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Hello Powells,

It appears after my last post that I accidentally dropped into a chasm and stayed there for two whole weeks. I apologise. It was nice in there though.

Highlights from the first week included:

• A trip to London for the Society of Authors Awards at Southwark Cathedral where a picture book I had illustrated (The Princes and the Pea written by Peter Bently) was nominated for The Queens Knickers award. We didn’t win and I commiserated this devastating loss by eating six egg and truffle sandwiches and drinking an endless supply of pink fizz, whilst listening to Cerrie Burnell give an excellent and hilarious keynote speech, the contents of which I now forget entirely due to drinking too much pink fizz. Congrats to X. Fang who won with her amazing picture book, We Are Definitely Human.

• The online awards ceremony for the Spark! Award where Marty Moose had been nominated for the best and most outstanding children’s book of the century. I didn’t win BUT I was lucky to even BE at the ceremony, as there was a minor cock-up with the online invitations and some nominees didn’t even know it was happening.

• A trip to the newly opened Quentin Blake Centre of Illustration, where I short-circuited at the counter, possibly due to the heatwave, and found myself becoming a member and then buying a quill for £12. I mention this because whilst a quill makes it sound fancy it’s actually just a big bird feather and I can get those for free off the floor any day of the week. A point perfectly supported by the fact I found three on the beach two days later…

The QB Centre of Illustration deserves a post of it’s own but suffice to say, I delighted in discovering the work of Murugiah, a British born Sri-Lanken illustrator, before I drooled over an exhibition of performance drawings by Sir Quentin. My favourites were the forty drawings he made for a whiskey maker - deceptively simple and, as you would expect, delightfully expressive. Looks like they were drawn with a quill, which is inspiring as I have four to experiment with [insert eye-roll here].

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• I got back from London, sank a decent cup of tea (WHY IS IT IMPOSSIBLE TO GET A DECENT CUP OF STRONG YORKSHIRE TEA IN LONDON?!), repacked my case and skipped back out the door with Stefan and Ziggy in tow. This time, headed in the opposite direction to where I had been the previous day—that’s north, incase you aren’t good with a compass—to visit my family and the beach. Oh! The beach! It steals my heart every time. My family come a close second. Whilst there, I made a brief visit to my pals at The West Kirby Bookshop, where I bought the latest Ann Patchett novel and met Richard Village from Foundry Editions, who is a very nice man with exceptionally good taste in eye-wear and neckties, and who happens to be from Derbyshire, where I now reside.

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What else….

• All of this week has been spent checking the weather. In case you too, have been in a chasm for the last couple of weeks and therefore aren’t aware, all of Europe is experiencing a heatwave of EPIC proportions. Some countries are as hot as Mel Gibson was in the eighties. I have been forced to break a boundary that I set a long time ago: I’ve had to put on a pair of shorts, something which I usually only do abroad where I am certain that no-one I know will see my legs, as they resemble two pieces of uncooked chicken.

• As a result of aforementioned heatwave, I had to postpone a trip to London for a school visit. This was disappointing but I was informed prior to travelling that the trains were melting and so travel was ill-advised. Hopefully the visit will be rescheduled for the autumn when I’ll be able to travel wearing full length trousers in the circumstances which I expect from the UK: wet drizzle.

• Work-wise I have gone from feeling not busy to oh shit, I am inundated! How did that happen?!. I have 3 projects of various sizes on the go, ranging from a cover (easy!); to a small 107 page book (mild pre-rough anxiety but nothing I can’t handle) and culminating with a 157 page book that I have barely started (absolute horror at the looming and impending deadline resulting in creative paralysis and complete avoidance… hence why I haven’t started it). I also have some exciting meetings coming up which I need to prep for and I FINALLY have some original art to put in my shop. I will send a separate email about that!

That pretty much brings us back up to date.

Sun Survival Guidelines*

As the sun really isn’t messing, I will finish with some basic sun survival guidelines:

• Wear sun-cream, even in bed.

• Don’t venture outside until September.

• Don’t do any strenuous activity, such as laundry or washing up, until September.

• Super-glue a hat to your head and stay away from windows, doors, and anywhere a sun can penetrate, like keyholes and cracks in walls.

• Do not even consider going in a conservatory, unless you wish to expire in one.

• Drink a pint of water every 90 seconds.

• Use a cold compress. Either saturate a nappy with water and wear it like a hat or use a tea-towel, admittedly not as stylish.

• Consider relocating to somewhere cooler, like Venus, which is fairly mild at this time of year - a meagre 465° C (869° F).

As talk show host and former Cincinnati mayor Jerry Springer used to say: Take care of yourselves and each other.

Powell x

*I am not a healthcare professional so please don’t sue me when you glue a hat to your head and then can’t get it off.

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Hello Powells,

I almost wrote to you on Tuesday to tell you what an amazing day I’d had, but… I’d only written the day before, so I took out a restraining order on myself until this morning.

This week has felt long! When I try and cast my mind back to last weekend it becomes cloudy, what did I do?!…

Oh yes, on Saturday I made bad choices.

I’d been looking forward to spending the day at home cleaning the house, drawing and gardening. Instead, I spent an hour driving to a tile shop that didn’t have what I wanted, ate a lunch I hated, and made an emergency trip to the pet shop after Ziggy chewed through his lead. There, a sales assistant ignored all the warning signs that I was not in the mood and attempted to persuade me that a £40 lead was significantly better than the apparently identical £10 one hanging beside it.

By the time we got home it was 5pm. The garden was still throwing a party for weeds, my pencil case was still firmly zipped, and the house was filthy. After a short pep talk involving several expletives, I cleaned the house in record time; frantically flung water on a few choice plants; haphazardly dug up a handful of weeds—and possibly uprooted my spinach; opened my pencil case, and promptly fell asleep.

On Sunday I decided to finish the final artwork for The Swifts book 3. I can’t say anything about it other than to say I did finish them, and above is a sneak peek! In-case you missed it, I shared the art from book one here.

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On Monday I waded up a mountain of admin, which I find soul zappingly boring. One day, I’ll be rich enough to hire a virtual assistant who can unsubscribe from all the newsletters I subscribe to, but don’t remember subscribing to, which then fill up my inbox on a daily basis. I also tidied the studio and then made it messy again when I started to set up my new computer. Apple packaging is brilliant—the design engineering is faultless—and infuriating—WHY SO MUCH CARDBOARD?!

