Sunday, January 22, 2017

Annual really long blog post, things that I did in 2016. Part 2 of 3

Hi.

so this is part 2 of my yearly round-up of stuff and things that happened to ME. 

It's about ME. Not any debate on whether 2016 was a terrible year or not. 
Actually I did address this issue in part one
Go read that if you haven't already, because it also includes fun things I did in the first 4 and a bit months of the year. Including, but not limited to, puffins, getting trapped in a wobbly dolphin, googly eyes, good life advice and REVERSE BATMAN.

I ended that post with: What else happened in MAY 2016 to our intrepid heroine Jenny Robins? Some NICE things I hope?

I can now reveal that this was a joke. Because in May we went to Nice. 

May you live in nice times


2016 really was very much the year of the mini-break for us, the brief sojourn. You know like when I definitely can't complain that I didn't go on a proper holiday all year because I went on so many small ones and that would make me sound like a dick. 

Most of the time that we were there we made jokes about how NICE it was. That literally did not get old for me and I think if I lived there it probably would not. 

Most especially we liked the cemeteries on top of the hill. 
If you are going to the cost of azure I thoroughly recommend visiting them.

Here is Alex choosing some light holiday reading at the Musée d'Art Moderne

Here is Alex displaying the effortless chic of all residents and visitors to the coast of azure. 

Here we are at a beach, It was hot but the sea was not hot. I went in the sea but I was a wus and I didn't stay in the sea long enough to acclimatise myself to the temperature which I've since dwelt on and this I believe is my biggest regret of 2016. Really, if I'd just stayed in another 5 minutes I could have had a proper nice swim. 

I didn't even make the pun on purpose that time. That is what is so great about the nice pun. You make it by mistake all the time. 
Also, it wouldn't have been a PROPER NICE swim, because this beach is in Antibes, not in Nice.
 Also, we didn't see any puffins. 

I drew this for awesome Lucy and Rory's wedding invitation:
You can see a blog about their brilliant wedding here on Down-to-earth Brides. It's worth having a look for Lucy's jumpsuit and cape alone. 

In May I also officially became a godparent to Arthur. 
Arthur is the one in the shorts. He's awesome.

Also we went to Fliss' wedding, the fabulous bride was able to take time out of her special day to salute the sun with Alex and this statue

I went to Comiket and saw nice comic book people like John and Paul and Anna and Kieron and Gareth (who I managed to thoroughly freak out) and Wallis (who gave me bad advice re: freaking Gareth out) and other people I am forgetting now. But also significantly I met Julia again (readers may recall I also met her in March) and handed over my then completed bundles of zines for her to sell through the awesome distro One Beat Zines, including the feminist poster I had designed especially for the occasion. 

I blogged about it here, in June. 

June know what I mean?

On the first of June I painted this winter portrait commission. Those patterns on the jumper were sooooo fun in that way that kind of pressures the edge of the brain because it's really hard. 
Do you know what I mean? 
I remember the first time I was aware of that feeling was at life drawing class when I was 17. Like you can feel the weight of the amount of visual data your brain is processing. It's super satisfying in a kind of cathartic way. 
Might just be me.
Anyway I posted in progress photos of this painting they are here if you're interested. 

Back on a wedding theme, by this point things had been building up to my Sister's wedding for a while, I based the invite around this portrait of her and her then fiancé from his best woman's wedding. 
With the power of clumsily erasing offending details in photoshop, printing the result out and painting back over the top, I then magically turned this into a a picture of them in their wedding outfits which was used on the programmes for the actual day. 
Monsieur I have conjured you a pocket square. Presto. 
They really like that photo. 
Of course they were even more beautiful on the real day, about which more in July. 

