My New Year's Resolutions

Happy New Year everyone, here's to a fantastic 2015!

I don't normally make New Year's resolutions, mainly because I never have any ideas, but this year there are a few things which I hope to do and achieve in 2015.

To give me more motivation to succeed, I've written them out, or rather painted them out, in the style of a journal page.

I really enjoyed making this today. I used it as an excuse to experiment with my Winsor and Newton watercolours. I've never really known how to merge colours successfully, so blending pink into purple was a bit of a challenge! For the most part it worked really well, although the right hand side of the 2015 rectangle looks a bit dodgy.

Anyway, back to my resolutions...

#1 Draw or paint a miniature portrait every week

I've done quite a few miniature portraits now and thought it would be a fun challenge to complete one per week, not only of celebrities but 'normal' people too!

This is my first one of the year, a coloured pencil drawing of Angelina Jolie on brown paper. I think I'll get bored if I do them all in the same medium, so I'll chop and change depending on how I feel!

#2 Make my art business flourish

Those of you who've read my blog for a while will probably know that I work full time and use my spare time for art. 2014 was an exciting year for me as I took more commissions for drawings, paintings and paper cuts than I ever have done before and I hope that 2015 will see many more!

If you would like to help me along with this resolution and commission a piece of art, please let me know! I can do mini portraits like the ones above, paper cuts, paintings, doodles...have a little flick through my blog or Facebook page and see what takes your fancy.

At the moment I'm working on some wedding card paper cutting templates for people to cut themselves. This is one of them. I have another two to cut before they'll be up for sale on Etsy as digital downloads.

#3 Get my ears pierced again

Bit of a weird one this! I've been thinking for a while that I'd like to get my ears pierced again. My sister got her second set done a while ago and I like the way you can wear dangle earrings alongside studs.

#4 Wear high heels to work

Again, another odd one! I walk to work every day, so wearing heels isn't really practical, but some of the girls keep a set at work to change into. I do like wearing heels, so thought I'd give it a go. Not sure how long this resolution will last!

In other news...

I ordered some new pens the other day and decided to put them through their paces to create a mandala. This is far from finished and there will be more inking on the section you can see here, but I'm very pleased with it at the moment!

I had a sudden urge to draw octopuses (octopi?) so they've made it into one of the rings!

Not sure what to include in the outer rings, so if you have any suggestions, let me know!

Finally, I'll leave you with a photo of Croyde beach where we started our walk to Saunton today.

I'm sharing this post on the following blogs: Paint Party Friday, The Queen of Creativity and Blue Chair Diary Illustrations!

New papercutting templates in the pipeline!

I finished my map of the Thames this week! It's all scanned and ready to be printed in a guide for Le Boat in the new year. I can't show you the finished map yet as I painted it in two parts and it's scanned in sections to be knitted together and labelled by their graphic designer. I can't wait to see it all in one piece and will share it with you as soon as I can!

New papercutting templates

This weekend, in between Christmassy bits and bobs and a celebratory dinner for Sam's mum's birthday, I've been working on a new set of paper cut templates to sell in January. I've designed four wedding card templates which will all be sold together.

This is the first one which I cut out today.

I'm going to save all of the originals as I have a few friends and family getting married next year. I hope they don't read my blog in the meantime else they won't be very surprised!

A recent commission

As I don't have much new work to share with you today, I thought I'd show you this paper cut which I was commissioned to do by my Aunty for my cousin's girlfriend. It contains lots of little bits and bobs which represent her and their family.

It's been a while since I've done a paper cut like this so I'm looking forward to hopefully doing some more next year.

My favourite bits of this one are the teapots and the bumblebees - both things which I'm very fond of!

Elf on the Shelf

I have had an extra responsibility this weekend too. I had to look after the work elf, Derek. He's an 'elf on the shelf', which, if you don't know, is Father Christmas' helper who has been sent to keep an eye on children's behaviour in the run up to Christmas. He's not particularly well-behaved himself though, and gets up to all sorts of mischief during the night!

Anyway, on Saturday he came with me to Living Coasts in Torquay where he tried to make friends with the penguins but unfortunately, his efforts weren't really reciprocated. In fact, the penguins were downright mean!

