“Yeti cooked with flare...” First, that unintentional typo had me giggling, then it inspired this spot illo. Funny how one word can change the meaning!

So here’s my yeti, chilling out “alone” on his Nepalese hillside, cooking with flare(s)...

Albert the wombat is going through a few growing pains adjusting to his new home...

Ah-MAZE-ing entries this month, everyone!

Here's mine. (Did you know that if acorns are put in a fire, they pop and jump around? It might have inspired my fairytale situation -- out of sight but ready with a plan to frighten away the enemies!)

Right now I'm up to my eyeballs in 3 different children's books, all in different stages of done-ness and all for small publishers or self-publishers. (This is a sneak peek at one of them.)

Big plan for this year is to get ready to submit (and hopefully submit) to bigger publishers.

Squeaking in right under the wire! Whew! (What do they say? Finished, not perfect?)

Did this little spot for an illustration challenge with the prompt "The moment before..."

And chose a pug because my latest picture book project is about a pug, so ... a great chance to sneak in some practice drawing pugs! (For this one, I challenged myself to draw from memory, just looked at one or two reference pictures of a plate of cookies and dogs counter surfing to get started.) Still unsure if this is how I want to approach the character and rendering style ... might need to draw a few more pugs.

Loving seeing what everyone's up to this month!

Here's my Albert -- he's trying but he's still got a lot of wild animal in him. Love seeing everyone's take on this prompt and what aspects of "first day of school" we chose to illustrate! Awesome job, everyone!

Been encountering technical difficulties and haven’t been able to post until now. I know this is late, but hopefully it can be included ... if not, that’s okay too ... just wanted to share with you all.

What if I was hired to illustrate a nonfiction / informational fiction picture book about yetis? That supposition fired my imagination, got me diving into internet research, and it snowballed from there!

Looking forward to feedback. Thanks so much!

I think I'm officially in cuteness overload! Or going into a cuteness coma...

@Asyas_illos SO cute! Love how you use both orange and aqua in your cat character. Your Albert koala is equally as cute ... and so mischievously artistic. LOVE it.

@williammeany awesome character! The way you convey expressions is impressive.

@kylebeaudette LOVE this character!

@Jeremiahbrown Your character is amazing! Love the texture, the facial expressions, the monocle, the butt crack...

@K-Flagg your traditional work is really nice -- would love to see more of it!

@Jenwardstudio those eyes! What a cutie!

@joosterwijk love the pencil textures in this piece!

@Moana-Maureen love how you stylized your musk ox Albert. Very creative.

@willicreate thanks for adding some context in your elevator pitch. Love how you simplified your Albert -- it upped the cuteness level to 11!

@Randi-Gordon -- love the wide-eyed cuteness. And YES -- I've run into the same problem so many times! Now I try to remember to write down which brushes I'm using ... or copy them into their own folder for that specific project.

@Jennifer-Ward love all that personality you infused into your lines!

@Mary-Toth love your watercolor rendering! Great character design. And way to go, making a possum so cute!

@Rachel-Horne -- wonderful design! You're a master at communicating emotion with only a few lines.

@ellenseal14 -- I can definitely see this cutie being BOTH mischievous and kind!

@ruth -- cute, cute, cute! (And I knew it was a coati right off, so well done!)

@miranda-hoover -- CUTE! And wonderfully rendered. As always!

@Jeremy-Ross -- loving this new style you're trying out.

@Iain-Davidson welcome to the group! Another cute character -- love his face! And love how he's only wearing one sock!

@brettb_draws -- love how you stylized your badger.

@Sara-Nilsson TOO cute! That head! That tail!

@mag -- love, love, LOVE this Albert! Furry? Check. Cute? Double check. Mischievous? Triple check!

@Janette -- oh, this is so well done and ... CUTE! "It's so FLUFFY!" (Not that I'm quoting a popular movie or anything...)

@xin-li -- love that you chose a boar ... and managed to make him cute! Loved seeing your progress posts, love his messiness, and love how he can be a little bit grumpy. ️

Hi, @davidhohn, @Michael-Angelo-Go & @NessIllustration -- just thought I'd add a little clarification since I did (unfortunately) start out my freelancing art career on Elance (now Upwork -- NOT something I'd recommend, but that's a different story and at the time I needed a paycheck).

YES, Upwork is a nonnegotiable work-for-hire situation -- lousy terms. However, all the clients that I worked with on Upwork were more than happy to give me permission to show the artwork in my portfolio. (And honestly, that's all I would've used that artwork for anyway.)

Yes, the client probably did say 22-page book, and yes, they probably didn't know what they were doing. This is VERY common to see with newbie self-publishing authors.