At some point during the day, most likely when I was trying to untangle myself from a mountain of cardboard, I pulled a muscle in my neck.

Tuesday was the highlight of my week! Marty Moose has been nominated for the InspiREAD Book Award and, as part of the award, five nominated authors were invited to a live event taking place in Derby at a conference centre. Classes from 13 local schools came and were treated to a whistle-stop workshop by each of us, with a cheese sandwich in-between. It was immense fun and I felt truly privileged to be a part of it.

This is possibly because I almost wasn’t part of it…

Having set off early to avoid being late and stressed, I arrived at the conference centre on time. I was feeling extremely pleased with myself as I signed in, took the clipboard that was handed to me, and sat in the seat shown to me. But, as the room filled with men in grey suits beneath a giant screen displaying COMROQ, I began to suspect something was wrong. After a heated exchange with the receptionist, I discovered I had driven to the wrong conference centre*.

And so it was that I arrived at the conference centre I was meant to be in, late and stressed. No matter! The day went smoothly after that and it was one of the best days of my life. Period. I’m not even joking.

If you’ve read Marty Moose and you’d like to vote for it please do, here. ❤️

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On Wednesday I was still high-on-life! I spent the day reading illustration briefs. The first for Marty Moose book 3 (title as yet to be revealed!) and the second for a small, top secret project I’m remaining tip-lipped about.

Yesterday, I began to set up my new computer around 10am and confidently expected to be finished by mid-morning, in time for a zoom meeting with my fabulous Marty Moose art director (and fellow author), Jamie Hammond. But, by 5.30pm, I was only half-way through, my eyeballs were slowly seeping out of my nostrils and my soul had booked a one-way ticket to go and live inside someone more exciting.

I decided to call it quits for the day and went to the pub instead, where I declared I was going to get wasted! (I had three ginger and turmeric kombuchas, a Hawaiian pizza and I was in bed at 9.43pm).

I received some wonderfully unexpected post yesterday from Walker Books: a monogrammed red beret and an advance proof of the LAST EVER Montgomery BonBon book, Scandal on the Stage. It publishes on 2nd July, which is rather a surprise as, I’d marked it in my calendar as publishing in October*.

Today I’m waiting for two external hard-drives to arrive so I can back up my entire career: a task which I expect will take thirty minutes but which probably won’t be done until mid-July. By which point, my soul will be sending me postcards from inside Cressida Cowell telling me what fun it’s having now.

This weekend, I’m having a belated birthday afternoon tea, washing the dog and, I don’t care if an unexpected storm called Nigel arrives blowing gale-force winds across the country, I AM ERECTING MY COMPOST BIN.

Yours truly,

Powell x

*This is why I need a virtual assistant: I cannot be trusted with dates or conference centre locations.

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Support Pen Powell Posts by becoming a paid subscriber for £4/month.

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Hello Powells.

A week has passed since I experienced The Week Sent To Test Me and since then—I almost can’t bear to say it incase I jinx it—life has been calm. Well, I tell a teeny weeny lie there because on Monday I had a major meltdown when I thought I’d broken my favourite fountain pen and I may have overreacted. And by overreact, I mean I ugly cried and announced to my husband that life was out to get me before I flopped to the floor like a toddler sobbing and smearing snot across my cheek. Stefan did as he always does: stared at me with raised eye-brows and waited patiently for the storm to pass. Which it did about 6 minutes later when I dragged myself off the floor, fixed my fountain pen and instantly felt great!

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Last Friday, I gave up on the week and drove to Manchester to see an illustrator pal, Penny Neville-Lee. Penny was always destined to be famous because she has a double-barrelled surname. She is the gal who started the colour collective over a decade ago, which is still going strong. She also illustrates books and is a straight-up lovely tall human with impeccable taste in floating kaftans.

I arrived at her house later than I wanted to because I left later than I planned. That’s how time works, I can’t argue with it. I had a lovely drive through the countryside to get there and as I sped through the lanes abiding the speed limits I felt the fog of the week lifting. By the time I arrived at my destination I had been reborn as a person who loves life. After a cup of tea and a studio tour, I was delighted to be told we were taking a tram to Altrincham, a pretty place with a name I can’t spell, where it is near impossible to find an establishment willing to serve you lunch after 3pm. As we were passing Waterstones we discovered Rachel Bellis, who heads up the children’s section, perspiring in the window trying to change the book display. Fun fact: Rachel and I went to school together, albeit in separate years. Rachel was kind enough to ask me to sign some Marty books, which made me feel a little bit special and I couldn’t resist buying this lovely book because it has flaps in and who doesn’t love a good flap!

Back at Penny’s house, I lounged in her garden den before realising that it was nearing 7pm and I was in danger of out-staying my welcome. I left in high-spirits, and even managed to keep my vibe high when my car warned me that my tyre was almost flat and I should find a garage and pump it up immediately. Obviously, because I needed a garage there wasn’t one anywhere. Except, that is, for the one that wouldn’t have looked out of place in a Hitchcock film and, seeing as it was in the middle of nowhere and darkness was falling, I didn’t fancy my chances. Eventually I crawled at 10mph into a well-lit Texaco with plenty of non-murderous looking people around and blew up my tyres, which were flatter than a supermodels bust.

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On Saturday, I drew a frog and then suggested to Stefan that we walk into town with Ziggy to do a spot of food shopping. I popped into the bookshop. This used to be The Bookshop, an imaginatively titled shop owned by a lovely bald man called Richard, who drank tea and ate rich tea biscuits with fingerless gloves on. He specialised in second hand books and I bought some absolute gems from him, before he retired last year. I was sad to see the town without a bookshop, although my bank balance looked quite healthy as a result. Then, along came Jess who, like a story from a Jojo Moyles novel, has realised a life-long dream and transformed the space into Hestia Books. The shelves are filled with new titles and I am excited to return and buy absolutely everything.

