Eveningsong Ink

The quick rundown of the latest works...

2012-02-11T21:35:00.003+10:00

What a busy month! I have finished the design of The Big Bad Wolf album in collaboration with Calhoun Fifis, designed a brand new Matryoshka doll for Melanie at Mel Makes Pretty, whipped up a vector Jimmy Hendrix for my graphics class, completed a photo retouched pinup portrait for Bec and I'm right in the middle of inking two of my pen drawings (and taking a much needed break before my fingers fall off!)

Melanie Matryoshka

The Big Bad Wolf cd design, top - front of fold out booklet, bottom - back of fold out booklet.

Jimmy!!

What have you been doing this month?

I'm in print! Ok, digitally, but it still counts

2012-01-30T20:04:00.000+10:00

I was recently interviewed by a lovely blogger and artist, Lyubka to be included in her artist interview series alongside some amazingly talented people. It's such an honour to be included and a massive boost to see my interview on screen.

Check out the interview and read all about Lyubka too, she's a talented artist and great blogger.

It's birthday crafting all round!

2012-01-26T15:25:00.001+10:00

My absence can be explained with two words, Extraordinarily Busy!

By far my biggest (both in time and physical size) project so far this month has been my Mother-in-law's Birthday quilt. I had originally umm'd and ahh'd over whether I should do it for Christmas but I was terribly afraid of working with stretchy fabrics on a large scale again. I gave myself a mental shake instead and decided I would try the blasted thing and if it sucked, so what? But if it was good then great!

Originally she had described this quilt to me as something she had seen many years ago and had always wanted. I searched the internet for panne velvet checkerboard quilts and came up with absolutely nothing. There were heaps of quilts, some patchy velvet ones, but none in a simple checkerboard with vibrant, jewel colours. Happily, she loved the gift which is fantastic given the hours of arranging, cutting and re-placing my husband and I had to do, not to mention the sewing. This was all completed on a basic sewing machine with no special foot.

Please note, the colours are quite off in the pictures. They are ruby, emerald, sapphire, gold and violet in reality :) backed with plain chocolate brown. 2.5m x 3m of velvety goodness.

Then our contribution to the party was a strawberry and cream filled chocolate cake with chocolate buttercream. Yum!

Time flies, allow me to recap...

2012-01-26T11:00:00.000+10:00

In attempting to find where the time has gone, I felt compelled to make a list. I have had 2 months free of study and swore to myself that after Christmas I would devote plenty of time to my own artwork and build a nice little library of work. While I did manage to complete 3 new pen drawings and an inked drawing, I didn't manage anywhere near what I planned. My wall is still full of post-its with ideas, plans and random names for artwork :(

In no particular order:

Hosted Christmas dinner
Prepared my son for his first year of school including all prerequisite uniform, stationery, backpack, lunchbox, textbook and accessory shopping. That quite frankly deserved a month all to itself
Hosted and promoted my first blog giveaway on two blogs
Opened an Etsy store
Sewed a panne velvet quilt
Baked a three tier chocolate cake, shortbread, sugar cookies, marshmallow slice, chocolate coated marshmallows and pretzels for dozens
Sewed 7 baby dresses, 5 headbands and made a dozen hairclips
Sewed a dinosaur pillow, wrist cuffs and made a customised dinosaur dig
Painted 5 shirts, a golf towel and made tulle pom poms for decorations
Put together 8 baby and child gift hampers for donation
Did the Christmas shopping!
Took the kids for a photo with Santa, attended a Christmas concert and a graduation
Made a flogger and tickler
Had a short holiday - the first as a family of four
Painted a swan portrait
Played with a DSLR camera for the first time
Had a Christmas party and organised a Secret Santa
Kept blogging AND Facebooking :)
Participated in various Etsy treasury-making and promotion
Watched my son ride his first big-boy bike and scooter, saw my daughter stand for the first time, cut new teeth and do a handstand
Got my hair done, woot!
Read at least six new books - that's right, start to finish, I feel your envy :)
Lost weight, not quite as much as I would have liked but I haven't regained any. Don't let the door hit you in the ass, weight!
Drew pictures, played Search and Find, built transformers and read stories with my son
Cuddled, sang to and played with my daughter
Spent time with my husband, we even saw at least one good dvd (though the rest were crap, thanks Hollywood)
Took on extra page-layout work, voluntary work and I-don't-get-paid-for-this extensive promoting, networking and random business crap that's supposed to make people notice me
Laughed, cried, was amazed and schocked
Spent too much time anxious or depressed, but got over it
Did all the regular stuff that helps keep the home and family going

None of this was done alone, were it not for my husband taking kid-duty while I worked or my kids being so well behaved and quiet while I converse with clients or finish artwork I never would have made a quarter of this list. I still wish I could find more time to work on my own stuff but perhaps that's something I have to work on this year.

How has your summer (or winter) been so far? Have you achieved what you wanted?

Don't forget you can always fit in those missed projects in the future!

Going black

2012-01-19T09:22:00.000+10:00

Today I'm going black to support the anti SPOA and PIPA movement.

Do you want your internet censored? Do you want your web page under scrutiny by the government? Do you want to risk being closed down because some big business thinks you are impinging on their copyright? Don't risk the amazing and free-spirited voice of the internet that has been creating and supporting individual voices for years.

