Easter comes early this year (March 31) and I'm excited to share two new Easter cards I've designed.
The design for the Happy Easter card first popped into my head back in November. The idea came from memories of a large Easter egg hunt my family threw every year at my grandmother's house when I was little. Colorful hand drawn decorative eggs and little bunnies peek behind grass.
The second card is a cross made up of tiny hand drawn flowers and vines set against a pale minty green background. While appropriate for Easter, it can also be used for baptisms, confirmations, and other religious occasions.
This week's card of the week is Thanks Vines, featuring hand-drawn vines. The card comes in two different colorways - a grass green and a medium blue.
One of my favorite things about designing cards is when I'm able to weave the illustration into the lettering so it's almost seamless. Here's a few shots when I first drew the design.
The drawing was done at a much larger scale (about 8" x 12") than the actual card itself (4.25" x 5.5"). Thanks Vines is available as a single card or as a boxed set of 10 cards. You can pick it up in the shop here!
For some reason, I've had turquoise on my mind a lot lately. I love the different shades and used this week's doodle to see how they play off one another. What do you think?
I thought I'd pull back the curtain a bit and give you a peek inside my creative process. Each of the cards you see in the shop is originally drawn by hand - by me! So just how does a design go from an idea in my mind to a sketch to a finished card? Here's a glance at the different steps in my creative process.
Doodling
I find myself doodling a lot. My sketchbooks are filled with random drawings and words. Some go nowhere, some turn into the cards you see for sale on this site, and some I revisit months later with renewed interest. Here's some recent sketches I've done.
Pen to Paper
Usually I'll take a preliminary sketch I've drawn and create something in ink. Sometimes I sketch out the design first in pencil; sometimes I just go for it with ink and hope I don't make a big mistake. Armed with some very fine black ink pens, I'll spend time drawing the motifs or patterns on drawing paper. I'm lucky to have a very steady hand.
Here's the original ink drawings for Thanks Vines, Busy Flowers, and Zinnias. With both of the designs for Busy Flowers and Zinnias, I didn't have a set design in my mind - each piece just grew as I went along.
Clean Up and Color
I scan my artwork and use software on my trusty computer to smooth lines, clean up mistakes, and color the artwork. I love playing around with different color combinations and seeing the different possibilities.
The End Result
The final products printed, scored, and ready to be sold!
