*free* baby jesus digi stamp

I'm still a beginner illustrator, so I feel like I should be open to requests. You know? Like, when you're just starting to build your portfolio or resumé for any job, you'll gleefully accept any account.

Soooo, when Maia (5 years old) asked me to draw her a baby Jesus that she could color, I made it happen.  Because, the budding portfolio. And also, baby Jesus.

As an aside, we'd just come back from church, she was singing Christmas carols, looking through my stamps and was SHOCKED to realize that Jesus was notably missing from my stash o' Christmas stamps. I mean, we teach her that Jesus is the reason for the season, but then all I have is one angel in a sweeping landscape of Santas and elves. (They are super cute, though.)



So, later that evening, I sat down to watch Mary Poppins and sketch a swaddled baby Jesus.  Monday morning, I was ready to make an illustrated version. Maia promptly colored herself 5 versions of baby Jesus, to be handed out to teacher and friends at school. I colored one to show off, and made the quickest card:



Because Jesus' gift of life is free, I'm offering this sweet baby Jesus image as a free digi stamp.  The card you see above is a standard 4.25 x 5.5 inch card, so that will give you an idea of how large the image is (if you do nothing to shrink it down.)  When you click on the link, it will automatically download the zip file to your computer or ask you to save it.  You'll get both a png and jpg format.

BABY JESUS

I really hope you enjoy printing and coloring the babe! If you'd like to see more of my illustrations, I have a Christmas collection available in my Etsy shop - click! And I am working to put out a Valentine collection, sometime in the early new year.  Thank you for all of your encouragement and support as I hack my way into the world of illustrators.

♥.

Just ME digital stamps etsy shop opening!

I am so excited to share with you all that I've opened a little digital stamp shop!

They are all part of my Christmas collection (they've just all winter and holiday themed, but that sounded fancy.)  I'm making all of my Christmas tags this year with the sweet deer image above.

This cute bear holding this stuffed snowman is my favorite. And the retro-looking banner is so fun!



I also have a couple of elf kids in the collection. With their holiday footed pyjamas, they are ready for Christmas!

If you only need the boy image, he comes to you atop a present. Of course he made the nice list!



The matching girl image also comes with a little reindeer friend.

Sometimes they do let Rudolph play in the reindeer games.



This one is a little play on the Nutcracker Suite.... it's nutcracker sweet! ha. The nutcracker is a girl and she hangs with her little mouse queen friend.

Last, but not least, this waving penguin with his snowman-shaped balloon.

I hope you like what you see! All images can be purchased in my shop, please feel free to look around - click!

GIVEAWAY: I'll be running a giveaway on instagram, so visit me there for a chance to win the entire Christmas collection! (I'm "mom2sofia" over there.)

you've got this.

Just for fun, I'm sharing an illustration I made for Sofia.  She isn't a runner, and with her knees still recovering from last year's surgeries she was so nervous to have to run 2K in her gym class. I tucked this little card into her lunch box and hoped it would put a smile on her face.

I hand-drew the girl and her huge apple, then scanned and turned it into an illustrated digital image for myself.



I thought she looked pretty cute in her little gym shorts and high socks. A little retro cool. But maybe not with black shoes. haha. Not sure why I colored those that color now that I look back.



I used my favorite Avery Elle sentiment, and stamped it twice for a heavier and crisper impression. I wanted to make sure the sentiment would stand out.  I used a stamp-a-ma-jig to make sure that I landed in the exact same place on the second stamping.  My hands aren't steady enough to wing it.

I also did some fancy die-cutting around the apple stem and leaf: I washi-taped my stitched rectangle die where I wanted it and sent it through the big shot 3 times: once to cut the lower half of the rectangle, and then on either side, making sure not to cut where I had the apple bleeding outside of its borders.  Finally, some scissor work to cut the top of the apple and make it look seamless.

I loaded the whole thing onto a walnut notecard (I need more and more of these, I can't stop using them!) and popped it into Sofia's bag.

When she came home, she had tears in her eyes because she was in the slower half of her class, but when she said: I didn't give up, mama. some of the girls quit, but I made it to the end -

we celebrated.

Here's to not giving up. You've got this, not matter what your "this" may be.

♥.

the girl with the bear hat - a free digi stamp

Hey there!

I know not all of you are into digi stamps, but as I work and practise on translating my hand-drawn doodles into illustrated artwork, I just love to be able to share a little something with you.

I drew a few back to school images, but I had in mind that she could be used for just about anything. Stick her next to a dear Santa sentiment, or a happy birthday and it would be just as cute. I love her bear hat and little school-girl dress.

I used a stencil on the background and printed her again so that I could fussy cut and pop her up. The sentiment is by Altenew.



This is my little gift to you, thanks for visiting my blog! I hope you like her.  If you decide to download and color her, leave me a link in the comments so I could come see - it always gives me a thrill!



If you want to download the png file, click HERE.

If you would rather download the jpg file, click HERE.

If you want to check out last month's free digi stamp, click HERE.

♥.

new digi stamps and a giveaway.

When the very talented and sweet Melania Deasy contacted me to see if I'd help promote her new digi stamp set, "Aero boy", it was a no-brainer.

The images are so cute!  I had so much fun creating this little scene:

I decided to work with my favorite pilot, but the set is full of more options, and some cheeky birds too :)  I printed the pilot, and the city-scape, and colored them in with copics before cutting them out.  I re-sized one of the greetings (ah, the magic of digi stamps!) and created a little banner to float behind the plane.

Isn't it just adorable?

Click on over to see Melania's full set reveal and read the details of her giveaway (did I mention there would be a giveaway?  hee.  Go now!)