New Batch of Bookplates

We’re in Blacksburg, VA for the weekend for Leah’s surprise birthday party.   I gave her the amazing cookbook Good to the Grain by Kim Boyce, and a whole slew of bookplates.   It’s a great excuse to bake delicious pastries and  breakfast items all in the name of good health- the recipes all use different whole grains like buckwheat, spelt, amaranth, oats and whole wheat.

These are some of the new bookplates I’ve added to my etsy shop.  They give any book a touch of class.  They’d be a great gift to give kids or adults along with a favorite book.

Personally, I won’t let any of my books out of the house without one.

For a town of Blacksburg’s size, it has a FANTASTIC food scene, and tons of options for local and exotic foods.  Really, for a town of any size, the choices are impressive.  This morning Leah and I made a delicious tour of the town that included,

Oasis, where I got several varieties of thai curry pastes, palm sugar, lemongrass and cherry lambic beer (to use with my new ice cream book, Jeni’s Splendid Ice Creams at Home!)

Annie Kay’s, soooo many whole food options, and grind your own peanut butter.

The Chocolate Spike, absolutely one of my favorite stops.  I always get the dark chocolate ginger bark and the aztec gold truffles.  Really, one of the best chocolate shops I’ve ever been to.

Farmer’s Market, not quite hopping this time of year, but we got some delicious homemade chai tea.  Can’t wait for April for the market to get in full swing.

Bollo’s, pretty much my favorite coffee shop. Home of delicious muffins and scones, and the famous Oat Fudge Bar.

We didn’t make it to Gillie’s this morning, but it is also a favorite.

…and Tractor Supply Co, where I was THISCLOSE to buy a little chick for $2.49.  Not sure why I hesitated, but it’s probably best I did considering that our little house is in our landlord’s back yard and he might not appreciated the sudden appearance of a chicken coop next to his motorcycle shed.  Someday, someday soon I will have a little flock of chickens, and a goat and a rabbit and a whole menagerie of functional pets.

Whale Submarine!

Check out this never-before-seen glimpse of the inner workings of whales and the men who man them!

Ok so you’ve seen this before, but I’m here to tell you that the screen printed version is now available for purchase in my etsy shop!

Each whale is so large it had to be printed in three sections with three different screens.  The paper measures 26″x40.”  The whales took over my kitchen table and then the whole living room!

I’ll compile a few ways people display it in another post, but it fits in a 27″x40″ poster frame which you can get for pretty cheap.  The top and bottom deckled edge of the paper show a little bit if you go this route.  I really like the way mine looks, cut out and mounted on foam core.  If you don’t want to frame it or cut it out, you can use clips to hang it on the wall like above.  I’m also planning on printing some more sometime with wavy blue lines around them like the whale men in the calendar (January).

I really loved drawing this cutaway, and I plan to do more like it in the future.  I want to make more and more complicated drawings of scenarios and people and places that no one has ever seen in real life.    I imagined what these whale men would do and think, shut up inside the whale like sailors on a submarine.  A few thoughts:  The captain is a little overwhelmed; he’s very capable but this is his first captain gig and he’s a bit afraid of the rest of the men.  So he stows away in his office a lot.  The crew is furious that they are being served squid for the 100th consecutive day, and the cook (who does the best he can) is pretty hot-headed himself.  The one guy that likes squid is trying not to draw attention to himself while still enjoying his meal.  A famous composer/conductor was talked into coming on this voyage and has whipped these sailors into shape- they now make the most beautiful whale sounds in the sea.

I hope these prints find a home somewhere where people stand around thinking and talking about the stories that they see in the whale.