The Silly Season

The silly season (otherwise known as 'Christmas') is now well and truly upon us. Apparently Christmas is all about the birth of Christ, but the mags that arrive in my weekend paper seem to suggest that its more about buying expensive useless junk for people just because we're expected to.

Sorry for being a bah-humbug, but at times Christmas really gets me down a bit. I often feel great pressure when it comes to buying gifts; advertising suggests that if we 'truly' love/care about someone, we'll match how we feel about them with the gifts we buy. I received a marketing email this afternoon that went something like, 'Say NO to socks and jocks!'

Now, I know socks and jocks are a bit boring, but they're practical and we need them right? So essentially they're not that bad!

This year I promised myself that rather than focussing on buying the perfect gifts for my family members, I'm going to instead focus on spending quality time with the people I care about, and the people that care about me...

...But only after I've completed my Christmas shopping.

A New Adventure

A few weeks ago I bought a small ship in a bottle at a little boutique shop in Bendigo. I bought this whimsical little piece as inspiration for my next children's picture book. I'd love to do a follow on from my last solo book project, The Box Boy. It's something I've wanted to do for ages, but just haven't had the time, work and everything else in life has just taken over for the last 3-4 years. About a month ago I also turned the ripe of age of 30... Eeek! So now that I'm all wise and knowledgeable (joking), I think its time to dust off my watercolours and set sail on a new creative adventure.

The photo below is a watercolour illustration of the ship in a bottle that I bought as inspiration. With a bit of luck there might be more to come, and a sequel to The Box Boy.

Spring Racing

Here's a cartoon I made this time last year... Inspired by the Melbourne Cup.

The Reality of Movember

Here's a little cartoon I made last night, to celebrate the first day of Movember. While the cartoon below may be true for some, its still an awesome cause and one that is very much worth supporting.

Departure

Today I had the final class of the year with my current cohort of Visual Communication Design students for 2013. I always find this to be a very emotional time of the year. Partly because I'm completely exhausted, but mainly because I've never been good at saying 'goodbye'. After working with my students over the course of a year, I've seen them all quickly grow into a group of young adults, each with their own values, views on the way they see the world around them, and each with positive futures ahead of them. Today my one piece of advice before we parted was the following quote below. It's one that I remember seeing somewhere a long while ago, I can't remember where or when, but I've never forgotten it. Its a quote that I try to live by: