Last shop update for the year!

From a limited edition of 40.

Print of an original pencil and watercolour drawing that I have done.

Printed on beautiful 220 gsm acid-free cream English paper. Inks used are archival, fade-proof, waterproof and smudge-proof! Comes titled, numbered and signed on the bottom of the print (in pencil)!

$16

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I know I said I was going to be away and be back here only next year! But because I had some spare time tonight, I decided to do a shop update! My last for this year. So yes, hop on over to my shop and get yourself a print if you like it! : )

In the meantime, do kick back, relax and have a Happy New year!

Wrapping it up!

(Image by Braedon Photography via Once Wed )

It's been a really amazing year thus far. I was going to show you guys some new drawings which I thought I could finish, but seems like all the holiday merry-making fun has temporarily taken over everything else. Oops! I've also been trying to spend as much time as I can with Darren before he returns to Melbourne (on New Year's day! ), while I stay here in Singapore till the end of February. I'm going to miss having him around! 2 whole months without him! Woah!

But yes, this year has been quite exciting ( if I can say so myself ). Lots happened, lots of friends came and went, artist moments, shows and blocks happened, and I think I learnt lessons and grew up a little more. So yes, cheers to this year, and more cheers to the one ahead. 2010 is going to be great! I can feel it in my toes already! : )

Thank you for visiting, saying hi and being my friend, buying and supporting my art making throughout this entire year! It's really encouraging and it's what keeps me going!

Yup, yup, I'm ready to move on to 2010! Cheers to more colour explosions and merry art making in the coming year!

I'll be sure to see you back here...Soon!

Woopeedee! And have yourself a Merry Happy New Year!

xxx Dawn

Just a day more!

Here's wishing all of you out there a wonderful happy Christmas! : )

Tiny night bits

Not up for dinner or anything else tonight. So here I am sitting at my table, dreaming pastel mountains and kitties, while I work on giving this little blog of mine a new look, and my art cv. I still have a lot more to add on to the kitty drawing. That's just the beginning really. I've yet to even draw the fur in in pencil.

2 more days to Christmas!

If only I could have these for christmas!

Floral oxford skimmers

Woven leather oxfords

1980s leather Huaraches

Awesome 1980s Cherokee Mens Huarache oxfords

I would buy all three pairs and the men's pair for Darren. Unfortunately, there's such a thing as limited shelf space, too big or small a size, too expensive to afford, horrible shipping prices. And you know, I really need to save all the money I get from selling my art, and use them to buy nice paper so I can make more art.

So yes, I had to hold myself back and buy myself only the third pair you see up there. Since that was kind of too cute to resist. And besides, it was the cheapest of them all. And Darren couldn't fit into the men's one.

Oh how I love brown, leathery, vintage shoes!

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Happy Holidays to all of you out there! I'm in Singapore right now, and it's really warm here. I wake up every morning wishing it would snow, just like it did here! But yes, I try and distract myself from the heat by drawing and spending time with Darren and friends. I intend to drop by just before Christmas, to show you all a completed kitty cat drawing I'm working on as of right now. Hehehe. It's my first time drawing a cat! It's quite fun so far.

So yes, be back! If not, happy holidays and a Merry very happy Christmas to you all!

xxxxxxxxx

: )

Best of Friends

This song came into my head while I was working on this guinea pig and dwarf rabbit drawing. In my head, I imagine these two to be the best of friends, scurrying around mountain heaps of dry autumn leaves. Snoring while sleeping on each other's bellies, munching on sweet apples and chasing after tiny yellow chicks.

Yup, in my head ; )

Oh and I think it makes this drawing makes a nice wallpaper too!

So do feel free to use the image above for your own wallpaper!

Conversations and drawings

Finally met up with Sarah yesterday evening! Over over-salty shellfish bisque. Sarah said she could taste the sea! And pretty dessert, the colours were so beautiful. Have you tried macaroons before? I've yet to try one. Was too full after dinner. But they were so lovely to look at! I had to sneak a shot!

Sarah and I chatted about lots of funny things. If all goes well, Sarah will be in lovely beautiful Melbourne City next year! Oh yay! : ) I cannot imagine and wait for all the fun things that I know will happen, with her around! Girl times! Yummy dessert, crafty, cooking times!

Over dinner, I gave Sarah a sea otter print and she asked how I started drawing animals and all. Especially since I'm usually drawing food items, packaging or at my easel painting glittery landscapes. I thought it was quite an interesting question...

