lello news

This past week my youngest turned 4. We showered her with gifts and a party in an enchanted forest (our converted dining room), complete with a birthday cake adorned with a unicorn with wings (her very specific request) created by yours truly. It’s was my first… and probably last… venture into Fondant as an illustrative medium. The 4 year old art director was patient with me giving gentle albeit specific art direction and feedback. Overall I think she was happy with the result ;)

Happy 4th Sadie!

Hoping you and yours have a great holiday and a wonderful new year! All the best, Mike, Erika, Jackson & Sadie.

Consider picking up one of our kids t-shirts or art prints from Geralyn’s Art Studio in the Maplewood Village. The studio is open today and tomorrow for all you crazed last minute shoppers… Oh and they’re available for a special holiday price!



Remember, you’ll get everything finished and your holiday will be fantastic! Cheers! :)

Oh boy… I’m sneaking this post in right under the wire aren’t I. One last hurrah for Halloween before we all stuff ourselves for Thanksgiving and join the insanity of holiday shopping. We had such a killer time trick-or-treating this year with friends and we were lucky enough to get this group photo of the crew that I just had to share.

Can you believe we got them all to pose at once??! Everyone looks so good in their costumes. Props to Mom who hand-made the girl’s Jessie (from toy story) costume! I’m super impressed with her sewing / crafting abilities. The boy chose to be the dark menacing (and headless) chap on the left. Super creeeeepy ;^) The entire night was a hoot and I can’t wait to do it again next year!

Our favorite holiday is here! We spent the morning prepping homemade costumes for school parties and parades happening later on today… and having a blast doing it! Sadie will be Jessie from Toy Story and Jaxs opted to be a headless man (NOT the headless horseman mind you). I’m not sure who’s more excited to show off their costumes, them or us :^) Keep an eye out for “dressed up” photos coming soon!

Also in the spirit of Halloween I often whip up a holiday drawing, but with the injury to my drawing arm I’ve had to find another avenue to channel that creative energy. So this year, instead of creating with a pencil and brush, I used a knife and food…

Over the last few months I’ve been creating lunch time bento boxes for my son. It’s the perfect merger of creativity and the endless pursuit to get him to eat and to eat healthy. I’m still learning this new medium and loving it!  My latest creation is a peanut butter and jelly skull sandwich with m&m eyes, grapes topped with string cheese cross bones and a semi-hidden chocolate evil eye. Happy Halloween everyone!!

A big thank you to Mikel Frank for hanging the show, to all of my fellow artists and to all the great peeps who came out to show their support.

If you missed the today’s opening, no worries, the show runs through October 10th. I hope you’ll stop in to take a look…. there’s a lot of great work! Thanks again to all for such a successful opening!

I dropping off my art earlier this evening for a group show I’ll be participating in at the 1978 Gallery here in Maplewood, NJ. The show opens this Sunday (September 12) and the reception is from 2 - 5pm. If you have some free time, stop on by, I’d love to chat!

6:23 is roughly the time that I arrive back in town each night. The train I take is perpetually late. I’m generally fried by the day’s onslaught of deliverables. And navigating the evening obstacle course, known as Penn Station, has left me on edge. So as you can imagine I was not in the best of moods as I walked up the hill to retrieve the truck for the last leg of my commute home.

But tonight’s drive home will be different. Tucked under the windshield wiper of the truck is a note from my son. It’s by far the best thing that’s happened to me all day. All negative feelings have melted away as I sit here writing this post. I’m happy and I can’t wait to get home and see my family.

It’s the little things you know :)

Earlier tonight I helped prep student artwork to be hung in this year’s Tuscan Elementary spring art show.  Along with Mary, Karen and JoEllen Petronzi (Tuscan’s art teacher) we started the arduous task of mounting, labeling and organizing roughly 900 works of art.  Sounds like fun right?  Actually, it was a blast!  I was seriously blown away by the talent, imagination and creativity of these kids and their teacher.  This is going to be one amazing show!  The following pictures highlight some of the kindergartner work.

If you can spare some time and want to get involved, I know JoEllen is looking for more help.  Give me a shout and I can get you in touch with the organizers.

Hey gang, it certainly has been awhile since our last post, but we’re still here and we’re still working all the time.

This year has been especially busy… in addition to new illustrations, cards, paintings, etc. I also decided to earn my certification to teach art in New Jersey public schools. So for the last 6 months I’ve been studying, taking classes and passing tests in my spare time to meet the State’s certification requirements. Well… last weekend I finally completed everything and submitted my paperwork to Trenton (Yah!). You may be wondering what I’m planning to do now, and where I’d like to teach. And I can look you in the eyes and honestly say… I have no idea! It’s a tough time to be starting out as a teacher these days with so many already qualified teachers out there losing jobs in NJ. I know I’m happiest when i’m teaching kids of any age, and I’ll consider myself lucky if things work out just about anywhere within commutable distance.

In the short term, I think I’ll take a little breather and focus on some paintings I’ve been wanting to complete. Maybe I’ll find that Zen place up in my studio (maybe not… it’s pretty messy). Now that I have some spare again, I’ll post a few more things that have been happening as of late. Until then, thanks for the continued support and I hope you’re all enjoying this beautiful spring weather!