SHOP UPDATE
I’m hoping to have some new pieces to add to my shop soon. But if you haven’t checked out my INPRNT and Society6 shops lately, there are already lots and lots of art available!
And if you have already ordered some of your favorites, thank you! The drawback of using a third-party to manage my art prints is that I can’t see any details on orders. So if you’ve ordered something and I haven’t thanked you profusely, it’s only because I don’t know! SO THANK YOU!!!
ART
I took a sabbatical! Well, I didn’t, Mr. Husband did. I was well intentioned, planning to work some during the holiday, but that was ridiculous. Why wouldn’t I take time off with him if I can?!? That’s why there was no July Newsletter and I was pretty much off social media.
I didn’t make any art during our time off either. It was weird at first. Then it was just kind of nice (I had been struggling with art block anyway, right). But then I really started to miss it. And I started like making notes about what kind of art I missed working on and wanted to make when I went back to work. And it turned out I just really really wanted to work on cartoons and comics again.
GO FIGURE.
But also, it was a relief — that I wasn’t like, “oh man, I really want to start working in oil paints” or “I just want to do pet portraits” or something. Because I tend to get a little distracted sometimes with my art… And it was just like so encouraging that the art I wanted to make was the art that I keep coming back to again and again!
Before sabbatical I was in the middle of rearranging my studio. So when I first came back to work I had to finish getting organized. It was actually great timing though since it let me set up everything to focus on making cartoon illustrations and my comics. YAY!
Now that I’m back at work, I’ve also managed to get my daily schedule organized. FINALLY. It’s been like a year of trying to figure it out, maybe being in a different time zone has me messed up? Anyway, I created a schedule wtih plenty of time for all the stuff I want to do like my breakfast sketches, illustrations, and comic strips.
I’ve even narrowed down the artists I want to study from for my breakfast sketches. I know I’ve had complicated feeling about fan art before, but I’m over it now. The studies have been super helpful, since they let me work on technical skills, focus on certain styles (very cartoony!) and and let me practice without needing to be creative… I don’t want to just be studying the work of others all the time, so I definitely plan on doing my own practice too (like drawing my own characters or cartooning existing characters from other media, for examples). I’m still just a smidge art blocked, which is just super annoying. But that’s the goal anyway.
So it’s A LOT. Studying cartoon art, working on my comic strip, and creating original cartoony illustrations. But it’s all good exciting things and I’m super excited to be back at it and do the work!
BOOKS
Over the holiday, I read Skottie Young’s I Hate Fairyland comic series. I’d tried it in the past and didn’t care for it, but I gave it another shot and LOVED IT. I just love his art, and the story was fun! It was definitely one of the reasons I was just so excited to start working on cartooning again!
I also read a bit more of The Expanse series, which is always a good time. And I started reading Jane Austen’s Emma again. I’ve only read it once before in like high school, after being obsessed with the movie (the 90s one). I know Emma isn’t a favorite Austen heroine but I really like her. She’s a mess, but just delightful!
THE REST
We went on a fair bit of hiking during sabbatical! My midwest upbringing was not sufficient training for hiking up “moderate” difficulty hikes. Basically, anything called a Mountain is a bit too much for me, despite my best efforts at conditioning. I could do it, but it’s a bit out of my comfort zone. Y’all I work out like it’s my hobby, because it is. And I was not prepared. The locals all seemed just fine. Elderly, children. And me, just wheezing and sputtering like I haven’t been outside before… At one point I was on my hands and knees looking what felt like straight up to the top of a “hill” on our last hike. I was just like, I have to go UP? Up there?! Technically there were something like giant boulder stairs to assist the assent. But I am not a particularly tall gal, so it. was. a. climb.
We made it to the top and it was so early to avoid the heat that we could only stare into a vast sea of fog. Oops.
One of the best photos I’ve ever taken on one of our first hikes. Me, on our last hike, afraid of heights and exhausted from those giant steps. And finally, the view. Which Mr. Husband photographed because I wasn’t going near the edge!
Still worth it! So fun!
It soon became too hot to bother with the outdoors. So Mr. Husband caught up on some video games, and I had us watch an impromptu James Bond marathon over the course of a week or so. That was something else, having not seen them all before, and I could now talk about it for daaaaaays.
We also watched some other classic movies. Yojimbo was incredible. And Tokyo Story and How Green Was My Valley were both suprisingly very good. I mean, it shouldn’t have been THAT surprising (the latter beat Citizen Kane for Best Picture)…but still. I didn’t know anything about either and was so glad we watched them!
Then, started watching the show Paper Girls this weekend! I really really liked the comic so it’s been really interesting to see this adaptation. I think they got a lot of the visuals like spot on, which is so cool. But also, they definitely changed a bit. I’ll have to see how the season ends before I decide how I feel about the changes. I don’t want to give anything away, and super recommend the comic. But the comic is delightfully weird in a way the show just… isn’t. Yet.
Alright, well I think that’s just about everything! And good grief it was A LOT! If you made it this far, thanks for reading!
Summer Child Designs 
Welcome back!!! You were missed, as was your artwork. I look forward to checking out your shops and can’t wait to see the next cartoon
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