!

Don't ask me what I'm looking at here, but this photo kinda makes me look like I have an actual office/studio, when the reality is the picture below.

I'm set up in the living room, complete with couch (see the red arm of it there) and bouncing zebra.

I can't be in my own room somewhere working cuz a good portion of my stuff is done during the day and I still have two small children and supposedly I'm supposed to watch them during the day or something.
So, that's it for now.  I think I'm slowly getting there.

Good Vibrations Sunday Sketch

This is my drawing for this weeks Sunday Sketches.  I haven't totally finished this illustration yet.  I still have to put in some shadows where things overlap and make my marky marks, no, not Marky Mark from Marky Mark & the Funky Bunch, my hash marks sillies, but this illustrtaion is giving me Good Vibrations. 

In hindsight, I might have not finished this on purpose just so I could make a Marky Mark reference.  I think it should be Make a Reference to Marky Mark Day!  If per chance you don't know who Marky Mark is go look it up online, you'll laugh. I'm totally babbling and apologize for all the Marky Markness.

Oh, as a side note, Sufjan, Jaun and Jan are in my illustration there (I just had them in a pattern recently, but there's also another illustration with them (the raccoon, yellow teddy and squirrel). They decided to invite a few others to their party.

BYE!

And the Winner of My One World One Heart Giveaway IS.....

*************************

Drum roll please! The winner of my One World One Heart giveaway is Belinda from Belinda Ferrell's Polymer Clay OOak Babies!  Everybody say YAY for Belinda, woot woot!

I also want to say hi and hello to all the new friends I made through this event.  This was fun!  Thanks to everybody who visted my blog and entered my giveaway. I visited everybody who left a comment (at least I believe I did), but still wasn't as active in the event as I wanted to be.  I've been so self absorbed lately.

Now, I know what it's like not to win a giveaway cuz I usually don't (even though I did win something this time around and I'm sooo excited, thanks OWOH and Trisha from FrenchKissed), so as a consolation prize I'm giving everybody else a pdf download, well I'm really not giving it to them cuz they do have to print it themselves, but you know what I mean.

Here it is below, what is it you ask? Well it's printable scrap/notebook paper.  Just print, fold in four and cut along the lines, then you have some pie paper.  I made the pies the light grey color so it wouldn't be to overbearing when you wrote or doodled on it.

Download PDF HERE!

This paper is for personal use only and in no way, shape or form can you sell it or sell anything you make with it.  If you want you can make someone a lovely little pie notebook as a present, but you can't sell it to them.

Thanks everybody who particpated in my giveaway and thanks One World One Heart, it's been swell.

Creative Tuesday and My OWOH Giveaway

"If we're lucky, nobody will recognize us."

This is my contribution for Creative Tuesday where the theme is lucky.  I know, I'm stretching it a bit, but I was working with these two and didn't want to stop, so I got the image above.  I was going to dress them like leprechauns, but they persuaded me outta it, but I did toss in a green background.

I'm trying to figure out why they're diguised, but I'm not sure if they did all that good of a job anyways. I hope they're not going to get into trouble, they do look older though when they're in disguise.   See them on the right there, that is them with no disguise.  To tell you the truth, I actually know what they're up to, but they promised me not to tell.  That won't even let me tell you guys their names.  If you haven't met them before, they are twins, the shorter one is a boy if per chance you can't tell.  They've delivered a couple messages for me before.  *****************Hmm, let's see what else, oh my giveaway ends tommorrow at midnight, so if anybody wants to enter that please do so.  I will draw a winner on the morning of the 17th.  Here's that post: One World One Heart.  Okay, now I'm just babbling to take up all this white space because I like the way this layout looks and I don't want all this empty space, so yeah.  Hey, I now have 140 blog followers, holy guacalmole I say to that!  I remember when I was excited when I had 9 followers.  My very first follower was my friend Amber.  She just started a cute family craft blog called The Rainy Day Toddler, so go check that out if ya have little ones.  So, I think that's it for now, bye, check ya later.

Cobain Bunny and Weezer Animals

Hello all.  I have returned.  I was going to take an extra day or two off from blogging, but then the Illustration Friday theme this week really got my brain a swirling.  Sorry if I sounded angry the other day, but I was.  A turd of some kind somehow hacked into my e-mail account and stole my contact list and sent them all whacky e-mails on my behalf.  My blogger also was all whack-a-do, don't know if the two were realated (prolly not), but anywho...went and changed everything up, so I think all is good now, so that is that. 

Cobain Bunny unplugged with his cardigan and Cobain Bunny with the classic striped sweater.

Weezer's Blue album, but with animals.

Since I did a few illustrations this post is doing double duty, first for Sunday Sketches, hello to my friends there and then also for Illustration Friday where the theme is sweater.  This theme brought immediate excitement to me cuz it instantly made me think of the nineties.  While the flannel was high and almighty in the nineties the sweater was also quite dominant.  So I made up a couple of bunnies in tribute to Kurt Cobain who ruled the sweater and who's birthday is on the 20th, I do believe he would have been turning 44.  So, first I have Cobain Bunny in an unplugged session, where he wore that one caridgan and then I have Cobain Bunny rockin the striped sweater (I know my colors aren't accurate).

The actual first thing that popped into my head when I saw the word sweater (before I thought of the sweaters of Kurt Cobain) was, Undone-the Sweater song by Weezer from The Blue Album.  At first I was going to have a picture of a sweater unraveling, but the imagery that kept popping into my head was the actual album cover, so I just made my version with animals.

