garden

blogging about blogging

2012-02-09T19:18:00.000-08:00

The author and wonderful person Tara Lazar invited me to write a guest post for her super popular blog.

Here it is.

Also, I just got an agent with Andrea Brown Literary Agency, and it's all thanks to Tara!

100!!

2012-02-06T21:20:00.001-08:00

This here was my 100th etsy sale!!

Thank you so much everyone who's bought or liked my stuff!

SCBWI nyc conference notes

2012-01-30T18:42:00.000-08:00

Here's some of my notes and drawings from the scbwi (pronounced skeeb-weeee). Just kidding, it's the society of children's book writer's and illustrators.

On a side note, illustrator can be pronounced (ill-us-truh-tore) to make it sound dignified and impressive.

It was awesome and frightening at different times, with an aftertaste of mostly awesome.

The 2nd page from the top with the little zebra donkey thing and the flat top is an example of the frightening. Flat top is a lady. She was the most joyless person there. You're in the business of children's books! Come on! She kept saying, and I quote "It's a bestseller business, make no mistakes about it." Holy crap was she a buzz kill.

Fortunately she was part of a panel of industry pros, and the lady next to her said, "Well not really, we publish books like Harry Potter, to give us the ability (money) to publish the quiet books."

Such a rollercoaster.

Another frightening part of it was the talent, holy craps! The portfolio review was saturated with serious talent.

The first page features a drawing of author Chris Cutcher who I had never heard of before. His speech almost brought me to tears, and had me laughing out loud. I'll definitely be checking out his books, he's a cool son of a gun.

The words 'Beeee kiiinnnnd, baby be kind' are from the excellent song at the bottom which was in my head most of the weekend. The conference was fri-sun and filled with lots of activities starting from 730am and going till 7pm on saturday. It was a little stressful. And my new stress technique is focusing on being nice to myself when I get anxious and stressed. Don't stress about being stressed, or beat yourself up for being stressed. Kindness makes it a lot more bearable. So that's where the song came from. It would come into my head spontaneously all weekend.

And the stress was good. I'm glad I did it. The adorable and righteous Executive Director of SCBWI Lin Oliver quoted the famous bodybuilder Ronnie Coleman thusly- "Everybody wants to be a bodybuilder but don't nobody want to lift no heavy-ass weights."

2012-01-16T14:53:00.000-08:00

The latest tiny drawing.

Tiny drawings!!!

2012-01-09T18:29:00.001-08:00

I have a tiny 3.5"x5" spiral sketchbook and I love it. I make a drawing and tear it out, and if it pleases me than I date it and put it in chronological order in a tiny envelope.

The sketchbook is perpetually on it's first page.

Also this song and band are perfect for making tiny drawings of your imaginary homestead.

doodle

2012-01-03T20:54:00.001-08:00

Doodle doesn't like when I take pictures of her tail-wang while she's trying to nap.

super sweet jewelry and super sweet dogs!!

2011-12-15T19:02:00.000-08:00

Hi guys, here's Dana Holscher's awesome etsy shop where she sells these cool earrings (most of them are 10 bucks!):

http://www.etsy.com/shop/botny?ref=pr_shop_more#

She's donating a bunch of her sales to a dog shelter in Fargo. Here's the story:

Help raise money for the 4 Luv of Dog Rescue in Fargo, ND by purchasing Botny earrings Tuesday, December 20th!! Rescue animals have always had a soft spot in my heart, and being that there are SO many dogs in the shelters right now that would love a forever home this Christmas season, 50% of all sales made on December 20th will go towards sponsoring the dogs that have been in the shelter the longest, and lowering their adoption fees so they can hopefully find their forever families this Christmas!! Spread the word and show your animal love this Tuesday!! :)
http://www.4luvofdog.org/wp/

A Treasury in honor of those pets we can help:http://www.etsy.com/treasury/ODMyOTI0NnwxNTM3MDE0MjAw/help-a-dog-in-need-this-christmas-season

FREE WORLDWIDE SHIPPING THROUGH DECEMBER!!

reading-ass hound dog

2011-12-12T12:30:00.000-08:00

reading-ass duck

2011-12-11T09:58:00.001-08:00

2011-12-05T18:46:00.000-08:00

Happy holidays!!

This is a print and card at my shop.

Chris' Birthday

2011-11-23T15:29:00.000-08:00

For my brother's birthday. He likes cats.

