Door Into Summer

Experimenting with tumblr after a decade-long hiatus | 36F She/her | Anthro/cartoon art, OC's, Nostalgia and Costuming. You might know me elsewhere online as clopandelarue, lullabytheskunk, or DoorIntoSummer.

[havethetouch]

Inkvent 23 - Fireside Snug

On the twenty-third day of Christmas my inkdealer gave to meeee~🎶

Fireside Snug, a warm and wholesome orange I adore. And what better way to utilize it than with Lullaby?

this one is for @summermcguire

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And with the twenty-third picture done and uploaded, I'd say this project is most likely wrapped up. I reserved the 24th for myself truth be told, but I am a little worn by what is likely the beginning of a flare-up and I rather rest and have a chill Christmas tomorrow with my mom, brother & his gf than draw one more piece. I'd like to thank everyone for receiving the calendar so well, I saw a lot of new followers drop in during it and I am thankful for the support, which was mainly the reason for this lil project. A lot of good folk supporting my art and I wanted to give back <3 So thank you I still have some comments to reply to and stuff but I have been rather exhausted the last couple of days so imma get to that soonish after Christmas (I hope) Either way, I wish you all Happy Holidays and Peace and Love.

[summermcguire]

"A Mother's Love," an Art Fight attack for Jakethewanderer2001 of his character Cibo, a mysterious Saluki-Kitsune whose soul has merged with her son's. Colored pencil and ink with a digital faux-watercolor background.

[summermcguire]

An Art Fight revenge attack on Cryptidrose's autumnal maned cat character, Harvest. (The moon in the background is an edited stock photo.)

I like how sassy, strong, and mysterious she looks.

[summermcguire]

An Art Fight attack for the incomparable @jlbriere, featuring her gentle vixen earth witch Amira coaxing a rose into bloom. I did this in graphite and then digitally colored it, which is a technique I’d like to play around with more.

[summermcguire]

An Art Fight attack for MangataGeist featuring their skunk girl Poppy, going with the flow.

[summermcguire]

Ever have one of those days?

An Art Fight attack for SilverFlash25 featuring his accident-prone dragon character Alicia, sheepishly shrugging in front of the inferno she just lit. Background from SignElements.

[summermcguire]

An Art Fight attack for FarelleMoon of her character Athena, a seamstress unicorn. She lost her horn a long time ago and it appears here as only a ghostly memory, but she has stitched together a beautiful and complete life for herself. I tried to create a serene portrait of a creative and resilient person, with a quilt pattern in the background.

This is not my character, but I channeled a lot of personal emotion into the piece because I drew it shortly after going no-contact with a dear friend and muse that I was obsessively, toxically infatuated with. It was an indescribably scary and painful step to take, and I'm still trying to be strong and stitch the pieces back together over a year later.

[summermcguire]

An Art Fight attack for BlindEDNA, who, like me, has a brightly colored female skunk character named Lullaby (full name Mephitidae Lullaby).

 This is either a cutesy comedic piece (Haha! The skunk is making the flower wilt!) or a tragically symbolic one (the wilting rose symbolizes the character's backstory—a beautiful young lady who died a wrongful, early death) depending on how you want to look at it.

[summermcguire]

An Art Fight attack from 2022 of CanidHarvey/Harveysaur’s character Zeke, a punk African wild dog.

[summermcguire]

An Art Fight attack from 2022 of Verephelle, a fiery fox-lynx hybrid who has renounced his destructive ways and is refining himself into a gentleman and a scholar.

You can see Verephelle's stunning pixel art work at https://www.furaffinity.net/user/verephelle/

[summermcguire]

My first Art Fight attack, from 2022. Quack the winged goat, ready for summer fun.

Autumn is here and I'm already over it. The pumpkin spice crowd can pry summer from my cold, dead hands.

[summermcguire]

A portrait from 2019 of my friend Kitcatfurry’s fursuit character, a small bat hybrid named Cotton Candy Swirl, under a rain of Sakura petals.

[summermcguire]

A character design from 2012: M’lady, a contest entry for a mascot for a “lady furs” Facebook group. I made her a jester to set her apart from other entries and to express my personal fascination with this kind of character, but also to symbolize the importance of self-empowerment through humor. M'Lady represents the ability to laugh at yourself, and the ability to laugh in the face of hypocrites and those who would try to suppress or denigrate you (I was observing/experiencing a lot of misogyny in the furry fandom at the time, and M’lady was a response to it).

Traditionally, a jester's position allowed him to get away with things nobody else could, unconstrained by normal social rules. So M'Lady also represents the ability to break conventional barriers and speak freely and honestly. Finally, as a performer and entertainer, she represents the importance of creativity and mutual appreciation between artists and their audiences.

M’lady didn’t win the contest, but I retooled her into a role playing character in the form of Melody, a feisty, spirited Arctic fox butcher who performs like this as a side hustle at festivals.

[summermcguire]

A summer camp-themed piece I did for the Campfire Tails con book in 2011, based on the theatrical poster for the Bill Murray film “Meatballs.” I watched a ton of summer camp-themed movies and shows as a kid and it captured my imagination, but never really had the classic American summer camp experience, outside of maybe a church camp or two.

[summermcguire]

I found this cute plush of Infinite from Sonic Forces (sans mask) in a Goodwill in Portland, OR for $10. Tags intact and everything. He seems to be a one-off, custom-made plush made by Budsies and I have no idea why he wound up in the Goodwill. Whoever had him made, I want you to know he's living his best life.

Photo shoot by my husband, Blue Squirrel Productions

[waffled0g]

Everyone gets “The 90s” look wrong and I hate it

Couple years ago I saw these two board games at the store back to back. Well, not saw them per se, but ya know. Spied them out of the corner of my eye. And for a moment without reading the text, I couldn’t tell you which was which decade at first. Funny. Either they were in a rush to get these out the door or they wanted their throwback trivia game boxes to look uniform. I didn’t think too much of it.

Only, from then on I started seeing it MORE. Every time someone markets a 90s or 80s throwback…

Goddammit they’re identical! What??! How did we let this happen? As a 90s survivor and a designer, this drives me up a wall.

Look, I know I’m late to the party to complain about “the 90s look” when we’re just starting to get sick of the Y2K nostalgia train. But c’mon, the 90s were not The 80s: Part Two™ 

Trust me when I say that we weren’t all wearing neon trapezoids up until the year 2000. The 90s look being peddled is so specific to the tail end of the 80s and an early early part of the 90s - a part of the 90s when it wouldn’t stop being the 80s. This is Memphis design being conflated with the wrong decade.

Keep reading for a long ass graphic design history lesson and pictures of old soda and fast food.

Keep reading

[summermcguire]

As Reddit user EAE8019 said:

“You can divide the 90s into 4 overlapping phases

1990-1993 : The 80's continues.

1991-1995 : Grunge and Gangstas

1995-1999 : The Clueless Macarena

1998 -2001 : Y2K aka the Blue iMac.

So even the grnge aesthetic he talks about is only part of the decade. Whats going on I think is people are actually trying the replicate the colourful Clueless Macarena era and instead falling into Memphis Junior.”

[summermcguire]

A ref sheet for my longtime friend Tabby (KitCat) that I did in 2014. She has intense clashing colors and a specific blend of cat and fox features that are hard to nail down, but I still really enjoy this design.