Stefan and I did a spot of shopping and then walked back home in sweltering heat. As sweat dripped down my back, my skin began to fry and my shoulders sagged under the weight of my backpack stuffed full of groceries, I deeply regretted my suggestion that we walk to town. I also deeply regretted choosing to wear jeans that day. The rest of the day was spent trying to erect a compost bin and then cooking dinner for friends.

Sunday. It rained. I worked on a cover I can’t talk about. I still didn’t manage to erect the compost bin.

We have already discussed Monday in paragraph one.

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On Tuesday, Stefan went to London and I was home alone with Ziggy. Usually, this means I spend 4 hours playing with him and his squeaky witch; 2 hours walking him; 5 hours chasing him around the house trying to retrieve something I own and value dearly from the clutches of his fangs and 30 minutes doing some work. On this day, by a miracle, he slept most of the day and I actually got some work done! I managed to artwork several full page illustrations for The Swifts book 3. I believe I only have three remaining.

On Wednesday, Ziggy went to the doggy day-care. This is by far, Ziggy’s favourite place to be. If he could speak, he would ask to live there permanently - he MUCH prefers hanging out with his friends Rollo and Bronte, than with me. It’s actually quite offensive how little he misses me when he is there. I continued with The Swifts; had a spiritual awakening which can be distilled as: have more fun; and listened to some podcast episodes by The Rockwell Center. I discovered the work of Etienne Delessert, which is so beautiful that I intend to write a whole post about him.

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Yesterday, a.k.a. Thursday, I had a glorious day of library events in Warsop (not to be confused with Worksop) hosted by the InspiRead Award, for which Marty Moose has been nominated. School events is fast becoming my favourite part of being an author-illustrator. Children are just so FUN and teaching them how to draw brings me great joy. They all seemed to enjoy it, so much so, one young boy gave me a hug. I wasn’t sure whether, under safeguarding rules, I was allowed to hug him back so I decided to play it safe and just stand perfectly still until he let go. He didn’t seem to notice my awkwardness, as before he left he told me he loved me. ❤️

On the way home, Stefan informed me that whilst he was doing a poo, UPS had tried to deliver my new iMac computer and, because Stefan didn’t open the door due to laying a log, it had been taken to a newsagents in the arse end of nowhere. Luckily, I was driving through the arse end of nowhere on my way home and I was able to collect it. It now sits in a box in my studio awaiting activation.

Today, I have made an emergency vets appointment to cut Ziggy’s toenails - they’ve grown so long (presumably because of all the rain we’ve been having) that he is struggling to open his tins of dog food. Tonight, I’m going to an ORB gig in a cave with three friends (yes, this has surprised me, too as I’m not usually this cool). I am the designated driver. Naturally, I am having low-level car anxiety about this and so, after the vets, I will be pumping up my car tyres as a precautionary measure.

If I’m lucky, there may even be time to do some work today, too. At the weekend I will be erecting the compost bin, again. Third time lucky!

Until next time,

Powell x

This postcard is free for all to read! ❤️ If you enjoyed it, subscribe for more weekly postcards, drawing telegrams, and a studio letter once a month.

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Happy Tuesday, Powells.

I have a long day of work ahead of me inking art for The Swifts—if Ziggy will allow it, most of my plans go out the window when he’s around and he’s literally around 24/7.

Bef…

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Hello Powells,

6.30am. Friday. I’m sat in the garden at my victorian style cast iron garden table on a damp cushion because I forgot to put it away and it must have rained in the night. My cup of tea is already cold beside me. The sound of baby lambs bleating fills my ears. Birds of all sorts are talking to one another happily, and if my bird app would bother to load, I could even tell you which ones. Other than the occasional quarry truck rumbling past it is peaceful: I’m internally thanking my angels for this gift because this week has been the definition of an actual shit-storm.

It all started a week ago today when Stefan and I were cleaning Ziggy’s dirty bottom in the courtyard and I discovered our trench drain was filled with toilet paper.

We were eating dinner in the kitchen when Ziggy sloped past us towards the lounge after doing his nightly business in the courtyard. After I finished my dinner, I retired to said lounge with a bowl of ice-cream. Ziggy was in his usual spot in the armchair and so I took up my usual spot on the sofa. I had the spoon half-lifted to my mouth when my nostrils caught a whiff of something they shouldn’t have been whiffing and it wasn’t long before I discovered a smear of dog poo on the arm of the sofa… which lead onto a cushion… over a blanket… across the rug and culminated in a tiny poo near the bookcase.

Ziggy isn't in the habit of using our furniture as toilet paper, so we concluded his evening's business had been a messy one and he'd decided the lounge was the best place to wipe his dirty bottom. A lift of his tail confirmed our theory and Ziggy was escorted into the courtyard for a wash. Whilst there, I noticed a pongy stench. Naturally, I blamed Ziggy’s bottom and had I not glanced down into our courtyard drain that’s where this story may have ended. Unluckily for me, I did glance into the drain and saw it was filled with toilet paper.

Now, you may not be familiar with courtyard drains but I can assure you they are not meant to be filled with toilet paper. On closer inspection we discovered that there were other things in the drain, which should not have been there… things which I thought I had flushed away a while ago. The forecast for the next day was 32 degrees celsius and, considering our drain was literally backed up with shit, I think I was right to panic that it was going to smell pretty bad.

And so, instead of enjoying bowls of ice-cream in front of the telly, Stefan and I found ourselves donning gardening gloves and cleaning out old faeces from our drain. The next morning, in temperatures akin to a summer holiday in Greece, we and the plumber, endured a stench worse than the bubonic plague when she lifted our manhole to sort out the blockage. That reminds me, I need to pay her for the pleasure.

I didn’t think the week could get worse than that to be honest, but life always has a way of showing me just how wrong I can be and so it did.

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On Saturday, I arrived at Chatsworth House bright and early, slathered in Factor 50 and SUPER excited to host five Marty Moose drawing workshops at their family festival. My events were taking place in the potting shed. To place you in the scene: this was near the entrance and just off the main path, which then meandered through perfectly manicured privets, past sculptures of naked men before arriving at the big-top marquees. My first event was packed to the rafters, but as the sun got hotter (which, to be fair, is its main job description), people seemed to become so relaxed they couldn’t quite manage the 50-metre stroll up the slight incline from the lawn where they were lazing like lobsters to the aforementioned potting shed.