And yes, self-publishing clients are the "boss", the editor, and the art director. Most of my clients had very little knowledge about the illustration process or the process of publishing a book, and most had no art experience. It does make the process a little challenging, to say the least.

A note about 24-page books. Most self-published authors choose to publish their books using print-on-demand services like KDP (Kindle Direct Publishing) and Ingram Spark, which have a minimum page count of 24. PODs have different printing specs since they print books using inkjet printers rather than offset printers. They print in multiples of 4: 24, 28, 32 pages, etc. Both KDP & Ingram Spark require the last page of a book to be left blank for their use. So if you're hired to illustrate a 24-page PB that will be POD, you actually deliver 23 pages of content, as page 24 needs to be kept blank.

Hope this helps clear things up -- or muddy the waters???

@Nyrryl-Cadiz definitely B. More friendly, less ominous without the fishhook.

@Frogpunzel student grade watercolor paper, and some artist grade watercolor paper, is made of wood pulp. It’ll work well if you only paint in one layer. Otherwise, the paint will lift when you add extra layers.

Since I tend to like to paint in many layers, cellulose (wood pulp) paper doesn’t work for me. I just would end up getting really frustrated and struggle with it.

100% cotton paper handles tons of layers — it just works better overall. MUCH less struggling and when you find your favorite paper, it’s such a joy to paint! (How can you tell what the paper is made out of? If it’s wood pulp, usually it just will say ‘watercolor paper’ as a description. Cotton paper will say either ‘100% cotton’ or ‘100% rag’ in the description.)

That’s the thing … painting style and technique is so individual, and the same goes for the supplies we like to use. My favorite watercolor paper might be your least favorite. That’s why I always suggest trying out different watercolor papers to see which works best for YOU.

Jackson’s Art (based in the UK but ships overseas — super affordable shipping to the US) has several watercolor paper sample packs you can purchase, an affordable way of trying out several papers to see which you prefer. Jerry’s Artarama also has a few sample packs, but not as many as Jackson’s.

If that’s not feasible for you and you just want to try out one reliable brand, most artists prefer Arches watercolor paper — while I do like their cold press, I’ve been underwhelmed with their hot press…but again, that’s just my preference. Arches is a solid paper that’s been around for hundreds of years, so it’s a good bet.

If you’re curious about what paper I use, my favorite watercolor brand is Fabriano Artistico — 140 lb soft press or 300 lb hot press. Other papers that I really like are Canson Heritage, Stonehenge Aqua (a nice, affordable 100% cotton paper), and Daler Rowney Langton Prestige.

As well as not recommending student grade watercolor paper for most applications, the one artist grade watercolor paper I do NOT recommend is Fluid 100. It’s just too much of a struggle to work with.

Hope this LONG treatise on watercolor paper was helpful. Believe it or not, I could go on and on and on… but I won’t!

@lpetiti I tried that a few times … didn’t work for me. It always still warped. ‍️

Now, I tape my preferred paper down on a board dry using artist’s tape and though it might warp a bit when I get it really wet, it dries completely flat. If I’m in a hurry, I get out the hair dryer … but usually I just let it air dry as that gives the best result.

@Frogpunzel great job!

What watercolor paper are you using? While a heavier weight can help with warping, sometimes it's the brand as well. As Lee said in the class, 100% cotton watercolor paper also makes all the difference.

@LisaF thanks, Lisa! The "What's New" button worked like a charm!

@Georgios-Christopoulos I haven't either.

@Janette for future reference, SCBWI's The Book has a Freelance Editors Directory that lists recommended (and legit) editors that specialize in children's books. This year, that chapter starts on page 211. There are some great editors in there!

@Janette absolutely understand where you're coming from, Janette! It sounds like you're doing your due diligence and that usually leads to a good outcome. Please let us know how it goes.

@Gabby-Correia thanks! Glad we helped you make a decision.

@Gabby-Correia way to go on getting serious and building a website! Looking forward to seeing it when it's up and running.

Like you, my first foray into building a website was getting the domain from GoDaddy and using Weebly (for free). That worked, but then the second year, GoDaddy raised their prices so I switched to Weebly for the domain name, which was more affordable at the time. But Weebly also raised their prices and when I decided I wanted to expand what I wanted my website to do, I needed to purchase a plan from Weebly. That's when I started looking around.

I settled on Squarespace and pay a monthly fee -- included in that fee is the price for the domain name. While Weebly was okay and worked for me for many years, I've personally found Squarespace to be more user-friendly for me, and more flexible. While my site is still pretty bare-bones, behind the scenes I'm working on adding a blog and a store (which is the reason why I switched from Weebly). I also used the switchover as an opportunity to get a new domain name, which is shorter and easier to remember: mbaileyart.com -- feel free to check it out!