 I love the way Derek appears to be looking at them out of the corner of his eye!

Luckily, he was rescued before they could do any lasting damage!

Thank you

I found out this week that my blog has unfortunately not been shortlisted in the National UK Blog Awards but I just want to say thank you to everyone who voted. I was very touched by all your support and will be entering again next year!

Happy Christmas!

Finally, I wish you all a very merry Christmas filled with lots of love, laughter, mince pies and cheesy Christmas classics!

I'm sharing this post on Blue Chair Diary Illustrations!

Detailed paper cut template: World design

Those of you who follow my facebook page will have already seen this, so I apologise if it's old news! I'm very excited that my first proper paper cut template is now available to download from my Etsy shop. The design is based on a paper cut I did a while ago.

It's been a bit of a learning curve as I normally hand draw all of my templates, which is fine for when I'm cutting them myself, but to expect someone else to follow my wonky lines and rubbings out is a bit too much to ask! So I've spent a bit of time a lot of time getting to know a free program called Inkscape which you can download here if you've got the next three days to spend getting to grips with it! Seriously though, it's very good because you can make vector images which is great because they can be scaled up and down with no loss of quality.

Anyway, enough about the design process, this is the paper cut which you can make from the template which can be downloaded from my shop.

For those of you who would like to give it a go, I thought I'd include a few tips in this blog post.

• When cutting, start from the middle and work outwards; that way you're not weakening the paper around the edge before you've cut the middle. Cutting around the edge of the whole design should be the last thing you do. You can also leave it with a solid border if you like, depending on how you plan to frame it.

• Use the same rule for cutting each individual element, for example, cut the windows out of the bus before cutting the outline.

• When cutting the circles I find it easiest to cut half, then turn the paper to cut the other half. I'm better at cutting curves around to the right (if that makes sense) so just find out what works best for you. 

• For fiddly bits like the countries of the world, use the tip of your finger to hold the paper firm, but be careful not to slip and chop it off!

• Finally, just take it slowly, make sure your blade is nice and sharp and don't press too firmly. Your movements should be steady but not stiff, else you'll end up with straight lines where you want curves!

I hope that helps, I've love to see how you get on if you give it a go!

Just a short post today as I will be back tomorrow to take part in the Blogland Tour which is a great way to discover new blogs.

I'll leave you with these few photos taken on our bike ride along the Tarka Trail today.

I'm sharing this post on the following blogs:  Handmade Harbour, Manon Popje's Illustrations, Nifty Thrifty Things, Be Different Act Normal and Tatertots and Jello.

Indian-style paper cut

Hello! Last week I was painting a dog portrait which I still haven't had chance to finish! Instead I've been working on a couple of other commissions, which has also been fun.

I can share this work in progress with you as it's for my sister who has asked me to design a piece for an Indian Summer marketing campaign she'll be running for her business later this year. After doing a bit of research on Indian designs, I decided that the beautiful patterns lent themselves to being transformed into an intricate paper cut.

This is it so far, held up to the window with yellow paper behind.

I think I'll back it with a mix of colours though, to reflect the Indian Summer theme.

I loved drawing out the pattern, filling out an A4 piece of paper with raindrop shapes, loops, flowers, fans and circles. It was like doodling!

Cutting it has been really good fun too, I love all the little curves and intricate shapes. The fish scale pattern shown in the picture above is one of my favourites!

There's still quite a way to go, so I better get back to cutting! I'll leave you with this photo of Sam and other kitesurfers at Westward Ho! today. :)

I'm sharing this post on the following blogs: Nifty Thrifty Things, Handmade Harbour, Manon Popje's Illustrations, Be Different Act Normal and Tatertots and Jello.

Pet portrait painting in progress - that's a lot of p's!

Hi everyone! I've been hard at work on a few commissions this week which is great fun!

I've had the house to myself as Sam has been away on a stag weekend, so it's been good to have plenty of time for painting.

This pet portrait is the main piece I've been working on. It's still not finished, in fact there's quite a way to go.

I've got to paint all the little hairs on the ear, add detail to the nose, finish the collar and tags and refine the shading.

