Thanks to your support, this project has unlocked it's second free reward to all physical pledges: the Tress the Minotaur bookmark! She is joining the free Blaze the Phoenix sticker. Hooray!
COVER ART!
The cover art for the calendar and coloring book are complete! Do you recognize what scene they are campaigning? I'm am SO happy with how Abi put this image together, it flows so well and really captures the personalities of each Cafe character. Let me know what you think of it!
PREVIOUS PROJECT REWARDS REMINDER
Any leftover goodies from the Cafe TTRPG pin project will be available as limited add-ons after the post-project surveys go out. Pins, art cards, and more! Last year's goodies from the 2024 Calendar are still available at DragonWoodshop.com at heavy discount, and some items may also become available during the surveys.
Sorry it has been awhile since an update, the fact is I do not have much of one.
The printer we are working with has made some very large errors in our proofs which we are currently working with them to fix.
We are being extra cautious this year, because as some of you know, last year they made a very big error to one of the guidebooks and didn't catch it before they sent the bulk order. So we had to reprint the books and send them separately on our own dime. A financial catastrophe we are still trying to catch up from. We are not a big business, we are a passion project. We make very little if any on these decks, they are a true labor of love <3
For that reason we are being extremely cautious, and many eyes are going over proofs so we catch every single mistake and can give you a perfect product.
We had to charge shipping now to order any addons you purchased so we can have them in a timely fashion. But in truth it most ilkely wont ship until the end of October, if ALL goes well.
I apologize about this, I really wish i could speed up this process. We are stuck with this printer this year because we already paid, but will be changing printers for the upcoming decks.
That is all for now!
In light of the delay I will be ordering a special gift for everyone but its a surprise!!! We hope you love it and thank you SO much for your patience. Indy publishing is a lot of work to get a perfect product so we really thank you so much for your understanding.
Thank you so much for getting our second calendar and coloring book so far! And we already need 80 prints of our first comic! This update has information about the December art and the $6000 freebie stretch goal.
DECEMBER ART!
December's art is all done, and I am so excited to show it off to you all. In this image, our main characters are in their TTRPG world, enjoying a warm fire (provided by Blaze) and good comradery. Do you recognize the griffin in the background, or the black and white dragons? This ADORABLE image just makes you feel like your part of the gathering, perhaps sitting on the tree with best friends Mythri and Hatch. What music do you think Mythri is playing? Abi "Nerdy Alchemist" really nailed the vibe of this piece and it's so much fun to see all of these wonderful characters together, enjoying good food and good company.
NEXT STRETCH GOAL
Our next goal is for $6000 in funding! When we reach this goal, I will add on a free Tress the minotaur (Alister's wife) bookmark to all physical pledges! This will be the same quality as the 6-pack bookmark add-on, so she will fit right in with the crew.
PREVIOUS PROJECT REWARDS REMINDER
Any leftover goodies from the Cafe TTRPG pin project will be available as limited add-ons after the post-project surveys go out. Pins, art cards, and more! Last year's goodies from the 2024 Calendar are still available at DragonWoodshop.com at heavy discount, and some items may also become available during the surveys.
Continuing with Snap Dragon. We've got our cherry blossom scene, with all the little critters having a picnic in a meadow. my main feedback on this (second pass sketch) was to build out more of the back of the shop, with picnic benches, so its more of a meadow in the back.
Also, here is very early interior-view sketch of Ice Cube, Overall, I like the direction, I was initially torn about this elemental and the one shown on the outside piece being the same; major addition will be a little dragon turtle plushie on the deck (or in the window). but once things start cleaning up, we'll probably have another tweak.
Stretch Extras With every calendar we do, typically after 10k we start producing other things to accompany your calendar, in prior years Its been magnets, stickers, bookmarks, coloring books etc. We did have an excellent recommendation by one of our backers for event stickers for our calendars, and i would love to hear what sort of events you'd like included? (doing just the text would work, but I'm thinking we could try illustrating little things, like an owlbear with a birthday hat, that says "Happy Birthday!" and doing a few different beasts). Just an idea for now, but curious to what everyone thinks (and what event/creature combos, you guys would love to see).
Hope everyone had a great weekend! and thank you all for the support, Andreas
I have finished every order I have the information I need for! There is one lingering with uncleared funds, one survey that I haven't received, and one that I'm waiting for custom art direction, but everything else is not only mailed but probably also already delivered! I am very close to out of the bonus cards and the crowdfunded edition of the companion guide, so if you missed out, or want a second copy, or you know someone who desperately needs this deck, you'd better grab it soon.
