bits + pieces lately

The busier things get around here in the bubble, the less I end up blogging. Sadly it's easier to just upload a quick photo to Instagram than find some time to sit and type and edit photos. I'm waaay behind on updating my website with recent projects so hopefully before the summer madness kicks in I'll be able to catch up a bit! 

Here's a peek at what has been keeping me away from the blog lately...

1.  I've been working more with Arts Outreach this year, which has been awesome! Between teaching, I've been organizing and cleaning supplies in one of my classrooms and probably playing with the supplies more than I should!

    2. This was my most recent custom wedding guestbook that I made for a sweet girl that I met in Italy years ago! I can't wait until she gets married so I can share more photos of this album. 

    3. I recently collaborated with the awesome ladies at Dreamcôte Wines in Los Olivos for a new label for them. We have a ton of ideas brewing for new projects too, I'm so excited! 

    4. My friend Kelly snapped this photo of me during my Words to Live By talk at Casa Dumetz last month! It was a bit insane of a night but so much fun! 

   5. I participated in a local art market a couple weeks ago with my friend Roni from Peace By the Sea. I always end up coming home from a market with a new necklace by her and some other treasures too. I found this Amelie Mancini tote at the Inez store booth! 

   6. I've been making SO MANY custom travel sketchbooks lately! This was the most recent one (and I'm binding about a dozen for a special event with Casa Dumetz in Los Alamos!)

   7. Last weekend I helped out at Mattei's Tavern for their Mother's Day event! A fellow artist from Arts Outreach and I crafted with the kiddos all day making flower crowns for their moms. Even the singer Pink came by with her daughter! So cute! 

   8. I recently did a couple interviews with some lovely creative ladies! Sabrina over at Hands and Hustle featured me and my art supply arsenal in her Tools of the Trade series a few weeks ago. The lovely ladies over at Dulcet Creative also featured a little interview I did for them as well! 

That's about it for news from the art bubble. Follow me on Instagram @sketchynotions to stay more up to date with all my projects and upcoming travels! 

hibernation

As my mother pointed out to me the other day (hi mom!), I'm overdue for a blog post. I'm stuck in blog limbo at the moment, which isn't exactly a bad spot to be. Today I'll be shipping out my last December commission and I can't wait to share all these new little books and stories and illustrations. 

BUT, I want to make sure their new owners have had plenty of time to enjoy them in private before I start sharing them all over the interwebs. Hence the limbo. 

I'm also just in deep, post-Holiday commission hibernation mode. That odd feeling of freedom that I haven't felt in about a month and a half because I've been so overwhelmed with work! Don't get me wrong, that overwhelmed sensation is a freakin' great feeling to have! But it is nice to be able to sit down in the middle of the afternoon and catch up on garbage TV and not feel guilty about it. It's amazing to go to bed before midnight and not panic that I'm falling behind. It's lovely to just watercolor and sketch without worrying about making a shipping deadline. This Holiday season was really amazing, but I'm pretty glad that hurdle is over. 

January is coming, which means many things. My birthday being one of them and my Etsy shops birthday as well! So you can expect a couple giveaways coming! And also the final looks at all my new custom children's books and other projects. Plus some new looks at what's coming for Sketchy Notions in 2015! 

Until then, here are some teeny peeks at my latest projects...

1. Little Amaya in New York!

2. My new favorite binding technique for custom children's books

3. My little boys and my favorite little cowgirl

4. A custom traveling sketchbook! 

5. One of the new additions for the new year, custom country and state watercolors doodles. And some new calligraphy prints coming to the Sketchy Notions shop! 

bits + pieces of Utah

My family and I spent Thanksgiving in southern Utah at my grandparent's house. Utah is definitely in the top three for favorite places in the world (tied with California and Castiglion Fiorentino of course). We were there for a week and we crammed SO much into that week! I found an arrowhead, we went off roading, found petroglyphs, got seriously lost for hours in the boonies, went to the Grand Canyon, shot skeet (and rocked it!), found an antler, chopped wood, had hydraulic grease explode all over me, drove through Zion and ate copious amounts of food! So much stuff in just 7 days! 

