And the winner is....

Well, it's been a week since I posted my birthday giveaway and today we are picking a winner! I used a random number generator to do the picking for me and the winner is......drum roll.....Siobhan Irish!!

Siobhan had this to say:

Siobhan, congratulations! I hope you will make your granddaugher very happy with this book:

Please mail me your snail mail address at c.m.j.winkelman[at]home.nl or through the message box in the sidebar. I will then make sure to order the book for you and have it sent your way.
A little warning: if I do not hear from you within a week I will pick another winner, but I'm sure you won't let it come to that! ;-)

Wishing you all a wonderful and artsy day and for those who didn't win: better luck next time! 

It's my birthday and you know what that means! (Giveaway Time!)

Yes, today is my birthday. I am turning 48 and slowly but way too fast moving towards 50! Just two more years to go before the big five o. There's no way around it: I am a middle aged woman. ;-)

On my blog I have been keeping a bit of a personal tradition ever since I started and that is to do a giveaway on my birthday. This year is no different, so pay attention blogsy people, and you might win something!

My gift this year is a book by one of my favorite art book authors Sarah Simblet. She is an artist and professor and has made some absolutely gorgeous books on subjects like botany and anatomy. I thought however for this giveaway I would pick a book that is a bit more general in nature, namely this one:

This book has two versions, the American version is called Sketchbook for the Artist, which is the version I personally have and the British version is called The Drawing Book. Now this latter title is way more appropriate as this is a book about drawing in all its forms and possibilities. It is like a treasure trove of the things you can do by means of drawing.

It handles all kinds of subjects you can draw from animals to plants to people and builldings, but also abstracts and drawing from the imagination. It also deals with drawing materials and drawing techniques and  handles subjects like perspective and shading. It gives many beautiful examples of the work of famous artists and also of Simblet's own prolific work.

Still, I would not call this book a drawing course or a drawing book for beginners to learn how to draw. I would simply call it a treasure chest of possibilities and inspiration. I myself am absolutely in love with it and have been for years.

Here are some spreads from the inside:

Now this isn't a brand new publication. I believe it originally stems from 2005. But since it's such a timeless book I don't think that really matters and you will of course get a brand new book, not my old and used one.

Depending on where you come from, I will order the book from Amazon or Bookdepository or Bol and have it sent to you.  That is cheaper than me buying it here and sending it to you through the mail myself.

Unfortunately for the Dutchies among you the Dutch translation is no longer in print, but I would be willling to check if I can get it second hand if you are so inclined, depending a little on the price of course.

So here's the rules and they are very simple:

• If you are interested in winning this giveaway all you have to do is leave a comment.
• I will pick a winner on April 18th, that's a week from today. 
• The winner will have another week to get in touch with me with their snail mail address and other info through my e-mail or the contact window in the sidebar. 
• If the winner does not contact me before the 25th of  April I will pick another winner.
• I won't jump through hoops to contact you. 

I hope somebody will be very happy with this giveaway and I wish you all good luck in participating. Hope you win!

Wishing you all a wonderful and artsy day!

And the winner is....

Last week I told you about the mistake I made in buying a sticker book that was not really suitable for me.

So I decided to give it away. There were not many takers, but that means that those who did enter had a bigger chance of winning. Still, I only have one sticker book, so with the help of a number generator I picked the winner from the comments and it is Mari! She had this to say:

Mari is from South Africa and we actually sometimes correspond through e-mail where she mails me in Afrikaans and I mail her back in Dutch. Because the languages are so related we can understand each other (almost) perfectly. Above she asked me to put her name in the sorting hat and thanks me for the opportunity to win. Mari, I sure hope you will enjoy those stickers! I think I still have your address, but would appreciate it if you confirmed it through e-mail (you know how to reach me). Thanks.

For the rest of you, I promise if I ever buy the wrong stickers again I will give them away on the blog so you can have another chance. ;-)

For now I wish you all a wonderful and artsy weekend!

An accidental giveaway

A little while ago I bought this cute sticker book made by Carpe Diem which looked like it was fun and just up my ally.

When I got home I realised I should have looked better at the full content instead of just the pretty colours and pictures and words like 'inspire', because it turned out to be very much about God and faith and Jesus, and well...I'm just not really that religious. I could probably use half the stickers and the rest would just remain unused, which seemed a bit wasteful.