Dog portrait

2011-11-14T18:51:00.000-08:00

The owner of this beautiful chihuahua asked me to make a portrait of the two of them. The chihuahua is a bit of a monster, so she had me draw it in the same way I drew this blue monster. It was a really fun drawing.

Unfortunately I haven't gathered the patience to learn anything at all about taking pictures, so here's a bunch of crappy pictures of it.

Also, here are two wonderful songs that melted my heart-balls.

doodle post

2011-10-24T16:02:00.000-07:00

Doodle steals our chairs. As soon as we get up she moves in. Sometimes she'll go chew on the trash can just to draw us away to scold her, then she takes our chair. Half the time she uses the chair for normal sitting and sleeping, the other half she does weird shit like this:

2011-10-20T13:19:00.001-07:00

2011-10-15T14:29:00.000-07:00

More sketchbook stuff. Just letting it all breathe.

sketchbook play

2011-10-07T13:16:00.001-07:00

children's book

2011-10-05T12:47:00.000-07:00

Here's a peek at a children's book I'm working on. This duck can't see too good.

Doodles

2011-09-25T20:37:00.000-07:00

This here is the latest member of the Peter Kayla Herman Melville clan. Her name is Doodles.

She's all sweetness. She's a 3 month old Coonhound mix from a high kill shelter in Virginia. I love her. When I go to the bathroom and come back she greets me as if we were long lost best friends. If anyone is interested she has two sisters still in Souderton, PA along with a whole litter of 6 week old black and tan coonhounds that are ridiculously cute.

sketchbook page

2011-09-14T13:08:00.001-07:00

Sorry the scan is so crappy.

Pig affection

2011-09-02T14:36:00.000-07:00

According to the "Complete Guinea Pig Owner's Manual" she's licking me because she loves me, awww. I think it's just because she's hungry all the time and super fat.

2011-08-23T18:15:00.001-07:00

whoa!

2011-08-22T14:52:00.000-07:00

I just had a butt-load of fun with this drawing.

I'm reading "Game of Thrones" and I wanted to draw a warrior, something with lots of testosterone and grit, but this is what ended up happening. It took special effort to draw pants on him.

I'm playing with digital coloring, and really enjoying how it works with my pencil lines. I always wanted to have finished looking stuff that has playful pencil lines.

I have to admit that the amazing Renata Liwska inspired this technique.

2011-08-20T12:45:00.000-07:00

Another duck

2011-08-16T08:32:00.000-07:00

My website!

2011-08-10T10:28:00.000-07:00

My website is finally finished! www.peterharren.com is complete!

And it's exactly how I want it!

I "finished" it a while ago but there were small issues with it, until last night when I most triumphantly resolved those issues!

Come see what I did! I built this little beauty from scratch! Many thanks to the most excellent Nate Meltzer for the technical and emotional support and the code that I stole for the footer.

duck!

2011-08-09T09:55:00.001-07:00

Reading ducks here.

Another reading-ass duck

2011-08-07T11:22:00.000-07:00

You can find this little dude here.

2011-08-01T18:30:00.000-07:00

A pet portrait! Holy crap do I want more jobs like this. This beautiful bulldog has passed on. Feel free to take a moment of silence to honor this beloved beauty, and possibly send some love to the family.

Dogs. Am I right? So wonderful.

2011-07-21T19:11:00.000-07:00

2011-07-20T10:41:00.001-07:00

hound dog

2011-07-13T11:26:00.001-07:00

this little guy is available here.

the wonderful kayla helped me paint him. she has insane painting skills.

another reading-ass duck

2011-07-01T11:53:00.000-07:00

This little dude is available in my shop, here.

Thats one reading-ass duck

2011-06-26T15:09:00.000-07:00

The duck is now in my shop.

It'll be sad to see him go.

duck

2011-06-25T18:06:00.000-07:00

Here's a sneak peek at one of my latest art adventures.

See that little duck with the glasses?

I'm making little sculptures to sell on etsy.

I'll have better photos when there's some good day light.

I would like to thank Erin Welsh for this. Not sure if you still check this blog, but I couldn't have made this little duck without you. 3 or 4 years ago I stole a tube of aqua green paint from you that I used on this duck. I'm not proud. Every time I see or use that paint I get pangs of guilt. I'm sorry I stole the aqua green paint from you. And the gold paint. I'm sorry about that too.

I owe you.

whoa

2011-06-21T20:41:00.000-07:00

Here's another one I found while I was putting together my new website. This guy has it all figured out.

whoa

2011-06-13T22:59:00.000-07:00

I've been picking through my old fart-work for things to put on my website. Here's one I like.

