Hellohello.

I had meant to have everything set up over yonder at our new facebook page and then invite everyone over, but now it turns out I need at least 100 fans before I can get going on that. So dearest friends and neighbours if you are on facebook and would like to join us yonder - please come over for tea!

MEOMI (all things meomi)
http://www.facebook.com/pages/MEOMI/99860917166

OCTONAUTS (all things octonauts, we'll try to keep the crossover between the pages to a minimal)
http://www.facebook.com/pages/Octonauts/97570906922

There's not much there yet, but I think we'll actually be moving our blog (LJ) over there because it has a nice set up with tabs and events. And for people who aren't into facebook (totally understand that!!) we're going to set up an rss feed.

Hopefully we can figure all that fancy tech out. I'm still stumbling my way around facebook like a baby elephant.

Hope everyone is well!! We're doing the finalfinal touches on the fourth Octonauts book, phew.
Happy Canada Day also ^__^ !! eh.

Just a reminder that the Cute and Dangerous show is opening this Friday in Laguna Beach ^__^ I had sent off 6 Lil Cloud Gardens prints along with an assortment of Cloud Seeds (our little paintings on wood drops.) Also there is a preview of a special project we've been working on with Surface Collective here in Vancouver.



And I will be at Vancouver Anime Evolution on Saturday! (Probably noonish forth... ^__^;;;)

Plus this video is pure awesome ^__^:::: (we've been noticing a lot of cookie crumbs around the studio also-hmm!)

Yay - our new Sakura Snail hats with lovely Punchbrand have been revealed! Celebrate Spring with these cute bear hats -- pink sakura blossoms scattered across the front and our friendly slowhaus snail! The design is embroidered in quality threads, and the hat is available in 2 colour-tones.

You can preorder them from the Punchbrand site - where they have more photos of cute girls wearing them!



If you're in Vancouver, I'll be at Anime Evolution on June 13th hanging with Punchbrand, and will have a selection of Meomi goodies for sale (Snail journals, Happy Together journals (only available in South America!!) posters, books, and possibly some toys! ^__^) AND of course the new hats! Drop by and try one on!

NOW if you're in LA -- then we direct you to the Cute & Dangerous Show opening Friday June 12th at the Seven Degrees gallery in Laguna Beach.



We'll be sending a series of Cloudseedery prints to the show, and hopefully a special preview of a new product we're working on. Check out their uber kawaii website for more info Apparently they will have tonnes of giveaways of artists goodies - don't miss out! ^__^

Finally mascot fans, a new game has launched on the Vancouver 2010 mascot site. The house remix of Kid Koala's original theme song is really fun! (And Mukmuk with glowsticks!)

We're going to be hanging out at the Vancouver downtown library this Saturday for the annual Springing Hatching. This is a really fun event for kids (with presentations and book giveaways, and meeting lots of local artists.) Drop by and say hi! ^__^

We'll have our mini posters for sale ($5 woot!) and free goodies... and if you're coming by and interested in any of our other hiatus-shop items like the journals (Darkhorse Slowtown one or the Happy Together one) vinyl toys, etc, let me know (comment or email) I can bring some along and trade ya for some cold hard cash. (great!)



The lovely folk at Harper Collins UK sent us a sample of the new Only Lonely Monster soft cover! And it's super lovely. Nice printing job with matte cover. Bonus - you get a drawing of Michael with a beard! (And also reminds me I need a hair cut. >__<



Couple weeks ago we got some new tags printed. I just wanted to thank those nice guys at Clubcard because they always do a great job. This is our first time with the 'greencards' and I love the matte printing and nice paper weight. Time to get new business cards ^__^ !

Made a little banner for the LA Times book fair this weekend!

Michael also informs me that he'll have *free* octo-posters to give out with book purchases! Or if you already own some octo-books, bring it by him and he'll be happy to give you one too ^__^! (He might give you one if you compliment him on his beard. shhh.)