We were also in Utah over Black Friday + Small Business Saturday + Cyber Monday and I'm so excited with how well it went this year! THANK YOU! There's still time to snag some goodies in time for Christmas, and if you sign up for the Sketchy Notions Newsletter you can snag 10% off your order! 

1. This guy almost didn't make it home but we were able to squeeze him in at the last minute! I'm still searching for the perfect spot to hang him! 

2. The view from my grandparent's house outside of Kanab. Best view to wake up early to. 

3. All my weapons of creation for arting in the wild. Armed with my trusty sling shot and favorite Bird Trouble pouch! 

4. A great off-roading ride that leads to the coolest petroglyph location!

5. Freja, our Danish foreign exchange student, and I got separated from our group another day we were off-roading. We were a bit lost for a couple hours but we got some great adventuring done and even some sketching. 

6. There's an old movie set by my grandparent's house too, where they filmed old Westerns. Now it's just a cool ghost town to wander through.

7. Dusty sunset after some off-roading. 

8. This is Freja just after we saw the Grand Canyon! Hooray! (She's also a fashion blogger!)

9. Sketching the Grand Canyon. I can check that off the sketching bucket list! 

10. We drove through Zion National Park on our way home. Zion is one of my favorite National Parks in the whole country. 

How was your Thanksgiving? Any good adventures or traveling stories to share?

bits + pieces + news

Hello blogosphere. Oofah. Last night was the first night in almost two weeks that I actually got a full night of sleep. This morning was the first in who knows how long that I was able to sleep in a bit. I repeat, OOFAH!

It's a good oofah though, very good. I started some volunteering for a local group (more on that below). The Holidays are in full swing around here with custom orders for Christmas and markets. I had my first Holiday market of the season yesterday and it was the best market I have EVER had! I'm still a little shocked by how well it went. It's a nice boost of confidence going into my second Holiday season with my business. Makes me feel like I'm on the right track with this art as a business life I'm building. 

In other business-y news, I finally started an Official Sketchy Notions Newsletter! It's high time I finally did it and I'm working on the first post to be sent out this week. I'll be sharing the latest news from the shops, upcoming markets and some special coupons for you special folks. If you would like to sign up, there's a link on the left sidebar or you can do so right here at this link! 

Here's a visual peek at everything that's been happening around here lately. If you can't find me here on the blog, chances are there's proof of my still being alive over on Instagram. 

1. My newest seasonal card collection! I'm a bit in love with that Thankful card (it was one of the most popular items at the market yesterday!)
2. Halloween is my favorite Holiday so I tend to go all out on my pumpkins. I carved this beast with my linoleum carver. My costume was pretty good too, I was grumpy cat. 
3. This is one of three Mini Traveling Sketchbooks I've made, all of which SOLD in the first few hours after listing them. WOW. I'm in the process of making some more too so keep an eye on the Etsy shop! 
4. I had never made a photo of all my own traveling sketchbooks together until recently. These are all my babies. 
5. My mentor Laura-Susan Thomas and I have been meeting at Bob's Well Bread in Los Alamos lately. It's pretty much the highlight of my day when we go there. So good! 

6. I recently had some of my Instagram photos from this past summer in Italy printed through Prinstagram and I LOVE the results! They're so fun to just tape up on the wall. 
7. My most recent mural for the C Gallery in Los Alamos. The theme was blackbirds. 
8. I spent last weekend at Camp Roberts in Paso Robles for the Youth & Government T&E 1 Conference. It's a mock legislature program for High Schoolers. I participated when I was in High School and I became an advisor for our local delegation a couple months ago. It's pretty inspiring being surrounded by over 3,000 politically charged high schoolers! 
9. The sunrise yesterday morning as I was getting ready for the market! 
10. I may not like Christmas much but I do love being able to decorate my booths up the wazoo for the Holiday markets! 

How's everything going for you guys? Find any cool goodies at any markets lately? 

last bits & pieces of Italia

The time has come to leave Italy. I actually left nearly a full day ago now. Currently hanging in New York on another lengthy layover. Then a couple more flights tomorrow and I'll be back home in California! 