The festival organisers and I stood scratching our heads, wondering how to entice them. Short of loading people into wheelbarrows, pushing them up the hill and tipping them out into seats, there wasn’t a lot we could do. And so my other two events of the day were attended by literally no one.

No matter! I had an ice cream and then developed a migraine, so I was busy anyway.

On day two, I dragged Stefan with me and forced him to do laps of the gardens, handing out free stickers and bookmarks to tempt people away from a woman blowing giant bubbles and a man on stilts making balloon animals. It worked (no one can resist a free sticker) and I managed to fill the morning event—we all had a great time.

But by mid-afternoon, a live, all-singing, all-dancing circus performance was luring children into the grand marquee like the Pied Piper. As the start time of my final event came and went, I was starting to feel a little beaten and wondering at what point I’d become less appealing than a balloon giraffe.

But my mood lifted considerably when a family with two eager children arrived and, huddled around a table, I ran the event just for them! They truly were delightful.

Later that day and back at home, I received an unexpected email that reminded me you only need to inspire one kid for it all to have been worthwhile. ❤️

Monday was mostly spent trying to locate a compost bin I’d ordered online. It promised delivery within two days, but two weeks later and it had yet to materialise in physical reality.

A good portion of the day was also devoted to trying to persuade the pole of my new parasol to fit through the hole in my garden table. Turns out, it doesn’t fit.

Tuesday I was home solo with Ziggy and, as I had a mountain of work to get through, I decided to walk him early before the temperatures rose. But Ziggy didn’t want to be walked. Ziggy wanted to sit down on the pavement and refuse to move. Ziggy wanted to go back home and eventually I relented. And then Ziggy had lots of energy because he hadn’t been walked. And then Ziggy tormented me all day and I got literally nothing done despite having two deadlines next week. Stress levels started to rise.

Wednesday was a repeat of Tuesday. Stress levels hit maximum at 5pm when I took my eye off Ziggy for ONE SECOND to refill a fountain pen and he chewed through the strap of my bag and ate a good portion of my hat. After crying in the kitchen, I realised maybe I needed some support so I did what any sane adhd perimenopausal woman would do: I put Ziggy in the car, took him to my friends house and released him into their secure garden where he zoomed around with their dog, whilst I drank a mojito straight from the can. Then I drank another. I left feeling hopeful that Thursday would be better.

It was not.

On Thursday my iMac died. I spent 5 hours intermittently on the phone to Apple trying to resuscitate it but, at 6.04pm, it was officially declared deceased.

Thursday ended with me having to spend £2,749 on a new one.

In an ADHD frustrated tantrum which boiled over too quick for me to catch it, I impulsively threw my Wacom pen at the wall whilst on hold to the Apple Sales team. OBVIOUSLY it broke and so then I had to spend £65 on a new one. The new iMac won’t be delivered for a week so I will muddle through using my laptop and (hopefully) get some work done over the weekend.

The weekend, which I had intended to spend assembling a compost bin that still hasn't arrived and walking a dog who still refuses to be walked.

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Is it just me, Powells? Am I cursed?! Or is this just life? Please, answers in the comments.

Regardless, I am checking out. I’ve had enough! I am going to see my illustrator friend Penny Neville-Lee this afternoon to drink tea in her garden and if Friday even thinks about throwing some shit at me I will not be held responsible for my actions.

Until then, you might be interested to know the birds in my garden are: Jackdaws, Wrens, Blackbirds, Goldfinches, Greenfinches and, last but not least, the common wood-pigeon

Yours,

Powell x

P.S. A round-up of what I’ve miraculously managed to draw this week will be sent over the weekend. Subscribe so you don’t miss it.

If you enjoy my posts and would like to support Pen Powell Posts, you can become a paid subscriber for £1/week.

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Please let me know in the comments how terrible your week has been so I don’t feel so alone.

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This drawing telegram is free for all to read! ❤️ If you enjoyed it, subscribe for weekly postcards every Monday, drawing telegrams every Friday, and a studio letter once a month.

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Hello Powells,

Monday morning, again! The week has flown by.

Tuesday I barely got anything done because I was the sole carer for Ziggy, whilst Stefan was in London. Ziggy is 8 months old now, has two pink testicles the size of grapes and legs so long Richard Osman would be jealous. He is cute and most people can’t walk past him without saying so, though I notice the compliment is never extended to me. Underneath the cuteness he is actually a demon wrapped in dense fur… or a baby-toddler-teenager all rolled into one - whichever is worse. On walks, he mostly sniffs every blade of grass and runs away from anything that moves, including me. That’s how I spent most of Tuesday: either walking at a snail’s pace whilst he inspected God’s every creation as though he was David Bellamy, or chasing him through dense bracken because he’d been spooked by an ant.

At home, Ziggy eats everything I own. Wednesday was a particularly bad day for this: he ‘re-styled’ my favourite pair of pumpkin orange fingerless gloves into wrist warmers, by eating half of them. He also made good attempts to eat my bobble hat, a Birkenstock, a brand new pair of bamboo socks and a 6b Koh-i-moor pencil. I managed to snatch a couple of hours work at the dining room table whilst the demon slept and, thanks to the ability to hyper-focus, got 9 hours of work done in 120 minutes. By the time I collected Stefan from the station at 10.08pm I had miraculously crossed finish The Swifts chapter heads off my list.

Thursday Ziggy had a lie-in and didn’t start tormenting me until well past eleven, so I snatched two hours of peaceful drawing time. In the afternoon I must have done something but I don’t remember what, because it has been overshadowed by a trip to the cinema to see The Devil Wears Prada 2. I spent most of the film thinking wow, isn’t Glenn Close amazing only to realise as the credits rolled that Miranda Priestly is played by Meryl Streep, not Glenn Close.

Friday I was so tired I actually called the doctor. I have a telephone appointment on 27th May, which feels unnecessary now as I don’t feel so tired. In the afternoon my eyes opened just enough for me to work on a couple of private commissions, a new venture for me which I’m very much enjoying.

