♥♥ Pairs ♥♥

Happy Valentine's Day; I hope you can share it with someone you love! Swans pair bond for life so I thought this picture from my Instagram account would be a good one for the blog today. Speaking of pair bonds, the Decorah eagles have reclaimed their nest and are due to start laying any day now.. watch this space:

................................................................................

Forest & Sea ▪ www.etsy.com/shop/ForestAndSea

hand drawn nature on fabric, accessories & homeware

  

Eagles Return

They're back! Their first egg was laid on the 17th of February. If you'd like a look at the chick stills from last year, click here or visit the Raptor Resource Project's blog here!

Two eggs and a newly renovated nest.

3 Chicks on the 4th of April:

The first chick hatched on the 27th of March and I'm glad to see they're enjoying sunny weather over in Iowa this year. This pair are amazing parents; this is the fifth nest they've raised and four of these had 3 eaglets, which is apparently rare. If you click the image above, you'll see the humungous fish they've caught for them.

................................................................................

Forest & Sea ▪ www.etsy.com/shop/ForestAndSea

hand drawn nature on fabric, accessories & homeware

  

Around the World in Fruit & Veg

A new and improved version of this! I really like the way the polar regions worked out in the different shade of wood.

Around the world in Fruit & Veg Details - click to view larger.

They're available as linen place mats here!

................................................................................

Forest & Sea ▪ www.etsy.com/shop/ForestAndSea

hand drawn nature on fabric, accessories & homeware

  

A new background.

Back in March, I submitted a design for the Joseph Joseph brief. You can see the winning designs here and, although mine isn't among them, I was happy with it. It was the first time I'd used vector graphics and really enjoyed learning on this design but was never satisfied with the blue background (put in at the last minute as a bit of a rush job) so I've updated it to something more me: 

A la Carte on Wood.

I think it makes the fruit and veg colours stand out much better and looks more in context laid out on the chopping board, although it's a weird old mix of photo and vector; still, I like it! Especially the new shadows, which you can see better in the details below. It's a happy coincidence that the crack in the board ended up pretty much on the date line :)

Click for detailed view.

I'm sure I can use it for something kitchen related. I was thinking a calendar or placemats; anyone got any other ideas?

................................................................................

Forest & Sea ▪ www.etsy.com/shop/ForestAndSea

hand drawn nature on fabric, accessories & homeware

  

Hatching!

This Bald Eagle pair from Iowa are about to welcome their first chick of 2011:

It's so amazing to watch something like this live and is thanks to the Raptor Resource Project, a nonprofit organisation working to restore bird of prey populations in the Midwest.

Update 12th April:

I caught these stills of feeding time earlier. They really don't do the chicks justice though; they're still so wobbly and uncoordinated :) I'm glad they're ok with all the bad weather they've had in the midwest this weekend. I hope that none of you have been badly affected either.

Click to view larger.

More bad weather (19th April):
Ahhh, poor thing : (

_________________________________________________

Forest & Sea ▪ www.etsy.com/shop/ForestAndSea

hand drawn nature on fabric, accessories & homeware