Friday, July 14, 2017

Coloring Book Featuring Cats:Cooking With Cats (A Curious Combo of Cats, Cupcakes & Colors) by Jess Erskine and a Give-Away!

From the moment I first read about Cooking With Cats (A Curious Combo of Cats, Cupcakes & Colors), by the talented Jess Erskine, on the fabulous  Pet Lady Blog, I was intrigued.  I LOVE to cook, I LOVE cats and I LOVE to color, so it was a no-brainer. I HAD to have this book!


Cooking With Cats – is a quirky mashup of cats, cookery and cuisine, and contender for the Most-Ridiculously-Wonderful-Coloring-Book-About-Cats-of-All-Time.
Cooking With Cats contains 25 scenes of cats cavorting in the kitchen and pretending to be a variety of gourmet foods. Coloring fans have the opportunity to color sushi cats, cupcake cats, hotdog cats, ice cream cats, and coffee cats in all their furry glory.
I KNEW I HAD TO HAVE THIS BOOK!!!

So, I reached out on Facebook practically begging for a chance to review/color this darling book and Jess's Dad, Jim, was happy to oblige!

First, when I opened the book and saw the sketch of Cody that Jess had surprised me with, I nearly DIED!!! Oh how she captured Cody's "cranky" expression!!!

 I LOVE how Jess wrote the caption of "Color me unimpressed..." that is ohhh sooo Cody!!!! I wonder if she knows just how FOOD OBSESSED Cody is? (Well, for that matter, I am too, but I digress...).......

The drawings in this book are precious and in my opinion, to not lose the quality of the actual drawing, I would strongly suggest using COLORED PENCILS for this book. (Yes, I know I am not normally a fan of coloring with colored pencils AT ALL, but with this book I wish I had them to enable me to do the sort of shading that I would like to do, while maintaining the integrity and beauty of Jess's original sketches.) The sketches of the cats in particular have lovely detail that I think colored markers (which I used on my page that I colored), ruins that. I am going to go out and get some colored pencils soon, before I color pages in the rest of the book. I want my coloring to not take away from Jess's talent. Below you will see the page that I colored with markers:



I think my coloring above, would look MUCH better had it been done with colored pencils. Also, there are scrumptious looking donuts, tacos, spaghetti, ice cream and so much more to color, and...you know ME, I AM SERIOUS ABOUT MY FOOD and I must make the food look as delectable as Jess's drawings, and I think using colored pencils will enable me to do that.The kitties that Jess has drawn  in this book are so beautifully sketched, that many of them look not only ready to be colored by YOU, but they look like you just might want to CUDDLE them as well!

Here is a sample page, (all of the sample pages may be downloaded and printed so that YOU can have fun coloring them too!)  so you can see what I mean:





MEET JESS ERSKINE


How did you come up with the idea for COOKING WITH CATS?
My dad thought of it first, so I stole it from him and ran with it… mashing cats together with every kind of food I love, like cupcakes and coffee and sushi and cinnamon buns. It’s hard to look at this coloring book without your mouth watering.
Jess and Morty. Photo Courtesy of Cooking With Cats

Do you have any cats of your own?
I do. Morty is my favorite cat of all time, and he knows it. But he’s also a butt. He’s packed full of attitude and spice, and was the model for some of the pages in COOKING WITH CATS. His favorite activities are attacking legs, chasing bugs, hide and seek, naps, and watching “The Office” with me. But he’s still a butt.
Morty as inspiration on left,
you can download the page to color
and on the right,
is Jess's drawing of Morty
that is actually the back cover of the book
Photos Courtesy of Cooking With Cats

Are any of your drawings mean to cats?
Well, a little DEmeaning maybe… but no, they are not mean or cruel. And if they were, I wouldn’t admit it anyway. For instance, there is Sushi Cat, who is wrapped up in some sushi. But did I cut him up? No. As you can see in his picture, he’s just an excellent food cosplayer.

Do you really eat food with cat hair in it?
Not knowingly. However, I recently had a tonsillectomy and I still can’t taste anything. So I wouldn’t know if I did. But I’d say I probably have recently.
Where can people find your book?
They can find it at RollingDonutPress.com or on Amazon. There’s also lots of pictures from the book to check out on our Facebook page, facebook.com/cookingwithcats
How pretty is Jess? She is GORGEOUS!!
Photo Courtesy of Cooking With Cats

ILLUSTRATOR BIO

Jess Erskine, age 24, was born and raised in the foothills of Kentucky – where tea is the sweetest, and gravy goes on everything. Jess is a self-taught illustrator and the founder of Rolling Donut Press, and is the author and illustrator of Finish the Drawing; Coupons for Couples; 50 Simple Reasons 


Jess developed her love for illustration thru an early obsession over Hal Foster’s “Prince Valiant” comic series. Most of her childhood was spent listening to vintage radio programs, annoying her brothers, and poring over Foster’s beautifully detailed illustrations.
Before pursuing illustration full time, Jess worked as a restaurant manager, goldsmith, videographer, and did contract work for several local theaters.
When she isn’t nose-deep in illustration, these days Jess can be found playing with her hellion cat Morty, collaborating with her dad Jim Erskine, striving for the highest Tetris score and searching for the world’s best donuts.
HAVE I PIQUED YOUR INTEREST? I KNOW YOU LOVE CATS OR YOU WOULDN'T BE HERE...ARE YOU HUNGRY YET???? YOU WILL BE BECAUSE THERE IS A GIVE-AWAY!!! THREE LUCKY READERS WHO ARE 18 AND OVER AND WHO RESIDE IN THE U.S. WILL EACH WIN A COPY OF THIS DARLING BOOK!! ENTERING IS SUPER EASY, JUST ENTER ON THE RAFFLECOPTER BELOW AND GOOD LUCK!!!!
a Rafflecopter giveaway





41 comments:

  1. That *is* a darling book!
    I am not going to enter since I just won in another givaway...but I will let others have a chance!

