This SO made my day:)

While at a fair a couple of weeks ago, I had the cutest thing happen to me. The talented Mary Kim her husband Yang and their little bundle of cuteness came by the Draw Me A Lion booth to visit and look what they brought me! Mary and Hannah made me a letter P pin (it has a safety pin on the back so I can stick it on my shirt) and put it into this little envelope with a little p on the back of it. It appears that Hannah is really into my book "Paulina P for Petersen" right now and so she wanted to make me a letter P. Totally teared up a wee bit when I opened the envelope and Mary told me the story behind it. Those little cute kids can really get to you! Thanks SO much Hannah, Mary and Yang! You guys are P-erfectly awesome!

Also, yes, this is my book Paulina P. for Petersen:) One of these days I'd like to get a new book published. I think it's about time for a new one. Pretty soon hopefully... we'll see. 

Inspiration: Antique Toys

It's always great for me to go back to Germany and visit. This time I visited three separate antique toy exhibitions. There is something about great toys that is so beautiful and magical even to this day for me. I can't quite describe the feeling but in a nutshell I don't think it's changed much since when I was just a wee one. Still the same awe, the desire to own them and the cheer satisfactory feeling to look at them in all their beauty. Of course not all toys, only the most beautiful ones, which are those with the most character I find. So full of personality, they come to life.  

Of course I always bring my sketchbook and sneak my camera in on those visits. Here are a few pictures of some toys that already brought joy to kids and adults alike hundreds of years ago and a drawing of a doll in all of her fancy that I made while there. Drawing some of these toys of course  inspired me onto other projects... but then I don't think that this is specific to the subject matter. I do think it specific to the process of drawing. Draw something and it will turn into something else... and inspire you to draw more... that's the beauty of drawing. Why don't you try drawing a favorite toy sometime and see what happens? Send us a picture of it! We'd love it! 

Then and Now...

On my recent trip to Germany where I grew up, I visited a friend of mine who I hadn't seen since we were both about 12 years old. It was a really great experience and even though we only had a few hours together we got along as if I hadn't left at all. Funny how friendships can be that way, frozen in time until you pick them back up somewhere someplace. She now has the sweetest little two year old boy.  I of course brought a few presents along one of them being this Colouring Postcard Booklet. She laughed when she saw it and showed me a friendship book of hers from way back when, where I had drawn a couple of horses for her. 'You still draw exactly like you used to!" she said and laughed. I really could almost not believe how much the same the drawings were. Down to the love of putting dots on horses. Still in tact.  I guess some things never change. That made me really happy.

Away on Holiday & Valentines!

I will be taking a short creative refueling leave from the shop, and so any orders you place online between Jan.31st-Feb.13th will be shipped promptly after the 14th of February. There might even be a little extra surprise in your order :)
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Speaking of the 14th of February... here is a sneak peak at our selection of Valentines this year around. They won't be available online, however if you're here in Vancouver they are already ready for you to pick up at some of our awesome retailers such as The Window Community Shop, Dilly Dally Kids, Bird on A Wire as well as our brand new retailers Brick & Mortar in New Westminster and Proper Topper in Washington DC for all of our US friends! Go and pick one up for that special someone!...you know who:)

Winter Time & What's A Good Drawing?

It's winter time here at Draw Me A Lion headquarters and I mostly sit in my studio with my trusty and fuzzy studio assistant thinking up new projects and ideas for the upcoming year.

One thing I always make sure of with all of the things I design for my line is that they can't be too perfect if you know what I mean. I always pay attention to keep that handmade feel, especially in my drawings. It's important for me that someone can look at a drawing and have it be fun to look at, in a way that makes them go..."Oh, maybe I could do that..." and then take it from there. When a drawing is too complicated and detailed this doesn't happen as easily.

I think the thing that stops so many people, especially adults from drawing, is this whole idea of the drawing needing to be 'good', ... and usually what they really mean by that is that their drawing needs to look as realistic as possible. For example, if you draw a chair and it looks exactly like a chair then it's a 'good' drawing. I however think just the opposite. To me what makes a drawing of a chair good is if it looks totally different than any old chair that I could just snap a quick picture of with my phone. Who needs a drawing of a chair that actually looks like a chair? Boring I say!  Give me a drawing of a chair that has wings, or a chair that can move and run around with a person, or a drawing of a chair with a hat, or a face, or with wheels, or with totally crazy wild colours or anything else you can imagine. Because I think THAT'S really what drawing is all about.. Imagination. Try is sometime won't you?