Piracy is the worst type of theft, stealing other's hard-earned ideas and creations is the most despicable form of flattery. But these laws are not the way to protect us.

anxiety and depression are lying cunts

2012-01-17T11:00:00.000+10:00

Gah! Anxiety and depression totally suck balls. Thanks to the inimitable genius of The Bloggess I now have my daily mantra of 'anxiety and depression are lying cunts'. Sorry for the profanity, I quite despise that word but I feel my loathing only emphasises just how true and nasty that mantra really is.

Like most people with anxiety and depression 'challenges' (as psychologists remind us not to use words like illness, problem or gut-wrenching pathetic mental hypochondria) I am still pretty much in the closet. I mean, people KNOW I have issues but they are quite blind as to just how much/often/debilitating those nasty little mind leeches can be. In the spirit of confession I'll admit the last six months have been hard, really hard. As in, not-since-I-needed-meds hard. I have often considered resuming medication and I have so far chosen not to, not because of some moral or emotional standpoint but because it's just been so long that I am being a stubborn ass about it.

Anyway, I'm not getting into the nitty gritty right now, the mind leeches are too close to the surface to speak about it with any sense of calm. Just be assured any of you readers out there (if you are even there) who fight the same fight, YOU ARE NOT ALONE. Unfortunately we are many in number but the upside to that is there are just that many more people in the world who get it and understand and don't think you're a coward for spending the day under the covers so you can get back to your routine tomorrow.

p.s. Get over to The Bloggess and read her stuff. She is by far the most amazing, funny and inspiring person I have the joy of reading via the 'net.

Zazzle

Someone link me a quest helper!

2012-01-16T20:38:00.000+10:00

Holy crap, who knew shopping for school supplies was so hard?! Spare me some sympathy though, it's my first year of school-supply shopping so I'm completely out of my depth.

The brave soul that I am, I figured 'to hell with the pre-packed school list, I can get a better deal if I shop on my own'. Famous. Last. Words. Do you know how hard it is to find Clag paste in the right size? And scrapbooks, seriously. Finding a scrapbook ANYWHERE is like making the first manned mission to Mars and getting one for a decent price is nigh fucking impossible.

I finally gathered together my little jewels, I swear it's harder than a level 85 end-game WoW quest to hunt down and hoard all those little beauties but gather I did! And the best part? Now I get to name every single piece. Oh joy!

More new pen work

2012-01-14T23:17:00.000+10:00

In addition to my tentacled lady and octopus love, I have also been working on my mermaid.

I still have to name these pieces and put some ink to them but I like the way the black and white pen artworks speak for themselves.

I love the idea of human-animal hybrids and sea creatures have the most amazing organic lines and flowing shapes.

I would like to add a third piece to match my tentacled lady and mermaid, what do you think? What should the next animal be?

Universal Craft Blog Directory

2012-01-13T22:03:00.001+10:00

Have you heard about the Universal Craft Blog Directory? It's an amazing list of crafty blogs from all over the web, you can read them or you can join them!

Universal Craft Blog Directory

I'm in there, come have a look and link up with other amazing bloggers too :)

Absence makes the pen work harder

2012-01-12T21:04:00.000+10:00

I've been absent, I know. But in my defense I've been getting my photography on and just couldn't tear myself away! I borrowed my brother's kick-ass DSLR and shot 325 photos over 3 days, lol.

My main aim was to attempt to photograph my pen drawings to see if I can wring some sense of quality from the shots. My point and shoot is good but I always have a bunch of work to do to the pictures afterward. I still had to edit the shots but it wasn't so bad and I could maintain the feeling of hand-drawn.

I've been working on some animal-woman hybrids and in the spirit of Valentine's Day that is assaulting my senses from all directions, an octopus embrace. Those ones are still un-inked but the raven is finished.

So after experimenting with focus, depth of field and macros I'm off to do some real work!

Got time for an email?

2012-01-06T14:06:00.000+10:00

Do you have a spare five minutes today? How about writing a quick email to wish Cole a happy birthday?

Jen over at jenbshaw is asking for nothing more than an email or posted card to make her nephew's fifth birthday special. Why is his birthday so special you might ask, it's a massive celebration because his doctor's didn't think he would make it to Christmas and here he is, on the verge of his next birthday.

Spare a moment to say hi to this brave fighter and make his day special.

Thanks to my friend Clare over at Blogginess for linking this story.

Crafty gift roundup Part 2

2012-01-04T01:00:00.000+10:00

Here are the rest of the crafty Christmas ideas!

Spinosaurus shirt for Poppy. Using Xavier's own artwork I created a freezer paper stencil and decorated the pocket with fabric paint.

T-shirts for Xavier's uncle and Daddy, made using the freezer paper stencils also

Gift hamper for donation, more about the project here.

Golf shirt and golf towel for Grandad. Once again using Xavier's art and freezer paper stencils.

Customised dino dig game, tutorial coming.

Tulle pom poms, for tree decoration or home decoration, tutorial coming.

Plush stegosaurus pillow cover, tutorial coming.

Fabric wrist cuffs - perfect for covering wrist tattoos, tutorial coming.

Happy New Year! Crafty gift roundup Part 1- ideas and instructions

2012-01-03T14:08:00.000+10:00

Happy 2012!