It all started when I was asked to participate in a secret artist project. Deal was, I had to provide 6 black and white drawings. It was a real challenge for me, knowing how I love and adore colours. So I thought I'd try. I mean, never try, never know. That's my mantra really. And I guess it kind of just happened. I decided on drawing a series of woodland animals. In particular a stag. I love stags but I can never draw one. Just can't. Not sure why. But I tried for days, weeks and came up with this fella here.

And from that drawing, I realized how much I actually enjoy pushing myself like that, to do something different. To try and draw animals, knowing I cannot draw them. I tried owls, birds, bears, a sea otter, mandarin duck, and I just kept going. For the fun and love of making a mark on paper. And being able to learn fun animal facts and them translate them into drawings. All the animals I've been drawing thus far, all have this interesting fact about them!

I've been pouring through my old animal pictorial books, flipping through pages of wild mustangs, beautiful spotted animals, furry animals, all sorts really! And I've also been staring and smiling at works by these few talented artists whom I really think draw hair/fur the best!

Meeri Anneli

Sarah Mcneil

Miso

So yes, I've arrived at a point whereby I'm really enjoying drawing and reading up on animals. Practicing and learning from the super artists. So I guess I'll just keep going, and I'll see where all these drawing takes me to!

For now, here's a drawing I'm working on right now. It's a guinea pig and a dwarf rabbit...

Mandarin Duck

I did this drawing a while ago. But I think I forgot to show it here. I have a thing for ducks. Their colours never fail to catch my eye. And Mandarin ducks in particular, have such bright lovely colours. Too hard to miss and not do a drawing of.

I'm currently working on a drawing of a guinea pig and dwarf rabbit. In the drawing, I pretend they are best of friends. Did you know, in real life, guinea pigs are good friends with rabbits and sometimes even dogs? How cute is that!

Early Christmas presents

If you follow my blog, you would know I wanted this book quite badly. I watched the movie and loved all the bits in it! Tried the poached eggs, omelette and roast chicken and they were all fantastic! Minus the poached eggs though, still learning to perfect it!

So Darren got this for me as an early Christmas gift! Sweet! I've been pouring through the book in amazement, laughing at the funny bits and trying to tell myself I'm still full and not eat after 10pm. I'm excited and would love to try the Quiche recipe soon!

Thank you so much Darren! You're the sweetest! xx

Apart from now being the proud owner of a great cookbook, I also treated myself to a nice red lipstick. ( Not sure why but it looks really pink in the photo below! Will take a nicer one soon! ) and my Kate Miss Silver drops necklace finally came in the mail! I love it so much, I wore it out the entire day! Friends commented it was pretty!

And if you're curious, yes, I knitted the tiny skinny scarf. It was my first ever knitting project from 4 years ago! I don't wear it out now though. Too short!

Craft Hatch this Saturday!

Hello all Melbourne people, have you seen this cute christmasy poster drawn by Clever Amy of Cake with giants? Amy will be down at the City Library tomorrow, along with other very talented artists, crafters, makers of all things pretty, and they will be selling lots of nice things you buy as presents for christmas!

You know, we should all support local talent : ) Buying handmade things sure beats buying all those industrial-made items that comes in like.. hmm. copies of a few thousands? Makes it a lot special I think, to be one of those lucky owners who own one of those special edition prints, necklaces, books, etc. Nice! What do you think?

Anyway, Amy will be there, at the City library from 11am to 4pm. She'll be selling bits and pieces from her beautiful Vanilla Bug shop, ( I've got one of her necklaces. It's so precious! ) and lovely made goodness from Bakers Dozen, of which I've got my hand bound books sold there too!

So please go check it out, say hi to Amy and all the other talented clever artists! : )
xxx

Oh Yay!

Yay for best girlfriends! I've been so blessed to be able to hang out with my funny girl friends from High school. Almost every other day. Tea and cake, good food and heart to heart talk sessions.

So if you realize posting has been a wee bit slower than usual, that's why : )

Sea otters are such cute things!

Did you know, sometimes sea otters sleep holding paws with other sea otters? Isn't that cute? I thought that was sweet so I made a little drawing of an imaginary sea otter friend. This imaginary sea otter friend loves the snow and winter.

