Merry Christmas Emporium!

Happy Christmas folks! I hope you all have a wonderful holiday period filled with all manner of lovely things! I'll see you in the New Year!

p.s apologies for failing to keep up my christmas gift guide. Time and energy got the better of me in the run up to my trip back to Plymouth from Edinburgh! Serves me right for setting myself a blogging challenge. I should have known I could never keep up the pace!

(p.s need I say that the title post is a reference to this fine fella?)

Christmas Countdown #10

 

I loooove the seafoam blue colour on this ring by MijiandYou.  

Christmas Countdown #9

Somewhat optimistically I'm upping the budget for today's handmade Christmas present choice. This beautiful bag is slightly pricier than the previous posts' items but I just couldn't resist the simple design and subtle wave pattern.

Christmas Countdown #8

For the neurotic in your life why not get this super print by Judy Kaufman? Oh I do love Woody Allen.  

Christmas Countdown #7

My choice for day seven is from the wonderful Clare Owen. I love love love this antique birdcage print. Wouldn't it look so perfect in a battered second hand frame?

10%  off in my shop if you use the coupon code BAUBLES. If you're in the US you need to order before Friday 10th, Europe 13th and UK the 17th.

Christmas Countdown #5 & 6

I was out last night so I missed my Christmas countdown post. Thus today you get two! TWO! Fancy that. First up is this wee bear fella from Sian on etsy. I am a total sucker for this kind of thing and I just love his expression! Dangerously cute. 

 Or how about one of these splendid egg cups from the peerless Donna Wilson. I would definitely eat more boiled eggs if I had one of these friendly faces to put them in!

I've added some packs of these gocco printed reindeer cards to my etsy store. They were printed last year and pretty much straight afterwards I put them away *somewhere safe* and lost them! Oops. Found them yesterday though so they're in the shop now!

Christmas Countdown #4

This super pretty handmade collar is my fourth choice in my countdown of handmade christmas presents. So perfect for making a plain dress that bit more festive!

Christmas Countdown #3

Today my tip for a handmade christmas gift this awesome ampersand letterpress print from illustration superhero and all-round lovely lass Gemma Correll.

What I Wore Today

(if you're in the US then you offically have ONE WEEK to order from my shop in time for Christmas)

Living Things Vol. 1

If you head over to the Little Otsu site today you might see a super exciting announcement involving yours truly. The fantastic Portland based purveyors of all things printed have launched a new series of books called 'Living Things' and I did the first one! It's called 'A guide to Eastern European Wildlife' (although it probably won't actually be that useful as a factual guide) and it features 16 brand new illustrations (8 full colour). It's up for pre-order now! YEAH!

Christmas Countdown #2

Today's stocking worthy treat are these crazy-cute cat keyrings from Yacspocket on etsy. Look at those happy wee faces! I'd like the orange fella please. Or a real cat. One of the two.

Christmas Countdown #1

OK i've decided (as of two minutes ago) that every day in the run up till Christmas I'm going to post a nice handmade thing that I think would make a lovely gift. First up- These pretty ceramic pins from Sophie Elm. Super cute, really affordable and probably thoroughly lovely on a cardigan. Sophie does lovely things with decorative ceramics and I heartily recommend a good nose through her blog.

Winter

 It's been snowing here in Edinburgh for the past few days. This is Blackford Hill near our house on the first day. It's snowed pretty heavily since then so i bet it looks really beautiful up there now. I grew up on the South-West coast of England so snow is still a bit of a novelty for me. I'm rapidly getting bored of the ankle-deep slush on the pavements though! Below Jez and I looking red-faced and chilly in our woolly hats!
 

What with it being December tomorrow I thought I'd give you a heads up on post deadlines for Christmas. These are the deadlines you need if you want to order from my shop and get it in time for Christmas:

Asia, Australia, NZ, Africa & S. America- December 6th 

USA & Eastern Europe- December 10th

Western Europe- December 13th

UK- December 18th

Red Bear

 New red version of the grizzly bear gocco print available in my shop. Roar!

Shop Local (local to me anyway)

 

Here's a quick round up of some of the hand made treats on offer in the fine city of Edinburgh this festive season. All pretty perfect gifts I reckon. 

