Target, Part II. The Return.

The Husband and I took a trip out to the other local Target on Thursday. Much like the first Target, they still have a half Halloween, half Back-to-School section. However, I did get to see some new stuff. My husband ended up buying the super creepy mask you see above and was kind enough to model it for me & my camera.

First up a few shots of what they have as far as their more 'sophisticated' adult party stuff. They had a set of 'splattered' shot glasses (which would have been pretty cool if they were actual glass), and here's one:

A shot of some of the various items that go with this line:

A close up of the invitations & coasters:

Here's some more. Some year (maybe this one), I'm going to buy one of those skull cookie jars.

An nothing says 'Welcome' quite like a glitter covered doormat. 'I'd love for you to track glitter into my house! Come on in!"

Here's some more items with the Jack-o-Lantern design:

Super cute party stuff. The bat napkins are adorable.

So still no Monster Cereals. This Target didn't even have the Oreos yet (which was a good thing). I ended up buying a hand towel set, and a plastic cloth. These were with the adult party stuff. I love the pattern. I wish I could get fabric with this printed on it. I'd have to have a skirt made.

Halloween shopping at Target

Look at that nosey cat!

There's a feeling of fall creeping in now, and I LOVE it! Yesterday, I suggested to my husband that we take a trip out to one of the local Target stores to see if they were putting out Halloween stuff yet. So away we went! This particular Target has a Starbucks, so I had my first Pumpkin Spice Latte of the season.

Now, I've always been a big fan of Target's Halloween t-shirts for girls/women, but this year's selection blows, as far as I'm concerned (more on that closer to the Halloween Countown, I have a rant planned). This shirt however, was pretty cool. It's from the little boy's section.

So as I suspected, the Halloween stuff was only creeping in at Target. I did get this great photo of the pegboard backdrop.

They had one aisle set up with stuff, the Jack o' Lantern theme, that looks just like what they did last year. But I do like these.

They have some spooky silhouettes on the aisles. Here's one. An owl marking the 'Candy Alternatives' section.

What does 'Candy Alternatives' mean? HALLOWEEN OREOS!!! And yes, I bought some. I really should have waited, but once I get through the current bag, I WILL NOT buy another one until next month, I swear.

Candy display encourages you to 'Be the GOOD House'.

Whee! Look at me!

Still waiting to see more, maybe next weekend we can go to the other Target. My total haul was light. The two plastic Halloween pumpkins you see my cat trying to crawl into, and a bag of Halloween Oreos. I really wanted some monster cereals, but they don't have those out yet either. I did buy these, not Halloween related, but totally bitchin' none the less.

Short update...

Hello everyone! Just a brief update: If you hadn't noticed already, I've got some prints for sale and I've added my remaining Vincentennial prints to the order list. This was a limited signed & numbered run of 25 prints. You can read more about it here. I've got a couple left.

ALSO:

I'm still waiting on some contributors to send some stuff, so I decided that I'd wait till after Halloween. So if you still want to send something you can. Contact me at scbilbrey@hotmail.com.

I'm preparing now for the Countdown to Halloween, starting October 1. If you want to know more, and see who else is participating, please check it out here. If you are participating, Shawn Robare has posted some super fun badges for you to sport on your blog. It was hard to choose, but I went with the 'surprised Vincent'.

Evil Ed

Last weeks topic on Art Jumble was 'Evil', so with the movie 'Fright Night' on the brain, I decided that I would draw the character 'Evil Ed'. While I'm not usually a big fan of remakes, there are occasionally some good ones. I've actually been looking forward to the new 'Fright Night' and it has had fairly positive reviews from what I've seen. So I will be going to see it, possibly this Monday. And funny enough, I will be going to see it in the same theater that I saw the original in, back in 1985. Scary.

My concept behind this piece was to do it in the style of a sticker from the 80's. I'm pretty sure it translates as such. :)

1940's Vampirella Cover Retake

Okay, let me just vent for a sec here. Originally this post was suppose to be a step by step type deal, where I take you all through the process and try to give a quick lesson in Illustrator. I had a big long post, with some 30 odd pictures to illustrate. I wrote it all out in June and attached the pics. But for whatever reason, the pics were really small and when you clicked on them, they didn't enlarge. Getting that post ready took me a long time so naturally, I was pretty angry. All that work, and I was going to have to go back and re-do all 30 pics. So now it's August, and I thought I should finish that up, re-do the photos. So I did, and it STILL didn't work. Photos were bigger, but you couldn't click on to enlarge. So I'm VERY ANNOYED right now.

This is my version of a Vampirella cover, with a 1940's Belle Dee style Vampi. Maybe some time I'll try the tutorial again.

Happy Birthday Me!

My birthday was this week. Yay me! Anyway, no big deal, I had to work. I had many well wishers, and one of my favorite artists ever, Pete Emslie, did this sketch of me. I've been a huge fan of his and I've been following his blog The Cartoon Cave for several years now. I love his work so much and was so thrilled by this drawing, I just had to share it. Ok, I'll shut up now, but look how cute I am!

For my birthday, I bought myself a bicycle. So I'll be out trying not to run down pedestrians this weekend.

ALSO... Do you love 'The Lost Skeleton'? Well, I sure do. So much in fact that I would like to host a tribute to 'The Lost Skeleton of Cadavra' and 'The Lost Skeleton Returns Again'. For two weeks in September, it's 'Lost Skeleton Week! And another week!" I'll be doing a few drawings for it, but I'll mostly be playing host. If you're interested in doing something for the tribute, leave a comment below. I'm mostly looking for art, but if you've made costumes or built a transmutitron that you want to share, that would be cool too. It will most likely be the second and third week of September. Then it will be almost time for 'The Halloween Countdown'!

Fun at the Black Lagoon

Well, I don't know what to say about this one. It pretty much speaks for itself. Everybody knows 'The Creature from the Black Lagoon' right?

I was thinking about doing a series of the Universal Monsters with Monster's Mate of choice. So hopefully, there will be more to follow. I've got some ideas about what I'm going to do for the other ones. I decided to start with the 'Creature', since I've never done a finished piece of him before. And it's a good summer time subject.

Enjoy this trailer:

Right now I'm working on illustrations for the upcoming Little Shoppe of Horrors magazine. This issue will focus on Roman Polanski's 'The Fearless Vampire Killers' aka 'Dance of the Vampires'.