What a Lotti

The Great Digital Outdoors

So here is a new thing that I’m doing. I’ll try to explain.

Shoo Fly Publishing is busy creating digital learning environment called School 360. It is for schools, and parents, and pupils, and teachers and other school related people.

And a big big section inside the environment is the Outdoor Learning. Which is a concept that encourages and helps schools, and pupils, and parents, and teachers to explore and learn about the great outdoors.

Halloween cartoon!

Well, my first Lithuanian app is finished and ready to go now.

I’ve been updating my website recently and noticed with an absolute horror a lack of illustrations of dogs going on holiday.

I had to react swiftly and fix this utterly unacceptable situation.

I’m making my first children's app in Lithuanian language (it’s not a made up language, it does exist) about Little Red Riding Hood. It is based on the original story by Charles Perrault, though gets a bit twisted towards the end. The app will contain an animated book and some silly puzzles and activities, which includes the Wolf dressing-up page.

The trouble is I get terribly distracted. Instead of starting on bit of coding and animation as I already finished most of the artwork, I started drawing some stupid dog cartoons. I called them ‘The Revenge oh the Human’.

I am obsessed with dogs. Here’s Jim, my little whippet who very patiently lets me dress him up in silly hats and other various items of clothing. I wonder if my next app should be a dog dressing-up one?

The recent BBC radio dramatisation of Pride and Prejudice throws mr. Darcy into a stream rather than a pond. And also turns him into a trout.

It’s the Puppies and Kittens app!

Shoo Fly has finally finished and released a brand new children’s app for the Stripes Publishers. It’s called Holly Webb: Puppies and Kittens.

Holly Webb is a wonderful childrens writer, her books about kittens and puppies are loved by children from all over the world. To celebrate her books we’ve loaded the app with plenty of exciting kitten and puppy based activities and games. It also has a brand new short story called ‘The Curious Kitten’!   

I’ve thoroughly enjoyed myself designing layouts, styling menus and making some of the artwork too. I also had a chance to work with a great bunch of people from the Stripes. 

Our bathroom keeps getting invaded by various creatures. Last year was a wallpaper munching slug.

This year we’ve got bumble bees. They kept appearing in the house out of nowhere until we’ve shut all the doors and windows and after few hours heard buzzing coming from the bathroom. We’ve opened the window, let the stripy  idiot out, shut the door and after a few hours a new furry bumbling nuisance presents itself. There’s a gap in a wall that opens up into the loft so we’re guessing that’s where these six-legged wooly numbskulls decided to invite themselves over for hibernation last year.

It’s been few days now of this repetitive open-the-window/wave-the-idiot-bee-out/shut-the-door action, so I’ve caught one in order to identify who this irritating flying little cretin is.

I’ve found this bumble bee guide and if had pulled the wings off the one I caught it’ll most likely match the Tree bumble bee picture.

The trouble with this guide is that it’s forgotten to mention few things about these arrogant hairy-arsed brown-ginger thorax, white tale twits. They also like to invade people’s bathrooms uninvited and present themselves when one is having a shower and can’t reach to open the bloody window.

The guide also doesn’t mention that because of this Bombus Imbecilus Hypnorum we now for days have to inspect the bathroom through a tiny door gap before carefully sneaking in, gently lifting towels with kitchen tongs and examining them thoroughly before using, and if one of these hovering hairy pillocks suddenly appear do an idiotic ducking and waving scamper towards the window to set the sting-you-once-and-die moron free.

I’ve heard that apparently the bee numbers are dropping down and there are a lot less of them spotted working. Frankly, I think that these tubby little buggers are just getting lazy and hide in bathrooms instead.