So! Long time no post.... Whoops. So yea.... Biggest news first I suppose and then I will probably ramble as I do usually...

So for people who follow me on Instagram, you will more than likely already know. So Pete and I are officially new home owners! We are moved in and everything! 

For those of you that don't have me on Instagram, here are a few images that I have posted in the last month about our adventures and moving in. Clearly I have been so busy I haven't really had time to put up many.
So first image is Pete literally picking up the keys to our new gaff. I was proper raging, as he got out of work early and I still had to stay in until 5. He at least waited for me before going to the house. 2nd image is the first neighbor we met, very nosy! we later found out that this fluffy high member of the neighbor hood watch is called buster.
3rd is just us "Getting our ducks in a row" figuring out whats what.

I have to admit the first few weeks since moving in, I still feel as though I am house sitting. I have just decided to move all my crap here and try to invoke squatting rights. I am told this is normal though. It's all still very new and strange, I am sure a few people reading this are thinking I am mental.... cheers!

I have even been getting into gardening as we have an amazing little garden here, previous owner kindly left us all her amazing plants, we have apple and pear trees. Blueberry, blackberry, gooseberries, strawberries, raspberries and  any other berry plant. Tomatoes and loads of herbs, still haven't gotten round to weeding everything..... It's still on the very large to do list.

Here's a couple of photos of our pear and apple trees. We have also had a few visitors of the four legged fluffy kind to our little garden........ And because I have nothing else to do with my time and we haven't yet been told what their names are. We have named them! so on the bottom right we have Toothless, the middle image is of Gandalf (because he's grey) and Charlie.... cause of the mustache.... yea...... and well you guys already know Valentino. He crawled in the back of our nephews pram and decided it was his new home.... Couldn't resist not putting him up. 

​So enough about my wee hoouse. Work wise, things kind of took a turn for the worst. Literally the week we were going to sign for the house, I was moved from being in house designer to dispatch... Basically the company I work for is incredibly small only 6 of us working there and basically they wanted more support for the actual printing team and basically shuffled everyone's jobs about.

From the company point of view I honestly think it was the right thing to do. It makes total sense. From my point of view, I was completely devastated.

​A lot of people thought I was being a bit over dramatic about the change. I honestly cried for days after it happened, I just felt like I could finally be one of those.....

.....Who say they love their job and everyone pretty much hates....
I was finally doing a job I enjoyed, I had free rein and I actually enjoyed going to work. I even felt like a woman scorned and seriously contemplated walking out.
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But being an adult and suddenly having a mortgage, mind over heart won.

Not the everything is as doom and gloom as I make it sound. I have to admit though (not that I have been doing my new role long) It really isn't all that bad. I still really miss doing design, its on my mind all the time. I am still from time to time asked to do a few things for customers design wise. We even got a big new sexy machine in work. We are now able to do spot UV and foiling. 

I have even been asked to design a marketing card for the company to use, to send out and show off what we are now able to do on top of everything else. However, after today I feel like the excitement for that was short lived. Due to with my new role I don't really have to much time to do anything mind blowing. I am pretty sure my boss got too excited and ended up just stealing images off google..... 

BUT! now that we have our own place I feel that I was just practicing and getting back into the way of things with using Photoshop and Illustrator. I plan to keep it going whether I am designing on commission or just doing arty farty things for myself. I may continue down the path of wedding stationery, I am not too sure. 

Either way I don't plan to give it up and I feel that after leaving university and having a bit of a fall out with all things arty is finally over. I want to do it all the time, I want to get better at it and I want to keep exploring and practicing. Just doing loads of different things. So I am still getting my office sorted in me hoouse, but I am hoping by the end of this month I will have everything semi set up. 

Plus now that my company has this new toy, I am hoping to maybe get new business cards done. As I very cleverly, locked myself out of my arty email address.... NIIIIIIIIICCCCCCCEEE!

so yea, I finally got a few of my designs that I did design for work. Here are a few of them. Hope you like them. 

The only other piece of design I have really done lately that isn't work related was making a cheesy poster for my partner. Yesterday was our 6 year anniversary.... Scarily all grown up now and proper with having a house together. I decided to make something for the house and for him. It was a song that we were pretty into when we first met and were getting to know each other. So yea... I guess you could call it "our song". (Slightly want to throw up with all the cheesiness). Anyways here is the poster I made 

So yea... that's all from me this month, here's hoping next month is as fun packed!

Happy Pancake Day! and belated valentines day!
​So a hell of a lot of stuff has happened in this short little month, all good and I'd even go as far to say great things!