It's been raining blossoms here in Vancouver (so pretty) and I forgot to mention that our Blossom Harvest poster is now available at Shanalogic and she also has some of our buttons and octo-posters in stock while our meomi shop is on hiatus.



We're still busy working away on the next Octobook while I'm trying to maintain consciousness with daily doses of Stinging Nettle tea (darn birch pollen achoo) But here is a sneak peak we just got of something coming up. more blossoms!



random: ^__^

Yay. The cover for the next Octonauts book is done and sent to them distro/catelogue people. Now just have to get the rest of the book done. I wish I can press a magic button and the below sketches automatically convert into full colour spreads. That would be fab.



EVENTS!! we have some. o-boy.

March 12-April 15. Our Cloudseeders Warrior prints are showing as part of Rojo's Great OCHO show. You can visit them at the Kalpany Artspace in Milano, Italy.

April 26. Michael is signing at the Kinokuniya booth at the LA Times Book festival from 2-3:30pm! They'll have all the Octonauts books in stock and maybe some of our other stuff. Hopefully it won't be as hot as last year.

May 2. We'll both be presenting and hanging out at the CWILL Spring Book Hatching at the Vancouver downtown library (downstairs) 1-3pm. This is a fun event for kids, teachers & librarians! Meet lots of great local BC authors and illustrators, activities and prizes.

June. There will be an art show and anime convention in here somewhere. more details coming! ;)

August 10. We'll be giving a talk at the Vancouver Canadian Book Camp It's not too late to sign up - all yee young aspiring writers/illustrators/book lovers! Aged 11-14+ :)



I've been enjoying reading about the different school programs involving the Vancouver mascots. Every so often we are contacted by teachers and librarians, I think this link at the Vancouver2010 website is a great place to start on project ideas.

I'm feeling rusty with blogging (now that I no longer have to post monthly desktops haha). but I hope everyone is well! (Now I should update our website at some point. oof.)

I can't believe I didn't know how delicious frozen raspberries are until now. I am a new convert!

♥ We didn't get a chance to wish everyone happy new years, so we wanted to wish it to you today on Chinese new years : ) Wishing everyone good health and happiness in 2009.

♥ The Octonauts are globetrotting this year, as the first three books are being re-released around the world by Harper Collins scheduled for May! (Hardcover & softcover.) You can even preorder now at your local book stores online and offline.

UK: http://www.amazon.co.uk/Octonauts-Only-Lonely-Monster/dp/0007312490/

We're excited that the books will be more accessible to those of you in faraway places, and hope you'll enjoy!


(Photo by the Vancouver Sun.)

♥ We were excited to see the mascot stamps are finally out with Canada Post! So bug your canadian friends to send mail ^__^ (Since I spent most of my teenage years doing nerdy mail art, this was particularly exciting!)

♥ Since the new year, I've been surprised by the number of emails we've received asking about 2009 desktop calendars! Wow - thank you to everyone who's left us a message and I apologize that we've been too busy to reply - but as you can guess, we aren't making 2009 desktop calendars (and now I feel bad!) our schedule this year is super busy so we'll need all our time to devote to work projects. But we're definitely thinking 2010... the cuteness will be back (mwahahaha)

♥ January has been nonstop work thus far, but in a good way : ) we're still working on various mascotty projects, and also some licensing products to be coming out later this year! And yes - more Slowtown adventures!! I haven't made any progress at all on Final Fantasy 12. And we're still quite behind on general mail & comments (thank you for everyone's patience!) Oranges are really yummy right now.

Happy holidays everyone! December calendar has been out for a bit - but we want to thank everyone who's shared a Cloudseeders year with us. It's been very fun and challenging doing this every month. We're definitely going to be doing other projects with the Cloudseeders, so stay tuned for some fun in the sky.

One recently launched project is the new teaser animation for Mukmuk, the official Vancouver 2010 Olympic mascot sidekick! Mukmuk loves to cheer his friends on, and now he's finally out in plush, t-shirts and all sorts of fun stuff. (You can see more at the Mascot site!.)