I'm starting off the new year by wrapping up the old one :) I wanted to share our crafty Christmas gifts with you and hopefully lend a little inspiration for the coming holidays/birthday/any time at all.

My husband made anklets for my daughter and myself. I just love that he made these with his own hands and picked the colours for us!

Hairclips for my daughter and niece. These were so simple and look beautiful.

Headbands for the babies too. I got to use my new ruffler foot for these :D

Action shot!

Christmas day outfits for both kids. Tutorial for shirred baby dresses over here.

Anklets:
Here is a good tutorial for the knotting technique. My anklet is 6 strands, 2 white, 2 forest green, 1 sage green, 1 grass green. Alexis has 2 dark purple, 2 medium purple and 2 blue. These can be as big or small as you want and you can use any amount of colours.

Hairclips:
Here's a good visual tutorial for how to cover your alligator clips with ribbon. Remember you are ONLY covering the top part of the clip and the hinge part. The bottom must be left bare so it slides into the hair. NOTE: I used a lighter to singe my ribbon ends and a hot clue gun to attach the ribbon. It was really easy. I got my clips from here, great product and great prices.

And a note on the new year stuff, I'm really not one for New Year's resolutions. You don't need a new year to start something or change something, every day, hour and minute gives you the chance to embark on a new path. You are never a failure for not keeping resolutions, just keep on in the right direction and give yourself a pat on the back for trying again.

Shopkeeping!

2011-12-31T16:47:00.002+10:00

I am gradually filling my new store with art prints. It's taking time as I just cannot seem to list anything without playing, tweaking and adjusting!

So far I have added my Pegasus Limited Edition art prints and my Swan Princess Open Edition art prints to join the digital owls and Matryoshka doll.

The plan is to keep the digital art pieces as open editions and the fine art prints and special digital pieces as limited editions. I want to offer something for everyone but I feel that with my fine art pieces and the more labour-intense and meaningful digital works they deserve limited prints. I want my customers to understand that all these artworks come from my heart and mind, they are all special to me and I want them to special to others too. I know you can pop out to the $2 store and pick up a print for like $5 but where is the soul behind it? What do you know of the artist? Do customers pick them because the artwork speaks to them and holds special meaning or because it matches the drapes?

I have always felt that art should be personal, meaningful and a delight every day; not something just to fill the void. Hopefully you will find something beautiful and personal in my pieces and want to see them every day too :)

The gift of giving. Pay it forward.

2011-12-31T11:00:00.000+10:00

As a part of our handmade festivities I wanted to do something for someone we would never meet. This has been a part of many of my Christmases and this year in particular I wanted to begin teaching my little boy about the hope, love and giving of Christmas and how so many people have less than us. While we have our own struggles, he needs to understand that some people have nothing at all for Christmas, including little children just like him.

We went to the store to pick out a boy's gift and a girl's gift (my daughter is still a little young to pick herself) to give away too. This created a little problem as Xavier wanted the toy so badly. After some tears he came up to me a few days later and told me that he understood the toy was not for him and that another little boy would have it, and how he didn't need to be upset about it. I was so proud of him. It's hard enough as an adult to give away something you want for yourself but at four it's even more colossal. He was so good and tried so hard to really understand, it just made my heart burst with pride.

We put together a few things this year:
3 x new baby packs - a toy car, newborn disposable nappies, a blanket, baby wipes, outfits for baby to wear now and one to wear in winter, some little sample packs of baby wash/shampoo/lotion and a face mask and hair conditioning treatment for Mum.

5 x little boy packs in various sizes from 000 to 2 - outfits to wear now, an outfit for winter and a toy car.

All these packs used clothes my own children have worn. All pre-loved but in good condition and more than a few with precious memories attached. The little cars came from Xavier's own toybox, he chose them and we attached them to the piles. The hessian bags were purchased from Woolworths and I just love the tree design, the nappies were from my stash, the wipes purchased for the occasion.

All up I spent about $15.00 for all these gifts. I added a lot of time and love and labeled each clothing pack by size and a little note to say that there was an outfit included that would fit for winter time. While these were a small investment for us, I really hope they made a big difference for someone else.

We dropped all the gift bags, clothing packs and the two toys off at the local Salvation Army temple. I'm not of a Christian faith myself but I have found that the Salvos are helpful and loving no matter who you are. They took great care of my uncle and I'll never forget my Mum telling me they were the only ones to really give him support to live his life.

Anyone could do something similar next holiday season, or just whenever. For the sake of a few dollars possibly made selling clothes on ebay we took the opportunity to turn them into special gifts instead.

I heard once that the true gift of giving is to donate something you want for yourself. While I did not give away outfits with the most precious memories, I did give away quite a few that were special to me. I hope that if they were special to me, and had good memories from my own children, that maybe they could do the same for someone new.

Happy New Year :)

Swan painting for Mum

2011-12-31T02:00:00.000+10:00

For Christmas this year I wanted to give my Mum something special. She has wanted a swan painting for as long as I can remember but I had always found the plain white of her favourite swans to be a bit boring in the painting stakes. Since i have been working in painted relief lately, and on wooden board I figured I would give it another go.

This piece is acrylic and pen on plywood board, approx60cm x 150cm.