Also, with previously mentioned lovely best woman Bella, I was in charge of a joint staghen picnic event which had been cleverly scheduled just two days after the EU referendum. We were tempted to allocate a special Brexit corner where people could vent/crow but opted for a blanket ban on discussion of the topic. A few days later again I posted a blog post in which I said a few fence sitty and yet still I feel, poignant or at least slightly pointy things on such matters. It's the same blog post as the one about the poster, so if you clicked that one don't worry about clicking this one. IF you didn't, here's another chance! 

I just re-read it and spotted a grammar error. Don't worry it's fixed now. 

Anyway, here are some photos from the staghen which was a great and glorious success.


I find this photo a little bit TOO hilarious. Despite my zero f**ks appearance on the right there, I actually did try really hard at egg and spooning. 
Since Bella was secretly pregnant at the time, I was drinking for two. 

This is my beauuuuutiful sister and me on the bus between the park and the pub. 
I made us hats. I made a lot of hats. 

Here is a photo of Hazel and Tristan that I clumsily photoshopped into McDonald's for jokes. 
Like, it's funny if you know them. Probably. 

That same blog post where I said pointy fence sitty things and wrote about the poster is also where I launched the new project, which was drawing lady folk coming out of cookie cutter shapes, and is still functioning under the title of the 3.52 Billion project. Although I would like to think of a new name. Or at least, I stated a vague intention to do so. I more officially launched it in August.

So I guess more about that in August, and I'll just carry on sprinkling them into the text whenever I fancy till then. 
In the real world of the present this week (which is to say the past by the time you read this, of mid January 2017) I am channelling Almas quite a lot, having both finished my tax return and drawn portraits at a queer performance art night. I encourage you too to embrace your inner Almas. 

Would I July to you?

So pretty much the first thing that happened in July, a week before I broke up from my teachy dayjob for the summer, was the actual wedding of Hazel. 

Obvs all of the stationary and signage was on point

I was chief bridesmatron, here is a really excellent photo of my extended family making funny faces. 

And an excellent one of just me and my parents looking very joyful.

This one is pretty great even though I am not even in it.

Also (because although this was obviously not MY day, this is MY blog) on the topic of me, I gave a really excellent speech. As well as being all touching and personal and shiz, it had a whole paragraph of alcohol puns in it, which I will share here because it doesn't have any mushy stuff in it:

Hazel and Tristan have chosen to celebrate their wedding in a place that symbolises what is most important to both of them; Alcohol. It’s good to see them giving love a shot, it may seem a little whisky, but if their relationship is ever on the rocks, I hope they can keep their spirits up, and when they’re apart, absinth will make their hearts grow fonder, until they cognac together again.  

It was a really lovely day.

But it was only the beginning of my dress wearing and three course meal consuming summer, as during July we also attended two further weddings. 

And I'm not saying Hazel's wasn't the most important (double negative, can't nothing please me) but her's didn't include an adventure of going to a place other than the one I grew up in. #justsaying

So one week after the family wedding, we were off up to Yorkshire (EAST Yorkshire) to attend another happiest day, that of our friends Dom and Paula. 

I was so organised  I made the card before we even left and so was able to scan it. 

Now, I want to stress clearly that I was very happy with how things went down. but there was one tiny detail that I was not entirely happy about. 

We were on our way to Yorkshire on an evening only invite. And I had no beef with that. I had a plan, to go see puffins on the cliffs during the day, and come to the dancing at the wedding in the evening. We had done the best thing ever to do for friends weddings that are far away, which is rent a big house near the venue with 10 other friends. And of those friends there were 6 of us in on the puffin plan. But on our way to Yorkshire we got a message offering us a bumped up position as day guests. This is the second time this has happened to us btw, we are a very first reserves kinda couple. So obviously we were like yes please to singing in a church and eating a tasty sit down breakfast. And it was a lovely wedding of lovely people with pinwheels and the sea and a good joke about black holes and bubbles. But on this occasion. 
No Puffins. 
See look how pleased we look to be in the church. 

No beef

But no puffins guys. 


Also, I really like Yorkshire and now I had been there 2 times ever and Andrew drove us through all of it and we saw lots of power stations. 