I kind of like the original drawing a lot and decided I should turn it into several prints ( but only just 40! ) so others can meet my sea otter friend and say hi to him in person too. So if you'd like to meet him and have him stay in your lovely home, you can pop over here!

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PS: The print is printed on a lovely heavyweight 220gsm smooth, matt, cream-coloured french cold pressed paper ( Oh what a mouthful! ) But yes, if you've been following all my twitter tweets, you would know how much I've been raving about this beautiful paper stock I've found! Oh and did I mention, the inks used for printing, are archival, fade-proof and waterproof? Yes yes! I'm excited about that too! : )

Sea Otter Drawing

I was reading up on Sea otters and mustelids, and decided to do a little drawing on one. I kind of like how the drawing turned out and am in the process of making a few prints out of it. I found this perfect French cream paper. It's beautiful! I've also found other wonderful papers, but they seem to be too thick or the colours just don't go well. I'm still on the search though. And let's just say, the search has been a little frustrating.

I'm going through one of those phases where I'm feeling really overwhelmed and tired. I feel like everything is not going right and I just can't focus. I feel like I'm in too many places at the same time and my head hurts so often. Those tension headaches are sure making a comeback. And that's not good at all.

I've been thinking about closing my online shop for a while now and reopen only in the new year. So I can take a good break. But I've signed up for another month of paid account. So that leaves me with no choice but to keep it open. It will be great if I could sell off all my remaining things so I can focus on making new things for the year ahead.

Anyway, for all Singaporean readers, I've got a few of this zine and one more fabric pack left. If you're interested to purchase any of them in SGD, let me know. We could arrange a meet up in town so you can waive on mailing charges as well.

Zine: $12.50

Fabric Pack: $13.50

It's beginning to look a lot like Christmas

And my brain seems to fill itself with all things foresty, soft and dreamy...

Beautifully made pine cones by Stephanie Congdon Barnes

Elizabeth and Ginger, Anne Hall Horse girls print which unfortunately seems to be not for sale

Michelle Arcila print, as seen on Print Society

Kat Macleod pillowcases from Third Drawer Down

Rainbow bird tile from Rare Device

Tell me something notebook by Karin Kramer

Tattoo Sweater and the Colours of Everything Inside... print by Sarah Mcneil

And lastly, a silver drop necklace by Kate Miss. PS: I scored myself one this morning! Yay : )

How about you? What have you been thinking of this Christmas?

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Sydney: Manly and The Rocks

It was such a hot super warm day! But we still had so much fun, jumping across, hopping across zebra crossings, visiting the MCA ( I loved it there! ), making strangers laugh and go 'ooh' with Darren's super huge taped up Sydway map. ( He was trying to be funny, his idea of an interactive art project ), had awesome potato cakes ( we actually do hate potato cakes, but the ones we had were so good! ) and fresh fish and chips. Taking a ferry across to Manly Beach with my two super cute friends Amy and Sarah. We walked a lot, and had fun ice cream times too!

I took this little picture, which I'm sure you've seen if you read their lovely blogs. Oh how I would love for another cone right now!

Fun ice cream times! Ice cream, oh ice cream, how I love you so much!

xx

Dreaming of the sun and warmth, even when it's cold

Made this little drawing last week. One of those little drawings I did for fun. I'm in the process of hunting for the perfect paper stock, so I can start turning it into both large and small prints. I hope you like it : ) xx

PS: And yes, I've been taking a break from painting mountains and landscapes at my easel. Instead, I've been working on some pencil drawings. But as you can see, I am still thinking of mountains everyday.

Hello again!

Being in Woolloomooloo was heaps of fun! If you're a Sydney-sider, have you tried the

hot dogs at Harry's Cafe De Wheels? If you haven't, you got to try it! Darren and I

heard so much about it, so we made it a point to try it. We ordered a Chilli dog, and a

Hot dog de wheels and sat by the water to enjoy our little feast. Both were so good,

so yummy and so filling! We saw another outlet at the Sydney airport, just before

heading back to Melbourne. And we decided to try their pie. It was wonderful too!

I think enjoying hot dogs by the water, was one of my favourite memories of our trip.

It was simple, fuss-free and really nice.

I have so much more pictures from my Sydney adventure. I hope I'm not boring you!

I've still yet to tell you about Glebe, the MCA, and our little ferry trip to Manly

with my two cute friends! Alright I'll post more when I find time.

xxx