I've been taking photos at each stage and am hoping to make them into a video when I'm finished. Until then, here are a few to show how it's progressed.

The last image in that series shows the dog looking very dark. To lighten it up I've painted tiny white hairs over the whole thing which I will then cover with a tan coloured wash to bring it all together.

I'm working in acrylic paint because it dries nice and quickly, allowing layers to be built up with no drying time in between. I've never tried oils but would love to have a go!

Here's where I've been working at the dining room table. It now has a few nice acrylic splodges...shh!

This week I've also been working on a paper cut kirigami cityscape. I'm still only at the cutting stage, the windows are taking ages! Eventually, when all the details have been cut, I'll fold it and it'll magically turn into a 3D city. Well, here's hoping. The last kirigami I did went wrong, so fingers crossed I've got the measurements right on this one.

Next Sunday, I'll hopefully have a finished pet portrait to show you!

If you've enjoyed this post, please pop by my Facebook page. I update it regularly during the week and I'd love to welcome some new faces!

I'm sharing this post on the following blogs: Paint Party Friday, Handmade Harbour, Be Different Act Normal, Manon Popje's Illustrations and Tatertots and Jello.

3D paper cut buildings

We've had a very busy and enjoyable weekend down in South Devon seeing family and friends, but Sunday evening has, yet again, arrived too soon. It has a horrible habit of turning up when it's least wanted!

It's not been a quiet week craft-wise either.

I'm so happy to have finally framed this paper cut. From finding the perfect shade of olive green to tracking down a suitable-size frame, it took the whole of Saturday morning but I think it was worth it.

It turns out Sainsbury's is a good place for frame shopping! The raised layered mount really suits the paper cut.

I have a to-do list in my bedside table which is where I record ideas for art and crafts which fleetingly pop into my head. I write them down because I'm bound to forget about them if I don't, and when I have some spare time, I work on one.

This idea was for a paper cut resembling knitted fabric. Although I trawled the internet for knitted folds falling in just the right way, I couldn't find anything which matched the image in my head, so I grabbed a jumper, threw it down and took my own reference photo!

It's raised in places because it's not stuck down yet. I can never make up my mind about finishing touches and once an idea's been ticked off my list I move onto the next without spending time on boring bits like mounting and framing!

Another idea is this 3D architectural paper cut, inspired by the amazing creations of by Marc Hagan-Guirey of Paper Dandy. This style of paper cut involving folding is known as 'kirigami'. My first one was small and a little rough (you can see the lines from incorrect folds in the top two small buildings), but it left me full of ideas for more.

The next one I cut was a little more ambitious, but my measuring let me down, making it a bit wonky!

Can you see the cuts extending from the tops of the buildings on the right hand side? Well, they shouldn't be there!

They look lovely with light coming from behind them. Here's a photo including my mitt for scale.

 Below is how they start life, on a flat sheet of paper with lots of measuring involved!

I'm not finished with them yet though, watch this space for more!

While at Mum and Dad's this weekend I 'borrowed' their scanner and printer to prepare my next design ready for paper cutting. I drew it out by hand on a piece of white A4 paper, scanned it in, and printed it out on dark blue. I find it easier to draw designs out first on rough paper so that any rubbings out don't damage the good quality paper. If they're A4, it's then easy to copy them onto the chosen paper for cutting.

Finally, I'll leave you to ponder what I could possibly do with these tiles and glue! As an art and craft blogger I've been invited to take part in a mosaic competition by Topps Tiles who sent these materials out to me to play with. I'll be working on my entry this week and hopefully including it in next week's blog post!

I'm linking to today's post on the following blogs: Handmade Harbour, Weekend Doings, Be Different Act Normal and Manon Popje's Illustrations.

All good things come to an end...

...so the saying goes, and holidays are no exception! We arrived home at 3am this morning after a week in beautiful, sunny Praia da Luz in Portugal. True to good old English form, it rained as we drove home.

The tan is already fading and it's back to work tomorrow; it's beginning to feel like the last week was just a lovely dream!

We stayed with friends in an incredible villa on a hill overlooking the beach at Praia da Luz. I would definitely recommend James Villas, the villa was extremely clean, service was excellent and there was always someone on hand to help (if, like us, you're silly enough to lock yourself out for example).