Also in July I drew some cool commissions like this one of Adam and Emma
Which was for an anniversary, but still obviously, basically a wedding portrait.

And this one of Michelle and Sean
Who have since gotten engaged. So like, no theme here guys.

It was the year of LOVE. In my diary anyway.

Back on a more usual theme, I got some bird prints into GingerWhite gallery in Bethnal Green in July also. 

And after drawing a few more Real TV Wisdom pictures, I finally had enough to bring out the second edition of the zine of the same name. 
available here yo.

I went to another Broken Frontier Drink and Draw and drew this dystopian coffee shop.

At some point in July I drew this:
based on a true story, of course. 

Then it was time to go on another adventure to Ireland for the wedding of my amazing cousin Jay. 

She's the one in the white dress, it was 1920s themed so we all got dressed up and stuff. 
We used to hang out the four of us here when we were kids and stuff and we were super cool cousins. 

Here is an action shot of my parents dancing to the Irish band.

We went for some additional adventures in county Limerick and Clare before the wedding and then in Dublin afterwards. This was my first time in Ireland so that was super awesome.

Me and Alex and Hazel and Tristan reflected multiple times in a sculpture thing in Dublin. 

Cool spooky church we stopped and explored.

Also we went to the cliffs of Moher.

There are meant to be puffins at the cliffs of Moher.


We didn't see any. 

It was pretty tho. 

I have quite a lot more puffin drawings in my backlog I can do that to btw. But on most days I accept it's not a thing to not see a puffin. Though I would be into it if one just came at me one grey London afternoon. You know like how in post apocalyptic films the animals have always escaped from the zoo so there's just giraffe's chillin in the park? Not that puffins would survive an apocalypse. They are  evolutionary culs de sacs for sure. 
That's part of why they are so great.

August is the proper summer

So come August I was into the proper summer. Which is to say, there were no weddings in my diary (until September anyway). I didn't have to go to school 3 days a week like I do most of the time (love my day job btw) and I could get down to some serious drawing and stuff.

I had a plan, and I had already put some of it into motion.

So this is kind of awkward to talk about, but I actually find school holidays kind of stressful.
I'm always trying to balance the three aims of resting, seeing friends and also getting lots of work done. Because I rely on my freelance work to fund anything outside of mortgage, food and bills I also feel under pressure to make the good money while I have the more time on my hands, which often leads to me spending more time scheming and cold calling than actually making anything (such is the freelancer life). But hanging out with so many comic book people was starting to rub off on me and I'd been feeling like I needed to put some serious time in to my personal work. So I came up with the plan. Which is this: In term time, I would start doing supply teaching work on the days when I didn't have a paying illustration client, starting in September 2016. In July I had done the getting the agency teacher job part and I was set to go for this. Now because I knew that I had that extra money coming in in September, I could spend August doing my own work without feeling guilty that I wasn't pitching or stalking art directors. I have a network to the extent that work trickles in, sometimes the flow is light and sometimes it's heavy, if you pardon the period parlance. But I had basically given myself permission to not worry about it. Which is pretty great. 

And I had bought myself August to do things like do some work on my Etsy shop after attending a really cool speed dating style shop critique session run by London Local Team
Also excitingly I got around to something I've been meaning to do for ages, which was to set up and film all of my personal sketchbooks from since I started having one, which was like, in 2001. So a LOT of random stuff that I drew/collaged/painted in my spare time in the intervening years. 


You can read more about this in the spiel I wrote on youtube here
You can pause it to look at individual pages, but I feel obligated to warn you that in the early 00s I drew a lot of boobs. There's some pretty embarrassing stuff in there tbh.

This is the classy professional setup I made to film them:
Bunny was executive producer.

There are a lot of pages though that I still love  a lot. 
That's a lot of years of making pictures, and when I'm stuck for inspiration, they're almost as reliable as Pinterest when I look back through them. 

