Metamorphous
Today is the first day of 2021. It’s New Year’s Day.
When I think about this past year and try to sum it up, the only word I can find is metamorphosis. My life today is so different from what it was on this day last year, it has forever been changed. In the past, I’ve found myself spending New Year’s Day making notes about all the things I’ll do differently. Today I’m just wishing I could have some of the things I lost last year back.
I drew this New Year’s Day using the Procreate App on my iPad.
Today is the first day of 2021. It’s New Year’s Day.
When I think about this past year and try to sum it up, the only word I can find is metamorphosis. My life today is so different from what it was on this day last year, it has forever been changed. In the past, I’ve found myself spending New Year’s Day making notes about all the things I’ll do differently. Today I’m just wishing I could have some of the things I lost last year back.
I think we all lost some of our freedom last year as a result of this “pandemic” and that’s been weighing heavily on me. All of the things I used to take for granted. Things I never imagined would be something I’d ever find myself missing. Freedom to travel, freedom to go to the grocery store without covering my face, freedom to send my kids to school. A lot of people welcomed the extra time at home and it was nice for my family at first too, but when 2 weeks turned into the rest of the year and the work slowed to almost a halt for me, it wasn’t nice anymore. I know I’m not the only one, but I just have to vent a little, I’m tired of it. I’ll take the new year, but not the “pandemic”.
As if 2020 was a cruel joke, the pandemic was minor compared to other things the year had for us. We lost my Grandpa in April, followed by our dear friend and neighbor, Ryan (who was only 37) in June to the ocean, the next month my stepdad was taken by the lake. And then as if three wasn’t enough, my younger sister who was only 27 passed away right before Thanksgiving. I spent the last month of 2020 full of anxiety wondering who would be next.
2020 was an absolute nightmare.
However, when the clock struck 12 this morning on January 1st, 2021, I was still standing. In retrospect, I have a lot to be thankful for and while I’m still processing the events of 2020, I’ve learned a lot and my outlook today is so different from what it was on this day last year. As doors closed, other doors opened. Life has changed and will keep changing. Our family grew by three when my nieces and nephew came to live with us. There are 6 kids in my house now and they are all thriving, every day is an adventure. My husband made it through his first year of retirement from the U.S. Army and has a job that he loves. We have the most amazing neighbors, friends, and extended family. My husband also gave me his “woodshop” and we converted it into a studio for me (more to come on that when it’s 100% finished) so I can hopefully get back to making art and being productive regardless of if the kids are at home or not.
2021, I don’t know what’s in store but I think it’s best to just take it a day at a time.
Stitchy Halloween
Stitchy Halloween is my best selling design on Spoonflower!
My most popular design on Spoonflower lately has been Stitchy Halloween which features a black cat. A few weeks ago someone sent me a message and asked if I could create another version of that design with a bunny. I thought it was a great idea and then from that idea I created several more coordinates. Now Stitchy Halloween has 25 designs and I can’t wait to see what everyone makes from these designs. So check it out, share with your friends and be sure to order your fabric soon because Halloween is going to come fast!
An overview of the collection. Click to see in larger sizes in my Spoonflower shop.
Free Font!
It took me forever, but I finally got around to using the fontself maker plug-in to make a font. It’s not perfect but I did it and I’m sharing the font with anyone who wants it. So here it is and a quick read to go with it.
Click to download a free copy of this font.
(for personal use only)
A work in progress shot. Quick and chunky did the trick.
A few years ago I bought a license to Fontself Maker and had grand plans to start making my own fonts. I installed it, opened it and never used it. At least once a week since then I would get the fontself newsletter, feel guilty about having had spent money on something I wasn’t using and think I really needed to set some time aside to make a font. Sometimes I’d get as far as drawing out (a few) letterforms but then I’d abandon task, mostly because I was seriously overthinking it. Even now as I’m typing this I’m thinking “is letterform the right word to describe a letter”. Anyway, today was the day. My son made a huge mess on my desk with chalk pastels and as I was cleaning them up I felt compelled to see what the alphabet would look like if I wrote it with the squared off shape of the pastel. It looked pretty good and it took me less than a minute! I took a picture of my work, drew over it on my iPad (using procreate) and then after converting everything to vector art, I used the adobe illustrator version of fontself to create my font. Fontself Maker was surprisingly easy to use- after I read the directions- something I had previously failed to do. So here’s my font, I named it "Cappy the first” because it’s all caps and it’s my first successful try in Fontself Maker. Go ahead and give it a try (personal use only please). It’s not perfect and I’ve still got a lot to learn, but I did it! I plan to practice in the coming weeks so hopefully I’ll have another fun font to share soon!
