tania howells

Illustration Friday : magic

How else could a red/orange bird land on a girls head? I LOVE this print on these underpants from Old Navy.

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Happy New Year!

We had a lovely Christmas, here is what it looked like at the bottom of my mum's garden. Those elves really do live there. We left them some cookies. From my "to do" list, I managed a nice bit of knitting, alot of loafing and reading, and that's about it! I became consumed by this puzzle. I love doing a puzzle over the Christmas holidays. Here is me back in town, it's lovely and snowy here still, but I am worried about all those people affected by the tsunami. My co-worker Meena, her family lives in Sri Lanka and are all ok. They live inland, but a friend of the family, he lost everyone. 16 family members. What can you say? It is beyond words, beyond belief. So scary.

Bonne Noel!

I hope everyone has a lovely holiday, whatever it is you celebrate! I am looking forward to a serious amount of loafing, reading, eating and generally enjoying myself with my family. Ahhh. AND! I have a whole list of things I want to make! Likely, I will get to only one or two, but here we go.

• Get my mum to teach me how to read knitting patterns.
  
• Knit something.
  
• Make something out of wire and beads. ( I woke up at 6 am this morning because I was so exited about the snow that fell all night and it being Christmas, and I did this task then. It didn't really work. Note to reader: I never EVER get up this early usually.)
  
• Make a tea cozy! (out of a shrunken moth eaten vest, and the rest of the brown mohair left over from Wilbur, the plain brown bird)
  
• Something out of the Japanese paper I bought?
  
• Crochet a monkey! ( this is not something I have ever tried, so I may end up with a mis-shapen foot and then give up.)
  
• FELT something!
  
• Write a Mondo Beyondo List
  
• Some kind of flowery brooch?

  
  see you next week!
  

  xo tania

The Japanese paper is already making itself useful around here! I made a few of these cards for my co-workers at the library for Christmas. You can't really see it, but the white paper is embossed with flying cranes! so pretty. Phew- I am all nerves today! Trying to please everybody and getting myself in a tizzy over nothing. I have my work under control though, so I really should just chill out for goodness sake!! It's Christmas!

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One of the wonderful things about my job, is the occaisional new book coming in. This book just came in and I am thrilled. The pictures are great and the variety of images is awesome!! I love how some of the printing is poorly registered. I will show some of them in the new year.

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This is pretty funny. A bunch of people apologising for Bush getting back into his far too powerful position. It's ok. we know you did your best.

Wilbur, the plain brown bird.

Meet Wilbur! He's my addition to the December month of softies. His holiday hang-up is not being very exiting. He isn't red and lively like a Cardinal or bossy and loud like a Blue Jay, he can't even whistle. So he found himself a nice red scarf and soon will figure out he is a very nice bird just the way he is. I was inspired to make him because I came across a sadly abandoned, vintage brown mohair, very shrunken, cardigan at the laundromat last week. It was too pretty to leave but too small to wear, so Wilbur was born!

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Well, if it rains it pours, and somehow I have two illustration jobs with roughs both due before Christmas! Now I am definately NOT complaining, but isn't it funny how there will be nothing for weeks, even months, and then whammo! "We need these right away!!" It sure will be nice to get those sweet sweet cheques in the mail just after Christmas though. (fingers crossed) Better get back to it!

marvelousness

Just a smidgen of the lovely bits of paper I got in the Japanese Paper Place scraps grab bag! Why are these things so irresistable? I do want to use the awesome patterned bits for cards and stuff, but there is also a lot of various rice papers and plain paper which I imagine I will have for YEARS and years...

The last craft show was yesterday, and it was fun! The sales were not spectacular, but they were ok and I got goodies in the last minute trading frenzy! Peanut butter chocolates, a cute necklace and some nice soap. They are wrapped up and under the tree. "To Tania and Paul, Love from SANTA!"

*** I got the nicest email from Kerstin of MECOZY! Checkout her lovely tea cozies and then go make a nice cuppa tea. yum.

*** pretty necklaces = eye candy!

Illustration Friday : Adoption

I could not think of anything to draw this week, so I googled "adoption". I came across the House Rabbit Society! It was so cute, so I drew some of the buttons on the main page. A few years ago, I had actually visited this site considering the idea of adopting a bunny as a pet. You can litter train them! In the end, my mum and I share the two cats. Whenever she went away, I would take them. Now we seem to share them 50/50.

Thank- you Leonor, for leaving the link for where to buy the magnificent Porcelaine pens online!

In remarkable display of generosity, my friend gave me her Nintendo system! Thanks Kerstin!!!!!! She said they were going to throw it out!! Admittedly, I have to hold the game in with my toe, trying to not wobble it at all, in order to play. And mostly it just flashes on and off, on and off. But when the game does work, it is like a piece of sedated joyous heaven. Bubble Bobble is one of the best games ever. I played it for hours when I was a kid on our Amiga 3000 computer. I even have it now on my mac, but there is something about sitting on the sofa while wasting your time with a video game- well, it really does not get anymore comfortingly mindless than that. I don't even need to talk about how perfect it is to be able to play Super Mario with the Christmas tree sparkling beside me...