Also check out Sumi's new flash game! It was fun drawing some Canadian prairies. : )

We also recently got samples for our journals, and they turned out lovely! Here's a pic of Slowtown with Darkhorse:


And the one with those lovely Monoblock kids: Happy Together


I leave you with this photo of teenytiny Quachis, Migas and Sumis ^___^

♥ We just updated our Flickr with lots of photos of our show in Spain at the Rojo Gallery! Thanks so much to everyone who showed up. It was really amazing talking with so many people (from so many places around the world.) If any of you are interested in purchasing prints / paintings, you can contact ROJO Gallery (A totally awesome group of people, who took care of us, fed us, bought us endless rolls of painters tape, and rocked.)

♥ Adam aka father of the birthday cutie below, introduced us to this great charity called Child's Play (created by those Penny Arcade mavericks.) Which encourages people to send video games, toys & books (possibly with geeky leanings.) to hospitals around the world. This year, the Octonauts is on the request list! So we wanted to spread the word to Octofans to help share some Octolove with your local hospital (because being stuck in a hospital during the holidays is pretty sucky.) and send some fun video games while you're at it! (I recommend Professor Layton or even a good Pokemon battle. :)



♥ LA friends, another wonderful place of play and imagination needs your help! (Click below image to view larger.)



♥ Finally thanks to Leslie Long for the photo of our Octonauts reading at Copperfields, Sebastopol. I love this photo because we're reading the part about Sauci dog combing her hair - so you can see all the kids combing their hair along with us :D

November calendar is up! http://meomi.com/desktops.html
Sorry it was a bit late! (And thanks to all of you who emailed to remind us ; ) it's nice to know people actually care haha!)

I forgot to mention that a little while ago we made a couple characters for the wonderful Monterey Bay Aquarium's new Sushiwatch guide which is now available for download on their site.

We want to encourage everyone to check it out, anything that's good for the ocean is good for you too! Please help spread the word. Psst. Click on the little squid on their site for a happy surprise : )



As a side tidbit, the Monterey Bay Aquarium was one of the original inspirations for the early Octonauts drawings! They have one of the best jellyfish exhibitions in the world. ^__^

We're off to Spain tomorrow. Hope to see some of you on November 11th at the Rojo Color Cloud Seeding Opening: http://www.rojo-magazine.com/bcn/

Adios!

We're back in LA. We've got our final book event at Meltdown comics this saturday - do drop by if you can, it'll just be us and the crickets. And possibly a vacuum of void.

Thanks to all the lovely folk who came by to say hi to us at our various Bay Area stops, it was really nice to meet everyone!

We'd especially like to thank the books stores and shops that hosted us: Comic Relief (Jonathan&Sooz&their buffalo!) Books Inc (really fun storytime), Copperfields (always brings together the best groups of kids!) Wink SF, Super7 and Barnes&Nobles San Jose for the interesting teacher event.



(Audrey's mum was carrying a stack of Ben Templesmith comics ^__^)

Lastly, thank you *so* much to Lola from makemestudio for sharing this photo of the cake she made inspired by our September Cloudseeders calendar for her daughter's 4 yr birthday! This photo totally made our day!



Plus she makes lots of other lovely/delicious looking things at: http://makemestudio.blogspot.com/

Click for larger....

We have some banners. yay! If anyone feels inclined to help us post it around, we'd totally appreciate it ^__^ (or not, if you don't feel inclined. hah.) I'm not really sure what clothing to pack for San Francisco as my body is all disorientated flying from Vancouver chilly autumness to crazy LA heat. I'm thinking San Francisco must be 'just right' for baby bears and porridge.

Hope to see some of you guys soon!

October desktop now available! http://meomi.com/desktops.html

Just a reminder of the Fall Book Harvest this Sunday at the Vancouver downtown library!


We finally got our mittens on a couple copies of the Frown Fish and will bring it along on Sunday for anyone who wants a preview! (Not 100% sure Kidsbooks will have any for sale, but they'll have our other books available.) And don't forget our $5 poster sale!





