Vermoosin' Hard Cider!!!!

Vermonters will probably remember last year when The Vermont based company "Woodchuck Hard Cider" was in a dispute with the "WoodChuck Coffee Roasters" Company over their name and Logo.

http://www.schwimmerlegal.com/2013/05/woodchuck-cider-v-woodchuck-coffee.html

Well that dispute worked out to my favor in a LARGE way as I'm now happy to present their new labeling and Identy will be branded around Barbs and My "Vermoosin" Concept!  They are calling it "Whacky Antler Hard Cider" and will be working with me to create a whole line of Kirby the Moose Illustrations to fit each of their products. Below is a mock up they sent of their "Amber" product.  Not only will I be getting a whole lot of free hard Cider but I managed to work out a really amazing advance and royalty with them!!!!  Here's a link to  my original Vermoosin' products on zazzle for those interested in purchasing them.   http://www.zazzle.com/sneezingleopard* 

EDIT:   Sorry to have to report this is actually just a bad April Fool's Joke. I posted it to FB as well and I started to feel pretty bad when everyone was showing such kind support. I have to say I even surprised myself when I dropped that moose into place in photoshop and saw how cool he looked. Maybe I should contact "Woodchuck" and see if they have plans to launch another line of products anytime soon!

Free Vermoosin' Coloring Pages and an Introduction

For the coloring pages go to the end of this post.

      I was looking through the last few blog posts I did and realized I haven't really posted any of the illustrations from my new line of Vermoosin' Products yet. I've also been wanting to post some more free coloring pages for kids and since this bunch of illustrations belong entirely to me and I have good line drawings of them, I have the freedom to do that!

    So far I only have  a handful of illustrations as I rarely have time to work on my own projects. I have big ideas in my mind and am still considering doing a couple of different styles to see if maybe the full line is done in another medium or style than this. Actually the moose on the bottom right was done in watercolor as it was originally a design i made up for my wife for valentines day.  I worked in digital for the rest as I started out thinking of doing screen printed T's and needed to have a limited color pallet, but that route didn't work out and so for now I kept things simple using zazzle as my printer.  www.zazzle.com/sneezingleopard*

    The illustrations I have so far.

         I'm hoping to eventually kickstart this project so I can actually give it the time and money it deserves. The moose's name is Kirby (my wife's home town) and I've begun to develop an entire back story to his existence which one day may make it into a children's book. He's a young energetic Vermont moose who pretty much enjoys any Vermont sport you can imagine (hiking, yaking, bowling, fishing, biking etc.) and of course his favorite drink is Vermont maple syrup which gives him all the energy he'll ever need for his wacky endeavours! I'm sure I'll reveal more of his story as time goes on but that's the basics.

some of the products you can find on my Vermoosin' store www.zazzle.com/sneezingleopard*

        Now for a few free coloring pages for kids to print out and use their own style to color in. These line art drawings were done with fine tip markers and then vectorized with inkscape to create clean crisp bold lines. Feel free to print out as many copies as you would like for students, doctors office, or your own kids. I would also love to see what they come up with so please send me a copy of their finished art to matthew.gauvin@gmail.com . If I get a handful of submissions or more I would be happy to show them on my blog with your permission. Enjoy!

A Recap of Recent work and link to my Recent WCAX Appearance

I haven't posted much for a while as I've been going in all sorts of directions. The coolest bits of news for me are that I was recently on the VT news WCAX: The 30 with Kristin Van Aken to discuss our book " PIGS! Under the Post Office?"  (linked to vid at end of this post) and leading up to that I finally began a project that I'm working on in collaboration with my wife Barb.

      That project is a series of Illustrated products under the title of "Vermoosin'". She's the mastermind behind it really. I mentioned to her that I've been really wanting to do a line of t-shirts and products centered around a crazy VT moose character and she reminded me that she LOVE's Moose and the brain storming began. I think she thought of the name "Vermoosin'" , she also came up with the name "Kirby" for the moose. This project is in the veeeeery beginning stages still and I actually will likely still do lots of character design and maybe move into a different medium or change the look of the character entirely. I really didn't push the character as much as I wanted to yet. We just wanted to get out some initial designs before the news appearance.  I'll do an official launch once we feel everything is where we want it and have  a good series of products started with a good store, website etc. I have tons of marketing ideas waaaay above and beyond anything I've ever done for any children's books so maybe one day this could be something known by name across Vewrmont! There is  a link on the homepage of my website and I'll get one on my blog soon. To purchase some of the initial designs go to http://www.zazzle.com/sneezingleopard*

Other recent work includes, I recently finished my third book in the samantha series.

I did a quick children's portrait.

I did  some new spot illustrations for the samantha book and a logo for a special edition of those books.

I've been working on thumbnail sketches for my newest children's book " Brave Roger, Little Mumps and Me: Four Stories for Grins and Giggles" By James Mee

For those who weren't able to see it live, here's the vid of Kristin and I on the news talking about our book. http://www.wcax.com/story/22019258/pigs-under-the-post-office  It's always bizzare seeing myself on any sort of video but I'm just happy I was able to get words to come out of my mouth! LOL You can get a copy of the book on amazon but the author's preference for buying is through createspace at https://www.createspace.com/4018119