The woodgrain comes through on the swan, giving her a sun-dappled appearance. She is highlighted by a vibrant mix of violet, lavender, cobalt, teal, grass and aqua and detailed in black fine line pen.

I was finalising the black sides on Christmas morning but it only took one and a half nights to complete :P

Tutorial - shirred baby dresses

2011-12-30T22:52:00.002+10:00

I managed to have nearly two weeks off, yay! Ok, nearly off, I did sneak in a little work here and there ;P

I'm breaking my silence by giving you a tutorial for shirred baby dresses. I made a bunch of these for my daughter and my niece and they turned out so adorable I just had to share

Please see the tutorial over at Hand Made-n's blog, you can view it on screen or save the file for later use!

Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License

Giveaway winners :)

2011-12-18T10:10:00.001+10:00

After the phenomenal success of my first giveaway I am thrilled to announce the winners of my owl triptych giveaway.

MissMary
rookie
tree

I decided that since you all gave me such a boost with your beautiful comments that I would choose three winners, each to receive the 3-piece owl triptych!

I wish I could have awarded a prize to everyone. You gave me such great feedback and I now have a whole list of fairytales to catch up on. I will be taking your comments to heart and using them as inspiration for my next round of artworks; digital, painted or drawn.

I really hope you hang about and keep an eye on my blog, I would love to get to know you all. In the upcoming days and weeks I'll have tutorials for tulle pom poms, DIY dinosaur dig game, hanging glass tealight lanterns and more. Plus pictures and ideas from my Christmas gifting, goodie hampers and decorating.

And don't forget my brand new Etsy shop! I have already added my owl prints and matryoshka doll and I'll be including more of my fine art prints too.

So thank you again, you have made this giveaway one to remember.

Giveaway success!

2011-12-15T20:52:00.000+10:00

I an totally overwhelmed by the success of my first giveaway. I feel like shouting from the rooftops 'they love my work, they really love it!' :D

I have had some beautiful responses and I'm trying really hard not to post my own comments, when it comes time to find a winner I don't want my own posts screwing up the count!

For those of you who have entered the giveaway and given me such wonderful feedback, thank you. Really. You have boosted my confidence so much I can't explain it.

In addition to amazing words of praise I have a whole new list of fairytales to brush up on! One of the main reasons I asked the two questions for the competition was to find out what everyone else likes. I adore myths, fairytales and monsters but sometimes I get artist-block and can't find any inspiration. Now I have your feedback I can call on all those amazing beasties and lore and get my arty wiggle on!

One of the biggest effects of your words is that I finally opened an Etsy shop. It's silly I know, since I could have done it any time at all but I'm so proud of myself for finding the balls to do it. I've been so afraid of opening a shop and it failing miserably that I never even tried. I'm now at the point where I figure it will either work or not. If it doesn't, I'll just pick a new direction!

So thank you again. I wanted to make a post specially for everyone who took the time to check out my blog and enter my competition. Now I have a bunch of Christmas stuff to do, post and photograph. It never ends!

It's time for a giveaway!

2011-12-11T22:39:00.001+10:00

Along with Sew, Mama, Sew! I'm getting in the giveaway spirit this year. This is your chance to win a print of my owl triptych. That's not one, not two, but THREE 8 x 10 owl prints. You can display them on their own or line them up and make a scene!

This is a worldwide giveaway. The winner will receive a glossy print of each of the owls below, posted in a firm cardboard envelope (so no posties bend them!) to their address.

All you have to do is answer the following two questions using the comments field below. Be as detailed or succinct as you like :)

Q1: If you commissioned a piece of art, which animal (bird/sea creature/monster) would you choose as the focus?
Q2: What is your favourite myth, legend or fairytale?

Remember to leave your email in the comments or I cannot contact you if you are the winner!

I'm not asking entrants to follow my blog or like my Facebook page. However, if you like my work, tutorials and general ramblings please feel free to link up. I'd love to share with you!

Extra info: After receiving interest in these prints I've decided to give participants extra ways to win. If you wish to follow my blog or my Facebook you will receive an extra entry into the draw. Just make a new comment for each follow, like 'Hi, I'm a new Facebook follower' and 'Hi I just started following your blog' and you can have three entries in total. Remember to include your Answers in your initial comment too! This is by no means mandatory, just an opportunity for extra entries :)

Owl triptych. Each 8 x 10 inches (20 x 25cm) total page size with a 2cm white border for framing (black frame is just to show the outline of the pictures, it's not on the prints). These little guys will arrive as prints only, unframed. Each will fit into a standard 8 x 10 photo frame, no need for custom framing :)

The winner will be chosen by random on December 17, 2011 11am (Brisbane, Australia EST. That's December 16, 2011 5pm PST). I know that's confusing! The winner will be notified by email within an hour of the draw and is required to respond with their address within 48 hours of notification or a new winner will be chosen.

Thank you in advance and I look forward to seeing your entries :)

I have another art giveaway coming up over at Hand Made-n's collaborative blog. It will be open tomorrow, check it out and enter that one too!

Giveaway Day is approaching!

2011-12-07T21:39:00.001+10:00

Giveaway Day is rapidly approaching! Prepare yourself for an onslaught of fantastic handmade items. I'll be hosting my own giveaway in conjunction with Sew, Mama, Sew! and we'll be having one over at Hand Made-n's too.

