Passion to Paid Entry Illustrated Animation

Hey, Dribbble community! It's been a hot minute since I last posted on here, and a lot has changed for me!

I'm officially working as an Independent Illustrative Designer, and am going to be working towards my focus of being a children's storybook illustrator.

This particular post was done as a scholarship entry for @Lauren Hom's Passion to Paid class, which allowed me to combine illustration with my current cowboy obsession.

More context about this project:

With a Swedish mom & a Canadian dad, I grew up with a lot of “weird" phrases & words. One of my favorite is whenever something starts to work out, you say, “Now we’re cooking with peanut oil!” I’ve always had an obsession with incorporating the most interesting phrases into my daily vernacular. 😏 More recently, I’ve been fascinated with Cowboy / Wild West culture. (is my quarter-life-crisis to become a cowgirl!?) Thanks to a friend, I’ve been introduced into a wide range of Texan phrases I’ve become obsessed with. I’ve been saying for months I’d love to illustrate these phrases. As I currently work towards my goal of children storybook illustrating, I think about all the fun words & phrases that I grew up with, ones I continue to learn now, and how much I’d love to bring them to life via illustration. The #1 thing I enjoy the most about illustration is how it gives the opportunity to conceptualize complex ideas / can communicate and connect a visual to the text for a reader. I would love to see these phrases categorized into different states & different countries, and put them into a format where they can be shared to all those who will get a good laugh / begin to use these words & phrases in their daily speech. I think this would be a great way to help launch me into children storybook illustrator while giving my design voice a real quirky personal touch.