Personalized Easter Baby Clothes for Under $20

Little Characters has a couple adorable designs for Baby's First Easter, and they can be personalized for free. Just email drawnbyk@gmail.com and I can have a new name or different coloring added to the store in one day.





I'm pretty happy with both these designs. I tried to give the babies features that weren't too specific, so lots of parents could see their little ones in the drawings. I like the swirlies in the lamb's wool and the bright polkadots on the Easter egg. I have sketches for a couple more Easter designs that I hope to have in the store for 2010.

I tried to put more names in the personalized sections to make it more convenient, but I haven't sold any of those yet. I'll have to wait and see if that works better. I'm very happy to add anyone's name by order (at no extra charge), and it only takes me a day to put a new name in the store, but I think if it's already been created, it might be more appealing to customers.

Passover Baby Gifts for Under $20

I've finally finished some adorable designs for Passover baby clothes. Click any picture to go straight to Little Characters store and buy now. Pesach is coming soon, but if you email drawnbyk@gmail.com I can personalize any design for free in one day. (I'm also happy to change any of the coloring.)







I'm happy to have finished these in time, but I have sketches for three more Passover designs. Hopefully, I'll have at least two of those available for 2010! This is a milestone for me though, because now that I've added Pesach designs, I have finished all the major holidays in the Jewish calendar. When I started my store, one of my first designs was for Rosh Hashanah. Now I've almost come full circle. That feels good.

Unitarian Universalist Design on T-Shirts for the Whole UU Family

I devoted a lot less time to my baby clothes store, Little Characters, in February. Patrick and I have been putting almost all our time and energy into trying to ensure that at least one of us has a good, paying job come summer. I'm currently chasing a dream. I'll know in the next month or two if it will become a reality, but I've just started to get some breaks from running.

And anyone who knows me well knows how I use my breaks . . . to work on my store! :D

I decided to treat myself. I delayed working on the next set of holiday designs for April (I do plan to create Passover/Pesach, Easter, and revamped Earth Day designs) and instead I focused on something closer to my heart . . . Unitarian Universalism.

I would estimate that I've spent well over a hundred hours on designs for Jewish, Christian, Muslim, and Hindu designs for baby clothes - with most of that time going toward the Jewish baby gifts. I feel very proud of that, because celebrating diversity is certainly a reflection of my values.

But those values come from my Unitarian Universalist faith, so it was about time I create something based on that! I just completed my first collection of UU designs for baby clothes, and T-shirts for toddlers, kids, youth, or parents.

Creating this collection was pretty involved. Each design says either "Little UU" or just "UU" and the letters are filled with symbols from the world's religions. I drew each of those symbols. (If you zoom in really big, the waves
in the lines will prove that to you! Don't worry though - it will look smooth when printed regular size on the products)

You'll find beautiful versions of the Sufi Winged Heart, the Shinto Torii (Gate), the Pagan Triple Moon, the Taoist Yin Yang, the Jewish Chai (Life symbol), the Christian Ichtus (Fish), the Hindu Om, the Bahai Nine Pointed Star, the Christian Cross, the Muslim Star & Crescent, the Buddhist Dharmachakra (Wheel Showing the Eight-fold Path), and the Jewish Star of David. And, of course, I couldn't forget the UU Chalice! Each period is filled with a chalice.

Here are some examples of products. JUST CLICK ANY PICTURE TO BUY. You can also browse the Unitarian Universalist section of my store to find the size, color, and product that's just right for you or email me at drawnbyk@gmail.com. I'm happy to do a special order changing any of the colors in the design at no extra charge. I could also add to the design to make it more personal for your congregation or church activity. Depending on how much time that would require, there may be a slight increase in the price.









Drawing each of these religious symbols was a spiritual practice for me. I thought about what each meant to me, and I tried to chose symbols that represented the elements of the traditions that called to me personally. For example, even though I think the Jewish symbol of the Hamsa (hand) is visually beautiful, I don't feel as inspired by a sign that's primary purpose is to ward off the evil eye.

I guess it is ironic that my first design focusing on Unitarian Universalism still included signs from all these other religions. I could have started with a design that only had a chalice, and that might have been more true to UU identity. The truth is that I've seen a couple of gorgeous chalice designs on Cafepress by other artists. I haven't seen anything quite like what I just created, so it was less intimidating to start with this. I hope to move on to doing some original chalice designs and I'm very excited to create a design based on a popular children's chalice lighting verse.

In the mean time, I'm happy with this beginning. I think that these T-shirts could be a good way of spreading the good news about Unitarian Universalism without proselytizing. I suspect that someone might see the shirt and ask the wearer a question. What better way to start conversations about Unitarian Universalism than with a question?!

Purim Gifts for the Whole Family: Adorable T-Shirts

Purim starts March 9th, 2009, and my store, Little Characters, has a great collection of designs for Jewish babies, kids, teens, and parents. These make cute gifts, and the baby clothes all cost under $20.

CLICK ANY PICTURE TO BUY NOW!
The T-shirts for the babies and children come first.

I am proud of this design. Some other designers have focused on Esther's looks, but it took more than a pretty face to save her people. She risked her own safety to cleverly arrange things with her husband. She's a real inspiration.