I also drew some strong Facebook portraits, and by some, I do mean 2.
This is Julia

This is Julian. I really love drawing pinstripes by the way. 

But mainly what I was doing in August was putting in time on working on a plan and starting to put that plan into action for me making a book. A big part of that plan is the (name still under discussion) 3.52billion project. I spent a lot of July and August drawing these ladies. As of the time of writing (now slightly later in mid January 2017) I have done almost 50 of them. For most of August I was posting them DAILY guys, on the gram of insta, I slowed that down to 3 a week once I went back to work and now they are as and when. 
 

 
 
 
 
They are basically really fun to draw and caption. I could do a book just of these pretty easily, but because I am a) a masochist b) creatively ambitious c) obsessed with doing a comic d) interested in telling deeper stories than can be told in a glib one liner e) still figuring out ways I can do this project and somehow not look like an arrogant white feminist because that's what my internet bubble tells me to worry about f) all of the above, obviously, I am going to use them as part of a bigger book project that will include comics and stories. I estimate this will take me about 2 years to complete if I am able to be strict enough with myself with my time allocation and not get tempted into little side projects and low paying commissions that sound fun. 
Which sounds pretty unlikely, so maybe 3 years is a safer bet. 

There's still more stuff that I did in August, but I feel like this has got super long and super late already. So  I'm going to continue that in the next instalment.

What to expect:
books, hats, blogs, more wedding stuff, more Yorkshire misadventures, and the most exciting new addition to our small family. 



Thursday, January 5, 2017

Annual really long blog post, things that I did in 2016. Part 1 of 3

A sign I made at some point to put up at Christmas fairs and never really used.

Things to look forward to in reading about my 2016: Bad spelling, questionable decision making, good drawing, cat pictures, very few mentions of celebrity deaths. 

WARNING this is a super long thing. I will split it up.

So lets get THE TALK over with to start with guys. 

The layers of self protective satire surrounding talking about 2016 have reached sleeping beauty thicket levels of growth, and while I hope you are rational enough to realise that years are not actually separate entities, have no personified malevolence and that the events which happen in them are not magically finished with after the 1st of January, since I am writing about the last 365 days (5 days ago) specifically, I need to address the wider context a little. 
Back in June I felt similarly compelled to add a political slant to my blog post because it didn't feel like putting something on the internet that didn't reference current events was even appropriate. Which possibly says more about what the internet has become than about the actual current events of the time. 


I think history is mostly made by trends, although it is the cataclysmic events that stand out. There have not actually been THAT many of those this year. There have been shifts in politics made by trends that maybe make cataclysmic events more likely in the coming years. There are some things in the world which are getting worse, mostly as a direct result of human action. There are lots of things in the world too that are getting better, mostly also as a direct result of human action. There are also things which coincidentally happened in 2016, which could have happened last year or next year. 
from my 3.52 Billion project

We are born, we perpetuate false dichotomies and prop up bloated power systems, and we die. My lifetime has seen a good few false dichotomies challenged and maybe even mortally wounded, but recently there seems to be a new (old) one that is causing a lot of trouble and that we are still trying to get our heads around. Maybe we will look back and see this as a crunch point in 50 years, or maybe there'll be a late night 50 stupidest things of the 2010s special where surviving celebrity talking heads reminisce about how clueless millennials really thought capitalism was indestructible. blah blah blah.

Real TV Wisdom drawing

In 50 years time we should be just about due for the stars of Geordie Shore to start dying off in significant numbers though, so maybe millennials will just be claiming 2066 is out to get them. 

Is that enough serious talk guys? Let's see if more organically emerges while I write about what I did this year shall we?

The turning of the year - January 2016

In January 2016 apparently I was mostly writing my blog posts about 2015, as it took me until February to actually post them all, let's aim for not taking so long this year. I did do a lot of cool stuff in 2015 tho, especially towards the end. Some of that carried over into 2016, for example in January I sold this piece through Little Carousel Gallery

The gold bits are like, more gold, in real life. Shiny. 