Watch this space!!

Recycled plant pots - the perfect gift or decoration :) Tutorial!

2011-12-02T22:27:00.001+10:00

Yet another recycled gift to add to your Christmas crafting is the Recycled Plant Pot. Seriously, if you grow these suckers from seed you'll spend about $2.00 for as many gifts as you like. Of course, don't be surprised if you end up keeping these little beauties for yourself!

Not only are these inexpensive but they are a real gift from the heart. Also, they don't collect dust, need batteries, make noise or need maintenance (apart from a little water now and then ;D)

Mine are filled with delicious strawberries :) I can move the pots to the best position, they drain well and the fruits will tumble down the side without rotting

Materials:

Clean, empty tins or plastic drink bottles (mine are baby formula containers and 3L juice bottles)
Garden wire
Spray primer
Paint (I used sample pots of wall paint)
Paintbrush
Drill
Craft knife
Sandpaper
Potting mix/garden soil/compost
Seedlings

Turn your containers upside down and drill some drainage holes in the bottoms
Bottle planters - cut out a hole for the plant to go into (towards the top of the bottle), it needs to be just big enough to squish in the root ball of the plant. If needed, sand the holes to remove sharp bits
Can planters - drill two holes at the top of the can opposite each other to thread a hanging wire through. Sand the holes lightly to keep sharp bits at bay
Roughly sand your containers to give the paint something to stick to. It's important to note that the shiny paint finish on formula containers will repel the paint if not sanded. It doesn't have to be perfect, just rough up the paint or plastic a bit
Prime your containers with the spray primer. Allow to dry (it won't take long!)
Paint your containers and decorate as you wish. You will need a couple of coats for good coverage. Allow to dry well
Snip and attach a length of garden wire to use as a hanging loop. The length will depend on whether you wish to hang your pots from a fence, tree branch or ceiling hook)
Bottle planters - lay your bottle down and fill with soil through the cutout. Scoop out just enough soil to fit the root ball of your seedling and carefully but firmly pack the plant in. You can keep the bottle laying down for a couple of weeks until the plant is established but I carefully propped mine up immediately
Can planters - fill with soil, leaving enough space to put your plant. Carefully pack in the roots of the plant and top up with a little more soil
Give them a drink and put them in a suitable spot to get established until it's time to give them away!

Notes:

Raise your own seedlings from seed and this project may well only cost you a couple of dollars
To give as gifts, choose a pretty annual flower. That way, at the end of the growing season your recipient can either re-plant or recycle their pot. No waste and no clutter! Perfect for the person who has everything
If you want a no-hassle gift plant your pots with succulents
For a kitchen goddess (or god ;P) plant your pots with herbs
For kids, plant a yummy treat like strawberries. My strawberries adore these pots since they like good drainage and if you add a hanging wire the strawberries will tumble down without rotting!

Bottle planter materials

Can planter materials

Drill drainage holes and cut out plant hole

Drill drainage holes and hanger holes

Prime and allow to dry. Paint in chosen colours

Hang them up and let them get established

Cheering up your own garden or awaiting a new home :)

A miniature dinosaur garden - tutorial

2011-11-29T10:59:00.001+10:00

Here's the low-down, my son loves dinosaurs.

Seriously.

Five minutes with him and you'll not only learn something new but tie your tongue in knots attempting to repeated the bloody names.

He's such a show-off :)

So what do you do for your dinosaur-obsessed kid? Make him his own dino garden, of course! This would be a wonderful gift for any adventurous young soul and can be customised for jungle animals, dogs, fairies, you name it.

Materials:

Large shallow tray with holes in the bottom (you can buy from a garden stockist but mine came from the recycling centre)
Old newspapers or junk mail
Potting mix
A selection of small plants
Plastic animals (or figurines made from an outdoor-friendly material)
Rocks, twigs, nuts, sand etc

Grab your tray and line it with newspaper/junk mail
Fill the tray 3/4 full with potting mix
Lay out your plants (still in the pots), figurines and ornaments until it looks just right
Plant your plants and mould the potting mix to achieve hills and valleys for your other adornments
We added a rock path, scattered some sand over the top and sprinkled in some flower and lettuce seeds (to feed the dinosaurs of course!)
Find a good place for your miniature garden, keep in mind the preferences of your plants. The idea is that the kids can play with their garden, but it would be best not to keep moving it about

Then let them get grubby!

To make this an ultimate gift how about:

Package all the materials into a DIY garden
Include a gift basket with a completed garden. With little garden gloves, a packet of seeds, mini watering can, extra animals and a little vial of fairy dust for fairy gardens
Make a custom sign for the garden with the recipient's name on it

It's giveaway time!

2011-11-29T10:46:00.001+10:00

Thanks to Sew, Mama, Sew! The great Giveaway Day is back again. December 12 to 16 you will find links to amazing giveaways on their page. Each giveaway is different, and hosted by a different blogger, but the prize with be either handmade, or materials for making handmade.

This year I'll be joining in the fun and putting some of my own artwork up for grabs!

The artwork in question will be revealed at the time of the giveaway and the competition will be open to everyone worldwide.

If you want to host your own giveaway or just keep an eye on all the great prizes you could win for yourself, head over to Sew, Mama, Sew! and follow the fun!

