Haven't done a blog in far too long! .... 8 months apparently.
I have been pretty lazy to be honest. A lot of things going on, and not really going on. So I guess I will try my best to give you just the highlights over the last 8 months.

Back In September I discovered that my Redbubble account (my shop) seemed to be slowly picking up so traction. I have made a few more sales that I was completely unaware of. YAY people want to pay me to do arty things!!!

This gave me a bit of a kick up the arse. To try and get back into the way of things. Yes I know I sound like a broken record! 

Since then I now have my own desk set up at home with everything set up and ready to go. I have been researching local artist and looking at so many things. Pinterest is a wonderfully handy tool. I have even started a new sketch book. As if I didn't have enough...

So for a bit of the boring stuff. Since moving in to my house I have been pretending to be a really good cook. I have even been baking! Even using the pears out of my own garden!

I more or less stole these from my Instagram, As you can see I have been doing a lot of baking and a lot of eating. In the last 8 months. 

I have recently made a few very big decisions. I have decided to take the plunge and I have opened my own Etsy store: https://www.etsy.com/uk/shop/CraicinDesigns
At the moment I only have 1 listing. I am still working on a few other things. The listing that is currently up allows for a custom portrait or action scene. Such as previous ones I have created below. 

Almost all of these little prints you have seen before but one of them is new.

So one of my good friends, will randomly call me up every so often asking for unique birthday, and engagement gifts. Usually everything he asks me for is themed. Breaking Bad, Fight Club, Jurassic Park. So just when I thought he could shock me. He asked for the above to be made.

Just to clarify what the above is. One of his friends took his girlfriend to New York and proposed to her in Central Park. He sent me a photo of the magical moment, when he popped the question. Then asked could I draw the groom-to-be as Venkman from ghost busters, and the bride-to-be as Miss Piggy from The Muppet's.....

So I did what every artist does and just created what my client asked me for. While the whole time thinking he is totally mental.I have to admit still an awful lot I am not happy with within the image. It took me a week alone to do the New York skyline and trees in Central Park.

So yes. I take completely random requests!

I have also been experimenting with a few others. Here is a little sneek peak:  

none of the above is finished!

It's all just a starting point for me looking into different ways of designing posters for bands, Looking into more detailed patterns, looking into more detail of machines and devices. I am also experimenting with the idea of inspirational quotes and the idea of creating a scene or back ground that is just as powerful as the quote.

So It's all happening. Slowly, but surely. I have also been getting back into designing some wedding stationery. I currently have three brides, which is fantastic! one who continuity changes her mind. however it can sometimes be frustrating. I am getting more design trials done and these can be used for perhaps other clients down the road.

I am trying to keep a positive spin on things. That's all from me, I will try to get back into writing a blog at the end/beginning of every month.

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!

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 guys, sorry to disappoint, I have pretty much......done nothing this month. I haven't really gotten around to designing anything. I have just been adjusting to my new job and chilling out really. I have gone to a few things at a local festival. Our open house festival. I saw the Foghorn string band all the way from Portland Oregon. I also went to see Punk in the Park, where some local punk bands played. I even got my face in the paper.... TWICE! 

On the Left here is the foghorn string band. (worst photo ever) It was a really good gig, a little bit of a different genera than what I would usually listen to but they were so good to see live and really chilled people. 

On the right it'a few photos from punk in the park. I went with my brother and our dogs Louis and Sophie. It was again a really good gig. the turn out was awesome and the bands were great!

And the picture that got put in my local paper.... not once.... but twice!

Other than going to the local gigs in my area I also have been doing a bit of harvesting. As well as possibly...... becoming an alcoholic 

This year the birds actually got bored with plums, so we were able to harvest them. So much so that we are making our own plum cider and plum brandy. 

Here is the cider doing it's thing! I will however be designing the labels for these when they are ready to be bottled and hopefully not killing anyone with alcohol poisoning.

I've also been celebrating 5 years with my partner. Ill save you all the lovey dovey stuff.So yea, this is pretty much what I've been doing this month, Also hoping to get back into the workshop to finish things off.