Hard to believe that it is technically still the day that I left, and yet so much time has passed...yet not according to my watch. Boh. Westbound travel is always mind-boggling, how you kinda sorta time travel a bit...wibbly wobbly timey whimey...

Back to Italy! My last night in Rome was incredible! The lovely and talented Gina Gomez gave me a list of things to do and places to eat for the perfect last night. And it was rather perfect. I checked in then cruised over to the Colosseum to sketch. Then wandered through my favorite corner of Rome to the Pantheon to sketch some more. I then cruised to Piazza Navona for another sketch and an Aperitivo! 

After my last Spritz, I went to check out the dinner spot. Unfortunately it was closed, and so was my back-up! Italy in August, it's to be expected. Luckily I found a small tasty spot around the corner. I finished up the night getting gelato from Gelateria del Teatro and enjoying it on the Ponte San'Angelo. Fiori di Lavanda e Pesca Bianca con Albicocca. Lavender with white peach and apricot. YUM. A lovely finish to a lovely, damn near perfect summer. 

Here's some of my favorite photos from my last days in Italy! I'll be scanning like a fiend this weekend to get ready for a shop update, hopefully the 2nd week of September. Stay tuned!  

1. My friend Simonetta drove me out to the Ponte della Maddalena (aka the Devil's Bridge). Definitely a good one to cross of the sketching bucket list! 

2. We then drove back up these tiny little road tucked into the mountains north of Lucca. I would move into this decrepit little house in a heart beat. 

3. Barga quickly became one of my new favorite towns in Italy. Winding streets with incredible views...

4. One last photo of Siena! I love how the Duomo just peeks up above all the terracotta streets. 

5. The streets of Lucca were SO quiet on Ferragosto, it was lovely! 

6. The other night in Lucca was Notte Bianca. My talented friend Vanessa Peters and I took advantage of it and took to the streets to play some music and sketch. 

7. Wandering through the streets of Rome and I found my favorite photo of the summer. A Fiat 500 and a cat. Quickest way to my heart. 

8. Sketching one of my favorite spaces in the world, the Pantheon in Rome! Perfect way to end a summer. 

bits + pieces of Cinque Terre

Last week, my friends and I made a day trip to Cinque Terre. This was my first visit back to this heavenly spot in about 4 years and it didn't disappoint. Not familiar with the Cinque Terre? Add it to your bucket list NOW. It's a small collection of five tiny towns tucked onto the Northwestern coastline of Italy. There are old trails that connect most of them that you can hike when they're open (landslides and massive rains ruined a few of the main coastal trails). 

Each town is unique and has a different sort of personality. From top to bottom they are: Monterosso al Mare, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola and Riomaggiore. Previously I had only seen Riomaggiore twice and Monterosso briefly as a student. On our day trip, we got up early in Lucca and took the trains up to Vernazza. Stunning! Such a charming and winding little town. We then decided to hike South to Corniglia, which was pretty daunting. Stairs after stairs after more stairs cutting into the mountainside with the most incredible views of the coastline and the Mediterranean. 

After about an hour hike, we reached Corniglia! We got a quick limone granita and headed to the train. Once in the next town, Manarola, we picked out a spot along the harbor and swam, sketched and even jumped off some crazy high rocks in the harbor. Afterwards we took the train to Riomaggiore for a quick look around before we had to catch our train back to Lucca. I managed to get a quick watercolor of the harbor in before sprinting back to the train station 4 minutes before the train was leaving! Worth it. 

1. Vernazza at the start of the trail South. You can see Monterosso in the distance up above

2. Bougainvillea up above the harbor in Vernazza 

3. Curious locals keeping an eye on the new hoard of tourists

4. Steep, winding staircases make for perfect napping places for kitties

5. Mediterranean waters at last!

6. Corniglia in the distance! And a long way down to the water...

7. I'm a sucker for bougainvillea. This lovely bunch was in Manarola

8. The harbor in Manarola, aka our swimming spot for the day! 

9. Manarola in watercolor

10. My favorite town Riomaggiore (Vernazza is now a close second). Quickly caught all the colors and buildings and ran back to the station! Not bad for 45 minutes.