Yep, I said it! and it is all a little scary too.
So first of all, I got a promotion in work to starting to design some wedding stationary. I am having an absolute blast! I was a little worried about getting back into things but I have been designing a few things such as order of services, RSVP's, wedding invitations. I even have my first wedding customers. It's all very slow at the moment, the usual you get with clients.... they give you such little information on what they want. So you do your best. Then when you go back to them, they want something completely different. It's all part of the job.

Here is what I designed. The top three designs are in order, wedding day invite, RSVP, and order of service. the bottom three are basically the inside or the other side of these.
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​I even got a new computer with my promotion and everything! 

before and after

It's so pretty!
​I also had a pretty good Valentines day. If you follow me on instagram you probably already saw it. Came home and my partner just told me we were going to bake. So we made stone age Nordic bread and brownies. I have to admit the Nordic bread was my absolute favorite. So tasty! I think pete has to work on his brownie making skills though :P

Lush!
​As most of you probably already know, I have started to house hunt with my partner, we've even started to shop for our invisible house. Our little Ikea starter kit.

House hunting has been so stressful! but things are definitely looking up, and keeping me super busy!
That's really all from me for this month, next month my post may be a little late due to going on Holiday to none other than....

HAPPY PANCAKE DAY!!

Little bit late with this months blog. I blame Halloween being way too awesome!

So I have actually been up to a lot of stuff this month, not only designing new random things, but...... yea you know what that is basically all I have been doing. So first thing, I am a huge fan of Rock n Roll Bride. and after seeing a photo from their facebook page. I decided to create something a little different.

You may or may not have seen this clue on my Instagram. (little bit of back story) I'm currently working at a printing company, we print a lot of designs for wedding stationery designers soooooooooooooo I thought I'd try my hand at it and after seeing the below picture from the Rock n Roll Bride magazine.  

So you've probably guessed it by now. I made dinosaur themed wedding invitations. Now I haven't yet finished it entirely but you get the idea 

SOOOOOOOOOO MUCH FUN MAKING THIS!!!

So yea hoping this month I will be able to get this finished as well as a few other designs I noticed I started and just due to life I haven't managed to get back to finish. So that is my goal for this month. 

So for Halloween I did a few different things.  

I went to the Crumblin Road Gaol paranormal tour in Belfast. I have to say I didn't see any ghosties, but it was.... interesting, but I have to admit it made me really want to do the actual tour. The most eerie thing that happened on the tour, and also turned out to be the funniest thing. We were standing in the hanging room where they had hung 15 of the 17 men to have been executed at the Gaol (I hope I remembered my numbers right) and when the tour guide began to call upon the last man who had been executed, the whole room fell silent waiting for any noise, any chance of a sign from beyond the grave. All we could hear was an ice cream truck's cheery music about a mile away from the gaol.

Of course there was also pumpkins to be had...... many many pumpkins

I basically sat the rest of Halloween carving pumpkins and watching scary movies. Speaking of scary movies, I even went to see John Carpenter's The Fog in the Barge in Belfast last night. I had never actually seen the movie before, I though it was pretty good. I think I more enjoyed going with my mates though and the atmosphere that was carefully created. 

Back to Dinosaurs!
I unfortunately I was unable to make it to a baby shower this month due to going to see Alien Ant Farm in the Empire in Belfast and pretending to be 15 again..... oops. However I was still asked to design a baby bib.... So I created a dinosaur wearing ox blood red DM boots, with the world ending and aliens coming down to save the dinosaurs........

I'm totally sane........ kinda.
Em..... I think that's really it for this month. literally a lot of dinosaur things and pumpkin carving. Hoping to keep this month just as mad, and as I said earlier hoping to slightly back track and have another look at designs I started a little while ago and just finish them off. 

Also want to wish my partner another Happy Birthday :D
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So this month I actually did stuff, not as much as I would have liked but I have definitely done more. So I have been trying to really get back into my design, have actually been revisiting old work. I have also been experimenting a little bit

So not too sure if you will recognize any of the above. These are from my British classic design project from university a variation of originals shown below and you can also find them in my store:

Annnnnnnnd..... speaking of store, I added 4 of my multi coloured images to my shop, mainly cause I'm still not too happy with 2 of them here is a little snap of what I have added:

I also looked back a little to my think happy thoughts t-shirt. I tweaked it a little bit, I changed some of the colours round, I'm still not happy with it. I may even just re-draw the whole thing.

Before and After, I wanted to make it a little more warmer and I don't know why, but the moutashe colour was annoying me. I felt it had to be a closer colour to the unicorns natural hair colour. Yup.

