There something really relaxing about watching an artist at work.  Elsbeth Mclean is an Australian painter who paints beautiful vibrant paintings, all made up of itty-bitty dots. 

I follow her on Facebook and she often posts short videos of herself painting--one tiny dot at a time.  It's so simple and short, and so fun to watch. (I got these videos off of Facebook, and you apparently have to be signed into Facebook to watch them, FYI)

I think I might start doing that.  So here's my first little one I posted today.  I don't love the lighting, but I like the brush gently filling the shape with color.

What do you think?  Interesting or boring?  It was originally posted on Instagram, which only allows 15 second videos (that's often all the attention span I have for online videos anyway).

In other news, I have a new fun pattern available on Society6, AND there is free shipping this week so you should most definitely take advantage of that.

I mainly drew this one while traveling--in the car to the coast, and on the plane to and from Texas.

Loosey-goosey patterns are a nice break sometimes.

Last week, Ryan and I flew from Portland to Dallas, for some good family time and the wedding of two dear friends. Fortuitously, I also finished this illustration of Texas at around the same time.  I made it at the request of a dear friend, Linh.

I'm happy with how it turned out, and looking forward to getting a print of it myself.

Here are some sweet snapshots of time spend with friends and family this past week.

And since Jessica and Trevor are now married, I can finally share this project I've been working on the past few months.  Jessica commissioned me to create a drawing for her and Trevor, which she gave to him on the wedding day, in a frame made by her dad.  There is a back story to the illustration of course, but I think this blog post is getting long enough, so you can just ask them about it. Here is the finished drawing:

And here are some process pics.  From beginning sketches, to a picture Jessica sent me of the frame-in-progress.

And then I added some color on Photoshop for kicks.

This is what happens when I go two weeks without posting a blog--there is so much I want to say and share.  I'll leave you with that for now.  And if you like the above Texas illustration, make sure you head over to BoomBoom Prints to buy prints, baby tees, bags, etc.  AND get %17.76 off your order until July 4th when you use the code BoomForth.