Book publishing party!

First spread of the new book. 

We had a book publishing party on Tuesday with Kerttu, the wonderfully energetic author of Elsa ja Lauri -bookseries. The top floor of a nice Café Talo was packed with our friends and relatives. Trio Pullakka, our very own house band played (me as the percussionist).
Here are some photos from our cheerful little celebration. And a tiniest little peek from the book I'm sketching at the moment...it's still a work in progress and a bit of a secret again :)

Kerttu and I celebrating!

The lovely little boy also named Lauri who has been Lauri's "model" in my mind.

Trio Pullakka (quartet) playing!

Plenty of colouring to do.

Mini fraction of the sketches that are piling up on my desk.

Helsinki Book Fair and our new book!

Last weekend was the Helsinki Book Fair; four days packed with events, interviews and book sales for all book-loving public to enjoy. Our latest picture book "Elsa ja Lauri matkustavat" (Elsa and Lauri go travelling") made it just in time from the printer to be presented and sold at the fair by Oppi&ilo, our publisher. 

Kerttu and I had a book reading session and afterwards we created paper airplanes with the children and their parents. It's always a great pleasure to see children listening to a story. Their attentiveness and concentration is amazing to watch. And the colourful paper planes were flying around the children's play area. Apparently some of the planes travelled all the way to Italy, Greece and Dubai, and even to Minecraft world.

I was also taking part in Kuvittajat's (The Association of Finnish Illustrators) stand and spend a couple of hours there as a cashier. Next to me was illustrator Maija Hurme drawing mini portraits of people for free. This caused quite a queue, so I jumped in to help out and did a few quick portraits myself (see the very poor quality photos...). It was nice to talk to people while drawing.  I'd love to that kind of thing more often, though without cashier duties at the same time!

Back to school/Holiday mood

Elsa and Lauri, the main characters of the picture book (written by very talented Kerttu Ruuska) I recently finished illustrating, are going for a vacation. Meanwhile in real life, our son is back to school already! I don't know how this summer just flew by. I've managed to fill my calendar with many things big and small, but this weekend I will enjoy the sun, swim in the lake and pick some lovely blueberries in the forest!

Holiday!

Tomorrow I'll be leaving for a week's holiday. This is a good moment to show you the cover illustration for the third Elsa book, as it happens to be on the theme of travelling. Though now it's not just Elsa, but also her little brother Lauri, travelling abroad. Such a convenient holiday trip when it comes to looking for reference!