I painted this watercolour from the balcony. I wanted to capture the subtle colours of the terracotta rooves and cool white buildings against the backdrop of lush green trees and gorgeous blue sea.

Just to prove it did happen and it isn't just a figment of my imagination, here I am, painting.

Here's the painting and view for comparison. I tried to be accurate but used a little artistic license!

I didn't quite get round to finishing this one, a painting of the contents of my suitcase.

I have to admit there were a few more clothes than pictured here!

This little drawing contains all our memories from our holiday. I thought it might look nice with a bit of colour and framed, but I expect I'll get too caught up in new projects to finish this one!

Today I finished sketching out a paper cut which I hope to start next weekend as I need to borrow my Mum and Dad's scanner to transfer it to the cutting paper!

It'll be the most intricate one I've done yet but I'm really excited about getting started.

I designed it for the Papercutting Workshop 'transportation' challenge on Facebook. The following photos show a bit more of the detail.

The pencil gives a bit of perspective to show how teeny it is!

I'll leave you with a few more of my holiday snaps, hope you've all had a lovely week! Don't forget you can also find me on Facebook and Twitter which I update in between blogs :)

PS. Please don't hesitate to get in touch if you're interested in commissioning a paper cut; I've finished a couple for other people now and really enjoy them!

I'm sharing this post on the following blogs: Manon Popje's Illustrations, Be Different Act Normal, Handmade Harbour and Sunny Simple Life.

Hamish, hearts and happy times

I forgot to mention in my last post, but it has been a whole year since I started writing my blog!

The 12 months since that very first post written in Malaysian Borneo has been a whirlwind. Finishing our travels, starting new jobs, moving house twice, meeting new people and of course a whole lot of creative bits and bobs in between have made this year fly past at 100 miles an hour. I've enjoyed every minute and am so glad to have this blog as reminder of all the good things which have happened.

Now I have a lovely group of followers on Facebook and Twitter, some great online 'blogger' friends and commissions to keep me busy in my spare time! Thank you to all who've been there from the beginning and those who've joined me along the way. :)

Now, on to this week's projects!

This is my latest paper cut heart, a (slightly belated) housewarming present for some friends. I asked for a list of what they would like included and drew out the design by hand before I started to cut. Can you spot a kite surfer, cupcakes, butterfly, teapot and teacups, poppies, hearts, Dartmoor, wine, stars, bees, 'love' and a bike?

Copyright Clare Willcocks

Here are a couple of close-ups. The kite surfer is about as small as my fingernail. I think I'll replace this background colour with a dark olive green to frame it.

This bank holiday weekend has been quite a productive one as I also managed to get started on another lovely piece. The 'Hamish' in today's post title was a very special Scottie dog of whom very few photos were taken, so this paper cut is to remember him by.

It's designed in a similar style to the cat paper cut which I did recently, although this time I've decided to feature the dogs and doggy bits and pieces as negative space.

It still has a little way to go but it's a lovely one to cut. As always, it started out as a hand-drawn design in reverse, rubbed out and tweaked until I was happy!

In fact, I've done quite a bit of drawing this weekend. This is a biro sketch I did while watching Sam fishing in Shaldon, South Devon.

Finally, I'll leave you with these photos taken on our walk today from Mortehoe, just a little further up the coast from Woolacombe in North Devon. We took a picnic and followed a circular route up and down along the cliffs and then back around to the village, finishing with a cup of tea in Town Farmhouse café.

Woolacombe beach looked very busy, it's clear that summer's on its way!

The bottom right photo below is a thumb-sized caterpillar which we came across on the path.

A nosy little lamb watched us from a precarious position where it was munching grass.

I ended up with loads of photos of these little pink flowers!

And that's all for today! I would love for you to pop by my Facebook page with a like if you haven't already.

Also, don't forget that if you'd like to have a go at paper cutting yourself, my free template and tutorial can be found on Hope and Chances Creativity. :)

Today I'm sharing this post on the following blogs: Handmade Harbour, Manon Popje's Illustrations, Be Different Act Normal and Beyond the Picket Fence.