sketchbook ep 40✏️ | drawings, work in progress, doodles🎨✨ | some photos related to my practice (I’m trying something new here??!?) | 🍉July’s theme announcement🍉 | long post ☕ (Patreon)

Hi!

It’s been a while! Where do I begin?

Well, let’s just start right away with some new illustrations and the things will unfold as I write!

The practice of drawing postage stamps slowed down a bit, but here are a few little illustrations I’ve made recently:

and here’s one of the stamps + the inspiration! This book has quickly became my favorite (is anyone interested in the list of vintage botanical books I have?!)

A super quick sketch → colors → details GIF of one of the illustrations I made for my upcoming book. Drawing ginkgo tree branch is one of the step-by-step projects!

Foxglove illustration is finally finished!

I usually don’t draw insects, bees or anything like that, but I figured it might be a good idea to add some pollinators to some of my illustrations.

This little drawing and the very inaccurate unfinished bumblebee next to it, have their own story, which I’ll share in the next post (and the page might be finished by then)

Some sketches for potential sticker designs! Just super simple doodles.

I accidentally set this page as my desktop background and it doesn’t look that bad, lol.

A while ago I asked my community on IG to suggest me fruits to draw! While I appreciate each request/suggestion, I just couldn’t get myself to finish this page! Oh, I even covered the kiwi illustration (with another kiwi illustration :D) cause I didn’t like it that much!! That day I was on a brink of burnout and decided to step back instead of keep pushing.

Then I realized I’m drawn to drawing watermelons, which I did, quite a few times.

I’m happy to announce watermelons are this month’s theme!!!

here’s a work in progress picture:

a page still in progress!

And finished sketchbook spread, full of sticker designs!

Ohhhh I almost forgotten about the berries!

I made some washi tape style little illustrations.

I don’t know yet what to do with them, but they were fun to make!

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oday I wanted to try a new way of sharing pictures that have something to do with my art!

I figured such photos could be a nice addition to posts from time to time, but I didn’t want them to take too much space in the post.

Please let me know what you think and if it’s even readable? This idea crossed my mind literally 5 minutes before I started editing scans for this post, so I haven’t think it through yet.

All of these things are somehow related to my art practice!

TL;DR: 1.inspiration, 2.me, 3.inspiration, 4.spiritual experience/inspiration, 5.inspiration, 6.my studio.

And now, some proper descriptions, if you're interested! (if not, feel free to skip this part!)

1. I love taking pictures of plants I see on my walks! Since I live in the city I get to see mostly some wild flowers growing along the sidewalk, but in some places there are tiny gardens where local sweet grandmas grow their plants in front of apartment buildings. This one is my favorite! It’s an endless source of inspiration.

2. Just a selfie!

3. I went to the grocery store I never go to (Aldi) to see what kind of ice cream they have. I bought some, but what’s more important, these gorgeous purple cut flowers caught my attention! It’s sea lavender. The flowers feels papery, almost like dried flowers!! I actually let them dry and they’re still on my desk a few weeks later!

4. One day, when I was feeling low, I heard some birds chirping. Turned out it was a swallow! I see them flying everyday and since I live on the 6th floor the view is really nice, but I’ve never ever seen this bird that close and it never sat on my windowsill! It was a shoooow. It lasted for a few hours. Baby swallows were sitting on my windowsills and their mom was bringing them snack. I spent most of the day watching them! Swallows symbolize hope and coming back home. Was it a sign for me? I hope so. I believe so.

5. I thrifted a few more vintage botanical books! There’s quite a few of them, so I’ll just make a post about them. I shared some of them on my IG stories but I figured it’d be nice to have all of the information in one place!

6. Most of my home décor (and honestly everything I own) is bought second hand but this time I bought this string of LED lights. I’m not sure yet how I feel about it, I might need another one, so the whole cart is decorated, but I just don’t like the idea that they’re plastic!

What’s next?

This week I’m going to share another catch up series post!

Next week I’m out of town, so I’ll do my best to squeeze in another update post/sketchbook episode this week as well.

On top of terrible shipping delays, I had (well, still have), some technical issues with my plotter and laptop, which only adds to all the delays! After years I recently switched to the new computer and weeeelllll, I lost some files from the old one, nothing serious, but for example I had to edit some scans that were edited before, I lost some older lists of shipping addresses.

The cutting machine not working properly is the worse part, but I don’t want to bore you with the drama here. I’m sure I’ll figure everything out!

I lost access to some of your addresses, some of them probably changed (recently I got a few mails returned to me).

To not elaborate on that here, I’ll just send private messages to each of you (I mean physical reward tiers Patrons) cause I know the delays are concerning!!! I'll also reply to all of the DMs today/tomorrow!!

Honestly, I’m coming off anxiety/depression meds andddd I think it might be not the best idea. At first it was going quite well but at some point it turned dark pretty quickly.

It knocked me down completely and while I know it happens I feel embarrassed. It might be easier to just not talk about it and show up after 3 weeks like nothing has happened.

I’m seeing my doctor this week, which is GREAT!

The appointment were supposed to be two weeks ago but I’m glad it had to be postponed, cause back then I felt quite good.

It feels so good to post and connect with you! I can't even express how grateful I am.

Thanks for your support and patience and see you in a few days!

Love,

Marta