 

Love to draw print by Robbie Porter

Super Christmas cards from Eleni Karlorkoti 

 

 Small Mr Lion screenprint by Verity Keniger

Small Print Factory by Jez Burrows

Log badge by Louise Smurthwaite

Or you could pick something up from an Edinburgh based shop like Analogue Books, the Red Door Gallery or Hannah Zakari.

Land

There's a new set of three postcards in my etsy store. I hope you folk like them.

 You have ONE MORE DAY if you want to get 15% off in my shop. Just add the code 'twitterdiscount' in the coupon box when you get to the checkout page. I know this isn't twitter but I figured you people deserve discounts just as much as my twitter followers!

Tigers & Treats

I did this illustration for yesterday's New York Time's Op-Ed Section. You can see it in situe with the article it accompanies here.

If you're after Christmas things from my etsy store I recently added postage deadlines to my storefront. Check the list to make sure your order will make it in time for Christmas!

Follow me on twitter? There's a special etsy offer for my twitter followers. 15% off for the next two days!

Bookcovers

Last week Eastwing asked that I put together some mocked up bookcovers for my folio. These are a few of the ones I did (they vary in quality- i did seven in under a week...come on!). I hope you like them!

 

NEW PRINTS

 I added two new prints to my shop today. 'The Russian Tower' and 'Freckles' are on sale now.

Ladies

Three ladylike drawings from last week. Done in snatched moments between 'real' work. 

Drawing Sale

I have drawings piling up around me right now. So there may be a few of these coming up over the next month. 

If you are interested in purchasing work please email me at lizzy (at) abouttoday.co.uk and let me know which piece you'd like, your postal address and a paypal address that I can send an invoice to. At this time I really can only accept Paypal payment from anyone outside the UK (uk-ers a cheque is fiiine). Prices and sizes vary from piece to piece, some are originals of prints and some have been hidden away unseen. Postage is not included in the price of work and will be added on when you order depending on where on earth you might be.

Bathers- Pencil & Watercolour £28 (to be trimmed & tided up around the edges)

 

 Eastern European Woman- Pencil- £14

Trees- Pencil & watercolour SOLD

House Hat- Pencil SOLD

Cloche- Pencil £15 (see the coloured version here)

BIGFOOT!

I did a quick illustration for the Eastwing news page yesterday. Everyday one of the EastwingToday is October 20th and on this day in 1967 illustrators posts an image relating to that days date. Roger Patterson and Robert Gimlin caught film footage of what they claimed was a 'Bigfoot'.

I also (finally) did a new picture book report post. Only its not finished.  

 

Retail Detail

If you're in Oxford then you can now pick up prints, cards and badges by me at the newly opened Comma. You can see a wee blue bear fella in the yellow frame in this photo. You can see more pictures here.

Glasgow dwellers can now get cards and badges at the glorious Made in the Shade Maisonette. 

My christmas cards are now on sale. Get 'em while their hot etc etc. Non UK residents please ensure you order them before November 20th if you want to recieve them with plenty of time to send out to your friends!

Christmas & Coveting

It seems far too early to be chatting about christmas cards but nevertheless here we are! These three are my Christmas cards for this year. They'll be on sale in packs of three (one of each) in a few days. Once I get round to packing them all into cellophane. Although it is, as mentioned, perilously early for festive things I'm putting them on sale this month so that lovely folk outside the UK can get theirs ordered in time to still be able to send them out! Makes sense eh?

Today I am wishing I didn't have giant feet and I could get me a pair of these super cute wellies from aigle (ok actually if by some miracle my feet did suddenly become normal size I'd probably go out any buy something more exciting than wellies...but they'd be on my list for sure.)

I am also wishing that the UK shipping on these nice, simple watches wasn't TWICE the price of the watch itself. Thats just plain stupid (americans who want to buy me presents? i want the purple or the grey please.)

Eastwing Brochure

This is my spread from this year's Eastwing promotional brochure. Having been super unhappy with the work I submitted last minute (the result of a combination of having only just joined the agency two days before the deadline and a debilitating lack of confidence in whatever i was trying to do) I am happy to say that I'm far more satisfied with this year's efforts. The brochure for 2010/11 sees all the Eastwing illustrators take on certain dates within a month and illustrate the events on those dates. I did the Cheltenham Jazz Festival, The publication of the Great Gatsby and the great Fire and Earthquake of San Francisco.