Saturday Ziggy woke me up at 6.30am by throwing dramatically up on the bedroom carpet. I left Stefan scrubbing aforementioned carpet and headed to Nottinghamshire for two library events. I’m always a little nervous incase the events are attended by absolutely no-one or just a dog and baby (it’s happened, I don’t want to re-live it here) but I was pleasantly surprised to have 22 attendees, including one Marty Moose super-fan called Bonnie. I broke the ice by leaning against a table that I didn’t realise had wheels, causing the whole thing to roll out from under me so I almost slipped a disc. In-between events I skipped down the high-street to Wonderland Bookshop, a delightful shop packed to the rafters with children’s books. I tried to act nonchalant whilst frantically scanning the shelves for some Marty books but alas, came up short. I wasn’t feeling strong enough to suffer the humiliation of them not knowing who the hell I was so, rather than introduce myself, I sidled out without announcing my arrival and visited Holland and Barrett for some flaxseed instead. After great book-chat over a hearty bowl of soup with the lovely librarian slash events co-ordinator Carolyn, it was time for the second event. One child arrived in tears exclaiming that they wanted to go home and one father sat through the entire thing watching a football match on his phone. I ratcheted my children’s entertainer dial up as far as it would go and, by the end, the crying child did a complete U-turn and cried because they didn’t want to go home. #superfannumber2. The football mad father managed to grunt a smile at me as he left, too so I assume he is now super-fan #3.

Yesterday, I had planned to set up my compost bin but it hasn’t arrived so that put an end to that. Instead, Stefan and I took Ziggy out and discovered the local vicarage was having a charity open garden event. I am new to gardening and would describe myself as KEEN so I flung a tenner at the vicar and raced in there as fast as you can say Amen. I interrogated the Vicar’s wife Jane about her woodland ferns and geraniums phaeum 'Samobor' then snooped around her greenhouse, apple orchard, and courtyard taking notes and snapping photos like I was the perennial paparazzi. Then Stefan and I settled down for a nice cup of tea and a slice of Jane’s home-made cake, whilst Ziggy ate a nearby rose bush. Having no executive function to make decisions, I couldn’t choose between Jane’s Death by Chocolate Cake or her Classic Victoria Sponge. In the end, I decided to have a slice of both. I left an hour later, experiencing a sugar rush and clutching a Euporbia I bought for £3.50.

Today, I must do as much work as possible because Stefan is off to London again tomorrow and I will be left alone with my tormentor for 48 hours. On the drawing board this week I have the final full page illustrations for The Swifts book 3. At the weekend, I’ll be at Chatsworth House both days doing events at their family festival, where I hope to convert more uninterested attendees into super-fans.

I’ll be back in your inbox on Friday with a round-up of drawings from this week. Currently, I’ve drawn nothing so… it may be a short post.

Until then!

Powell x

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This drawing telegram is free for all to read! ❤️ If you enjoyed it, subscribe for weekly postcards every Monday, drawing telegrams every Friday, and a studio letter once a month.

If you’d like to support Pen Powell Posts, you can become a paid subscriber for £4/month.

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Or, if a monthly subscription isn’t your thing but this telegram made you smile today, you can always buy me a pencil! ✏️

Buy Me a Pencil!

Thanks for reading — I always love hearing your thoughts in the comments! ❤️

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Hello Powells,

How are you? This morning was non-stop high drama! I was motoring home from dropping hubby at the station when I rounded the corner and encountered a goose crossing the road with six fluffy yellow goslings waddling behind her. Luckily for them, I was going up hill in an automatic and had a top speed of 14 mph. I slammed on the brakes and skidded to a halt just in time to stop them all becoming goose pate. Talking of food… I’ve just finished an exceedingly unsatisfying late lunch. It was meant to be a gloriously delicious chicken and pepper, harissa yoghurt wrap but I burnt the wrap, discovered the pepper was mouldy and the yoghurt pot was empty. So instead, I masticated on several strips of dry left-over chicken slathered in so much harissa my eyeballs won’t stop sweating. I’m juggling several things on the drawing board this week, including the illustrations for the third and final instalment of The Swifts: A Garden of Vipers. I’ve also started the cover for a new project which I can’t say a peep about! What I will say is, I’m very excited about it. It’s a one-off project—for a fab author!—which feels refreshing and lovely after working on so many series’s in recent years. I also have two private commissions to illustrate and I’m doing a day of library events in Nottingham this coming Saturday. You’re welcome to come to if you live nearby (tickets here). BUT all of that pails in comparison to the main event of the week: the eagerly awaited delivery of a compost bin and a herb ladder. When they arrive I will naturally stop all aforementioned work IMMEDIATELY to turn my attention to their assembly. I’ve been collecting tea-bags all week to get the compost going. I’m sure you’re as excited as I am so I will keep you updated. I’ll be back in your inbox on Friday with a round-up of things I’ve drawn in the past week. Until then, enjoy this drawing of the goose and her goslings, which I drew as soon as I got home this morning after almost squashing them flat.

Yours truly,

Powell x

This postcard is free for all to read! ❤️ Subscribe for more weekly postcards, a studio letter once a month, and drawing telegrams every Friday. If you’d like to support my work, upgrade to paid membership for just £4/month.

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Good morning Powells,

I LOVE snooker. I used to watch it on a black and white telly with my nan. Last night, the lean mean potting machine Wu Yize (China) out potted Shaun ‘the magician’ Murphy (England) to win the World Championship at The Crucible in Sheffield.

Wu won half a million quid. Shaun a measly 200 grand.

I suspect they both ended up being ranked in the Top 10 snooker players in the WORLD because they spend most of their time focused on… snooker.

I, on the other hand, spend most of my time doing everything other than drawing and making things. I persistently do things that don’t matter and only make a millimetre of progress in a thousand directions*. Then I consistently moan I don’t have enough time for the things that matter most to me.

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This behaviour cannot be allowed to continue. So, since my last post I’ve been eliminating non-essential things from my life with reckless abandon:

• I’ve deleted all unnecessary apps. Instead of having 6 exercise apps that I definitely never use, I now have one that I probably won’t use. Estimated time saved: none because I never used them anyway.

• I’ve unsubscribed from all the emails I don’t remember signing up for and I’ve created a TBR folder for all the emails I think I’ll read but absolutely won’t. Estimated time saved: 6.2 hours a day.

