llovely llamas

I hope you all had a lovely long Easter weekend.

It was perfect spring weather on Monday so we went on a drive to the Ashdown Forest and popped into the Llama park while we were there.



It's definitely worth a visit - the llamas and alpacas are so cute! And really friendly too (particularly if you have some food).

Just look how fluffy they are!



Their necks are super woolly when you stroke them.



I'm in love.



There were some other sweet animals too. Some (stinky but cute) piglets, guinea fowl, donkeys, and some super friendly goats. Like this one...



Nosy.

It was great to feel the warmth of the sun too.
I think the spring has finally made a breakthrough this week!

petting zoo

Time spent with pets is always a pleasure.
Even if some of them do make my eyes incredibly itchy.

As well as seeing these guys at the weekend I also went to Birdworld where I got to stroke baby goats and rabbits, and hold a tiny mouse. So soft!

Cape

Some more very quick drawings.

sahara

My new favourite activity is drawing while watching Africa. It's a challenge to draw so quickly.
Luckily less animals live in the Sahara than other parts.

booth museum

I went on a little outing to the Booth museum yesterday.

It's a peaceful place. I like the taxidermy.

If I had a zoo...

It's mixtape time again.

This month I went with the theme of animals and for the cover I allowed myself the length of each song to cut and paste the animals out of paper. I wonder if you can guess what all of them are? OR better still, the song?

Note: Animals may not be anatomically correct.

and breathe.

Today I handed in my MA final project report.
Only the practical work left now.
And 26 days.

Also, this week I've mainly been appreciating animals jumping on things.
This video & this photo are the highlights:

photo

I would also give anything to own this cat.

photo

sunglasses & cheese

On Sunday we hopped in the van and took a little trip to Middle Farm.

There was running & jumping, some extremely soft lambs, a bit of tree climbing, a very big horse, some terrible cider tasting (& some slightly less terrible), a little bit too much of a donkey, some cheese & chutney buying AND some very big pigs.

gerbils

a drawing for my shopping list hunt.

show and tell

As promised here are some pictures of the lovely things I picked up at the art junky fair last week:


Isn't this jigsaw puzzle lovely? I'd call it a dogsaw rather than a jigsaw though. It cost me £1 and kept me entertained for 2 evenings last week. What more can you ask for?

I also bought this rather sweet arctic hare:


Made by Kaye Blegvad from the Illustrators Elbow collective, a group currently studying on the BA Illlustration course at Brighton uni.
They are a talented bunch so do check them out!

it snowed last week...

...and i made a snow pigeon!


photo courtesy of sam.
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CMYK snail

how bright he is!

a snail with a colourful trail

some other animals

did i mention that i like pigeons?

it's a snake!

snake in a tree, drawn by me.
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an interesting find

The other day I picked up 2 bags of fabric via freecycle (my new addiction) and amongst all the scraps & nice grey fabric I found these animal shapes (along with their templates) that had been cut out for use in some kind of art and craft project.


I think it's a shame that they never got put to use but I really like the simple shapes (so maybe I'll sew them onto something one of these days). I wonder what I can get from freecycle next...

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things worth mentioning

I've got a whole variety of things I've been meaning to post about for a few days now so I thought it best to tackle them all in an extra looooong post. So here goes:


I went to the v&a village fete last friday and it was a most enjoyable evening out. The last time I went was a couple of years ago but it seems to have got much more popular since then as the queue for tickets was ever so long, and stretched quite far around the inside of the museum.

The fete itself was in the central courtyard and was fully of lovely stalls from a variety of talented design folk. One of my favourites was the stall by the ever so talented rob ryan which hosted a scratch card treasure hunt where you had to race against the clock to uncover the clues.
I just about managed to do it (with a lot of shouted help & a very small 5p piece) and just look what I got for my troubles:


A beautiful limited edition print! I'm ever so pleased.

Another stall that took my fancy was by the folks at garudio studiage and involved a game of picking 3 hutches with the same animals inside. Unfortunately I didn't match 3 so didn't win one of these amazing cardboard pets but I did get a poster for my troubles:


What a cute bunny!
Garudio Studiage have lots of nice items in their shop and I'm particularly fond of the items from Chris Ratcliffe - lovely!

I just realised I never posted a picture of my finished pigeons so here they are:


I'll try and get around to listing some in my etsy shop soon and if any of you are interested in owning your own little pigeon then please let me know!

What else have I got to report? Oh yes, I've got a nice new dress:


and that is all!
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hello spider

old age

today i decided it was time to part ways with my deer keyring, as he's looking very sorry for himself.


click here to see what he looked like in his prime.

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