Heres some random cars and cats I made for my partner. and below and random cat that genuinely keeps breaking into his house.

.....we call him stevie.

A LOT HAS HAPPENED THIS MONTH!
So, where to start. Logo design for M Mahood Music is done, currently still designing flyers but I am incredibly happy with the outcome, even my client is over the moon with it! Which is the most important thing!

Hopefully my watermark isn't too over powering. But yea, this is what we came up with in the end.  Very impressed it I don't say so myself ;) created using Illustrator and Photoshop. 

Here's a few of the logos that I played around with, before coming to the final:

As you can see some a lot better than others. But there are many different stages that you go through when designing a logo. I had a lot of fun doing this! 

My Silversmithing course, has been very off and on, as I am getting to the stage where, to be honest I don't feel like I'm learning. I have noticed there is a huge difference from being at university and doing a part time course. If you basically showed interest in learning a technique and asked tutors in university, or if it was a tutors specialism. They got super excited and were pretty much awesome with showing you how it worked.

So yea, I am getting to the point that YouTube is probably a better educator that any college or university, as well as cheaper! Which is a bit of a shame, but at the same time, it has made me hungry for knowledge! I've recently been experimenting with copper. Actually been very impressed with all the amazing colours and although I'm kind of doing it to waste time, I’m actually learning a lot from it:

The above is just little pieces I have been experimenting with. Still lots of other stuff I want to experiment with but I have to admit, even experimenting with the different colours that come from the copper. Is amazing, and all I am doing is applying heat in different areas and even experimenting by heating the metal through other pieces of metals.
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It’s all still very small stuff, but I am starting to think about making sculptures, so who knows my next course could be a wielding course, or my YouTube will be full of wielding videos.


I've also been doing more patterns, I have already started my 2nd in the series. I haven't yet put these up on my red bubble, as I am wanting to have at least 3-4 different series of patterns before I do, so here's the first it all it's different variations of glory!

So that's basically what I've been up to this month, I have to admit June may be a bit slow as I am mainly just finishing off work and continuing to experiment with metal work. But I am also off to Glastonbury! So I shall also be putting up lots of pictures of that when I get back, But I think I will do my June blog before I leave for Glastonbury, we will see.

Thanks guys for stopping by, keep your eyes peeled for more pattern designs coming soon and more experiments. Please follow me on Instagram, as I am aiming to try and start posting more things on there!

Long, long time no speak. Firstly, HAPPY NEW YEAR!!!!
So yea I have to admit I haven't been up to much. I have done a few wee bits and pieces designing some stuff for a few lovely people, and working my wee bum off in my none arty farty job, which suuuuuuuuuuucccckkkkkssss!!!! 
But we all gotta start from somewhere. So yea, I had a fantastic piece of news over the Christmas holidays that a few of my t-shirt designs sold from my RedBubble store! super happy about that! I have decided to kick my self up my own arse and get back to drawing again. Here are a few recent things I've done:

One of my closest fiends went to a wedding recently and asked if I could design a wedding present for the newly weds. What I love about this is it's so different, very much keeping up with pop culture. Breaking Bad, this was a lot of fun to do, I haven't experimented with using smoke brushes in a very long time.....7 years roughly.... So this was a lot of fun to get back to.

I also have been such a terrible friend, one of my oldest and dearest friends is in an amazing band and every single time he had a gig. I couldn't make it due to working. Sad faces all round :(
So to make up for my absence and still embarrass him as I have been doing over the years at his gigs. I made him a cheesy fan girl t-shirt. This is probably the first one of many that I have made that looks professional   

I actually got this printed on about 5 t-shirts and gave them to everyone at my friends annual Christmas gathering :) it was well worth it!
here's their Facebook page:  ​https://www.facebook.com/paperdogsband/?fref=ts
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/paperdogsband/
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Please like, share, follow and fall in love.