Today I need to finish sanding wood for our raindrop Rojo installation (It's going to be the last day of sunshine we're going to get in Vancouver for a while.) There is a little sneak preview on the meomi site of the paintings. Ahhh, only 2 weeks left til deadline! *panic*

And for pure randomness ^__^ here are some funny mascotty photos I found on flickr because they make me smile.


by DavidYung


by dmckil


by beth77

http://www.octonauts.com
We've finally updated the Octonauts site for the new book, there are preview spreads & couple new colouring pages and a LONG list of dates/places/events along the west coast where we'll be reading/signing/hanging out/looking lonely. Hope you guys will drop by and say hi!




We were trying to think of other images that might be fun for coloring pages - if any of you octo-fans out there have any favourite pages/characters/images you would like us to turn into coloring pages, let me know! Since we have to to a teacher/librarian presentation in San Jose, I think we're going to try to put together a teacher's guide and some activity sheets also.

First event is in Vancouver: we have a minibooth at this lovely fair for BC Children's writers/illustrations. We'll be previewing/sneak peeking the Octonauts & the Frown Fish (I'm not sure the book itself will be available quite yet.) but we'll also be having a POSTER SALE!! All our mini-posters will be available for $5, just for this event.


If you're in Buenos Aires, drop by this wonderful launch party for Monoblock's new journal series:


A preview of ours ^__^ (will post up some proper photos once we get our hands on some copies) Of what I saw, the print quality & package design looks really awesome. yay for monoblock.



And if you happen to be near Lyons France, Panos is taking over the streets with a collection of fake street signs! More info: http://www.bopano.com/



Right now, we're busy prepping for our art show in Barcelona in November. >__< Stressssss. I have a bag of sandpaper and woodstain samples waiting for me.

An early note, we'll be closing the Meomi online shop starting October 1st til the end of the year. So if anyone wants any last minute orders, please get them to us before the end of the month - of course we have lovely resellers that will have our goodies in stock including Shanalogic and Hot pop in WI who just told me they have some of the 8" Powder Cat Qees in stock!!

Quicky update. September calendar has been up!
http://meomi.com/desktops.html

We're busy plotting things for the big Octonauts launch coming up and other things. Will update next week hopefully ^__^ the Autumn weather is really lovely right now in Vancouver.

We have a new journal coming out this fall with Darkhorse! And it's now available for preorders. yay!
http://www.amazon.com/Meomi-Journal/dp/1596176997/



And we were recently featured in the 'GREEN' issue of BG Magazine from Ecuador. They sent me a copy and I was so impressed with the design and content - really lovely stuff. So besides amazingly cute critters, ecuador also rocks with creative vibes ^__^



The fall is shaping up to be super busy, we're just planning out what's happening with Octonauts readings and such, so hopefully next time I update I can share some previews and also know more about dates! I think we'll be attending the Cwill Fall Hatching in Vancouver (October 5th) as that's a nice little relaxing event. Will post more soon ^__^ hope everyone has a nice rest of summer.

Currently, Michael is apparently watching lots of Hart to Hart and Vicki is watching lots of Kamen Rider.

HENSHIN!

Summer drumming : http://meomi.com/desktops.html

Little behind on the blogging this month. A little project roundup of some recent completed projects. Other bigger projects are still... ongoing (•__•);; I will try to do another update next week when the heat hasn't fried my brains! meeps.

Superbuzzy site redesign! http://www.superbuzzy.com



We had the pleasure of working with Kelly from Superbuzzy and the very talented team at Aeolidia Design on this new site. Drop by and pick up some of the cutest fabrics, notions and cute stuff around!



A little poster we did for the Ottawa Lumiere festival. The festival is this weekend, bring and make lanterns for some nice summer fun! Look out for night critters.