• I’ve deleted Vinted. I do not need any more ill-fitting cottage-core hand-wash-only white blouses that ‘only cost a fiver’. Estimated time saved: 12 hours a day.

• I made a radical decision to delete my over-complicated budgeting app. I no longer need to track, record and reconcile the £2.49 protein bar I bought at a train station, and allocate it to a category (does that go in travel or food and drink?!). Estimated time saved: 4 hours a day.

• I’ve streamlined my financial spreadsheet so it has 4 columns, not 400: what came in, what went out, what I saved and what I have left (that column is currently in the minus). Estimated time saved: 3 days a month.

• I’ve bought a small suitcase for overnight stays and filled 3 spare wash-bags with miniature versions of all the things I need for an overnight stay. Now I don’t need to pack every time I go on a school visit. Estimated time saved: 4 days a week because packing hurts my brain.

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So far (because this is just the beginning) eliminating the non-essential has saved me over 22 hours a day.

With these re-gained hours I intend to: rekindle my daily sketchbook practice which has been severely neglected in recent weeks; actually read The Bookseller—rather than using it to usher woodlice from my dining room; read the Substack publications I pay for each month and the 12 library books I’ve been renewing since November; finally put products in my shop. Weed the garden once a week. Finish decorating the attic after it lying dormant and half decorated for almost 12 months.

That all feels essential… doesn’t it?!

At the time of writing (ie. today, right now this second) I’ve already managed to do an hour of sketch booking and write to you.

I am off to a good start.

Powell x

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*Bastardised from Greg McKeown’s Book Essentialism, which I highly recommend.

Good Evening Powells,

I’m trying something new!

I often draw quick sketches in pencil but then, for one reason or another, don’t ink and colour straight away. I might be on a train, or maybe it’s late…

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Dear Powells,

This week, I’ve been preparing to re-enter the Substack stratosphere.

All systems went down for a while there, and I experienced a total blackout—a complete and utter loss of communication—which left me floating in outer silence, surviving on rations of powdered peas and dried shrimp.

Today is my planned re-entry window and I am preparing for a crash landing because I am about to get something off my flat chest.

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I have fallen off the Substack wagon many times—lots of you have stuck with me (thanks) many have left (that’s okay). Usually, when I return I make a joke of how busy I’ve been and I vow to be better next time around.

But this time I need to address the elephant in the room… or rocket, if I’m continuing with the outer space theme I appear to have started: my adhd.

If I don’t talk about this now, I will be living proof of the famous quote that wasn’t said by Albert Einstein: Insanity is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.

If I don’t publicly acknowledge how my adhd sometimes derails me, it will derail me more, because I’ll still be sort of pretending I don’t have it and then I can’t show up here as me.

So strap in because we’re about to hit some G-Force.

I was diagnosed in October 2024 at 7.30am in the morning over Zoom. The time isn’t actually relevant, I just want you to know how early I had to get up for the appointment.

At the time I was 45 years old.

My adhd is combined, meaning it’s hyperactivity-impulsivity, and inattentiveness all rolled into one. Fun times.

I knew absolutely nothing about adhd but I remember thinking it sounded like something I would rather not have. I had just moved house and I had no internet, my ceiling was leaking, I couldn’t find the box that contained my knickers and I had a manuscript to deliver in 3 days that I hadn’t started. Now that I write that I see that the signs of me having adhd were possibly there all along.

For a few weeks nothing changed. I didn’t even find my knickers. But the thread of my life had been pulled, and inevitably the whole thing started to unravel. Eventually, I was left holding a tangled mess of itchy wool that used to be my life.

Untangling it has been, in equal measures: emotional, ugly, confusing, overwhelming, tiresome, time consuming, expensive but ultimately, liberating. If I could trade it in for something else, a permanently ingrown toenail for example, I still might be tempted...

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Adhd shows up in my life in a myriad of ways, but let me use a real life example from last month.

• An aversion to boring things: I need to file my VAT return but after 10 minutes I get bored. I decide I’ll do the VAT some other time (ie. at the eleventh hour when it’s really urgent) and instead I’ll do something EXCITING now because I deserve it (a lie my brain tells me - for a quick hit of dopamine - that I believe).

• Inability to recognise body’s emotions: I confuse my body’s fear at what I’m about to do for excitement and decide to drive to a vintage shop 20 minutes away on the premise that it’s inspiring (another lie my brain tells me, which I believe).

• Impulsivity: As soon as I walk in through the door of the shop I see a plan chest that I do not need. Within 4.5 seconds I find myself paying an astronomical amount for it.

• Unrealistic expectations aka. living in a fantasy: As I am paying, I believe the plan chest is going to change my life and definitely make me a best-selling author before the year ends.

• Loud inner critic: She has LOTS of fun on the drive home telling me how stupid I was to buy it as I’m meant to be saving for a new bathroom and hasn’t she always known I was bad with money… blah blah blah.

• Shame: I realise when I get home that maybe, just maybe, I have been a little impulsive. The dopamine has officially worn off. The shame causes me to ignore the shop’s texts about a delivery date for 6 days.

• Inattentiveness: I did not measure for the plan chest. It did not even cross my mind. On this occasion (unlike with the washing machine I had to return for the same reason) it fits where it’s meant to go.

• Avoidance: The studio is now an absolute mess so I avoid it for a week and go on holiday.

• Time blindness: Another corker. When I’m back from holiday, I believe that sorting this mess will only take a couple of hours and I’ll be done by lunchtime. Great!—because I have lots of drawing to do and I want to write a Substack post.

• Indecision: By mid-afternoon I’m nowhere near done and all the decisions I have to make about where things go are draining my life-force energy.

• Hyperfocus: This is when my brain lasers in on something and won’t let go of it until I finish it, or spontaneously combust from trying. I spend 14 hours solid tidying the studio. By the end it’s 10pm, I’ve not eaten, haven’t had a wee to the point of bringing on a urinary infection and I’m exhausted.

Sidenote: All the furniture that was in my studio had to live in the dining room for a while because I didn’t manage to sell it in time. Actually, I didn’t even try. So the chaos continued until this morning, when a nice lady with no teeth collected it for free.

