New Arrival: Potted Kalanchoe Design!

Succulents are supposed to be easy to care for, which is why I got myself a lovely Kalanchoe with orange blossoms! Though, I am absolutely terrible with plants and my Kalanchoe has died since drawing this picture. I think I may have overwatered it, or maybe the window it was sitting in got too cold during our Canadian winter... *sadface* I've had the Kalanchoe since August of last year when I got my new place, so I suppose this attempt at plant care wasn't terribly bad. But it was my favourite plant, and the first plant I bought for our new place, so as I am still in noob plant care 101 territory I will soon be getting a new one and have a good feeling that it will survive this time around! :P

So yes, while this is an illustrated pattern of my Kalanchoe, lets just call it an artistic rendering of what my Kalanchoe once looked like, and what my future new Kalanchoe can hope to look like. What draws me to this potted plant is the beautiful 4 petaled flowers that blossom on the top of this succulent. I think they are just lovely, especially in bright orange. When healthy, the leaves and stem are such a beautiful, fresh shade of green. It makes me happy to see. I got the grey and white colour block pot from IKEA recently too, and it only made sense to include it as the pot in this pattern. It is the pot that my future Kalanchoe will be in. :P

This pattern was drawn as part of my 100 day pattern challenge by the way, isn't it amazing the things that you see inspiration in when you are drawing every day?

My pattern in print form from Society6! Its drawn digitally but placed on a watercolour texture for a hand drawn feel.
Little asymmetrical dots surround the plants, and these Kalanchoes are in bloom with gorgeous orange flowers. 

Here are a few products with my Kalanchoe pattern, from my Zazzle and Society6 shop!

For selfies with your favourite kalanchoe. :)

Diaries of a plant mom (great place to track your plants growth & watering schedule!)

Custom gift tags from Zazzle, with the pattern on the back & illustration on the front!

The cute botanical kalanchoe pattern on a warm and cozy sherpa blanket.

And, for those plant moms out there who don't kill their plants and instead have an exceptional green thumb, I've created a "Plant Mom" typography design featuring my potted Kalanchoe illustration. Its available on my Zazzle, Society6 and DesignByHumans shops on various products!

Full Succulent Kalanchoe Potted Plant Collection on Zazzle

Hope you like this new design! Do you have a favourite houseplant that you have drawn creative inspiration from? Feel free to share in the comments below!

Tanya

Society6 Printed Mugs Review

A few weeks ago I purchased a few mugs from my Society6 shop for my mom (and I got one for myself, too!). My mom has wanted something from my shop for a while, and especially liked the mugs in my shop so I thought they would make a great Valentine's gift. I got the standard 11 oz. mugs in her two favourite patterns of mine, my Red Poppy pattern and my vintage redbreast robin pattern! And for myself, I chose to get a 15 oz. mug in my aqua pearlescent mermaid pattern. I went for the larger size because who wants a small cup of coffee really. :P

Here are the mugs, I apologize for my phone camera shots (I left my camera at work and now my mom has the mugs, so I can't retake the photos!)

I could have purchased the mugs through any of my print on demand shops, but I chose Society6 because I really wanted to make sure that the print quality of items I am offering in my shop is good. There is also a bit of an artists discount at Society6, plus they have sales often so if you wait for a sale day you can save quite a bit on custom printed gifts.

My attempt at capturing the details in low light - the print is clean and pretty true
to the colour of my original design in person!

Here is the original bird artwork, so you can get a better idea of how the artwork
colours compares to what is on the mugs! 

Well, I was really happy with how these mugs turned out! The colours are vibrant and rich in print, and the designs printed nice and crisp. What you get in person is pretty accurate to what is shown in the mockup, which was great to find out. On the 11 oz mugs, the pattern designs print almost right to the edges and on the 15 oz mug there is a bit of a white space on the bottom where the mug curves.

My mom was thrilled to get these! She thought the designs were beautiful, and was even more excited for them when we found out they were dishwasher safe. She has since put them in the dishwasher a few times, and the designs have kept their vibrancy, which is nice. I do not own a dishwasher, so I've been hand washing mine with no issues as well. These mugs are also microwave safe, so they make great hot chocolate mugs.

The bottom of the mug has the Society6 logo printed

As for the actual mug quality, these are very nice premium quality ceramic mugs. The construction of both the 15 oz and 11 oz mug is smooth and sturdy. The handles are nice and wide and easy to hold. The mugs also don't get too hot when you put piping hot coffee in it, and instead give off a nice warmth (which is extra nice for warming your hands in the winter!).

The package they came in was just a standard brown box, but inside they were packed really tightly with extra padding and cardboard dividers so that the mugs can't move around and break during shipment.

Holding my nice coffee sized 15 oz mug!

As for shipping, they did arrive quickly... but unfortunately they did not actually arrive to my house because of those pesky duties. Extra charges because of customs is probably the only thing I really hate about being Canadian! I had to drive to a pickup location to get my package, where I had to pay extra. The duties were basically like paying the shipping cost a second time. Now, Society6 will refund duties the first time you get them, which is great. But in Canada if you have any order over $20 coming over the border you are subject to duties, and since I was hit with them on my very first order I'm not optimistic that I'll dodge them for my second or third order. This experience is echoed from other Canadian artists in the Society6 community, who are repeatedly charged duties.
I do not think that Society6 provides ample warning about duties on their main order page, but considering the rate at which international orders shipped by them are charged extra, they really should. So, I'll just put this here as a little heads up - if you are living outside of the U.S.A, especially Canada, chances are you are going to get charged with customs. Maybe one day they will improve upon this or switch shipping carriers, but at the time of writing this, if you are an international buyer count on pesky duties being part of your shipping experience with Society6.