PLUS! It is exiting to have discovered that there is a store selling Finnish products right here in town!!
I have been wanting to find a source of Marimekko stuff for years. I bet they have the cutest Christmas stuff right now...but I doubt I will get there anytime soon!

Maia has found some awesome links for her last few posts!! check it out!

woo!

Well, I am very exited by this latest thing! A big thank-you to Heidi for telling everyone about this awesome Porcelaine pen by Pebao. It rocks!

Maybe this is all I needed, in terms of pottery. It is way more fun to draw on it than make it from scratch actually. Plus, who can go wrong with 50¢ (I found the cents button!!) dishes from IKEA. I have to wonder though, if I am supporting a slave dish factory by buying them so cheap...Ugh

Some people (everyone) are getting dishes for Christmas this year.

If you are looking for presents that actually make a difference though, my uncle works for this organisation- AMURT. They offer gifts like small business loans for women in the Philippines, warm clothes for a child in Mongolia and a self sufficiency program for women with AIDS in Kenya, where they train them to create tie died clothes to sell. I am really proud of my uncle, who spends all his time travelling to these places working on aid projects. He really helps people to help themselves. If only I could half as selfless as that!

international desk day

Well, I am a day late for my own project! sheesh! That's ok, I barely touch my computer on weekends and it was such a fun filled one too! Dinner with great old friends, a play, a craft sale (it went ok), seeing more friends and a great band, walking around town in the snow, sleeping in. tres bien.
Anybody else do a desk shot? I would love to see! Leave me a link!

***** so delicious, delicious

crazy plant

Paul has this plant that only blooms once every hundred years! Well, maybe every 3 years, but as soon as it arrived here at our shared abode, it decided to bloom. We looked on it as a good omen! However, once the flowers had begun to open, the entire house smelled like someone had opened a jar of old cat pee. The poor thing needed to be pruned. Now the flowers are happily sitting on the back porch, living a new life of freedom and exitement and the house smells normal again.

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I love these rabbits

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I almost forgot!! Sunday is international desk day, December 12. (monday is fine too) I would love it if you left a link in my comments so I can see all your neat-o workspaces! Which reminds me, I forgot to do Heidi's "show your purse day"!! Where IS MY HEAD???? Oh and then I also forgot Illustration Friday. My goodness.

I am working on a quote today. I don't like doing that! Usually a client tells me what I am getting paid. That is so much easier! While I was reading about prices in the Graphic Artists Guild Handbook of Pricing and Ethical Guidlines, I decided it was high time I had a contract to use. I downloaded one from their website. A few years ago, I got what I thought was a dream job of illustrating a kid's book. It turned out to be a nightmare with no contract to protect me and a shifty shifty client. Trouble!! This one I downloaded should be good once it is edited to suit my needs. You send it out and the client has to sign before you do any work at all.

Since it is closer to Christmas, I decided to lower my Christmas card prices to $20.00 for 16 cards. It's not too late yet!

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This poster popped up in October around town. I love it. I am loving this underground movement of awesome silkscreened concert posters! They look so cool!

I don't know who did this one. These guys in Montreal are pretty neat.

There are these awesome wallpaper sample books at my library. They must be from the 60's or earlier.
I love the one with the little lanterns! It would make a swinging rumpus room, non?

The new inspiration links are up! Some of them will not be new to you, but I just found them! I always expect to not be able to keep finding cool stuff, but my goodness, there is so much wonderfulness out there on the web. Thanks Erica for the Lizette Greco link! So cool! And thanks to whom ever and where ever else I found all these other cool links.

Illustration Friday: bubbles ( I think )

I am pretty sure this is the theme this week! I knew I had a bubbles drawing from a long time ago on a cd. I was trying to learn Illustrator, and I don't think I have used that program since! I just never got used to it I guess. Those crazy wiggly curves and stuff! eek!

The girl cat.

I always think it is so darn cute when the cats act like such stereotypes - Sitting in boxes, freaking out over yarn. Sigh. So cute.

*A place to talk about why you LOVE Toronto!I hope they will eventually post everyone's responses.

*I Visited Eva and kris and Karina at the One of a Kind show last night. Their displays looked awesome and it was great to see them! I visited Monster Farms too and was impressed to see their shelves almost empty from selling so many of their cutie pie monsters! Way to go!
I only had time to race through the almost 750 exhibitors booths but liked the looks of Viola Blanca and of the Candy Factory. So much crafty goodness!

Some of the very neat things Paul has brought into the house are these Christmas balls! Only 99 (my keyboard doesnot have an obvious "cents" symbol...goodness) at the Two Guys store! Well, that must have been back in the 60's or something because I would pay AT LEAST $5.00 for these babies. They are still nestled in the box. I haven't quite gotten to the decorating part of things. The place is a bit of a crafty disaster with all these various shows going on! Hey, I have been surprised (and even envious) to see lots of you people in the U.S. of A have had lovely snow already!! We have had a wee sprinkle, and then one aftrenoon of soppy wet stuff, but nothing serious yet. It is almost like the myth that all we do in Canada is ski 24/7, is being shattered before our very eyes!!

Here is the funny flower I managed to crochet this weekend. My mum has this amazing peruvian wool a friend gave her in 1975! That is the pink part. Anyway, this was my first try at it and I was pleased it looked remotely flower-like. Now I can try again!