I've even started to experiment with polymer clay. I have to admit I was very much inspired by Amanda Louise Spayd's dolls:

AMAZING AREN'T THEY!!!! So yea I decided to use polymer clay, watched a hell of a lot of youtube videos on it an thought, yea, I can sooooo do this. I even got glass eyes and fake resin teeth (Spayd actually uses real human teeth, I did hunt the web for them but couldn't find them, and then as soon as I said to my partner, 3 clicks and he found them.... had when that happens AND you've already purchased resin teeth....ANYWAY) I wanted to make my own monster.

When I got my polymer clay I was actually super surprised at how tough the clay was to work with. I have worked with clay before and fully loved it, but the polymer was very much a dry touch clay. Even plasticine is so much easier to use.
​But anyways I persevered and created my snot monster Edger:

Thought this was hilarious as the only good things about him such as his eye and teeth, I didn't even make.... LOL but yea I haven't done anymore polymer clay experiments, because of the clay being hard to work with, it has sort of put me off. I still have loads left over so I think once I come up with a better idea of a monster, Ill go back to it. Until then though I have really missed drawing and making the fan girl t-shirt made me realize that. So I have been thinking about going back to the Illustration Friday competitions.

BUT! I'm going to start off gentle, I really like the idea of a word and building on that, but due to not really having much of a social life, I don't know when Ill get it done so I make use one word for over a month, who knows. I've also been thinking back to my old art that I love and actually really miss doing. Been even thinking how I can improve on the ideas, So don't want to give too much away but, I will say that it will be more physical forms of work rather than a pretty picture. Probably more fine art actually when I really think about it. So yea. This year I will hopefully be more balanced art and work wise and who knows hopefully find another job more to do with my art :)

That's all from me hope you've enjoyed, I'm not even going to make a promise of when I will keep up with the blog. But until next time Happy New Year! :)

So today, I did a bit more work to my sketch books, I am now on my 3rd sketch book for my main project which is crazy, especially because with my first sketch book I actually added more pages to it before just buying a new sketch book. It has taken me only two weeks to fill one sketch book for my main project, and to be honest I feel like I am just getting started with my project and really getting down to business of what I want to do, so it's pretty crazy and I can now say I definitely feeling the pressure starting to mount. This is the last week of April, I have pretty much only have a month to get my work together and 6 weeks to actually hand in my work to find out if I am graduating with honors or not. 

So the above our my sketch books for just my main project. 
Besides my main project, a mini project was emailed to me. There are some students in my class taking part in New Blood, I have spoken about New Blood previously, it must have been just before Christmas. They have an idea for the end of year show to sell some tea towels with Communication Designs portraits on them, just like the ones you would have done in school. I originally just took a photo of myself and started to trace it in Illustrator. But the more and more I started to draw it, I got bored of it. I mean this is a graphic design course, I can be very serious about things, but myself taking a photo, I have actually been told off by friends mothers for not taking a photo properly...

These are sort of a small range of photos of me not being very serious and so on.... 
So here are the images I originally created from for the tea towel task:

These pretty much are Illustrating my "Resting Bitch Face". I have to admit I look kind of scary, and I do like to think of myself as a nice person, obviously I'm a little mental, but a good mental. So below is the face I pretty much pull in most of my "Selfies" on Instagram. You can follow me on Instagram: https://instagram.com/craicin_designs/

I have to admit as well, because this is going on a tea towel. There is no point in doing shading, this needs to be all block colours and lines and they have to be black and sharp, so that they can pick up on all of the lines here to print on the tea towel. I asked my boyfriend and my best friend which they preferred out of all three. Both chose the 3rd saying it looks very like me.... not too sure if I should be insulted or Yay!. I think I am going to go with the image above. 

With this exercise however, I actually thought it was really good and I actually really enjoyed it. It cut out a lot of the usual things I would do and just went straight in with the basics. I actually really like this, it's simple yet really effective. I'm very happy, this is something I think I will be doing a lot more of, it have been a while since I have done this kind of line drawing. 

That's all from me today, tomorrow I will hopefully have a lot more Illustrations for you with doing my info graphics