Community Garden signage complete!

2011-11-26T08:30:00.000+10:00

Our Community Garden was involved in the Gold Coast Harvest Festival last weekend and needed a nice bright sign for the event. As volunteer graphic artist for the group I created a hand-painted sign :D

In keeping with the colours, plants and vegies currently in bloom, the sign has become a favourable addition to the Garden.

The music festival I'd want to attend :D

2011-11-25T20:23:00.001+10:00

So, one of my final assignments turned out really well so I wanted to post it on here. We had to do up a whole bunch of advertising and merchandising for an imaginary music festival. Please note, turning up to The Spit next year will not bathe you in the dulcet tones of Norah Jones or the rhythmic rapping of Eminem. Just sayin ;P

logo

bumper sticker

cd sleeve

drink bottle

poster/advertisement

skate deck

website

I am especially proud of the piano key wings. This was a great way of practicing how getting the logo, colours and fonts right the first time, paves the way for creating great, unified additional marketing materials.

My Clockwork Heart

2011-11-21T18:03:00.001+10:00

Thanks to my amazing tutors at TAFE I have completed my first ever photo manipulation piece. It's been a fantastic journey and while I will continue to grow and learn I am really very proud of this work. Next year I get to delve deeper still and adventure into digital painting and illustration, woo hoo!

This is a culmination of a stock photograph of the naked model, various clockwork and mechanical photos and many, many hours of digital painting and Photoshop manipulation. The icon in the background is also my own work, created in Illustrator.

So I give to you, My Clockwork Heart. Comments are always welcome :D

Celebrating a 21st musical birthday

2011-11-19T21:39:00.001+10:00

My incredibly musical sister Clair had her 21st birthday today. What better to give her than a Grammy-inspired digital portrait with the lyrics to her favourite song?

Happily she loves it and was really pleased. Yay!

This was my first foray into digital portraiture of this style. I really quite enjoyed it. I added in handmade vector details for her face, arms and earphones to give it a little detail.

Zombear needs braaaaiiiinnnnsssss

2011-11-17T16:14:00.001+10:00

So, my adorable sister (in-law) is in hospital getting all types of scans on her brain. They think there's something abnormal, I think unique just translates badly to CT scans.

So I spent the morning making her this, my first ever vector zombie and pretty damned cool if I do say so :D

and the inside:

At least it gave her a laugh :D

And then it all went pear-shaped

2011-11-12T22:19:00.001+10:00

I have no idea why pear-shaped is bad, but it is.

After carefully sketching, masking and taping I added the inks and then shit happened. The paper warped, the ink pigment separated and I ended up with a wet muddy mess.

So I started again.

A decent artists' watercolour paper this time, taped to the board and sketched. AGAIN. By this time I was becoming right royally pissed with winged horses. Do you KNOW how many muscles and shit a horse has? Unless you have studied horse anatomy it makes drawing them a pain in the ass. And here I had to draw it about five times.

Anyway, it's done now. You can see the progress here:

sketch penned in

body outline thickened, hair detail in

first wing detail

second wing detail

contour lines and ink laid on

gouache backdrop in, water and splash detail in

finalised!

So there you go, a little glimpse into the progress of my mixed media drawings :)

This is how the inking starts

2011-11-08T23:50:00.001+10:00

Just a little insight into how my ink pieces develop.

After sketching the design and finalising my proportions, I sketch the image onto watercolour paper, giving thought to how much background I want to show. Then I grab some masking fluid and a rubber sculpting tool and mask off all the areas I want left the paper colour first.

Once the fluid is dry the background goes on. That's up later :D

Stegosaurus

2011-11-05T23:15:00.000+10:00

Feeling the dinosaur love tonight.

Keeping up with my homework, I was working in Illustrator and attempting a typography portrait (a major task. Google 'typography portrait' and be blown away, I dare you) and decided on a friendly steggy. I blame my son for my dinosaur state of mind. If that kid doesn't become a paleontologist I'll be amazed.

An early Christmas present for you!

2011-11-03T22:28:00.000+10:00

As we rapidly approach the season of ~~overspending~~ celebrating, I have been thinking hard about what the holidays really mean. I planned a handmade holiday this year for a variety of reasons.

Christmas/Yule does not revolve around who gets what, but rather celebrating our lives and appreciating our loved ones
All the work and money spent on a single day is, quite frankly, fucking ludicrous
In order for my children to appreciate quality, meaning and the joy of putting your heart into a gift, they have to experience it properly
I am so sick of cheap, sweat-shop, useless, meaningless crap and my house needs less, NOT more

Step 1: make presents meaningful and incorporate more activities into the season to spend with loved ones.

Step 2: make all of December a great big occasion and plan various outings, events and doings for everyone to look forward to and be excited about

Step 3: Xavier is big enough now to understand that some things break easily and the difference between quality toys and crap but still needs to learn that handmade = better made. He is starting to realise that sometimes he really wants something that just doesn't exist. BUT if someone could make it for him, he would have exactly what he wants and no one else would have one. He is also learning the joy of making but giving his art work to us as gifts, and how proud he can feel from handmade. This year he can experience how it feels to give someone a handmade gift and see them light up, and what it is like to receive a thoughtfully handmade gift.

