Girl with bird and boy with whale

Last week I made two illustrations to try out some techniques. It took me about four hours to draw each illustration.
The first illustration shows a girl and a bird.

Above you can see a coloured outline and below the same illustration with a black outline. I don't have a clear preference for a coloured outline or black outline in this picture...

I worked out the background completly and then placed a blur over it. 

 Below the drawing without  a blur.

And a few sketches...

In the second illustration you can see a boy and a whale swimming by...

In this illustration I wanted to try some brushes and check out how I could make a fine light effect

Also check out some sketches.