The Simple Stuff.

Jumping for Love.

A list for October!
Hands down favourite song of the month: Home by Edward Sharpe and The Magnetic Zeros
Inspiration: Sun Sets and the forever blooming fall flowers, especially those dusty rose ones.
Best Colour: as stated above Dusty Rose.
Flavours: Butter Tarts and Caramel anything!
Fashion: Back to my favourite combo - Jeans and Stripes!
Happiness: Slow dancing in the kitchen surrounded by furry cats and fall foliage.

What's your October list?

Kid Icarus Artist Series Cards!

photos courtesy of Bianca and Mike over at Kid Icarus

So I am so excited about this bit of news I have to share tonight!  The greeting cards I collaborated on with the most excellent folks over at Kid Icarus are all printed up and ready for cuddles!  If you don't know Kid Icarus, please check out their website, and if you are in Toronto make sure you stop by and visit their store/print shop located in the heart of Kensington Market.  These are my first ever greeting cards and I am over the moon with a net collecting stardust, stray sun-rays and bursting with excitement.  I have linked to the Kid Icarus official blog post so you can check out more photos and if you are interested in taking a couple of these guys home, just shoot an email over here with a request: info@kidicarus.ca or stop by the store!

photos courtesy of Bianca and Mike over at Kid Icarus

Journal pages.

cotton dreams.

October is so pretty here in Ontario.  Our trees are getting all fancied up for one last big night out before the winter sleep and it's impossible to not want to join in the party.  Well, I don't know about you, but I can't wait to break out into this gorgeous day and soak up the beauty...let's go!

all through the night.

lake dreams.

Bunny Zine!

All piled high and ready to be fly off to new homes.

The Bunny zine is all wrapped up! I am pretty happy with the results, though some of the water colour was lost in translation, or in the copy machine.  I will learn from this when making my next zine...any ideas what that should be?

And now i would like to make a little list about the good things from this weekend:
1. All night crafting at the workroom, during Nuit Blanche.  Getting to hang with lots and lots of good people...and seeing some old friends and sharing some belly laughs!
2. Butter Tarts...two batches...two emergency phone calls to grandma...still learning.
3. Rainy and cold weekend = long and cozy nap!
4. Good news from oceans away!

Bunnies doing what bunnies do best...hopping.

A bunny sleeping...which is essentially what i did all weekend.

Carrot party, it's a bunny thing.

There are also bunnies on the last page!

A birthday and some bunnies.

Jumping.

First off, I need to send out a huge thank you to the ladies over at Le Funky Mamas, a modern culture blog for mom of today, for featuring my blog as their blog of the month! Totally amazing to be featured on such an awesome and beautiful place here on the internet! Thank you, Thank you!!!

Mom's flowers!

This weekend my sister and i had a party for my mom's birthday.  It was just small and sweet at my place.  We decorated with fabric bunting, flowers and I made my first Angel Food cake from scratch (which turned out somewhat right…but i am not sure it rose to the full extent).  Essentially we had a mother-daughter slumber party.  It was hilarious.  We watched Bridesmaids and feasted on take out.  But the highlight of the night was our spontaneous dance party.  We pulled out some supreme moves.  I made note of our play list for those who would also like some awesome tunes to 'shake a tail' to:

Hold On - Wilson Philips
This Must Be the Place - Talking Heads
Cherish - Madonna
How Bizarre - OMC
Pictures of You - The Cure
Dance With Somebody - Whitney Houston
Ice Ice Baby - Vanilla Ice
River Deep Mountain High - Tina Turner

Process work!

 I am getting closer to finishing up my next zine all about bunnies! I have included some of the process images.  Essentially these are all the cut outs that I will paste onto the zine pages, to make into little scenes, also adding bits of colorful paper to add more colour, and text and line work to add some more details.  I can't wait to finish it off, print some up, fold them up and see what it looks like!  I really hope it works out. 

Bunny dreams.

The clouds and trees.

Ready for the party.

A lonely cupcake

Finally, my latest macarons! Espresso with caramel buttercream filling! Delicious, though while making the caramel some dripped on to the stove element and things got pretty smoky.  Oh the ups and down of baking!

Espresso Macarons with Caramel butter cream filling.

Somewhere in September...

sending postcards to the one i love.

It was a quiet weekend for me.  Lots of puttering and baking.  I put the finishing touches on some pistachio macarons this evening and boy are they tasty! I also did some journal pages and started work on a new little zine...hint: it's full of bunnies!  I hope everyone else had a lovely weekend as well...any highlights?

catching the last tangles of summer in our hands.

good times.

Friends!

framed in branches and forest light.

pistachio macarons!