Step 4: Quality. Seriously, is it really that hard to understand? Breakages, sweat shop workers and lead paint scares aside, the crap we buy from big stores is severely lacking on anything resembling craftsmanship, individuality or meaning. I'm not the same as the next person, I don't want what they have. I want my own thankyouverymuch. I want custom-made not factory-made!

When did consumers decide that individually crafted is inferior to big-box, same-as-the-next-person stuff? A matter of decades ago, custom orders were a show of taste, fashion and wealth. Now handmade is seen as folksy, cute and *shudder* childish. WTF?

So, in order to further the Handmade Holidays, I give to you this A4-sized printable to share, post, email, link and otherwise spam the world with.

[Copyright Eveningsong Ink, personal use only. Not to be redistributed as your own creation, mass marketed, sold, or used commercially. Please mention/link back me when sharing with others. Linking back to me on blogs and websites is fine as long as you give credit and follow the rest of the copyright mumbo jumbo :) For commercial use please contact me. ]

Click > Show Original > Right Click (Save as)

I will also be posting this on my Facebook. Jump on over and share it share it share it! Spread the word and give yourself a fun and happy holiday season. Also available via Hand Made-n's crafty blog.

Over the next few weeks I will be posting our holiday crafts, tutorials and recipes. Don't miss it!

Liquid chalk = love

2011-11-01T21:34:00.001+10:00

Oh liquid chalk markers, how I love you!

I grabbed a couple of these suckers to decorate the windows for Halloween and fell in love with the bright colours. Going to clean them off the windows and they cleaned off with a tissue O_O. Yeah Baby.

Christmas is going to be full of chalky goodness. I think all I need to decorate the house now are random acrylic sheets tacked up everywhere waiting for some penmanship...

Fruity jelly cups recipe - the deliciously healthy treat

2011-10-29T16:45:00.000+10:00

I have been meaning to write up a recipe for jelly cups for ages, but never seemed to find the time.

These are my go-to saviours when it comes to pre-school parties, 'bring a plate' events and last minute 'Mum, I feel like something yummy' treats. They're simple, easy and most of all HEALTHY! Yay!

Ingredients:
Fruit juice (pictured: apple) - pick a 100% juice for maximum goodness
Gelatin or alternative
Fruit - (pictured: tinned peaches and grapes) a mix of fresh and tinned is delicious
Water
Lollies (pictured: Natural Confection Company snakes) only for treats :)

Equipment:
Large measuring jug
Small measuring jug
Spoon measures
Knife
Cups/bowls/disposable cups
Cookie tray

1. The mathematical bit. Grab your cup and fill it about halfway with water, take note of the measurement. Multiply your measurement by the number of cups you want to fill. This is how much juice you need, pour it into the large measuring jug.

Juice left, gelatin and water right.

2. Chop your fruit into chunks. I love tinned peaches, fresh grapes, fresh pears and fresh cherries but any fruit is good. Come to think of it I probably wouldn't use bananas, I don't think they would like to be immersed in jelly for too long.

3. Evenly distribute your fruit in your cups.

4. My gelatin pack says 1 tablespoon dissolved in 100mLs of water will set 400mL of liquid. That's about right but I heap my tablespoon measures slightly to ensure a firm set. Use 3 heaped tablespoons of gelatin dissolved in 1 cup of boiling water. Add the gelatin mix to the fruit juice. Stir well, don't let the mix sit too long or it will set.

5. Evenly distribute the juice mix between your cups.

6. Optional: Carefully arrange snakes over the side of the cups, with about half the snake in the fruit mix.

7. Pop the cups on a cookie tray and set in the fridge for a few hours.

You get to control exactly what goes into these sweet treats and the recipe can be altered to suit any palette.

Notes:

Use disposable cups and spoons for picnics, bbqs, school parties and bring-a-plate events
Use transparent cups and orange juice/apple and raspberry juice/green-tinted apple juice for ghoulish Halloween jellies. Add some snakes or crumbled cookie 'grave dirt' and worms
Jellies set in a few hours
GREAT for babies and toddlers. Use a mild juice like apple or pear and water down as needed and add soft or stewed fruits. Babies practice chewing on the jelly, without the hazard of choking and you can introduce the flavours and fruits you want.

Enjoy!

It's all fun and games till someone gets murdered with a butcher knife

2011-10-29T16:02:00.001+10:00

Hot on the heels of our jack-o-melon escapades came our family Halloween party. Loads of fun!

We had spider (chicken and corn pot) pies, chocolate spider biscuits with strawberry legs, snake jellies and balanced it all out with an unhealthy amount of m&ms and salted peanuts. mmmmmmmmmm

Spiders biscuits were inspired by these amazing treats and I used the recipe for these scrumptious cookies.

With the cookie recipe I tweaked it a bit due to time restraints. I eliminated the whole choc chips and used Sweet Williams lactose free chocolate chips for the melted choc. Seriously delicious but I would not recommend the recipe for these double, icing filled concoctions. The biscuit recipe is just too rich to really be able to enjoy these creepy crawlies. The filling is regular icing made with icing sugar and a little butter and the legs are strawberry licorice snipped into skinny threads. These would be phenomenal with a light filling and homemade blackcurrant or blueberry roll-ups for the legs.