I also got paid for this Puffin picture which sold the year before. Can you tell I'm looking at my business records to inform this post because I'm pretending to multi-task and do my tax return? Maybe I should also look at my facebook or calendar for some non transactional memories. 



I drew this picture of my beautiful cousin Julia in January, who has a very consistent pose in photographs.
One of a grand total of 5 portraits for the facebook project I drew in 2016. I know. I am terrible. 

Now I am making a proper list and looking through all of the stuff, which I remember now was a vital part of this year write up blog post thing. Looking at all the stuff I realise there was actually a lot of very awesome that happened in 2016 too. Worst year ever my foot. 

So also in January it turns out I went for an excellent celebratory mini-break to Mallorca/Majorca, so nice they can't decide how to spell it. 
This was to mark the passing of my friend Susanna into the 30 something club.

That's her on the left looking glamourous and out of focus. We mostly enjoyed the not cold weather and the locally not expensive alcohol. 
Also the beautiful scenery and culture too though. 

Most significantly while we were there I got myself stuck in a children's playground wobbly creature. I cried out in fear and my husband and friends rushed towards me. Not to help me though obviously. To PHOTOGRAPH me. 

This is where our culture has arrived people. People in distress are now mainly a spectacle for the digital hivemind. 

Also in this photo you do get a feel for the lovely golden light in late January in Mallorca/Majorca. Which was in fact beautiful and therapeutic and atmospheric. 
Even when one is trapped in a quivering dolphin.

Everything looks better with googley eyes - February 



In February 2016 I found an old address book I'd had as a child containing 26 fabulously cheesy shots of kittens, many of them in comically anthropomorphic scenes. I decided to cut it up and add googley eyes to the cats to make them into greetings cards.

It was probably the best idea I've ever had.

I sold the last one at a Christmas market the other week. 

Even the best things can't last forever.

February is of course the season of Love. As usual I was peddling my alternative valentines cards in printed and Zine form. As part of my ongoing quest to look relatively professional, and with the help of the tripod my parents had gifted me for Christmas 2015, I took some more proper good looking photos of some of my products for my Etsy shop


As well as new things like the kitten cards and this startrek onesie I made for Bex, I re-shot some old things like those love zines. This image I liked so much I made it my banner image all over the place. Because colours fun and spiky.  

It's satisfying, n'est pas?

I like this live portrait I did at London Below in February. I like drawing anyone, but really punks are fun. 

I got commissioned by Lucy to draw a comic of her first date for her now-hugsband Rory for Valentines. (that's a good idea isn't it, why don't you do that this year? #shamelessselfpromotion) 
This is an excerpt only. None of your beeswax. 

Also in February I had a nice commission for an NHS poster about good research practice. 

I didn't write the advice, but it is pretty good advice really. 

I also went to an NSEAD art teacher event to coincide with the exhibition of their Sketchbook Circle project from last last year. There was some seriously awesome sketchbookery on display here, also some clever workshops. 

I made this textile interpretation of a Peter Doig painting. 

The exhibition showed printed highlights of the project where art teachers across the country kept colaborative sketchbooks, posting them back and forth and working into and responding to each others work. Many of the actual sketchbooks were available for that day only for us to look through. To say they were beautiful and inspiring would be an understatement. 

I'm so glad I went to this event, I've met NSEAD people before through Big Draw stuff, and have followed the sketchbook circle on facebook for a while, but seeing these creative troves in the papery flesh was a real treat. If you have the chance to go to this years event I thoroughly recommend it. 

I went to a drink and draw in February, but I already shared the best drawing I did that night on this blog this one other time. This year I have generally upped my time doing networking in the comic book fold, by which I mean I have attended a greater variety and frequency, but still a very tiny percentage of the array of comic scene themed events in London. Mostly at Gosh Comics and mostly at the pub afterwards. Which is where the most important chat happens. 