If you got tracking for overseas and your link is showing an unknown status, try using your tracking number at THIS site: https://www.goglobalpost.com/track/
(I'm not sure why they weren't showing correctly through the USPS link!)
I would LOVE to hear from you if your order arrived safely and know which parts you enjoyed most. Have you done a few readings? Is the system intuitive?? I would ESPECIALLY like to know what your favorite card in the deck is, and which layout you like best (if you got the guidebook)!
If you missed out on the Patreon bonus card, I have a few extra, and they will go to new patrons at any tier until I run out.
What am I working on next?
I have a book coming out next week, A Bear in a Birdbath, which is a silly-fluffy menage romance book with a Fairy, a Troll, and a Cave Bear. Next on my writing desk is a prequel novella for Green Valley Shifters. (If you'd like to download a checklist of all my Elva Birch books, I have one you can print here!)
I'm also planning to put together a new coloring book before the holidays - this one a print on demand retrospective with the best of my previous four solo books and seven new pieces! I will also have spiral bound books available direct - including left-hand bound!
Bonus Picture
I went to a Viking Festival two weekends ago, bought an antler headdress that I didn't take off all weekend, and got to hold a gyrfalcon!!
Thank you so much for supporting A Unicorn Key! I hope you are wildly happy with it! <3
Greetings Art Lovers, Boudoir photography explores the raw power and vulnerability of the nude model through an intimate lens that celebrates confidence, beauty, and individuality. My boudoir photography book captures bedroom moments revealing the strength and elegance of every model. Let these images inspire you to see boudoir and the female form in a new light. Want to learn more?
I hope you'll join me in this glimpse behind closed doors to witness the boudoir moments of dozens of women captured nude in the privacy of their bedrooms.
Hey all! As mentioned the updates will be kind of sparse as there's not much to report until we actually get down there for the shoot in November.
However I did want to let you know the suits have been ordered and we've started booking the flights! ✈️
When I have something fun to show you (like the suit art previews that I'm hoping to see very soon!) I will make another update. Of course feel free to reach out anytime! 🥰
We've been filling in the suggestions list as things come to us. Feel free to leave them here or message me on socials.
Just a quick update here from our BackerKit orchestrator here: we were seeing folks having trouble accessing their PDFs right away, so we've changed/updated the distribution for both BUFFOMET and the PARADISE LUST digital PDFs! You should have received an extra email containing your download links, but comment below or contact Backerkit Support if you're still having trouble accessing these. We're also working on allowing people who wanted to add on physical items to their PDF-only tiers, so hang tight and we or Backerkit support will be in touch ASAP!
We still have ~25% of backers who need to respond to your survey, so fill those out ASAP to ensure your rewards are sent to you as soon as everything's ready to roll! Thanks again everyone, and have a wonderful rest of your week!
The project is going wonderfully, and I am continually grateful for your support! As a thank you for reaching 100 pledges, I'm offering a free 3" x 1.5" sticker to all physical pledges (if you pledge for the Digital Bundle, but get a physical Add On, you'll receive this sticker too).
This sticker will be of Blaze the Phoenix, a recurring background character in the Cafe. She is an architect, and collects candles and candle holders of all different kinds. You may recognize her from last year's calendar! One of her unique abilities is whenever she touches a crystal or gemstone, she takes on their colors! Her natural colors are as seen below.
NEW POLL
I have a new poll up, please be sure to answer it! This will help us know who you guys might want our next plushie to be.
PREVIOUS PROJECT REWARDS
Any leftover goodies from the Cafe TTRPG pin project will be available as limited add-ons after the post-project surveys go out. Pins (including Blaze pins), art cards, and more! Last year's goodies are still available at DragonWoodshop.com at heavy discount AND with free shipping.
Hey All, Welcome back to another year of amazing calendars!
Funnily enough, I ran into Selustials when I was looking for cute and cozy creature-food art back in 2011 (for a different food-related project idea). From that, we made a couple of cute little pieces of art (boba owlbear being a favorite). As we came to thinking about what we wanted to do for 2025, I really wanted to try something a little different and go down the route of exploring what a dnd cafe would look like (and Selustials's work was a perfect fit for the idea).
The other thing was that (because I love coffee/tea/and boba), we wanted to showcase all of these different things, which led us to creating a few different locations, that would specialize in different things. (would also let us show off a few different creatures as well).
We finally settled on three for the interior so that we could give each of them a shopfront, an interior, and two focus interior shots, see any familiar characters? :)
Check out Snap Dragon
Front of House (jan)
Snap Dragon Interior
Matcha!!!
Anyways, Im super excited to seeing this come to life, I am still open to what sort of extras we can put into the calendar, and would love to see what you guys would be interested in for this calendar.