As I said though I am still not too happy with it, I want to go back and play more with highlights and shadows, or as I said previously just start the drawing again from scratch.

I also went on holiday this month to Portugal.  Literally the first time I have been out of the UK and Ireland in 9 years. It was stunning.

I had a fantastic time, cool beer, hot weather and blue skies. I couldn't ask for anything more. I only wish I had gotten more photos. 

My partner and I are even starting to plan our next holiday to Vegas baby! which should be good. This month I plan on just continuing to design more things, I have realised my portfolio is seriously lacking in so many elements. So I am planning to fix that. I also have more work lined up in the form of labels for some local products. All negotiations are still on going so I can't really talk much about it at the moment, but I am very excited. That's all from me for this month. 

Long time now blog..... So since my last blog, I had my exhibition, I got my final grade, I've moved back to Northern Ireland and I graduated on Friday there. I have been job hunting, went to Glastonbury and even went to see the tall ships in Belfast.

Yep, a lot of stuff has been happening in the past month!

Here's a few images from my exhibition show, which was a huge success. although I didn't get to sell any of my little playing cards :(
so for anyone who reads my blogs and would like to purchase one of the deck of cards packs, please get in touch! 

Here are some of the very, very few images I took at the exhibition. sorry there isn't that much to see! It was a really great night, there was so much to see and I have to admit I wish I had gone back during the public opening to really have a nosy at all the work there! 

Here are a few pictures from my graduation, I was awarded a 2.2:

It was a great day, super tiring, however completely fantastic!

So at the moment my plan is to just get a job to help out with bills, while I continue to do my art in my spare time. Even to start looking for an internship. So yea, I'm at a very exciting and scary time of my life. In saying that. I'm unsure of how often I will be blogging. I will at least aim for a weekly blog instead :)

So yes, bloggity again in a weeks time :)

So I went into uni today due to my Photoshop and Illustrator prescription being out of date and as I am a poor student, soon to be just poor. I couldn't really afford to keep my subscription. Not going to lie, pretty heart broken about it.  So anyways, I had to re-do my portrait of the eyes open bar-code image. I have 10 different versions of the same image and some really funky looking edits from making the image. So here are my 10 different versions:

Some are very similar and there are little changes, but I am glad to say I have my final, although I know things aren't spelt right, I will make this right tomorrow when I go back to uni. here is my final though with all of the incorrect spellings:

I also want to do a little more detail with the type and make it more glossy and even 3D looking, as I want to give it the effect of it being a glossy gold. 

The rest of my day I have been writing up sketch books and making sure everything is in order, I am sure that tomorrow will be no different with getting my work to a standard that I am happy with.

Today I got  a lot done. I have re-photoshopped some images, even ordered my deck of cards to be printed for the end of year show. Everything seems to be coming together nicely. 

For my deck of cards I had a choice between my three designs:

I have decided to just show my cupcakes, I have also ordered my monsters to be printed and my cupcakes to be printed to hopefully sell at the end of year show :)

I had also experimented with the idea of having all three of my designs together and the jokers and backs of the deck of cards, I just felt that this looked really strange.

I'm honestly just not happy about it, So I have chosen to go for just the cupcake theme.

I also successfully and finally got around to the re-edit of the "No Say" Coca- Cola image, I also went back to the facebook images and the bar-code ones too, and just tweaked them a little:

I went back into my bar-code portrait, I just made the bar-code look a little more realistic, The Coca - Cola portrait I finally edited to a way I liked it. I will admit the almost turquoise background was a little unexpected. Although I have to admit I rather like it and I think it really makes all the other colours within the portrait really pop. The Facebook images, I simply just went back in and made the "F" lighter and more white to really stand out. I really like all of these and I am really happy with these results.  

This is an update of what my end of year show will look like. I just have to make a choice of whether or not to have my original Coca-Cola portrait or the re-edit of the portrait. I have to admit while l look at these side by side, I actually think the original Coca-Cola Portrait stands out more compared to the new portrait. I will have to ask around and see what others think. I am hoping to have these printed out either tomorrow or Tuesday. 

I am still to buy my piggy banks, as well as dwindling down the slogans or facts I may put on them, although I have to think fast about either paper mache, black chalk board piggy bank and the paint it yourself piggy banks from hobby craft. Again hopefully this will be more items I can sell at the end of year show, hopefully people will want to buy them, I just have to start thinking of how and what way I am going to design them. Which I will hopefully get started on tomorrow.

So, I am very much nearly there, If this was the lord of the rings trilogy, I have just reached Mordor. That's it from me today, hopefully more development to show tomorrow.