Networking is a bit of a dirty word, but going to the pub and meeting people is often the start of the best things. In November of 2015 I met a nice lady at an Intersectional Feminism event at Gosh, who put me in touch with her husband Pete who edits the Quietus comic review column, and now I get to write for that. several of my short comics included in compilations have also been the result of meeting people at Comica events over the last few years too. I met the amazing Julia Scheele at Laydeez do Comics in March 2016, and later she put out a selection of my zines on One Beat Zines. That happened in March, but I'll tell you more about it in June. 

Not literally in June, obviously. 
In the bit where I write about June. 

As a result of other networking, I ended up helping run a stand on super heroes and colour perception at the Cartoon Museum, that is where REVERSE BATMAN came from:
I love him and I carried him around in my handbag for ages because I didn't know what to do with him. I'm not sure where he is now. 
But he is science because look what happens when you invert the colours:
Did I mention it was an event about Science? 

I had never been to the Cartoon Museum before but I've been there loads this year (last year). Just like I had never been to Yorkshire this time a year and a bit ago (before Sheffield), and now I've been there like 3 times. Horizons. Expanded guys. 

March, not of the penguins. 


I drew this in March. My hair is pretty good thank you for asking. 

 My lifestlye in the new (not so new anymore) flat includes even less rubbish television unfortunately. I have to make an active effort to watch some on the internets. 

As mentioned above I went to my first ever official Laydeez do Comics event in March too. They are very very good and I can't believe it was less than a year ago. I had been on the mailing list for probably 2 years before I actually went, but I was never quite brave enough to go, and also slightly put off by the spelling of Laydeez. Which coming from someone as bad at spelling as me is pretty rich really. 
Anyway if you are in London Glasgow,  Bristol, Leeds, Dublin, San Francisco or Chicago and you like comics but not just the POW kind. You should go. 
There is cake.

Also in March I did this wedding portrait commission.  
notice the splendid Melissa Vivienne Westwood shoes. I covet them. 
WEDDINGS guys.
Also in 2016 we went to 5 weddings as guests. So prepare for pictures of me in dresses once the weather gets a bit warmer. 
Again, not the actual weather. Sorry. 

I also did some collages in March. I blgged about them here, also a lot of the stuff from April. So don't read that if you don't want spoilers for the next paragraphs. 

Also it was my birthday and I ate this mountain of shellfish
Ok Alex may have helped. But I had almost all the oysters. 

April fools eat cake and moan about it

In Spring I am unable to resist photographing all of the blossom. 

In April 2016 I saw Guys and Dolls

I didn't do any drawing, I just watched it. 
Sometimes I do that. SORRY. 
It had Richard Kind in it, who I've always identified with as the hypochondriac who turns out to be actually sick in Scrubs. 

What if I am actually sick tho Alex? What then?
It's not my fault. I inherited it. 
also from my 3.52 Billion project, more on that later.



Also in April I did some invite designs for the lovely Bunna, incorporating these cornflowers.

I was invited to pitch for an illustration job at the Royal Opera House to design new Arts Awards booklets for them at this time too. It was kind of a big deal kind of job which would have set me up for half the year money wise. I didn't get it. 
Them's the breaks n'est pas? 


As part of the pitch I made this though, which I like a lot and have since put on sketchbook covers. 
Also these:
April was kind of a big month for shooting and missing as I also wrote a script for an 12 page comic story which I pitched to Beyond. I didn't get that job either. But these things are kind of relevant to some of the decisions I made later in the year. 
If anyone who is reading is an aspiring artist, illustrator, writer or whatevs, be aware guys. We mostly just blog about the wins. It's not fun to blog about the losses. But be assured that there are A LOT more losses than wins when you're freelancing. I'm not as good at shooting for the big game as I should be. It takes a lot of prep. And balls. And perseverance. 
Those are in fact the breaks that are them.