I feel so nostalgic now.  I'm going to go put on some Converse and a thermal with a tee-shirt over it and sit on my high school lawn and listen to Nevermind and The Blue Album and then I think I'll also toss in Dookie (the Green Day CD not actual poop) oh, and some Smashing Pumpkins (I could go on with listing nineties music, but I won't bore you).  After that I'm going to go inside and watch My So Called Life and Saved By the Bell (I will not include the first season or the new class).

And if per chance you don't know who the bands I mentioned are (or you don't like them or don't care) or have no interest about my nineties nostaglia, just enjoy my drawings (that's a direct order!).

Boy can I go on about nothing, so I guess that's a wrap.

Bargh!

Hello my friends.  I'm taking several days off here to sort some technical things out.  People have been getting crazy e-mails from me and I sure didn't send them and this account has been acting whack-a-do, so there's a turd head out there somewhere who's messing with my shiz!  I'll see what happens with my accounts and stuff,but just so you all know I'm still here.

I Couldn't Leave Comments!

Illustrated Children's Surface Patterns

It's time for Sunday Sketches!  These above aren't really sketches, but they were originally.  I took an illustration I made not to long ago and made it into a couple patterns.  I didn't sketch anything new because I've been practicing making patterns and I figured it out and can't stop now!  I was able to make patterns before, but I figured out how to make more complex interlocking patterns.  I still need to practice more cuz I just had my Aha pattern making moment yesterday.  I think my husband is getting tired of hearing me saying, "I'm so proud of myself, I figured it out!"

Google, my friends.  I learn to do most things via Goggle.

My Steps to Becoming a Children's Illustrator

Okay, I'm actually taking steps to put myself on the path to becoming an actual children's illustrator.  You could say I am one already, but nobody gives me money for it, so I want to become a professional illustrator I guess you could say.  I've been claiming that I'm a wannabe/asipiring illustrator for a while now, but I haven't done that much about it.  I've sent stuff out here and there and sometimes a few in a row, but nothing major, but starting last Friday I got my butt in gear.  These are the things I've done so far:

-Established a style, I think when you look at my stuff you can say, "Oh, that's Melissa."

-Created an online portfolio, I'm finally totally happy with it.  I took out some old stuff and replaced it with even better stuff.

-Did my research and compiled my list.  This I think is the hardest part, even with the guides you can buy, it's hard finding publishers/magazines/agents where my work suits/fits their needs.

-Designed some tear sheets, I'm actually proud of myself for this one. I kept making different versions of them, but was never happy and then I'd get frustrated and put them to the side, but last Friday I actually sat down and made them.

-Got my tear sheets printed!  Got envelopes and labels! Put my tear sheets in these properly marked envelopes! Tomm. I' mailing the first batch!

-Designed my promotional postcards, now I just have to order them.
     Here's my downer though, I can't afford to print and mail all my tear sheets at once, so I'm doing them fourteen mailings at a time:( I can see why people procrastinate on the promotional side of this cuz it costs money.  Some places  you can e-mail, but a large portion of them still want hard copies, so you have to pay to print your tear sheets, postcards and then the postage. 

-I also updated all my online accounts, so everything is cohesive, like my avatar and name.  I'm switching everything to Melissa T. Liban, see in my blog topper, I squished a T. in there.  I'm doing this for two reasons, so everything is consistent cuz my promo stuff does say Melissa T. Liban cuz that's what I go by in the real world and I also did this for googling reasons cuz when you google Melissa Liban a portion of the time you get the web pages for a Lebanese singer, which I am not, so now if you google my whole name you just get me and my old website which I have to address cuz it has all my old ugly work on it.  I canceled the service and the domain name and everything, but my old site still comes up.

-Let's see, what else, I did a lot of online searching.  I've found the blog of illustrator Holli Conger to be quite helpful.  Throughtout Dec. she had a tip everyday for asipring illustrators A Girl who Creates.  She also has an older blog that follows her journey to becoming an illustrator.  I just hope my end results are anywhere as near as good as hers, but I'm putting all self doubt to the side and everything will wind up stellar!  Cuz today is the start of the Chinese New Year and it's the year of the rabbit and I'm all about the rabbits!  It's not my Chinese zodiac sign, but I still love me my bunnies.  I put my bunnies to the side, but they're coming back out to celebrate and cheer me on! I would like to thank Diana Ting Delosh at The Hare Illustratere cuz without visiting her blog I wouldn't have know this information.

-One last thing for now and then I will stop babbling.  It's a lot of work trying to get yourself out there!  Hopefully it'll be worth it, my bunnies say it will be, hopefully they're right.

Creative Tuesday and Illustration Friday

If your looking for my OWOH post, it's the one before this one and so everybody else knows there's a giveaway in that post! Oh, and it doesn't matter where in the world you live!

Download an 81/2 by 11 pdf of this patter/paper HERE!

Download an 81/2 by 11 pdf of this patter/paper HERE!

Hello all this is my entry for Creative Tuesday where the theme is Valentine and it is also my entry for Illustration Friday where the theme is surrender.  They surrendered to love!

I've been working at pattern making thus the two images above (I hope to get somewhat good at it), I wasn't sure if it looked to busy with the colored hearts, so I also made them in black and white.  Below are my two illustrations I used.

I kept them simple cuz I knew I'd be making them small for my pattern, so no little sketchy, inky, lines/ hashy like marks on them, just outlines and plain color, so that's why they look kinda generic like when they're not in the pattern.  I could make them more detailed, but I have promotional mailers to make.  I'm actually getting my butt in gear!  But I did make the cats into a downloadble digital stamp if you want to make a Valentine treat for someone special.  But remember it's for personal use only and I would prefer if you were one of my bloggy friends.

Download this digital stamp HERE!