This design is perfect for your little noisemaker!

Your baby or toddler might not be ready to take part in all the Purim festivities, but at least s/he can enjoy eating Hamantaschen!

Adorable Holi Baby T-Shirts, Onesies, Bibs: Great Gifts for Hindu Festival

My online store, Little Characters, has some brand new baby clothes for Hindu babies ready to celebrate the spring holiday of Holi. There's a nice collection of kids', junior, men, women's, plus-size, and maternity clothes for Holi, too! These are all original designs hand-drawn by me (Kerridwen).


Just CLICK ANY PICTURE below to BUY NOW.








I'm extremely proud of my Holi designs! I think they are a great expression of my personal values and my artistic style.

It is very important to me to celebrate religious diversity, and unfortunately, Hinduism and other polytheistic faiths are often misunderstood, trivialized, or ignored. There are so many holidays in the Hindu tradition, so I had a hard time choosing which to feature in my designs. But Holi seems like such a fun festival! I've never participated in it myself, but I can imagine how much I would love to become a running paint canvass! And I think this holiday in particular is one that really gives children a chance to go a bit wild and just be kids. I'm definitely in favor of that!

I really like the way my drawings turned out, too. I didn't compromise to make them more marketable. I love the way the baby's shirt is hugging a lovely chubby belly. I like the curls arcing over the head and the way the paint spray looks like a firework. I just enjoyed being able to use vibrant color, too: especially the pink/orange combination that is a lot more common in India than in America. It was a joy to draw this design. I hope it adds to the joy of some Hindu family's celebration.

Fantasy Babies

I don't think I've had a chance to brag about my Fantasy designs for baby T-shirts, onesies, and bibs.

I'm in a bit of a bad mood, and it will cheer me up to show off my Future DM design for baby clothes. Click on any of the pictures to BUY NOW.





I am definitely the kind of gal to have lots of geeks for friends, so I'm glad to have designed something that would make a good gift for any role playing, dungeon mastering geeks who become parents. I think my drawing of this little kid is especially cute, and I like the bright blue color in the dragon. I wish that the drawing didn't end so abruptly with the line across the bottom, but dragons are big and there's only so much design space for baby clothes! I spent forever drawing and coloring in each of the dragon's scales, and now that I see it, I think it actually would have looked better if I just made the scales bigger. Live and learn. Someday when I am rolling in free time, I'll add more message options, so there are also onesies, T-shirts, and bibs that say "Future Player" "Role Playing Baby" "That's How I Roll" (see the 20 sided die), etc.

Sometimes It Sucks to be a Work From Home Mom

Don't get me wrong. I love the creative part. It makes me really happy to draw my little pictures of babies and toddlers. And if I stop and think about it, it's fabulous that there are people all over America (not A LOT of people, but they are spread out geographically) whose infants are wearing my designs.

But it's been ages since I've actually drawn a picture. I've been spending all my available "me time" on uploading the drawings, writing the descriptions for the store, and . . . as much free online advertising as I can bear.

Okay, I shouldn't just focus on the negative. The online advertising can be a lot of fun, too, or I just wouldn't be spending so much time on it. I do get a chance to be creative when I'm creating lenses on Squidoo: Little Characters Baby Clothes Lens or adding entries to my blogs: Obama Baby Clothes, Baby Nicknames Onesies, and Jewish Baby Clothes. But they do suck up a whole lot of time.

And then there was yesterday. My husband had helped me design flyers and I thought I would go to a few local grocery stores and post them. We went to the store closest to home and I bought my son a banana. Happy times.

We drove to the next one on my list - taking a slight detour to look for Starbucks (which we couldn't find!) - and arriving about 15 minutes later. My son is starting to get pretty tired of being taken in and out of moving things with seatbelts. Carts, cars . . . kinda all the same! But he goes along with me and I discover that this Giant doesn't have a community bulletin board. Aargh.

I try to salvage the whole mission by taking him to a funky coffeehouse nearby. This way, he can just sit with me a little while and have fun, right? Well, the only way an 18 month old can really do that is by being strapped into a highchair! More seatbelts - though this isn't a moving thing. Luckily, they have cookies. I'm not especially proud of this, but I let him eat a big chocolate chip cookie all by himself. (Well, he did share it with his Cookie Monster doll) We talk to Daddy on the cell phone, my little guy says "Wubba" (which is Sesame Street monster talk for "I love you"), and I plan to try just one more grocery store on the way home.

My son throws a fit when I try to get him back in the car. I guess that this is normal for his age, and I can certainly understand his frustration, but for a second or two I really didn't know how we were going to get home. He was bucking and it took everything I had to get him safely in that carseat in as gentle a manner as possible. I promised him we were going straight home. Enough is enough. He is normally so good in cars with all my mama errands, so I had clearly pushed the limit.

And after all this, I just wonder, what did I really accomplish? I caused my sweet-mannered little boy to have a tantrum and bribed him with a hugely sugary snack, and what do I have to show for it? Two flyers hanging on bulletin boards hidden by restrooms.

Okay, I'm going to draw now.