Here is a photo of me, of my studio assistant taking a nap and a drawing I did of me in my studio. If you want to  see more of me in my studio you can watch this short movie here that was made in warmer times not that long ago.  

Happy Halloween!

The launch of the new Mask Colouring Book went really well and I had a super fun time! There will be pictures from it soon that I will be sure to post. In the meantime, my favorite non-holiday has arrived! Happy Halloween everyone!

What a great idea to take a day out of the year to dress up as someone or something you would like to turn into for a day. Here is a picture of me when I was 9. A little leopard. Not surprising really, leopards  are related to lions after all.

Happy Birthday Roald Dahl

The other day was once again the birthday of the fantastic Roald Dahl. Had he not died in 1990 he would have been 96 this year. I have always loved all of his fabulous stories and can still remember my mom reading his book The Witches to me and me loving it. I remember how

deliciously scary some of the parts were and I remember enjoying myself tremendously. Here I found two photos of this great, great children's author in two opposite stages of his life in age but not in personality and heart it seems. (the first image is of Dahl at age 6).

If you haven't yet, you should take a peek at his official website and if nothing else, listen to the short interview clips of his that are posted there. They will give you quite a good insight into his work process and life. Also, and this applies specifically to the clip of him reading an excerpt from the BFG-(that's clip #11) Roald Dahl himself has the most amazing storyteller voice ever. Tell me you can listen to him reading that part of the BFG while looking at this photo of him here and not fall in love. Impossible. 

Camping Inspiration

 bike rides through meadows • oversized breakfast • cornfields and sunscreen smell • lazy afternoon beers • camping by the ocean • sounds the water makes • finding treasures on the beach • like a shell that a little girl named kate made • how great is that • very great • thank you kate •

 
 looking for summer gnomes in the little forest • I think I found them • I think I found them • they say hello • hello hello hello • the new cards are here •

Cards for Flower Lovers

Huzzah! There are new cards in the shop and they're for flower lovers all over the universe! I have been venturing to the beautiful public gardens here in Vancouver a lot lately and there are so many beautiful flowers to see and smell and touch and of course also to draw (lucky me:)) I get really blown away by just how beautiful and unique every flower is. Of course then when I make the actual drawings for my cards like these here, I don't really worry about the type of flower and getting the specifics right, but I'm simply letting my imagination take over. I'm more after the feeling that flowers give me. 

 This feeling is what I tried to put into these two cards here. If you can enjoy these half as much as I enjoyed making them it would make me very happy. A big thanks here to all of the green thumbs at the community gardens in Vancouver and everywhere! It's so lovely seeing all the beautiful work you've done. Lovely lovely lovely. Thanks so much for making our cities more magical. 

Colour and Colouring

I loved colouring and drawing as a kid and I remember very well what it was about the images that I liked to colour the most. It was that I really liked looking at them. It was never exciting to colour in a drawing that I didn't like. I still like colouring today and I think that it can be such a fantastic way to wind down and relax. Colouring isn't just great for kids, it's a like a meditation, you just have to allow yourself to really get lost in. So simple, so fun and so effective. And of course as your're colouring in something, you learn so much about colour itself and what it can do.

Today when I make images for the Draw Me A Lion colouring items in the shop, I always try to leave space for the person's imagination that will be doing the colouring. Sometimes it's really fun to colour in a super detailed drawing, but it's also fun to add more by drawing on the drawings and really make it yours.

Here is the original Cat Colouring Postcard I coloured in two different ways up at the top. How would you have coloured it in? Would you have drawn in something extra? Maybe there could be a tiny cat sitting on top of the big cat! It's all up to you!

Happy Canada Day!

Happy Canada Day! 

In celebration of Canada day, here are two very Canadian artists. They are different from each other in many ways and yet very much alike in others. Ted Harrison and Jerry Whitehead. I had the pleasure of working on a collaboration with Jerry some years in the past. He is an amazing person and does a lot of work in schools and with kids. You can check more of his work out here. 

ALL our Prints are Stories!

Did you know that every time you buy one of our limited edition prints, there is a certificate of limited edition included that let's you know which number out of the edition your print is, AND there's also an activity suggestion that comes along with your print.

It's a simple but very effective and fun activity. Here is the gist of it:

Looking at your Draw Me A Lion limited edition print, pretend that the image was the cover of a picture book. What do you think the story might be about? Who might be in it? What might happen next and ...how might the story end? Write down the answers and draw a picture to go along with them. The result will be a fun story that you will have created yourself...with a little inspiration from Draw Me A Lion. 

Here is a little bit of my inspiration. Always a fan of picture books of any kind!