My moms mugs together :) 

Even though I was charged duties, I would definitely order from Society6 again... but will be ordering on sale days to anticipate extra charges from customs. The print quality and product quality of these mugs is great, the price isn't so bad for a custom print item, and they do ship fast. Plus I'd love to get one of those floor pillows one of these days. I think my cat would love it. :) Overall I was really impressed with the items I received, and it makes me happy to know that my customers are getting an extremely accurate print of my artwork on the products they order.

I hope this review has been useful to you! If you have any additional questions about these mugs, I'll do my best to answer them in the comments below!

Until next time,

Tanya

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To find these mugs & more in my Society6 shop, click here!

Mermaid Scales Pattern - Pearlescent Aqua & Ultraviolet!

I've been on a design spree lately with my 100 days of pattern challenge! So far I am on day 37/100 and I'm finding it amazing how great its been for me. Now, I've definitely had days where I don't really have any ideas and am not motivated to do anything, but sticking with the challenge and designing something anyways or trying a new technique out on an old vector drawing has really helped me overall.

Now, since I'm designing on all days instead of just select days when I feel motivated to do so, I have a HUGE backlog of new patterns and designs! I've been trying to add them to my shops and aim for about 2 a week. One of my earlier patterns in this challenge was my Mermaid Scales pattern. My Aqua Pearlescent Mermaid scales pattern in particular has become so popular ever since I added it to my Society6 shop. I even purchased it for myself, because I love it too! :)

My beautiful 15 oz. mermaid scale mug! Its my new favourite. I'm drinking a
delicious cup of coffee from it as I type this post! ;) I'll post a review about this another
time, but I purchased it from Society6 and was impressed by the print and the
quality of the mug. I bought a few more for my mom, too!

Whats cool about this mermaid scale pattern and what gives it the multi shade scale effect is that I actually coloured each scale in a different shade of purple originally in illustrator. Each shade was individually selected and placed to give the look of shiny light & dark, and a bit of variation like I'd expect to see on fish scales. I then used a watercolour texture and a few layer effects in photoshop to achieve the textured scale look you see in the pattern. Then I added a bit of a gold yellow outline to the scales to tie it all together.

Here are some of my favourite creations with this Mermaid pattern from my Society6 and Zazzle shop!

What do you think of this new pattern? And what other colours would you like to see it in? 

To see more products with these new patterns in my Zazzle shop, click the collections below!

Pearlescent Mermaid Scale Pattern
by Tanya

Ultra Violet Mermaid Scale Pattern
by Tanya

New Arrival! Super Canadian Maple Syrup Pattern

One of my newest designs as part of my 100 day of pattern challenge was this maple syrup pattern!! I had wanted to draw a maple syrup pattern for a while, because, you know, its my favourite food. Actually though. I eat maple syrup on pancakes, French toast, waffles, bacon, sausage, on ice cream... or as maple butter, maple candy, maple fudge... YUM!

Ahem... anyways, I am sure there are more people who love maple syrup like me, and would appreciate this pattern. Filled with syrupy bottles of goodness, and red maple leaves. I've added it to products at my Zazzle, Society6 & RedBubble shops! Here are a few of my favourites.

Shop this design on Society6: Click Here

Shop this design on RedBubble: Click Here

Shop this design on Zazzle: Click Here

Canadian Maple Syrup Pattern
by Tanya

Hope you enjoy this one! 

- Tanya

Daily Pattern Challenge

Hi everyone, its been a while since I posted (again!) I find it hard to keep up with my blog, my shops, and my social media, especially around the hectic-ness that was Christmas time. If you follow me on my twitter or my instagram, you probably know that I've been keeping myself pretty busy in the design department!! Since January is literally one of the worst months for selling things, I've decided to cut my marketing efforts in half and instead focus all of my spare time on designing.

Finishing projects is always a struggle to me, and while I love drawing, sometimes I replace it with other things I love.. *cough cough* video games or reading. If I'm on a reading binge or if I find a really really good video game that I need to play, 100% of all of my attention goes to that thing instead of my drawing things. What I need is a schedule for drawing, and a little self discipline and will power. So for that, I have decided to start a 100 day pattern challenge!

I've recently been inspired by a few other artists who took up this challenge and completed the full 100 days. Im a believer of the "21 days" of doing something turns it into a habit, so my first goal will be to get into the groove of creating something new every single day. The rest of the 79 days will be for enjoying my newfound habit and coming up with as many unique designs as I can think of! I've already completed a full week of patterns, which I have shared below.

Day 1

Stormy Nautical Pattern

Day 2

Cute Cats Pattern

Day 3

Ultraviolet Mermaid Scales Pattern

Day 4

Dreamy Violets Floral Pattern

Day 5

Super Canadian Maple Syrup Pattern

Day 6

Retro 80s Winter Triangles

Day 7

Falling Stars

I'm a week in to my challenge but there is still a long way to go! Feel free to join in to the challenge with me if you are feeling the need to do 100 drawings too :D I'm using the hashtag #100daysofpatterns. Make it in design has a challenge using the hashtag #100daysofpattern as well as some art prompt topics to get you started, which I thought was fantastic.

Most of the patterns I create will eventually make it to my shops. In fact some of them have made it already! Keep an eye out on my shops for the newest additions, and if you have any specific product requests let me know & I'll be sure to add it for you!

Until next time,

Tanya