The website is coming soon! Its been so much freaking fun to make.

goat

2011-06-09T17:01:00.000-07:00

Here's the first idea I had for the goat drawing. I think it was a little uncomfortable to look at, so I chose the other one. Now I'm not so sure which one is more uncomfortable.

2011-05-23T00:35:00.000-07:00

This is Herman Melville. I adopted her a few weeks ago. She is fat and she is precious. She loves lettuce and carrots. She eats too much. I ask her why she is so fat.

2011-05-23T00:34:00.000-07:00

2011-05-20T08:57:00.000-07:00

A gift for a friend of a friend who loves goats. At first i wrote "goat loving friend of a friend" but that sounded gross.

2011-05-18T17:26:00.000-07:00

the girl with the golden hair. any fans of the book 'iron john' out there?

2011-05-13T17:05:00.000-07:00

These dudes made it to etsy's front page!! My shop has been flooded with activity, it's beautiful.

rock

2011-04-30T23:50:00.001-07:00

rock

2011-04-30T23:18:00.001-07:00

rock

2011-04-30T23:15:00.000-07:00

rock

2011-04-30T23:06:00.000-07:00

more sketches

2011-04-26T15:55:00.000-07:00

sketchbook fun

2011-04-25T19:04:00.001-07:00

hallelujah

2011-04-01T23:01:00.001-07:00

I was sitting in front of a very small piece of blank paper and this song came on pandora:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tfpVq4rPfQg

I replayed it over and over on youtube and drew these happy little dudes. Its such an amazing song. Here's what Leonard Cohen has to say about it-

"It's, as I say, a desire to affirm my faith in life, not in some formal religious way but with enthusiasm, with emotion.... It's a rather joyous song." ~ Leonard Cohen, creator of the song, Hallelujah. He says: "I wanted to write something in the tradition of the hallelujah choruses but from a different point of view... It's the notion that there is no perfection ~ that this is a broken world and we live with broken hearts and broken lives but still that is no alibi for anything. On the contrary, you have to stand up and say hallelujah under those circumstances."

second bird

2011-03-29T20:34:00.000-07:00

here's the second bird bookmark i'm selling on my shop. the first guy sold already! i'll definitely make more of these dudes.

2011-03-23T17:54:00.000-07:00

Here it is! My first bookmark that I'm selling on Etsy- here

The book is the 'the windup bird chronicle' in case you're curious. Murakami's new one comes out this fall! Its gonna be massive! Who's as excited as me?! Come on.

bookmark

2011-03-21T14:38:00.000-07:00

This little dude is going to be a bookmark that I'll be selling on my etsy page peterharren.etsy.com pretty soon, along with another dude.

2011-03-05T18:21:00.000-08:00

2011-03-03T14:00:00.000-08:00

A bookmark I made for Kayla.

2011-02-13T19:35:00.000-08:00

A project for class. We had to make art that represented our goal.

2011-02-09T21:01:00.000-08:00

dancin'-ass fool

2011-02-09T20:48:00.001-08:00

another kayla

2011-01-28T07:32:00.000-08:00

watercolor, colored pencil, pencil

2011-01-25T15:22:00.000-08:00

Here's some sketches, so from the train, some from class. Notice the Kayla hair touching almost every drawing.

2011-01-23T12:02:00.000-08:00

Sleepy subway riders.

2011-01-21T17:41:00.000-08:00

Fun with watercolors.

2011-01-16T16:06:00.000-08:00

People in Finland are cool. This is a little thank you drawing I did that I'm sending with a print I sold on Etsy. I've sold more prints internationally than within the states. I'm not passing judgement as much as I'm romanticizing Nordic countries, and Canada, people seem pretty cool in Canada.

2011-01-15T09:48:00.000-08:00

Last week I got paid to make drawings! I did 2 illustrations for the Emergen-C facebook page. I don't know if they're still up, but here they are. I had to do each one in 2 hours, because they were being posted for a 'tell your Emergen-c story' day. People posted their stories and the ad agency who hosted the thing gave me these 2 stories to illustrate. The first one is about a housewife who calls Emergen-c her 'fizzy lifting drink', and she thinks it makes her strong. The end. The second one is a about a woman who was dragging in a poker tournament, and remembered she had Emergen-c in her pocket, and felt triumphant, or 'most triumphant' as my friends Bill & Ted would say. Oh, and the first one got a hilarious comment on facebook. Someone said "she looks like she's about to punch that baby into next week". That wasn't my intention, but I can't look at it any other way now.