If you’d like to make your own font, here’s a link to get 10% off Fontself Maker. The plug-in is available for Adobe Illustrator, Photoshop or both.
Newish design for Birdsong's IPA Series
New year, newish design for Birdsong Brewing Company’s 2019 IPA series.
New year, newish design for Birdsong Brewing Company’s 2019 IPA series. Here’s the first of them with the patterned background that’s been affectionately called the Hopsaic. It’s a bigger and blockier version of the design I did for them last year.
I hope everyone loves this one as much as they loved the last one! To see more of my art on their cans, check out Birdsong’s Instagram.
Otterly in love with this otter!
New enamel pin in my Etsy shop! Plus see how this otter has evolved in the three years since I originally drew it.
Back in 2016 I created a fun little pattern that I called Significant otter that featured a happy blue otter clutching a pink heart, I redid the design last year (2018) because I loved the otter but didnt feel like the pattern had a good flow to it. When I changed the pattern I also changed the color of the otter. Then this year (2019) I decided to bring my otter back into the spotlight and make it into a pin so here it is! With another color change. Now she’s white and with a touch of blue. I just love this little pin and I’m expecting she’ll be a hit in my Etsy shop. It’s fun to bring old designs back and make them new again.
To buy this pin for yourself or to give as a gift visit my Etsy shop: ShopJackieHurd.etsy.com
Recycle your Boxes into DIY Gift Tags
If you’re like me and forgot to buy gift tags but are so over Christmas shopping that you don’t want to step foot into another store to pick some up, this is your opportunity to recycle some of those boxes into gift tags.
Tis the season for lots of shopping and if you buy online, almost everything comes in a box or with cardboard inserts. Sometimes the cardboard is kind of nice, fancy on one side, blank on the other or in such good shape that it seems like a waste to throw it away. If you’re like me and forgot to buy gift tags but are so over Christmas shopping that you don’t want to step foot into another store to pick some up, this is your opportunity to recycle some of those boxes into gift tags. I did just that with a few small boxes I found in my studio. They were white on one side and plain on the other. I dug out some acrylic gauche and painted the white side. The photos I took are pretty self explanatory but for those who just like things that come with instructions, here’s a few tips and things you might need to make your own DIY holiday gift tags.
Supplies:
Cardboard- on the thinner side will be easier to cut
Scissors or cutting board
Ribbon or Twine
Paint or markers- I used acrylic gauche
Hole punch
Make It
Trim your cardboard into as many rectangles as you can. 2” wide and 3” long is a good starting point Mine are various sizes because variety is fun.
After you have your rectangles made, trim off the top two corners, be careful not to trim them too much, you’ll want the middle of the tag to remain straight.
Punch a hole in the middle of the two corners about 1/8” down from the top of the tag.
Get out your paint or markers and add your festive flair. I left enough room on each tag to right names, but you can always paint or draw on the entire front and save the back for names.
Cut your ribbon or twine into 10” pieces and then loop them through the holes leaving the ends untied so you can secure them to your gift bags or gifts.
And that’s it, it’s that easy! Save those boxes and make some tags.
Tags cut from extra gift boxes
Have fun and paint whatever you’d like on your tags.
Once your tags are dry, add the ribbon and then tie the to a wrapped gift.
You can find the gnome enamel pin I’ve used to pin the ribbon in my Etsy shop.
Take me to the Pines
To all of my art, there’s a story. This is the story behind my latest Enamel Pin, “Take me to the Pines”. When I was 11 my mom’s husband at the time, Jim, went on a trip to North Carolina. At the time we were living in New Britain, Connecticut. Connecticut was where I was born, where my whole family lived and a place I never imagined I would leave.
To all of my art, there’s a story. This is the story behind my latest Enamel Pin, “Take me to the Pines”.
When I was 11, my mom’s husband at the time, Jim, went on a trip to North Carolina. At the time we were living in New Britain, Connecticut. Connecticut was where I was born, where my whole family lived and a place I never imagined I would leave. When Jim came back from his trip he announced that he got a job for a NASCAR driver and that we would be moving to North Carolina. Within 6 months we found ourselves in a little town called Siler City. Talk about culture shock. From a big city where I fell asleep to sirens and honking horns to a house surrounded by nothing but drab looking pastures and cows for at least a mile. There were even cows in our front yard! The silence was odd. I wasn’t used to falling asleep to crickets.