AND, more excellent news: 

This suggested activity is now included in ALL of the Draw Me A Lion prints, limited edition AND ongoing edition! So no matter what print you get, you'll always have a fun and easy way to create a story out of it! 

That's why our motto is: We need Your Imagination!

Inspiration: Alexander Calder

                               

We all know Alexander Calder for his amazingly beautiful mobiles, but I did not know until some years back that he was also the creator and ringmaster of a very magical circus that he made and also performed with as a 'one-man-circus-art show'so to say. This is something I would have really loved to see live. However, not to fret, there is a great video of him performing his charming circus on hand.

I had the chance to see this video and others on Calder along with several rooms full of his amazing mobiles and the inhabitants of his circus when I went to Seattle with a good friend of mine back in 2009 at the Art Gallery there. It was most likely my favorite art exhibit I had ever seen. Which really means a lot, because I have been to quite a few in my life time. :) 

 Alexander Calder's mobiles are so full of life, and move so elegantly that they seem actually alive, organic and it is as if you can watch them breath, each in it's own strange rhythm. If I will ever get my hands on tons of money in life I'll be sure to be the proud owner of a living and breathing Calder mobile. So inspired by this man's creations and so in agreement with his philosophy on life and art. 

Eric Carle's Father

I have recently read the fantastic book "The Art of Eric Carle" in which Carle not only talks about his art, but also about his life, his upbringing and inspiration. Carle loved his father who was also artistically inclined but was unable to realize this goal himself because his family did not allow it. So while his father could not be an artist himself he installed and fostered Eric's artistic side, encouraging him to paint and look closely at the world around him. Eric and his father were very close and if you look at any interview with Eric Carle he will always talk about his father as his main inspiration and the person responsible for giving him the gift of love.


When Eric Carle lists "some of the basic ingredients to a few of his books" in "The Art of Eric Carle" the following quote is one of them.

" My father's love and his sense for passing on existing knowledge"


I also found this cute video of Eric Carle's book "Papa Please Get Me The Moon" and which of course is dedicated to Carle's Father.




Here is another post about Eric Carle I recently wrote for my I Heart Picture Books blog. Enjoy.

A Card for Dad

I didn't have a dad growing up myself that I could dedicate this entry in the honor of father's day to. It's no big deal, my mom and dad split up before I was even a couple months old. We never saw him again and I don't bear any grudges, it was probably for the best. Today when I think of the word 'Dad' I don't think of my own dad, but I think of all of my awesome friends that are now dad's themselves. I think of how great they are and how proud they are of their kids and how they are trying to do everything they can to make their children have a safe, interesting, exciting and fun childhood. 

My friend Justin is one of my oldest friends who now has a son of his own and I'd like to dedicate this fathers day card to him and his super cute son Jude.  

I'm pretty happy with how colourful and happy this card turned out and I'm even more happy to let you know that it comes with this -brand new to the shop- 100% recycled kraft envelope. Yay for dads and yay for recycling! Grab one and get ready for that special dad in your life! 

The Flowers Are Here!

This is the most I've ever loved flowers in my life. I used to like them ok, but now I really really love them. I've been taking pictures of flowers almost every time I take my funny dog out for a walk and they are inspiring me tons. I think there might be even more flower inspired new items on the way!

How neat would it be, to be tiny and in a field of flowers? I seem to be thinking about this a lot because I keep on drawing kids that are either microscopic next to regular flowers, or even better yet, regular sized kids next to huge magical flowers. While we're at it lets just pretend that the flowers can talk too. 

Maurice Sendak - Truly a Lion

 One week ago was the day Maurice Sendak died. It's already been a whole week that has gone by since then, and that seems crazy. It was really very strange for me to hear about this. It made me realize something quite sad which is that a lot of the great illustrators or writers of children's books that I love and admire so much are either already dead, or are getting older and older, just like everyone else.
The beautiful stories they have created however won't be leaving us along with them. They will always remain with us, and for those of us who really loved them they will actually become part of us. Part of what we are made out of. Part of what we believe in and part of what we will want to pass onto those new generations to come.

I know that Maurice Sendak's stories will continue to make an impact on those that read them for years and years to come and will be responsible for many new ideas and creative projects. Thank you Maurice Sendak for your trust in yourself to tell stories that were so often the centre of controversy. You stuck with your gut and with what you knew was important to children and that takes a whole heap of courage.

I also wrote a blog entry on Maurice Sendak on the "I Heart Picture Book" blog here, and made this illustration in his honor which you can view here on my Sketchblog.