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I suspect a neurotypical person may have approached their boring VAT return like this:

• Get a bit bored.

• Stop for a biscuit.

• Make a Pinterest board for inspiration.

• Have a wee.

• Finish VAT return.

• The End.

Maybe one day I’ll be able to do the same...

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Yours, back on planet Substack,

Powell x

P.S I have popped some adhd resources below for anyone that might be interested.

I only have four that I currently recommend because if you have adhd one thing you don’t need is choice. I do not read books on ADHD because I cannot think of anything more boring. Only one has made it to my list because it’s short.

Kristen Carder - I’m a member of her adhd coaching group and she has straight up saved my sanity. She is worth every penny. If you can’t afford coaching, listen to her free podcast.

Kelly Banks who writes The Dopamine Dispatch. Thank you for pointing me in Kelly’s direction.

Leanne Maskell’s book ADHD an A-Z. Bite-sized explanations to get you started. Great for family or friends who may need help understanding what you need (or don’t).

One Sec app. This is brilliant and so simple. It interrupts the app’s or websites you tell it to and makes you breathe for a few seconds, before it asks you to decide whether you want to continue and if so… why.

Medication. I tried it. I have a cupboard full of it and it definitely works to quiet your mind and help you focus. In my case though, I prefer to take it only when I’m working on something mundane, like inking artwork or cleaning the house. I’ve discovered I can’t take it if I’m writing or brainstorming ideas, my brain feels too slow, so I choose carefully when to take them.

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Hello Powells,

I apologise that it’s taken me a week to post the recording of the wonderful chat I had with my illustrator author designer printmaker pal, .

Neil is such a stand-up guy. A person who m…

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Hello Powells,

I would like to retract the statement I made in my previous letter where I said I loved January. I now despise January. So much so, I would like it to be deleted from the yearly calendar entirely and for ever. I won’t bore you with what transpired to elicit such a U-turn, but trust me when I say: January sucked.

I am making a plea to February to just be nicer. So far, I’d say it’s been a mixed bag BUT, as we’re not even half-way through, there’s still time for it to win The Best Month of the Year Yet award!

On Tuesday this week my book published in the States. I hadn’t quite comprehended it until someone here told me they’ve ordered it from their library in Kansas. KANSAS! Do you know how far away that is from me?!

4,204 miles (if you fly in a straight line).

That’s 6,765,682 meters.

OR 43,976,933 sausages (if you lay them end to end and use an average 6 inch Lincolnshire).

It blows my mind to think that forty three million sausages away someone will be checking my book out of a library and taking it home to read (and presumably falling in love with).

To celebrate, I made homemade blueberry pancakes and got a haircut. Whilst I was in the hairdressers I was given a copy of Country Life magazine, a glossy weekly that started in 1897. I love this magazine - it’s very posh and hoity toity. In fact, it’s the only reason I get a haircut - so I can read it from cover to cover. To set the scene, the first few pages are ‘houses’ for sale and in the edition I was reading one desirable family home was a mere £15 million.

Aside from the cheap property, there are always some interesting articles about art… or art-icles if you wanted to make use of the obvious pun. One which I particularly liked was about illustrated menus. Let us campaign to bring illustrated menus back, as they are delightful. I took some photos and I assume sharing them here is fine?!*

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When I returned home, I sat with newly bouffant-ed hair and spent a ridiculously long time making an instagram post announcing that my book had published in the states. I posted it and immediately despised it. Viscerally. Almost as much as I despise January. I deleted it a mere 14 hours later and posted instead, something that took me two minutes to create and which I liked much better.

I think we can all agree that was an excellent use of my time (not).

Yours, forty-three million sausages away,

Powell x

* If I get sued by them I will be LIVID, as I am saving up for a Country Life magazine house.

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Good afternoon Powells,

Misty day here. I’m watching snooker whilst the sausage casserole slowly gets its act together in the slow cooker.

Last week I worked many hours on the third draft of my next Marty book and I got it to my editor by the skin of my teeth on Thursday night. I will talk about that soon but today, I thought I’d share something I did yesterday, which turned out surprisingly well and which I may do more of.

Yesterday was a planned joint birthday party for 3 friends. It ended up being four friends, as one jumped on the bandwagon at the last minute. I couldn’t think of anything to get them, so I decided I’d use the talent ‘God’ has given me and draw something for each of them instead. That bit was easy. One hour, 4 drawings, done.

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Sadly, I have progressed past the point now, of feeling comfortable handing friends an unframed drawing. It feels unfinished… dare I say, lazy. Handing drawings over with a blob of blu-tack and saying ‘stick it on the fridge’ doesn’t seem an option either, though I did consider it. So, this week, I went on the hunt for a framers.

There is one framers a stones throw away but you’ll wait half your life for the framed drawing to be ‘ready for collection’ so using them was a hard no.

Drive a little further (8 minutes) and you’ll discover (as I did) Peakland Arts Framers down a pot-holed back alley. If you visit, ditch your vehicle and walk down the alley because the pot-holes are deep enough that your entire car could disappear down one.

On arrival, you will be met by Sonya and Jon who are VERY cheerful; Jon cracked three jokes before I had fully crossed the threshold. My kind of guy. The framers has been in Pot-Hole Alley for 50 years - it was started in 1976 by Jon’s father, and Jon has now taken it over. The workshop is in a long brick building which is stuffed to the rafters with bits of coloured wood, and half made frames.

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Naturally, I was on a deadline (a.k.a OUT OF TIME). I arrived with the 4 drawings and only 9 hours before I had to hand them over to the intended recipients. Jon and Sonya were clocking off in approximately 90 minutes as they close at 12.30 on a Saturday, a fact which I didn’t not learn until 11am on Saturday. I didn’t think it could be done, but not only did they manage to frame all 4 drawings beautifully, I also had time to pop round the corner for a bowl of spiced pear and pecan soup!

Sonya is a mount matching genius. I, being a peasant, would have opted for an off-white but Sonya showed me how a coloured mount can change the world. She also selected a frame for my goat drawing that, moments earlier, I’d internally labelled as ‘disgusting’. But it works perfectly! The goat is in a wood the frame is wood and my goodness, it’s a match made in woody heaven.

