Rubber ducky

I was asked to contribute an ATC (Artist Trading Card) to a colleague in an art forum to commemorate the impending birth of her first baby - a girl. The opportunity piqued my curiosity as I hadn't done much work on that scale before. An artist trading card is 2.5 x 3.5 inches so miniaturizing a drawing to fit into that space took a little experimental drawing first.

Here is the result. It will be mailed off to her this week and become part of what I hope will be an assortment of ATCs that she receives. It should make an interesting keepsake that will prove a real talking point now and into the future. It was completed in Prismacolor pencils on Moleskine watercolour sketchbook - small, which I then cut down.

I've been on a search lately for childhood memories of toys. Finding them is a challenge as most traditional toys have been modernized and are no longer the dull, utilitarian colours or sizes that I recall from my childhood but now come in garish neon colours and plastic with flashing lights. So simply finding a rubber duck was the challenge. My other search is for a set of jacks. Simple gunmetal grey aluminum jacks with a little red ball. What can I find instead? Bright fluorescent green, pink and yellow jacks that a child would find near impossible to catch more than two in their hand, combined with a clear blue plastic ball that flashes green and red lights when it bounces. When on when, will manufacturers embrace the concept and not **** with stuff that already was perfectly good?

So if anyone reading this has a set of jacks - the REAL ones - that they'd like to part company with, please let me know. I'll pay for them. I want to use them as part of a series of drawings and paintings of traditional childhood toys.