2011-01-08T17:32:00.001-08:00

2011-01-08T17:30:00.000-08:00

2011-01-02T14:17:00.000-08:00

2010-12-14T01:15:00.000-08:00

Another Kayla for Etsy.

2010-12-14T01:13:00.000-08:00

Another old Kayla drawing I put on Etsy.

2010-12-14T01:12:00.000-08:00

Here's another old one that I put on the ol' Etsy page.

2010-12-14T01:09:00.000-08:00

I just created an Etsy page!! peterharren.etsy.com. Check it out! Tell your friends! Now you can own my drawings!! Whoa. As I was organizing some stuff to put on there, I came across a bunch of Kayla drawings and other cool stuff I did before I started this blog.

2010-12-08T21:31:00.000-08:00

Kayla is wonderful. She posed for about 2 hours for this one.

I draw tiny. From top to bottom the drawing is about 4 inches. 2 hours for a 4 inch drawing! Thats wacky. I usually spend minutes or even seconds on some of my drawings. Its so weird spending all that time on something and it's still not perfect. So many times I draw something in a minute and I'm crazy about it. I do like this one though. And realism is a butt-load of fun sometimes. It's all thanks to an issue of American Artist Drawing magazine I was looking at today in Borders. Inspiring as a mo-fo. I'll probably do more stuff like it.

2010-12-03T13:28:00.000-08:00

2010-12-03T13:27:00.000-08:00

Kayla got a humongous new monitor.

2010-12-03T13:26:00.000-08:00

2010-12-03T13:13:00.000-08:00

Drawing robots with my bro.

2010-12-01T13:55:00.000-08:00

A birthday present for my bro-bocop.

2010-11-27T19:27:00.000-08:00

2010-11-27T19:24:00.000-08:00

Brando! Undies!

2010-11-20T18:25:00.000-08:00

Its my boss's birthday, and she loves Brando.

nut face

2010-11-20T18:23:00.000-08:00

guitar shredding mo-flippin' split

2010-11-14T19:39:00.000-08:00

I really love drawing. I really don't like math. Sorry math, it's just on account of how stupid you make me feel. So I drew all over your goddamn math-face when I should've been math-ing! Boo-ya!

REINCARNATION IS REAL!

2010-11-02T00:15:00.000-07:00

This poor baby seal had trouble letting go of his body at the time of death and came back as a seal-shaped sweet potato. Remember to let go when the time comes everyone! If not you could end up as an adorable edible plant that only gets chosen, and thusly eaten faster because of its cuteness. Death humbles all! If you try to hold on to anything Death will make an example of you and possibly make you delicious and darling in your next shell. I'm sorry baby seal. I definitely enjoyed the crap out of you, if that's worth anything in this cold bitch of a world.

2010-10-24T19:41:00.000-07:00

A gift for a friend. She did me and Kayla a huge favor recently, but she's been deserving a gift for a long time.

2010-10-19T22:04:00.000-07:00

2010-10-19T22:03:00.000-07:00

2010-10-11T18:12:00.001-07:00

2010-10-11T18:11:00.000-07:00

2010-10-02T23:33:00.000-07:00

If you go to the very righteous Think Coffee on 4th ave between 12th and 13th streets in new york city you can see my drawings on the walls. Now you can experience my drawings in real life! Way better than computers. Touch and smell and all that shit!
The show was organized by employees of the neighboring Strand bookstore. I'm the only former Strand employee in the show, the rest are current book-pushers. The art will be up for the month of October.
Here's the poster I drew for it.

2010-09-27T20:05:00.001-07:00

first page of a new sketchbook. all potential and mystery.

2010-09-21T15:55:00.000-07:00

I believe the weirdo with the utility belt marks a most propitious beginning to this blank book. Isn't propitious a wonderful word? Just learned me that one.

the end of a book. sigh. so much experienced.

2010-09-21T15:52:00.000-07:00

The last page of this sketchbook.

2010-09-16T16:30:00.000-07:00

2010-09-16T16:21:00.001-07:00

2010-09-14T13:54:00.001-07:00

2010-09-14T13:53:00.000-07:00

2010-09-14T13:52:00.000-07:00

2010-09-01T18:26:00.000-07:00

2010-09-01T18:25:00.002-07:00

2010-09-01T18:25:00.001-07:00

2010-09-01T18:24:00.000-07:00