Mood Monitoring Owls

I created this image for Illustration Friday's word of the week "Robot"!  It was a lot of fun creating these critters.  Owls have always been one of my favorite animals, so I thought I'd get creative here and draw something other than your typical robot.  The mother owl is not having one her best days, so I have her displaying her "mood monitor".  They had a long day of traveling from their home planet, so the mother owl is feeling quite tired and frustrated!  Baby owl is confused, and isn't sure how to act around his mama.  Maybe I didn't get that point across, but hey - I had fun creating it!!  ;)

school lunch envy

Growing up, I ate more peanut butter & jelly sandwiches than I'd like to admit.  I suppose they were just easy, and healthier than other options in the school cafeteria.  No matter what, there would always be envy, or curiosity at least, of each others lunches in school.  I'm sure school cafeterias have many more options today.  Anyhow - I had fun drawing the tiny packed lunch.  :)

Cozy Holiday Wishes

I love giraffes... and I also love knitting.  This is my illustration titled "Cozy Holiday Wishes".  I'm hoping to make prints of it soon to sell on etsy.com as a greeting card.  :) 

wings, fins, and frogs.

Another illustration for my children's book - "wings, fins, and frogs", which is still in the works.  I might go back and change this one up a bit... add more to the sky, a bit of atmosphere or something.  But I was eager to post it, so here it is!

hammerin' hammerheads

My previous post has a sketch of my little hammerhead here.  What an interesting creature to draw... it was a bit tricky, but fun to draw something out of my comfort zone.  Illustration Friday's word of the week is "myth".  There are so many myths about sharks, I don't know where to start.  I'm an avid Shark Week fan.  Sharks just fascinate me and there are endless things to learn about them. 

One myth about sharks - "sharks are mindless eating machines!"  Although there are many recorded shark attacks, there are very few recorded attacks by hammerhead sharks.  They are very smart, and biologists have even come to find that they have personalities.  

There is also the myth that hammerhead sharks use their head to "hammer" their prey, but their broad head is actually full of sensors which detect the heartbeat of their prey!, among other things... Hammerheads also use their head to pin down stingrays, as well as other prey.  Anyhow, I could keep writing about SHARKS but I have more illustrating to do!

hammerhead shark sketch

Last week I watched an incredible documentary on hammerhead sharks called National Geographic:  Shark Superhighway.  It taught me quite a bit about hammerhead sharks, and inspired me to illustrate one!

I'm a huge fan of "Shark week".  I look forward to it every year, but I never did an illustration involving a shark, so here goes nothing!  This is my first sketch and I'm pretty happy with it.  The final illustration will be slightly different... I always tweak them along the way, but the sketch gives me the gist of what the character will look like.

bride & groom 1

A late post for Illustration Friday's word of the week - "new".  I never like posting something on a Thursday, knowing it won't even be on the site for 24 hours buuuut I started a series of bride and groom illustrations, this being the first, and am eager to share!  Just finished it moments ago... and now I shall begin creating the next newlyweds!