Christopher decided to shoot a video of me demonstrating the different stages of making the Nancy print. The first part (of four) is below. Though the screen I did in this video turned out to be underexposed and not usable, the videos hopefully have a lot of info for would-be screen printers. Enjoy!

The silver prints cost $15 and the black ones are $12. Check them out!

Once the cards were designed, it was pretty easy getting them printed at Overnight Prints. Add in boxes, clear plastic sleeves, and labels on the back and voilà — eight LitKids cards in a box!

My next LitKids project will be taking images of four of the more popular designs and professionally printing up some blank note cards. I’m hoping to put together boxes of eight and putting, say, ten dollars on them. This one makes me a bit leery, since I’m still in the red and it will cost me more $$$. Online, I’ve sold 69 prints in 2010 — which was wonderful — but 2011 is turning out sluggish. I’m gonna go ahead and print the cards anyhow, since it will be nice to diversify the product line a bit.

Tom and many more characters are available at my LitKids Etsy shop.

Unlike some of the earlier prints, this one was a breeze to do. The background is some Victorian era clip art of a flower, screen printed in bright yellow. I then used some sage green spray paint on the mole shape, making a nice speckled texture. A spray of gold paint and the dark green mole image was complete. Here it is, listed on Etsy.

As a bonus, here’s a photo Christopher shot of me sitting at the table we had set up last weekend at (excellent) local bookseller Changing Hands. We were there for five six hours peddling prints, and at the end of the day we wound up selling ten prints — including more copies of the Mole print than anything else!

In other LitKids news, I’m happy to report that some of my prints will be available locally in a brick-and-mortar retail setting! Changing Hands, the legendary indie bookseller in the Phoenix area, will be selling matted and poly bagged versions of a few of my prints in a special display starting on October 20. They only took five prints (our Laura was among the rejected ones), but they look excellent packaged like this. Hopefully they’ll sell out those five and want more. Later on this month, I’m going to be shopping the prints around to other local retailers. Wish me luck.

This print is the last of the six designs I worked on before launching LitKids in April. Which character should I do next? So many possibilities, and it doesn’t even have to be a kid. Here’s the direct link to get a Heidi print.

The ones that did come out are really nice, however. I love the interplay between my design and the tinted John Tenniel illustrations from the 1946 edition of Through the Looking Glass I used. Next step: getting it on the Etsy front page!

Come on and check it out at LitKids!

Anyway, the photos below show some of the stuff I’ve been working on lately — a screen stretched with a cherished old silk shirt with a comic book pattern (which didn’t stretch right, soaked up too much liquid, and eventually got ripped), a piece with pages from a circa 1900 copy of Treasure Island pasted on, inks, papers, and all that good stuff. Enjoy!

There was also the matter of Huckleberry Finn containing the “n” word. Hmmm, I didn’t notice the text has lots of “n” words! I was able to catch some of the offending words and creatively cover them up with splashes of gold paint; I just hope we don’t wind up with a pissed off customer! My opinion is that quaint 1800s language set off by a modern drawing is part of what makes these prints unique, so if someone gets a print with an un-p.c. word or two consider it one of the extra special ones.

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My first run of Jo March Lit Kids screen prints was completed this week. The pages come from an lovely old edition of Little Women. I did a lot of preliminary drawings for Jo, and I’m still not sure if this one captures her spunky spirit, but they came out pretty nice all the same. And the color palette of mauve, purple and gold on yellowing paper looks absolutely gorgeous.

I was so busy with printing that I forgot about our Wednesday video. How about a scene from the historically inaccurate 1978 TV movie version of Little Women? I mean how “1978 TV movie” is the casting of Susan Dey as Jo and Meredith Baxter Birney as Jo’s sister Meg? Eve Plumb was in this as well (being a Brady Bunch fan, that was the only thing about this production I remember).

The photo below is the first fruit of my efforts. It’s a drawing of Anne Shirley from Anne of Green Gables screen printed atop facing pages from the book that bears her name. This was an, how we say, interesting experience. Many of the prints came out off-register and with blobby looking lines, but I might be deluded enough to believe those elements add to their funky handmade charm. They’ll get more professional looking in time. Anne is the first, but I have great designs ready for five more characters. The process has been an expensive learning experience, but I’m having a lot of fun with it. Each print is completely unique, and I think there are a lot of factors involved (nostalgia for printed books, new mommies wanting something special for their kids) that might possibly resonate with the Etsy crowd. Most of all, it’s a lovingly handcrafted project that totally reflects my style, not something someone else imposed on me. As far as I’m concerned, it’s already a success.

The Etsy store is not officially open yet. I want to get another character printed up so it’s not just Anne sitting there by herself. The shop ought to be going live in a few weeks.