mouse cookie cookie

My amazing niece, Mari, will be celebrating her third birthday next month.  She LOVES animals, especially mice.  Her favorite mouse is Mouse Cookie. I cannot wait to see her face when she sees Mouse Cookie on a cookie.

When I started this project, I assumed that I would create the designs using icing only (no painting.)  But once I finished icing, I realized I could not capture the true essence of Mouse Cookie without adding hand-painted details.

I painted outlines with a very fine paintbrush dipped in black airbrush color.  I created the shading details on the face, body, and overalls using a destroyed paintbrush. I used to discard my brushes when the bristles became separated.  Now I keep them around so I can paint textures like the ones seen here.

For the face and body, I dipped a destroyed paintbrush in brown, tan, and white food dye. I lightly ran the paintbrush over the face and arms.  For the overalls, I dipped the brush in navy, royal, and white food dye and lightly painted stripes over the blue base coat.  These small steps gave the illustrations depth and detail, and took very little time to accomplish.

Happy third birthday, Mari!