But I know there are plenty among you who are of the more religious persuasion that would probably love to own this sticker book and it's a lot nicer to have somebody else use the whole thing instead of me just using half of it. So ... I've decided to do a giveaway, a sort of accidental giveaway, haha.

Here's a peek at some of the pages in the book:

There are twelve pages in total and 703 stickers, but you get the idea. They are very cute and pretty and I think they would make someone very happy.

If you would like to win this sticker book just leave a comment. I will post a winner on September 9th, so be sure to comment before then. The winner will then have a week to get in touch with me and if they don't I will simply pick another winner. I sure hope these stickers will bring joy to one of you.

Wishing you all a wonderful and artsy day!

I'm back with a giveaway winner and a slideshow!

Hello my blogsy people! I am always amazed at how fast the time flies. It's been two weeks since we last spoke and in between I have had a wonderful vacation and a happy birthday indeed.

When I left you for my blog break I had a little giveaway of some cahier style sketchbooks by Seawhite of Brighton. There were not very many takers, but that's only a good thing for those participating, because the fewer contestants the higher the chance to win, right?

Anyway, let's get to it. I used a random number generator to pick a winner from the eight contestants and here is the result:

The seventh commenter was Mary! Congratulations Mary, you won! Please contact me at c.m.j.winkelman[at]home.nl or use the contact form on the sidebar, so you can give me your snail mail address and I can send the sketchbooks to you. Please do so before next Friday (the 28th) because otherwise I will pick another winner. But I'm sure you will be happy to receive your gift and I hope you enjoy it very much.

Now onto my vacation. You know how it goes: I go away and come back with a truckload of photographs and that means there are also a bunch of slideshows coming up in my upcoming posts.

As said above, my vacation was absolutely wonderful. I went to a town called Valkenburg which is in the south of the province called Limburg, which is again the southernmost province of The Netherlands (I live all the way in the northernmost part). It is a landscape of green hills and lovely valleys. Because in general we are a rather flat country a lot of those hills are referred to as mountains, but make no mistake, they are not mountains by a long shot. We're just not used to much around here, haha.

The apartment I was staying in for instance was in a holiday resort on the Cauberg ('berg' means mountain) and it was a bit of a climb to get up that 'berg', but that still does't mean it was a mountain.
The apartment was spacious and comfortable and a good place to come home to after a day of walking.

The apartments of the type I stayed in were built in such a manner that they overlooked each other so you could enjoy the view from your (big) terrace, which was a nice little valley with an orchard.

What I loved most about this place was that even though the resort (which looked most like a very tidy little village) was located near a rather busy road, but all I could hear in my apartment was birdsong. I live on a dune where most birds are gulls, jackdaws and magpies, not exactly pretty songbirds, so to me this was a real treat.

The next five (!) posts will be a slideshow of my vacation and the sixth one will a bit of a bonus, so if you hate those types of posts check back in about two weeks and there might be some artsy stuff again. But I need to get a trip out of my system first before I can move on and I know many of you do like these looks at a different country.

Hope you will enjoy traveling with me. For now it's good to be back and I wish you a wonderful and artsy weekend!

A Birthday Giveaway and a Blog Break

Let me start by saying it is not my birthday today as the title of this blogpost might have made you believe. My birthday is April 11 and it has been a personal tradition to do a giveaway for you all at that time, but I will not be here on my birthday which leads me to the second part of the title of my blogpost, namely that there will be a blog break.

Let me start with the important stuff: the giveaway. 
It's always a bit of a challenge to find something interesting to give away. There have been years I made something, years I bought something and years I ordered something and had it directly shipped to the winner. I think mostly my birthday giveaways have been about the things that fascinated me at the time.

Now I have been praising the Seawhite of Brighton sketchbooks on and off on this blog lately. Mostly because they are perfect for people like me, and by that I mean people who find it hard to just stick to one medium. If you like to switch between pencils, paint, markers, mixed media and everything in between in one book, then Seawhite is the one to get.

If you are just a watercolour painter, then please get a 'real' watercolour book. If you are a sketch artist, then please get a good drawing paper. If you like collage and acrylic, you might like to get one of those mixed media papers.
But if for you, like me, the world of art supplies is like a banquet that you cannot possibly choose only one course from, then get something like the Seawhite paper. By this I just want to say that the books aren't perfect, they are just really well suited for me.

Their books come in different formats of which the square big and thick ones are my favorite. Unfortunately they would also cost a fortune to ship around the world, so I decided on something a bit simpler, namely their Eco Sketchbooks.

