Next Assignment

My favorite assignment in this class, was to create a fully developed picture book character. Before I left California, I pet sat for children's book author Q.L. Pearce, who I had hosted events for over my years at Borders. Q's pet family consisted of 3 dogs, a parakeet, and a rat. I was initially appalled at the idea of taking care of, and possibly touching a rat, but who knew it was possible to fall in love with a rodent? I and my daughter Molly, soon came to adore her. Lacey was polite and tolerated us, but would immediately wash her hands after being touched. She lived in a large cage with several stories. Lacey appeared to have a craft project going on in each room, leaving weaving and macrame projects half done before moving on to the next endeaver. I always thought she would make a fabulous picture book character - here was my chance!

New Work

I just finished a great class at Pacific Northwest College of Art in Portland. The class was called Children's Book Illustration Portfolio and was taught by Writer/Illustrator Victoria Jamieson. It definitely gave me the push I needed to getting moving again with illustration. I had never actually taken an illustration class before, so I learned a lot and the critiques were very helpful.



The first assignment was to illustration a fairy tale of our choice. Here is what I came up with.