Mess ups and Macarons

one flower.

I cannot believe that it's been almost two and half years since I set my mind back to my journals and really started to explore and develop an illustrative style.  It has been an excellent journey up to this point, and I feel that my pen and pencil now speak with a distinct Rhya style... it's all very exciting!  That being said, I realize that there is still a long road ahead of me, as I work towards perfecting the translation of the thoughts and characters that frolic through my brain onto paper...or whatever medium they tumble on to. 

Bliss' birthday card.

I make many mistakes...and I am queen of erasing.  But it's usually from the mistakes that I stumble onto different ideas and or realize how I can make my next image stronger.  For example, tonight I made a hand drawn card from my friend Bliss and I am almost happy with the results.  My big error was that I didn't do a preliminary sketch (something I usually do) and thus there are elements on the card that I wish I could go back and change.  I tend to go a little over board with my work, I am always adding another little detail here and there, yet I think I much prefer my minimal work.  Anyhoo...I thought i would post this card up, with some close ups of some of the things I am not 100% satisfied with. Taking a critical eye to your work is always a good exercise...though I try to keep my eye constructive and positive! It helps you understand why you do things and I think it leads to you developing and defining your own process and style.   

Here is where I think i really ran off the rails.  I wanted there to be some colour under my little character...but I should have tested my materials a bit more, as I am not satisfied with the pencil crayon on this paper.  Also, my little character could be higher on the page to help with balance.

Though I really love this style of text and the balloon, I think my scale and spacing was off.  It's not really displayed here, but the 'Happy Day' could be moved down into the space below the balloon.  But I do look forward to do more text like this!

On a totally unrelated note...i have gotten obsessed with trying to perfect the art of macaron making.  I even started a 'macaron' journal! I will get some pics of it at some point.  The photo above is from batch #7, where I got brave enough to add food colouring!  The ultimate goal is to get good enough at making these so I can have them at my wedding....dreams...I have them!

The First of September's Pages.

Autumn. The oranges and yellows started me thinking all about the fall.  It will be here so soon!

These are the first of my September journal pages.  One is made up from things Jessica sent me in the mail and the other is really all about a memory of Kyle and i floating over the lakes in Algonquin...a memory i am going to savor all year long.

Kyle and i floating along.

August's incoming mail.

a lovely letter arrived from jaime on this beautiful stationery!

My August was full of sunshine, moody storms and lots of wonderful letters in my mailbox.  Sometimes I find it hard to keep up with posting all that comes through...and sometimes I want to keep my letters secret.  But now it's time to share! Above and below are photos of letter fragments from these most talented and lovely people: Jaime, Clare, Lindsay, Heather and Jessica! 

Clare sent me a thick package of many many treats! This one really caught my eye. It's like the dead centre of summer caught on paper forever! I am going to keep it close to my desk all through the cold months.

Heather knows me well. Yes, I am a huge Elvis fan...it's true.  She also sent me the most curious lamp...made out of a badminton birdie! It's designed and made by Kiel Mead.  Check out the site, there are tons of interesting things...i am also kind of in love with their heartsmith ring! My brother is a major badminton player. I can't wait to show this to him!

What can i say about this...a post card with the letter R and a Rainbow.  Pretty much the best thing ever! Thanks Jessica!

I love all the blues mixing together here on the back of Jessica's postcard.  There was also a special surprise hidden underneath the ocean of tape and paper.

Lindsay sent me these beautiful hang tags with Jack Layton's words hand written on them, to help spread around the city.

My 6x8 Piece.

The finished piece...untitled for now.

Back in the early days of summer, i ran into my friend Petra at the Paper Place (one of my favourite shops here in toronto). We got to talking about making things and I explained how I was really getting into working with paper again and she recommended I enter the 6x8 Exhibition. The deal with this show is the Paper Place supplies you with one 6x8 piece of Etchu Hagaki 300g kozo paper and from there it's up to you to make something out of it. 

Detail of Wolfy Face.

I just put the finishing touches on my piece tonight, and will be handing it over tomorrow! I decided to build up from the paper, using it as my base and background.  I am fairly happy with the final results, though next time I might go a little more minimal.  Cutting out all the flower details was really time consuming, but very satisfying...but again I still need to work on my technique.  On the whole this was a great project.  I got to try a more detailed diorama and explore a whole new world of papers (all found on the shelves of the paper place!).  I can't wait to see what the other artists did, I saw one sneak peek here!

The grasslands.

Waiting on the night.

Eastbound.

before ink.

i love the pencil lines...but they didn't read as well from a far...but i may start working more in this medium.

More process work.

two of these little guys didn't make it into the piece...they will probably end up in an envelope or my journal.