These simple cahier style sketchbooks have craft covers and 32 pages of paper each. They are staple bound and come in three sizes (as far as I know): A6, A5 and A4. They should be easier to ship in a regular envelope and that way I can make this giveaway available to everyone that wants to join.

What can you win? Well, basically the above photograph! I will give away one of each size sketchbook, so you will get three sketchbooks in one giveaway! How cool is that?

There's only two things you have to do to be in the draw:
1) Comment that you want to win so I can put your name on the list.
2) Check back here in two weeks to see if you have won.

That's it. I will draw a winner on Friday the 21st of April. The winner will then have another week to contact me either through the contact form in the side bar or by mailing me directly at c.m.j.winkelman[at]home.nl. If the winner has not contacted me before the 28th of April I will draw another winner. Those are the rules and I'm sticking by them!

Now for the second part of the post: the blog break. 
 I will be away from this here blog until the draw on the 21st. This is because I'm not only giving away something to you for my birthday, but to myself as well, namely a vacation to the south of the Netherlands to a beautiful place called Valkenburg. I will be there a little over a week mostly walking and photographing until I drop. You know, the way I spend all my vacations! ;-)

I know, I know... my giveaway to myself is way more generous than the one I'm giving to you, but at least you can count on some interesting slide shows of a whole different region of  my country when I get back.

I will only be there for a little over a week, but right after my vacation I have to get back to full work days and there won't be time to do blogposts, so I might as well just take the full two weeks off from the blog and save myself a lot of stress.

And that's all I have to say today. I hope I will make someone happy with this giveaway. I hope my vacation will be wonderful. I hope my birthday in the south will be interesting. I hope those of you who celebrate Easter have a blessed time and I hope to find you all here in two weeks, alive and happy.

Until then I wish you a wonderful and artsy day!

And the winner is....

Last week I did my traditional birthday giveaway where you could win this beautiful colouring book by Johanna Basford.

I used a random number generator to pick the winner from the 22 commenters. The winner was number 4 and that is P. Welch. Here's what he/she had to say:

Looks like you have to get into the colouring book trend now! Congratulations on your win.

Now if you want to claim your prize please contact me either through the contact form on the side bar or through regular e-mail at c.m.j.winkelman[at]home.nl with your snail mail address so I can have the book sent to you. Please do so within two weeks. If I don't hear from you before May 2, I will pick another winner from the original commenters. Comments for my giveaway post will be closed for that reason. But I'm sure you would like to claim your prize so a second draw won't be necessary. ;-)

As for the rest of you, thank you so much for participating and for your kind birthday wishes. Hopefully next time it will be your turn to win, be it on this blog or another.

For now I wish you all a wonderful and artsy day!

It's my birthday and you know what that means! Giveaway time!

Hello my wonderful blogsy people!

Today I celebrate my 46th birthday (yes yay!) and it has become a personal tradition to do a giveaway on my blog on my birthday, so pay attention and you might win something (yay again!).

I have been wondering about what I should give away this year and I decided to simply go with something I have fallen in love with, namely adult colouring books!

I have bought quite a few colouring books over the last year or two and here's the weird thing I have to confess: I don't really colour in them! You see,  I buy them mostly because I am infatuated with all the beautiful line drawings and patterns in them. So to me they are more like art books than workbooks. When it comes to the actual colouring in, I always prefer to colour in my own drawings, so for me colouring books are mostly just a source of inspiration. But far be it from me to prevent anyone else from colouring their hearts out, I certainly see the appeal.

One of my favorite artists for making colouring pages is Johanna Basford and I know I don't stand alone in this, because her books are super popular. I have all her three colouring books and for this giveaway I have decided to give one of her books away. No, not my copy (nobody is touching that!), but a brand new one.

I have decided on this one:

It's I think her third colouring book and it's absolutely stunning!

Here are some pages from the inside:

Isn't it gorgeous?
If you would like to win this book all you have to do is comment. That's all. No strings attached.

The winner will be drawn a week from now on Monday the 18th of April. Please be sure to check back whether you have won. I will then give instructions on how to get your prize. Please do keep in mind that if you don't check back I will (after a reasonable amount of time of course) pick another winner.

Well, I hope I will make somebody very happy with this giveaway and I wish you all a wonderful and artsy and colourful day! Oh and...Happy Birthday to me! ;-)

Update: comments for this post have been closed as a winner has been picked.

Birthday giveaway - The Flow Book for Paper Lovers!