    That image of the Sushi Kitty reminded me of the Beatrice Potter tale about Tom Kitten and the Roly-Poly-Pudding, MOL!!

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  2. Great idea...wish I had thought of it. Fun to illustrate! Morty looks like Loulou's cousin, for sure.

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    1. that makes two of us, but my drawings wouldn't be nearly as good as Jess's! Yes!! Morty DOES look like he could be Loulou's cousin!!! Love it!!

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  3. Wow! We loved the drawings!!! Our human is actually quite into adult-coloring books, and she knows pretty well which books are sold around here - and there's nothing alike the above pictures. Just wonderful funny. Our local bookstores do have cat coloring books for adults, but they're pretty boring.

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    1. Jess's drawings are just wonderful! I am into coloring too (when I have the time, which often I don't), but this one is NOT boring!!

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  4. That is a great idea for a coloring book.

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  5. Cats and food?? Brilliant! My favorite food is mac & cheese. Real Cat Webster's favorite food is whatever is on the nearest human's plate. :)

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    1. Webster is EXACTLY like Cody. Whatever is on MY plate interests him no matter what it is! MOL!

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  6. The coloring books, beautiful sketches and giveaway is wonderful and impressive. I love the artwork. Your coloring is lovely. I enjoy eating crusty bread with tomatoes and the cats savor fish galore.

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    1. Thank you for your kind words! Yes her sketches are beautiful! I have to get colored pencils! lol

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  7. This looks fabulous! I have a thing for cat coloring books. The illustrator clearly knows her cats.

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  8. Sneaky Pie loves his we cat food mostly seafood ones and Mushu likes the dry "Meow Mix". Of course Mushu would love ice cream only but He can only have it once in awhile.

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  9. I love those sketches I wished I could draw like that :-)

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  10. That is so cool and so well done too, very impressive!

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  11. Adorable! Love the extra special Cody drawing too; you must be over the moon, Caren!

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  12. What a cute coloring book! It made us smile! We love ice cream and tortilla chips! Not together though.

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  13. A real nice coloring book.
    The cat in the cup looks a lot like "Hosico".
    Bonne soirée
    Nat Ă  Chat

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  14. This one ticks all the boxes MOLMOL! Just gutted we can't enter!! That sketch of Cody absolutely nails him!!! xxx

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  15. That is adorable and I love the drawing of Cody. My cats love meat, especially chicken.

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  16. Awww, so precious.

    Have a purrfect day, Cody. My best to your wonderful mom. ♥♥♥

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  17. What lovely pictures! I use pencils but have been thinking about getting gel pens for more depth of colour. The pencils do give a more delicate colour but take forever to colour in. I love the drawing of Cody.

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  18. I had determined a few weeks ago I was not going to enter any more drawings. It's a lot to go through and I never win. But...here I am this last time as the author is adorable...she reminds me of my daughter-in-law...we are both from the South and that is an adorable coloring book. I have never colored one. So..here I am.

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  19. I cook with kitty cats every day!

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  20. My cats favorite food is fancy feast tuna

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  21. TW wishes I left her time to color. That book looks adorable but I still like the last one you reviewed best. My fave is Chinese food but TW only lets me have one piece.

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  22. Looks like a great book! The illustrations are beautiful!

    Purrs xx
    Athena and Marie

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  23. This looks like such a wonderful coloring book. Jess is so talented!

    Zoe's favorite food is whatever Gracie is eating. And vice versa. MOL!

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  24. I'm not entering because I'm doing a giveaway too but I ADORE this book! I go nuts over cats disguised as food LOL

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  25. I am so impressed by this book and theme! I love the drawings! I got such a kick out of her drawing of Cody and her note and Cody's "Color me impressed" caption! I actually really like colored pencils because of the shading. What a great giveaway!

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  26. What a super fun book. Who doesn't love coloring and cats on top of that, purrfect combination.

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  27. WOW! What a great book! And I LOVE the sketch Jess did of Cody! She is extremely talented. Thanks for the review! I cant wait to see her FB page.
    Love Barb

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  28. Oh boy!
    We love to color AND we love to cook...

    Noodle and crew

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  29. What an adorable coloring book! I love what you did with the photo you shared of your coloring. I always use markers too but have been wanting to experiment with some colored pencils for shading. I just love the boldness of markers. Let me know how your colored pencil experiments go! Definitely entering the giveaway...

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    1. Thank you so much! I am like you, I normally prefer markers because they are "bold", but you are right, depending on the book (and this is one of them), I think that colored pencils are the way to go. I still haven't gotten them, but when I finally do, I will make it a point to do another from this book and try to remember to post it! Good luck!!!!

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  30. Food and cute cats : the best combo for Claire ! What a pawsome giveaway, good luck to our US friends ! Purrs

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  31. What a cute coloring book. Just the way to relax, coloring cats and food. Thanks for the great giveaway!

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  32. Oh my gosh, that drawing of Cody is amazing! What a talent she has! My cats love any treats, but Olive goes crazy for those Ciao Churu Cat Treats.

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