Doodlebud is here to help with all your doodlin' needs. He keeps your pens and pencils safe, and patiently holds the paper roll at the ready! Isn't that so nice of him?
Young Buck!
I made this oversized pocket knife for my son, and he loves it! it's easy for him to handle, safe, and I feel like it might help him get comfortable with handling knives - who knows. Mostly it's just for fun! Now they are now available in the shop! Get one!
New Josh Makes logo and why I'm glad nobody will hire me.
Is one blog post a year an ok thing to do? As of now, that is the rate I'm at. Maybe I'll get up to two or three this year, we'll see.
The last couple of months have been a big transitional period. When we moved back to Phoenix about a year ago, I was planning on pursuing illustration and design jobs. I even spent a couple of months trying to get a full time agency job, which I've never had (since graduating from design school, 10 years ago.) I wasn't landing anything! It was so stressful. I felt like I had the creativity and skill set needed to work at an agency, why weren't they giving me a chance!? As time went on, I began to think maybe I had missed my window of opportunity. Maybe I'm too old. Maybe I didn't know the right people. Maybe just really suck at design. Maybe my portfolio was the worst. Bla bla bla.
I don't know why I never got hired. Maybe it was a combination of all the above, maybe I didn't try hard or long enough, maybe it doesn't matter why.
Maybe it was good thing wasn't hired.
Actually, I know it was a good thing!!
Now, I'm so glad never got hired at one of those crappy ol' agencies (I'm not bitter or anything.) Seriously though, If I had landed a desk job, I probably would have sat there dreaming about not sitting there.
While I was job searching, I was doing personal woodworking projects for fun (plus I had a lot of time on my hands) and eventually started renting a shop space. Over the span of few months I started to take on more woodworking commissions, and less and less freelance design and illustration gigs. If I wasn't getting commissions, I was making stuff for our home, or just to make and/or to learn. I had (and have) so much to learn. Over time, more and more people started to contact me with projects, and now I'm basically doing wood work full time. I love it! I get to do what I love, work when I want, how I want, on projects that I want. It's great. I also have the flexibility to support Sarah in her endeavors, one of which (a major one) we are working on together!
All that to say, I decided to design a logo for the woodworking side of things. I still want to do some design and illustration projects, but I think the woodwork side should have somewhat of its own identity. So here it is, thanks for looking and reading.
Stay tuned, I might post another one of these within 2016!
AZ PLANTER
For a while now, I've had the idea of turning the Arizona state shape into an extruded container. After moving back here for the third time, I figured it was time to finally make it happen. I'm happy to now offer these fun little AZ Planters! Order yours here!
#AZPLANTER
Click to order!!