Jon then took over and whipped out the saw, scalpel and superglue and I skipped out of the framers at 12.28pm with my four FRAMED drawings delighted. They had two minutes to recover from the shock of meeting me before they closed.

The finished results look a lot better in real life because:

1. Photographing glass is about as easy as driving down Pot-Hole Alley.

2. It was pitch black by the time I got home and photographing at night is about as easy as blah blah..

Here they are anyway.

All four drawings appeared to be well received. Obviously, I’ve inadvertently started something that I may later (will definitely) regret, as now everyone I know needs to receive a framed drawing for their birthday. But, I have faith that Jon and Sonya will make that ball and chain feel less cumbersome.

I must go stir the casserole.

Yours truly,

Powell x

P.S. I’m going back to see J&S this week (lucky THEM) to get some other drawings framed, which I’ll sell in my shop. Watch this space.

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I love January. It has always felt like a small pocket of freedom to me. A month full of hope and possibility. I like to pack the previous twelve months into a box, lock it, stick it in the boot, drive it to the nearest lake and throw the thing in—preferably from a high bridge so it makes a satisfying splash before sinking out of sight. Then I drive home feeling about four billion times lighter. Metaphorically speaking, of course.

Other January highlights:

• I can wear wool from head to toe without breaking a bead of sweat.

• No one judges me for not drinking because no-one is drinking.

• The snooker’s on.

• It’s the perfect season for BBC Dickensian dramas (though how anyone survived snowy London in a taffeta dress I’ll never know).

• Mince pies are half price.

• It snows.

If my front path weren’t icy enough for Torvill and Dean to skate their perfect-scoring Boléro on, January would get a ten out of ten from me.

Talking of snow…

We awoke this morning to over 30 centimetres of the stuff. I want to say I leapt out bed and rushed outside like the boy in The Snowman but, I’m 46 years old. I creaked and groaned my way out of bed, needed two cups of tea before I felt my brain engage and then manipulated my stiff and aching body into leg-warmers and walking boots.

The snow is beautifully deep and the surrounding countryside eerily quiet — just the drip-drip-drip of melting snow and the crunch of my boots. I half-expected to glimpse Mr Tumnus, or for the Snow Queen to appear on her sleigh and bribe me with Turkish delight. Instead, I saw a man on skis, skiing to the supermarket. A shame, really, as I hadn’t yet had breakfast and would have happily accepted some Turkish delight.

Meanwhile, back indoors…

I’m knee-deep not in snow, but in the first draft of Marty Moose book three.

The draft is due next week, so I’ll save the emotional rollercoaster (which seems to accompany every book) and the story of my new writing desk (complete with a secret button and a former life aboard a sea captain’s ship) for another day.

For now, I’ll sign off with a few of recent character drawings and a book I’ve enjoyed.

Yours truly,

Powell x

Drawn this week:

Photographed, not scanned so… please forgive the quality. Drawn with a fountain pen and pencil in an unbranded sketchbook.

Read this week:

Short. Beautifully written. Unexpected ending that broke my heart.

Damn you, DiCamillo, you’re too good! Borrowed from the library and hard to return.

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Hello Powells,

Today is an exciting day!

No, I’m not talking about Black Friday: only exciting if you’ve had your eye on some luxury quilted pillow protectors since May but, refusing to pay the hefty price tag, have stubbornly waited half a year to purchase them at a heavily discounted price.

Granted, that does sound quite exciting.

However, I am talking about today being the National Day for Illustration! Thanks to the Quentin Blake Centre who set this whole thing up, we have a whole day to OFFICALLY celebrate illustration.

Hip-hip hurray for Sir QB! And… Happy National Illustration Day!

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After being newly diagnosed with ADHD age 45 ½ last October, I went on to have an existential crisis: I questioned my entire existence, turned myself inside out to have a good look at what was going on, and recently put myself and my life back together in a way that makes more sense. I put the finishing touches to my new life on Tuesday, when I reorganised my entire filing structure on iCloud.

I also gave a great deal of thought this year to answering the question: Why does illustration bring me so much joy?

Here is what I’ve come to realise:

Let us say I am having a one of those days. Maybe it’s a grouchy day or an everything is booooring day. It could be an anxious-about-everything day, or a my-mind-is-like-a-henhouse-at-feeding-time kinda day, where I can’t get a break from a constant pecking of thoughts.

Regardless, if I happen to take a break and look at an illustration such as the one above, the following happens in approximately 6.7 seconds:

1. My mind shuts up instantly. It’s as though you have dangled a shiny object in front of a crying baby - suddenly, it’s distracted and soothed.

2. As a result, my worries drift away.

3. With my mind quiet I am able to feel the well of inner peace that exists inside of me at all times but is usually elbowed into a dark crevice by an bullish mind. Inner peace now takes up space.

4. Feeling peaceful leads to feeling unhurried, not something I am used to feeling. I can now allow myself the enjoyment of staring at the drawing and appreciating it.

5. The grand finale: inspiration strikes! Now I want to create something as beautiful and I cannot get to my sketchbook quick enough.

6. The result: my day has been transformed and I now feel different to how I felt 6.7 seconds ago. I suddenly feel hopeful, inspired, joyful, possibly even nostalgic and in some cases I may even be laughing-out-loud.

The exact same process happens to me when I open my sketchbook and start to draw.

My conclusion therefore is: Illustration transforms my mind and mood in less than 10 seconds for the better and it is therefore awesome.

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Now the only thing left to do here is to finish with an illustrator whose work inspires and delights me. I will choose:

Norman Thelwell.

I was about 7 years old when I started riding horses but I’m not sure when I first engaged with his work. I have a vague memory of seeing a Thelwell ceramic mug in the tack shop and I got one of his books for Christmas a few years after, so probably then. His sense of humour, the expressions, the dry British sarcasm all roll into one big ball of wonderfulness, and I have been a life-long fan of his work ever since.

Writing this, I was surprised to discover Thelwell grew up in BIRKENHEAD! - a stone’s throw from my home-town, and the place where I went to art college (and failed, but that’s a story for a different day).

Let me know in the comments why you love illustration and who you’re celebrating today.

Yours, a member of the Thelwell appreciation society,

Powell x

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