Anyways. Also in April I got invited to do a really fun thing which was live drawing at the play Radioman at the Old Red Lion Theatre, which I blogged about here, as what I previously mentioned. 
This is how I like to draw music n'est pas?

Also I went to a lovely Broken Frontier drink and draw session and drew this Avian Soho.

I attended a Symposium at Tate Modern on what Art is and stuff. 
No really it was actually called Art is... bad news anyone who thought that question might be answered evertimes. It was really good though. I hung out with people from my MA and wrote lots of notes I will probably not ever read. I couldn't resist drawing Micheal Craig Martin though.
Because a lot of the audience was art nerds, not children, he was mostly talking about being a tutor at the Goldsmiths when all of the YBAs were there. Yeah I get that that's a thing. I really wanted to ask him about how it feels to be one of the artists that art teachers reliably use to give their students an excuse to not use shading in their work though. Because actually at a symposium about what art is, maybe the popular imagination should be as relevant as the culturati, and despite MCM being more famous in the art world for his students than his own work, I'd bet substantial moneys that more school children in this country are introduced to his work than ever are to Tracey Emin. 


As well as the BF drink and draw, I went to a more official non-competitive time based drawing event in April. It was a 'Sketchbook Social' organised by London Book and Screen Week

I was very excited because it was being hosted by Chris Riddell who has been one of my vary favourite illustrators for many years. I've been in love with his linework and characterisation since reading the Phillip Ridley books he illustrated in the 90s as a tween. 

This one picture from Kasper in the Glitter, is basically the style template for my life. I imagine this is what my soul looks like, maybe with a bird. 

So it's good that he's really famous now and stuff. And at this particular event it also happened to be his BIRTHDAY. I don't think he was very pleased that this was announced to the audience. 

There were fun drawing challenges and I drew these things:

As you might imagine I was quite pleased when the birds theme was announced. 
I hung out with some nice people who work for The Phoenix Comic, which was awesome. 

But the most amazing thing happened at the end of the festivities. I went to say hi to Wallis Eates and Rachael Ball who run the London Laydeez Do Comics cos I met them in the pub after the Laydeez event in March (see it's all coming together). And while we were chatting the jokes we came upon the discarded birthday cake of Chris Riddell. The event organisers had got him a super indulgent Patisserie Valerie gateaux slice and put a candle in it (which as you will remember, he was not pleased by) and he had left it behind. Possibly through anti birthday sentiment, anti cream cake sensibleness or the forgetfulness of a creative genius. Who knows.

Reader, we ate it.

Now I'm not saying that by imbibing this cake we partook a part of the children's laureate's creative essence, perhaps his soul. And those who know me in RL will also know that this is exactly the kind of food that I am not allowed to eat because it will make me ill.

It did make me ill.

Worth it. 

May you live in interesting times

On the first of May I was chillin in EC1 at Urban Bazaar, selling stuffs and doing portraits, when my sister visited with three of her youthful friends. It was a good chance for me to meet more of her friends because I was in the middle of planning her staghen party for the summer. I'll show you some pics of that in the second part of the year post (because it's really getting a bit too long now isn't it? Also there is other stuff on my to do list for today)
Hazel is my sister she's bottom right.

I have this cool oldschool editable stamp that I use to brand my wares, and I know that in May I finally got around to digging out the letter set and changing the .co.uk on it to a .com


ONLY a year and 3 months after I launched the .com website! 
I know I'm so organised (jennyrobins.co.uk is still a thing tho with a link to jennyrobins.com so it's not like I was sending people to a fail page) and so instagramtastic with this arty shot of my stamp too. It's all balanced and curated and shiz. 

What else happened in MAY 2016 to our intrepid heroine Jenny Robins? Some NICE things I hope?

I'm going to post this now so you will have to wait and see 

Find out in the next thrilling instalment OF

Annual really long blog post, things that I did in 2016.