Welcome to the inaugural post of chubbellart.com. This month I hope to finish the latest in my series of bird portraits. These blue jays are done in mixed media, but primarily water color. I’m building up layers of grainy colored pencil and water color in the background. I’ve used water color pencils as well. I’m working on Arches 140# hot press, and it seems to be holding up to all the scrubbing and lifting I’ve been torturing it with.
My long journey to learn the craft of children’s book writing and illustrating continues. I’m participating in the SCBWI Carolinas Picture Book Dummy Challenge. It is truly challenging. After working on character development, setting, and composition, we’re finalizing dummy sketches and creating finished artwork. My story is about a cat named Noodles who must tame the magic sock in order to get his heart’s desire. I’ve got Noodles taped to the back of my studio door. I’m using the cats as models when they can be bothered to pose. I’ve got a week to finish the dummy sketches, a month to get the final art ready, and my primary goal is to not embarrass myself when I submit everything at the end. Assuming, of course, that I’ve checked in at all stages of the challenge and finish on time. We’ll see how it goes!
Christine Hubbell 
Really like the children’s book illustrations.