Powerpop Aussie band, The Wellington's new album "Heading north for the winter" is out in Japan, and soon the rest of the world.
http://www.myspace.com/thewellingtonsmusic
http://www.thistimerecords.com/release/re_headingnorthforthewinter.htm

I know you all need some fun cozy winter music now (esp. if you're down-under ^__^)

Happy Canada day & July ^__^
New calendar: http://meomi.com/desktops.html

If you've been enjoying our Cloudseeders calendars, just wanted to mention many of the pieces have similar drawings inside our new Cloudseeders book!... which... we finally got to see copies of last week! woot!



(They posted a bigger preview on Rojo: http://www.rojo-magazine.com/papel/)

Thanks to the people who dropped by to say Hi to us during the Cwill Spring Hatching. A few people even brought copies of the Cloudseeders book which was a great surprise and really nice! I think we surprised Anne from Seattle when we started pawing her copy since it was our first time laying eyes on the book hah!



Another fun surprise was this guy in the mail! (Thanks so much to Darren at Comrade Agency & rei at AKQA) While ago we designed a lil mascot for the AKQA Future Lions competition and they turned him into a vinyl. I even like the fancy black box with gold emboss.



And the proofs from the Octonauts were dropped off, some minor tweakings were made (eeks thx superdesigner Stefanie!) and they're off to the printers!

It's looking to be a busy summer but we're excited to be working on new toys (some internally and some for clients yay) and some other fun products coming out later this year! Michael is busy working on an animation project and even though he's sitting in LA right now, I can mentally tell he's eyeing me and telling me to get back to work! sooo adieu!

June desktop calendar is up! http://meomi.com/desktops.html



For those of you in Vancouver, we'd love to invite you to the CWILL Spring Hatching on June 14th at the Vancouver Central Library (located down in the moat area and one of the rooms.) There will be lots of local Vancouver children's book writers and illustrators hanging out at booths and doing presentations, lots of fun activities - great for teachers, students, families :o)

We'll be hanging out there with Octonauts books and posters for sale. Also fun freebies like stickers, colouring pages and more!

Yesterday, the zune originals program was announced in Canada - so earlier this week I got to do a fun day of pr and meet local bloggers / magazines / nice folk. Here are our two designs you can select to have engraved on a zune: Percussion tree & Rainy day music (how vancouver!)



I thought the engravings of the B&W versions turned out really nice! :)


Photos from the Microsoft PR machine: (gold leaf limited prints!)




Some awesome work by the other canadian artists for zune originals canada - Luke Ramsey, Derrick Hodgson, Andrew Pommier, ndeur, Stephen Crowhurst.

And now I have to share the *best* fanmail we've ever received ^___^ thanks so much to Linda & Peter Rogers for sharing these wonderful photos and story with us.

Greetings, Meomi.
We are huge fans of the Sea of Shade book.

Our son wanted a Shadow Appreciation Party for his 4th birthday party. We downloaded and colored Octonauts pictures; I read the guests the Sea of Shade book; our son, Peter, enlisted his friends to be Shade Ambassadors-- sticking a badge on each one; and the cake was the same as the one in the book. We handmade decorations that were inspired by the illustrations in the book. The children made sun prints using photographic paper. They also scratched rainbow pictures out of dark sheets of art paper. All the guests were pairs of siblings. The younger ones dressed in light colors and the older siblings dressed in the colors of the shadows. The shadows followed the pre-schoolers around and all were careful not to step on their shadows. It was a fabulous party. We all loved it.

Peter was pleased to get the Sea Monster book for his birthday.
Your website is nifty and encourages us to send you art. I am attaching photos from the fiesta.
Merci for a great experience.
Linda and Peter


(This barnacle cake always puts the biggest smile on my face!)


The birthday boy, Peter!


I hope there was a big shady hug at the end of the story. :)


Shadow appreciation crew.

These photos reminded us that we've been meaning to post up Shade ambassador badges on the Octonauts site for people to download! So I've sat Michael in front of the computer and he's busy working on those and also some new colouring pages.