So I got a hell of a lot done today, I am almost there to having everything finished up, it's just a case of getting things printed and mounted for the degree show. Today I spent mainly drawing up my jokers for the Monster deck and the cup cake deck. I also went back and fixed my traditional deck of cards. I have now gone online and have managed to find a quote to get them printed. I am just not too sure at the moment whether or not to get multiples printed off to sell, as I am a poor student. At the moment I have worked out that I am able to at least get 3 of the cupcakes and 3 of the monster decks printed. I have looked at my traditional deck of cards and although I do like it. I have realized that they more than likely will not be very interesting to others. I would prefer to get all of the one deck of cards, So I am going to ask around and see what others suggest. I have basically until Sunday to decide. As I had hoped to get them printed out for my hand in. But looks like it's going to take roughly 3 weeks to get them sent here, so yea. Anyways here are my jokers I designed:

I have also decided on which backs I want to have on my cards:

I am not too sure about the cupcake backing, I am hoping to use the jumble of cupcakes, although I am unsure. I have however decided to go with these blue and red backs for the Monsters and Traditional decks of cards. The red for the Traditional and the Blue for the Monsters. 

I am hoping to do more research into the photography portraits I previously done and get them all prepared as well as my cards above for print for the degree show, I am currently thinking of having the below as my exhibition:

obviously With the Cup Cakes I am planning on just choosing one of the suits and I will do the same with the other two suits, then on the fourth line of the cards I am planning to show the jokers choose one of the backings. to display. I was also thinking about even having some vinyl gold coins around the portraits. I also want to experiment again with words at the bottom or along the top of the portraits with facts. Although I already have a feeling that these may be stronger on their own. However I am still planning on experimenting further. 

Even as I look at these now, I have realized I haven't yet bought the piggy banks, I am hoping to also go to hobby craft. Maybe find some cheaper Piggy Banks.... Anyways, to get to the point, I may even experiment and see if I might be able to write facts about how companies exploit people out of money or even just the facts of how money in big businesses are corrupted. I knew my dissertation research would come in handy now!

That's it for me today, hopefully more to show tomorrow. 

Today I got a lot of stuff done, I'm happy to say I am nearly finished all of my major images. I went back and began to play about with my posters for the student advice section of my project:

I am actually really happy how these have turned out. Still unsure on the fonts, but I am still very happy with these pieces. They aren't amazing, but i do like my graphics and I put a lot of work into them. I am still unhappy with my coffee cup poster, The other three though, I'm more than pleased with.

I have also started to get my joker done for cupcake theme of cards. I am even starting to think about the portraits of facebook, the bar code and coca cola with possibly going back to putting writings on the posters as a bit of insightful information. I am pretty sure that the portraits of the exploitation will be displayed for my final end of year show. Anyways here is my Joker cupcake so far:

I'm still really not too sure on the colours I am using as I want to merge the red and black suits together, or in this case the browns and the reds. My idea is to try and get it to look like a chocolate and strawberry cupcake. This is still a work in progress, I also have to do another joker for the traditional and the monster decks. I am planning on merging these two together. Either way I don't think it will be too hard as he traditional looking jokers are creepy looking anyways. So it should fit in with the Monster and Traditional suits. So here is hoping I will get this all finished up tomorrow and be able to send them off to get printed for the degree show. It will be awesome!

I have finally decided on a song for my video. What is great about this is because the song is so long, I can cut it down to the parts that I want. I think that this song will work well in the background of my video. It's upbeat and slightly dance. Please listen to You Tube video below.

I experimented a lot with portrait photography. As the ViewBug challenge I have decided to do is on unique portraits, I wanted to create something that had a connection with consumerism and basically how big companies completely screw people over. Here a few of my very quickly photographed ideas:

Coca Cola, is very well known for actually paying researchers off, when the content of their sugar is called into questions along with basically everything that is bad for you in their soft drinks. Coca Cola, actually owns a lot of other products. Especially lots of other soft drinks. I also started playing around with the idea of consumerism in the future.  I very badly painted my face and put little gems around my eyes and cheeks. Playing around with the idea that models may get even skinnier, our health getting worse due to the amount of crap big companies put in our food, and the never ending want for pretty shiny things. Even a tiny little bit of mad max theme (badly done make-up) These images will of course need photoshopped and tweaked a little bit:

I have also been looking at getting my actual deck of cards made. I am still trying to figure that part out but so far it is going well, and it is do-able. Just not too sure on the price and when they will get here. I have been sketching more characters for my monster deck of cards, Which I have to admit it is going very well, I am hoping to have them all done in illustrator by the end of the week, well at least started anyways.