I was the new kid in 7th grade at a school called Silk Hope, also surrounded by fields and cows. Instead of walking through busy blocks of brick buildings with city sounds and smells to get to school, I rode the bus for what seemed like hours with weird sounding country kids and farm smells. In the months leading up to the move, I imagined that being the new kid was going to be a fun new start with fun new friends. To my disapointment, everyone had already made their friends; way back when their own parents were in Kindergarten at the very same school. New kids weren’t very common in Silk Hope, plus I was way too different to fit in. I talked funny. I was weird. I was a “Yankee”.
Being the new kid in a small town was not fun. Even though I eventually made a few good friends who remained my friends throughout high school and beyond, the new kid feeling never wore off. Siler City never really felt like home. When I found myself on my own and able to leave at 16 (long story that I’ll save for another time), I bounced around from Connecticut to Florida and then back to Siler City before finally joining the Air Force and escaping to Missouri.
I thought I had left Siler City for good, but after the Air Force I somehow ended up back in Siler City. Had I lost my mind? I was a single parent and my family (though now scattered and divided) lived in Siler City. I kept telling myself that eventually it would feel like home. I enrolled my daughter in kindergarten at Siler City Elementary and drove from Siler City to my job on Fort Bragg every single day. An hour drive each way. The thought of moving closer didn’t cross my mind because the other cities and towns I drove through weren’t any more appealing.
But then something happened that changed everything.
A friend of mine insisted I join her for dinner one night in a town sort of near Fort Bragg that I had never heard of called Southern Pines. We dined on the patio of a neat little downtown restaurant called The Bell Tree Tavern and I was in awe! Afterwards I drove around admiring the cozy downtown with buildings and houses that reminded me of New England. I knew instantly that Southern Pines could be my home. Within a few weeks my daughter and I were living in Southern Pines. Soon after I met and fell in love with Tom, we got married, bought a house with a yard full of pine trees and our family grew to 6. It didn’t take much for this place to become home. Here in this town surrounded by long leaf pines, everything seems to fall perfectly into place, this is where I feel happiest. This is home.
Because my flowers are gone
Here’s the first of my “because my flowers are gone I will just draw them until they come back” illustrations.
We finally had our first frost here in North Carolina and it was heart breaking to see how fast my Japanese Maple dropped its’ leaves! And all of the flowers except my camellias are done for the year. Thank goodness for camellias! They’ll get me through until the spring along with a strong drive to draw flowers until the real ones return. I think that’s why there is so much floral art out there- we artists long for the wild colors, shapes and textures. So get ready- I might be producing excessive amounts of floral illustrations and patterns over the next few months. Here’s the first of my “because my flowers are gone I will just draw them until they come back” illustrations. I’ve made it available as a set of note cards (there’s also a separate listing for an individual card). Coincidentally, they go nicely with my unicorn pin!
It starts off sloppy
Read about why I’ve gone digital for most of my art, this cute Weimaraner waiting under the mistletoe card and watch the time-lapse of me drawing it.
I fought the digital transition for a long time because I REALLY love pens and paper- I love ink! But there’s a major problem with pens and me- there’s no undo. I didnt even realize this was a problem until I started drawing using procreate on my iPad with features like tap once to undo a mistake! Amazing. After a few iPad drawing sessions, when faced with ink on paper, I found myself attempting to tap to remove a misplaced line- with no luck of course! As a result I’ve been drawing exclusively on my ipad pro for a few months now. My poor pens are feeling awfully neglected- and my sketchbooks are being filled with fire trucks by my 6 year old, Miles. But I’m having too much fun to turn back. The best part about drawing digitally is that I can record my process, that’s actually the real reason I’m writing this post. I wanted to share how sloppy a drawing originally starts off. I feel like this is important because artist or not, we all start off with a sloppy sketch and more often than not, abandon that sketch thinking it’s a waste. In this video you’ll see that my initial sketch looks nothing like my final drawing. After I was finished I exported my drawing into photoshop where I finished it into a greeting card.
What do you think? If you’d like to see more of these time lapses, let me know!
Also, you can buy this and other greeting cards in my Etsy shop as a single card or as a set.
Small Business Saturday- Visit my studio!
Visit my Southern Pines studio located at 175 W. Pennsylvania Ave., this Saturday, November 24th from noon-5pm.
My enamel pins (they make great stocking stuffers) will be available for purchase along with a variety of illustrated holiday greeting cards.
Options for personalized cards will also be available.
Here’s a peek at some of the cards that I’ll have available with more on the way.
You can buy them in my Etsy shop now if you’d like but I will be offering special pricing for in-person orders this Saturday.
Special holiday gnome pins available! Aren’t they cute?
Will you be stopping in? Let me know in the comments or send me an email.