Gilad's Invitation

Several years ago I met a lovely lady when our sons went to the same English class. She is a talented crafter herself and, after regularly chatting whilst waiting for our boys, we soon connected over facebook. I know that she reads my blog regularly and so was delighted when she wrote to me to commission a design for a Bar Mitzvah invitation and an album for her son.

Her son, she told me, loves drawing, bike riding, origami and daydreaming! His favourite colour is green, like the green English countryside, and, what she thought I might not have noticed (I hadn't!) is that on the left side of his hair he has a small blond wisp... kind of like a feather!

My customer wanted the invitation design to have a Bar Mitzvah theme but, aside from that, was happy to leave me to come up with something suitable. My favourite kind of customer!

I decided to show the Bar Mitzvah boy, Gilad, wearing a kippa (skullcap) on his head and a tallit (a Jewish prayer shawl) over his shoulders. He is holding a book and some pencils in one hand, and an origami swan in the other. The facebookers amongst you may well remember the teeny-weeny origami swan, above, which I posted on my page whilst working on the design. Gilad's black bike, with a yellow stripe on it, is also shown in the background and he is daydreaming about being 13!
Finally, this particular customer chose to keep all the wording in English which made for a good, clean design. She kept 'our project' a secret until I had finished the artwork but wrote to tell me that her son was thrilled when he saw it. "Amazing" she said "[I've] just showed Gilad and he loves it! Thanks so much!".
The invitations were beautifully printed on white cardstock, below, and their guests seemed to like them.
I made Gilad an album for the Bar Mitzvah party too but that is going to have to wait for another post. Look out for it!