Well, I sure hope you are all well rested after our photography trip to Texel, because it's time for another fun event: my birthday!

Today I turn 45. My, how the time flies. As I've already stated in the past I have no hangups about getting older. So far life just gets better with age and I hope to keep that up.

While you are reading this I am actually on a little trip I gave myself as a birthday present. For years now I have wanted to go to the zoo in Emmen (which is in the east of the Netherlands and a gorgeous zoo) to have a day of just photographing all the animals there. I never really went, because as you know I live on an island and a trip like that would take me three days. Well, now I have actually booked a hotel in Emmen and am staying there for a weekend trip. A photography trip to the zoo! I swear, I'm still a kid at heart, that's how excited I am about this, haha. But hey, I'm 45, I can do whatever I want!

Now, to the exciting part for you:

It has become a bit of a personal tradition for me to do a giveaway on my birthday and this year I picked a really fun one. For years I have been a big fan of the Dutch magazine Flow and for years I was a bit sorry I could not share it with my international followers. It's gorgeous after all. But what do you know: Flow is taking over the world! There are now French and German and international versions of this magazine. You can read all about it here.

As it grew bigger and bigger Flow has been publishing special editions and now even weekly notebooks. But my absolute favorite is The Flow Book for Paper Lovers! It's exactly what it says it is: a book for lovers of everything paper. It's one thick book filled to the brim with pretty papers, stickers, tags, labels, posters, wrapping paper, pages to colour in, paper projects, postcards. You name it, it's in there.

Last year's edition was so popular it totally sold out, but thankfully this year's edition is still available.
Here are some pics to show you what I'm talking about. This is the book that is in my personal possession.

The above is just the tip of the iceberg, people!

So here's my giveaway: for one lucky commenter I will go to the Flow site and order and have shipped a paper lovers book to their door! And yes, this is an international giveaway, so you all can play.

The rules are simple:

• Comment on this post before April 18. I'd love to hear what you would do with a book full of paper goodies, but just wishing me a happy birthday is allowed too.
• I will randomly draw a winner on April 18.
• Check between April 18 and April 25 to see if you have won and if so contact me (I will give the contact info in the April 18 post, but if you look at my profile you will see it too).
• If you do not contact me before or on April 25 I will pick another winner.
• I will not search half the internet to find you, so if you know you will not (be able to) check back, just don't respond. (Yes, I have hangups about this.) 

That's all. No jumping through hoops necessary.

I hope I can make somebody really happy with this book. How happy? Oh, about as happy as a birthday girl in a zoo!

Have a good weekend all!

Want some snail mail? Let me know!

There was a time when I did lots of art trading in the form of either mail art or artist trading cards, but somehow I have let all that slip for different kinds of art.

I'm perfectly okay with that, but sometimes I just feel like making mail art again or postcards or just something I can send to someone. So recently I gave into that urge and I made eight art cards.

I used some left over photographs that had remained unused from an old journal project and just combined them with self made collage elements, washi tape and some bits and bobs. I really enjoyed using all these pieces to turn them into what I consider an attractive composition on a card. It made me realize that I had kind of missed doing this type of thing and why I used to do it in the first place.

Here are the cards close up:

So now I have these eight cards and I would really like to send them to someone. So that's why the title of this post is 'Want some mail?', because I would like them to go to my blogsy people! So this is sort of a little art giveaway.

If you would like to receive some snail mail from me all you have to do is mail me at c.m.j.winkelman[at]home.nl and I will send one of the above to you. I will not use your address for anything else, promise. Don't leave your addy in the comments, I can't guarantee some creepy person is not lurking around to abuse it. If you have a preference for a certain card let me know and I will see what I can do, but I can't promise anything. 

If I have more than 8 takers I will draw some 'winners' who will get the cards, but I will probably make some more in the future and then those left over will be the first to receive one of those. So in the end everybody wins, haha. 

Update: all cards are taken and then some! Wow, they went fast. I'll get back to all takers personally through mail or facebook messenger. 
I will make some more in the future. I'll let you know as soon as there's another batch made and offer them here on the blog.



I don't need anything in return, by the way, but don't let that stop you from sending me mail art too, haha. I love receiving mail. And yes, I know there are sites and groups where you can exchange mail art and such (I have been a member of several in the past), but it's usually around themes and prompts and with deadlines and I hate that. I just want to make some cards and send them. The end. ;-)

Look forward to sending these your way. Until then have a wonderful and artsy day!