We just got the first mock-ups back of Frown Fish from our wonderful designer Stefanie Liang - so its *almost* done. The journal design we did for monoblock is coming out soon (will share that in the next update) and we're just super busy wrapping up various big and small projects right now. I'm glad that summer is around the corner :o)

May desktop calendar is up!
http://meomi.com/desktops.html

^___^

♥ We have a new limited edition book coming out with Rojo as part of their artist monograph series. 160 pages of color clouds, ghostly plants & happy spirits. You can now Preorder from the Rojo website (err, it's kind of on the right and down a bit... under Available soon) ^___~ It'll have some familiar cloudiness and many new ghastly images like monkeys playing triangles (egads!).



Clickyclick above for larger goodness.

♥ Come visit us at the LA TIMES Festival of Books on April 26th.(that's this Saturday!!) We'll be hanging out at the Kinokuniya book store booth from 2 - 3 pm signing Octonauts books and looking goofy.

Also, our new Octonauts book is now available for pre-order on Amazon! Stay tuned to our blog, we'll post some preview spreads soon!



♥ Thanks to lovely Claire who sent us this funny clipping from her local paper on the island. It's also really great to see all the attention Mukmuk is getting - we hope everyone will be equally devoted and passionate about Vancouver Island Marmots in general! Those little guys are just so awesome.



♥ and and and... just a little note to thank everyone who emailed us, sent us photos or questions - as you can see, we've been buried under a lot of work so we're still catching up on replying, but thanks for your patience! xo

April desktop is up! http://meomi.com/desktops.html

Phew. wasn't sure we were going to make it in time this month. We're super busy right now, hanging loose in San Francisco. Have to be awake in a few hours to attend a shoot. And I'm slowly trying to indoctorate Michael onto classic Teresa Teng songs. ^___^

More... later... happy April!

-- OH. meanwhile. --

Ms. M has lots of photograph prints for sale on her etsy store! I just got my order today in the mail and they look really lovely.

http://www.etsy.com/shop.php?user_id=2427

And Dan sent one of his Mr. Toast toys and it's awesome. It squeeks! Thanks Dan!

http://www.theimaginaryworld.com/page3.html

'lo from sunny LA. How about a pussywillow parade? Now on our desktops page! ^__^

If you're in Barcelona, the Rojo.OUT has launched! And the city is littered with art on billboards - very cool! David sent us this awesome photo (love how it's plants growing over construction, kind of like our drawing.)



If you're free this Saturday, do drop by Monkeyhouse Toys for Dan Goodsell's Mistertoast show (!!) He invited many neato artists to do drawings for it also, and here is ours "Toaster in the sky" (I confess the whole time I had "Spirit in the sky" stuck in my head. Then Michael & I had to go to Youtube and look up the 80s and 70s videos of the song and compare.





We also spotted a review of Sea of shade inside the latest ShojoBeat.



Although I don't usually follow shojo manga - but aww, I do have a soft spot for Honey&Clover (must be the art school brat in me) It's the chapter where they're getting ready for project finals and Morita builds a lifesize model of himself. ^___^



Our little web elf made some iPhone icons for our websites hehe. (y'know if you feel the urge to browse us on-the-go.) Not to mention we finally have favicons. yay.

♣ February in Kachi Kingdom desktop calendar

♣ ART PRINTS ARE HERE!
We've finally sorted out the details - and our large Giclee art prints are now available through our online store. You can view the selection -here-
♣ If you're in/near/around Barcelona - check out Rojo.OUT, International Outdoor Urban Art exhibition featuring various artists with their works printed out in giant billboards located around Barcelona metro. Including some of our work! : )

Aye. it's a little more 'grown up' than our usual drawings since the sponsor is J&B Scotch -
RSVP for the event and enjoy an evening of art, magazines and scotch! (who doesn't like free booze?!?)





♣ We also got our Wachi Fichuz cards from the lovely Argentinian kids. Alas I'm currently camera-less so no photo - but check out the site and pick up a pack of assorted lovely art!