My new favorite illustration prompt: #Colour_Collective

I’m putting a spotlight on #Colour_Collective this week because it’s helped me find tons of amazing artwork from many talented illustrators! And I love that all artists and mediums are welcome.

Here’s the skinny. Every Saturday on Twitter @Clr_Collective releases a new color for that week’s inspiration. The following Friday at 19:30 BST (that’s 1:30pm CST, my Midwestern friends), artists of all stripes share artwork inspired by that color and tag it #Colour_Collective.

Here are some of the pieces I’ve made over the past couple weeks and the colors that inspired them.

So, if you’re looking for a smile on Fridays, browse the hashtag for some beautiful art! And if you’re an artist looking for weekly inspiration, join in! The online community around this is awesome. This week’s color is Portland Orange, and I can’t wait to post something new tomorrow and see all the amazing artwork!

BIG NEWS! My debut picture book is going to be published by KWiL!

My debut picture book Hide & Go Seek-A-Saurus is set to be published by Milwaukee’s own KWiL Publishing in Spring 2018! KWiL has a cool business model as a small, startup publisher, and I’m excited to partner with them not only on the book, but also on promotions, community events and more! KWiL’s founder Abby Janowiec and I celebrated the contract signing by hanging out with the book’s main characters Steve and Daryl. We are pretty darn sneaky… 🙂

So what’s Hide & Go Seek-A-Saurus about? I think KWiL puts it nicely:

“After a long and successful run of the Hide & Go Seek-A-Saurus show, Steve and Daryl are retired, relaxed and ready to eat pizza, lots and lots of pizza, until…a kid—the reader—shows up expecting a round of hide-and-go-seek. Reluctant as they may be, this dinomite duo never disappoints; and as soon as they pop the pizza in the oven and go over the rules, the countdown is on.

Alternately talking directly to the reader and arguing with each other over whom the reader found first, Steve and Daryl are a delight, and even more delightful to find, which is what readers are invited to do on three full spreads. Combine dinosaurs, pizza, hilarious countdowns and actual games of hide-and-go- seek, and young readers will be asking to read—or better yet—play with—this book over and over again.”

The story was inspired by several random things, including this drawing I posted in February, which then evolved into these guys:

The look of Steve and Daryl continued to evolve when I sketched out the entire story, so the Steve and Daryl you see in the final book will be a tad different than the drawing above. But I’m in the process of finalizing tweaks to the sketches and manuscript, and then I’m diving into final art. Stay tuned for teasers as it all comes together!