autumn in my garden

Beautiful little crab apples, Autumn cropping raspberries and a red lime (which tastes amazing, especially in a dry martini!)

A Broccoli Raab seedling in a home-made hothouse (thanks Liz for the soda water bottles!), another Broccoli Raab seedling and carrots ready for harvest. I grew all these vegies from seed, there's nothing better than sitting down to a dinner of beautiful fresh vegies you have raised yourself from a tiny seed!

The last of the Autumn roses, the first camellias are blooming, and the white wind flowers are just finishing.


Ah - my fave time of year! The weather over the past few days has really been stunning. Up here in the hills there are tonnes of beautiful old deciduous trees, and they are turning the most gorgeous colours at the moment, it's the most beautiful time of year up here. I took a few snaps in my garden this morning and thought I'd share these with you all today. Righto - back to work! Got some magazine illos to work on today. I hope you are having a good week so far :)

exciting news!

Hello friends! Sorry for the lack of blog activity this week - work days at the flower farm have been ridiculously long and I've had very little time or energy for anything else... needless to say I am currently in the process of finding a different day-job. I have been doing some job trials at local cafes and will hopefully know if I've been successful over the next few days. Fingers crossed!
Anyway - I am VERY excited to let you all know that I have just signed with Heartfelt Agency in London - YYAAYYY! Heartfelt are a really fab licensing agency and I am so thrilled to be on board with them. Although I am still a fair way away from achieving my dream of working full-time for myself, I think this is a rather large step in the right direction :)
The one illustration I have managed to squeeze out this week is Gilbert Bear (pictured above), he's a happy new friend for Rory the lion.
I hope you are all doing great... hopefully I'll have more time to pop over to all your blogs a bit more next week - I've missed you!!

happy garden

I took those tiny birds from the pattern I posted this morning and put them in a happy garden! This one is a bit crazy... quite the opposite of the last pattern I made :) Hope you enjoy.

tiny birds

I had a little tiny bit of time to myself last night so I whipped up these little tiny birds. It is a SUPER simple pattern, but super-simple definitely has it's place. It's good to let the negative space and the colour do the talking sometimes. Surprisingly, it can be just as challenging to come up with a minimal pattern that uses simple shapes as it is to create something much more complex.

sunshine awards!

I am SOOO honoured to have been given the Sunshine Award from two lovely fellow bloggers, Shirley and Julissa. Thanks so much ladies! Please check out Shirley and Julissa's blogs if you have a sec, they are both wonderfully talented illustrators with super great blogs.

I am to pass this along to 12 super bloggers (I've also tried to pass this on to people who haven't received a Sunshine Award recently). Please take a sec and visit them, you will find rays of sunshine, a TONNE of inspiration and so much creativity! It was hard to just pick twelve out of so many awesome people but here they are in no particular order:

Katia (Plushka's Craft)
Sarah Anderson
Knicky Knacks
Kassandra Heller
Jennie (Posie Patchwork)
Little Ted Canvas
Tania (Cheeky Little Monsters)
Kate (Fox's Lane)
Anastasia C
Belinda (Tutti Fruiti)
Lisa Perret
Lucky Nielsen

A great big THANKS to ALL of you who come to read my blog, I really appreciate every one of you.

Here are the rules:
1. Thank the person who gave it to you.
2. Copy the logo and place in on your blog.
3. Link to the person who nominated you.
4. Pass it along to 12 other people.

and the winners are...

here you all are, sitting in my dish!

and the winners - Moira and Amy

Sorry for not posting this morning everyone - I ended up having to work at the flower farm today. Thanks for all your entries, some very interesting facts there indeed! And it's lovely to learn a little more about you guys too, even if it is just your favourite animals :)
I have just drawn the two winners - they are Moira and Amy (Stickers & Stuff) Congrats ladies! I'll be in touch to grab your details. Sorry everyone else, I wish I could give you all a little something... but don't fret, I'll do another giveaway soon!
I hope you all have really fab Easter breaks, whoopee the Easter Bunny comes tonight!!

GIVEAWAY TIME!

PACK ONE


PACK TWO

Hello lovelies! Hope you all had fab weekends. I'd just like to let you all know how much I appreciate you visiting my blog :) It really puts a smile on my face knowing that you guys enjoy reading what I have to write, and looking at the pics I post. And your comments and thoughts are always very much appreciated. So, although I'd love to give every single one of you a wee gift, I have two little packs to give away (see pics above).
PACK ONE contains: a Mister Fox Notepad, Nelly greeting card and Hello Sunshine greeting card.
PACK TWO contains: a Winter Owl Notepad, Winter Owl greeting card and Winter Bird greeting card.
If you'd like to be in the draw to win, just leave me a comment below telling me your favourite animal and why (any animal at all)! I love to know these things about you guys :D
FOR AN EXTRA ENTRY - Tell me a fun fact about your chosen animal - teach me something!
I'll draw the winner Saturday morning (Aussie time). Winners will be picked randomly out of a hat.
Good luck everyone, and thanks again XOXOXOX

weekend yay...and more patterns

rainbow bunnies



apples


Happy weekend everyone! I hope you get some time to relax and do some things you really enjoy :)
I have some illustrating to do, but I'm determined to put some time aside to get into my garden and do a tidy-up... my poor vegie beds are looking very sad. And I have seeds to sow and bulbs to plant! Anyway - here are a couple of new patterns I've worked on this week. I'm building up my pattern portfolio whenever I get a spare second. Hope you enjoy! Have a lovely weekend.

shape those booties!

Yay it's Wednesday - that means only two more days until the weekend! And boy am I hanging for the weekend... this week is super duper busy! How is your week going?
Just a quick note to let you all know the new season's range of Booty Shapers is out now.
What are Booty Shapers you ask? Booty Shapers are inflatable supports that keep your boots from flopping over in the cupboard, keeping them crease-free especially when you're not using them in the warmer months. The lovely Miriam (the brains behind Booty Shapers) asked me to design this season's range about a year ago, and they are now in stores - yippee! You can also buy them online here. It was a fun project, and a challenge too which made it extra exciting :)
P.S... Stay tuned for my first ever GIVEAWAY happening early next week.

floral

A very simple floral pattern I've whipped up... I kinda wanted this to have a 60s tablecloth fabric feel to it. It's not the most clever or complex of designs, but sometimes I think simple is the best way to go :)

fashion vs. function

A little illustration I did for the April edition of Super Food Ideas magazine... out now!
This one was loads of fun to work on.

adler in our pad

I have managed to tear myself away from staring at these beauties which now adorn the mantle in our lounge room so I can share their beauty with you! I caught up with a very dear friend last night who gave a belated wedding gift to Marty and I... this pair of breathtakingly beautiful ceramic birds by Jonathan Adler. I've been drooling over these birds for quite some time now - I can't believe they are sitting on our mantle! We are two very lucky people - thanks so much Liz and Jason XOXO

rory

Meet Rory the lion. Been fiddling with some new greeting card ideas and he popped out... yet to decide whether he'll actually be a greeting card though. What do you think?

lovely lark

How was your weekend? I had such a fabulous Sunday! Marty and I drove up to Daylesford to deliver my first lot of stock to the lovely Allison at Lark (I was pretty excited!). It was a real pleasure to meet Allison and Tess, (hi guys!) and have a look around the very gorgeous Lark shop.
Daylesford was super-busy with the Chillout Festival in action, and there was a real buzz in the air - it was a great weekend to visit, so much fun!
Allison kindly marked out a few places on the map where we could do some good vintage and thrift shopping, and one of those places was the Mill Markets. Oh I was in heaven! SO MUCH vintage and retro stuff all under one roof, it was packed full of treasure. I came home with one very beautiful West German ceramic vase - pictured above (the cream one). I have a love of West German ceramics from the 60s, and I bought the little red vase a while ago because I fell in love with it instantly. So you can imagine my delight when I found this 'big sister' version... and it was reduced to half it's original price... what a great find - Thanks Allison!