Spider pies inspired by these yummy tentacle pies. I just made a quick chicken and corn pie filling from shredded bbq chicken, frozen corn kernel a basic white sauce and some concentrated chicken stock. Delish!

We topped it all off with Monsters Inc for Xavier, followed by Scream 4 and Pirates 4 + snuggles on the couch with the Mr.

Jelly cups recipe coming right up...

This year's Jack-o-melon has been born!

2011-10-26T10:13:00.000+10:00

So we hunted down our quarry at the grocery store and set to carving him a handsome countenance. And a spider. AND a dinosaur. But I regress.

Here we go, with guts in a bowl:

Yep, that's the same tablecloth as seen in the first ever jack-o-melon. I love that thing. $2 from the local discount store, flannel-backed vinyl with 'kiss the cook'. It makes me smile :)

Nearly ready:

Ta daaaaaa:

I think this year the spider is my favourite.

While carving I asked Xavier if he would like to help scoop out the innards. He said 'no'. I said 'but if you don't scoop out the inside you'll just be watching. Don't you want to do a bit?' To which he responded 'that's ok Mum, I'll do the eating bit'. And that's a big reason why we have a jack-o-melon. Gotta love kids!

Pinterest obsession. And an unhealthy fixation on the weeks until Christmas.

2011-10-23T23:07:00.002+10:00

Pinterest.

Need I say more? I am seriously addicted to the concept of creating a digital noticeboard that saves your pictures, links and information in one handy-dandy spot to be retrieved from anywhere. Except TAFE, it's blocked. Weird, I know.

I have been scrolling the joyous boards gathering ideas for our Handmade Christmas. This year, handmade's the bomb baby. X and I have been brainstorming ideas for handmade gifts and we have been encouraging our family to make presents for us too. If anyone is really uncomfortable with making their own, we just ask them to please consider buying handmade and supporting small business.

Pinterest has been such a hub of ideas, I just adore it. Do you have an account? Drop me a line so we can hook up and share the Pinterest love!

Pinterest - Eveningsong Ink

Tis the season to be scary

2011-10-22T23:19:00.000+10:00

So, Halloween is rapidly approaching. I love Halloween, really I do. My problem lays in the fact that it is not really Halloween in the Southern Hemisphere; that it is really Beltane, not Samhain; and that time is so very limited right now that I feel as though I scarcely have the time to smell the roses, never mind picking some to decorate the home.

That being said, With X in preschool he has become very aware of Halloween (based mostly on the fact he has yet another excuse to dress up as a pirate, I suspect) and is really quite excited. This of course reminds me of the joy of the season so we have been celebrating our 'Samhain' in a spring-like fashion.

While we have been tending our garden - 2 enormous zucchinis to date and plentiful herbs - we have been discussing how the seasons work and why there is a cycle to everything. So, as we have in Halloweens past, we will be celebrating this year by carving our newest jack-o-melon. Since I totally made that up on my own years ago and to my knowledge have been the first person to jack-o a melon rather than a pumpkin, I totally claim it. Yep, you heard it here first folks ;P

Behold! the Jack-o-melon!
Our two previous jack-o-melons turned out quite spectacularly. The first was an astonishing success, liberally sprinkled with a sense of wtf? It WORKED? And the giddy overload of happy-creative-hormones.

Jack-o-melon. Type #2.
So this year we will be carving our melon and we also plan to have our own little Halloween party the weekend before. Which will probably include a vast array of winsomely scary treats and a child's Halloween movie, followed by something suitably adult-scary that I would probably do best to avoid.

Added to this should be some fresh flower decorations and possibly some window drawings if I can rustle up a chunky chalk pen.

All in all, a respectable nod to the false Samhain and another venture into teaching the children the importance of seasons, seasonal eating, respecting the earth and drawing a shitload of skulls.

Creative conference of inspiration

2011-10-21T23:47:00.000+10:00

Today was the first ever Analogue Digital Creative Conference. A brand new event (and on the Gold Coast, no travelling!) featuring inspiring arty types from various disciplines. Two speakers in particular stood out for me, Claudio Kirac and Dare Jennings, though all were interesting to hear and I came away with advice from everyone.

What captured me about these two were the way they expressed themselves to us. Both were very visual, interesting and funny but where Claudio caught me with his outrageous videos and humour, Dare's stunning photos and fascinating life were just as impressive.

Their stories could belong to any of us. I could have the same success and adventure they have had. Those two points are what really brought things home for me. I could DO that, I remember thinking. They both emphasised hard work and dedication but I expected that bit, I don't think anyone truly values something if they didn't need to sweat or try or burn for it. But their stories began so normally; I found myself noting that it didn't take some unattainable situation or opportunity for them to get started, so maybe I could reach those heights too.

Possibly the only thing that sets me on a different course is that with a young family, my considerations are directed differently. They will always be most important but I am a person too, and if I can make a success of my art then that paves the way for them too. I have found time to go to a gallery opening already and will be attending the Rabbit and Cocoon opening too. I'm pleased at taking the chance to attend, hopefully at the Rabbit and Cocoon event I'll actually find the chance to introduce myself and engage some artists in conversation. Honestly, self-marketing and breaking the ice in an industry where you know so few is really quite overwhelming, but if I don't then I am expecting people to just stumble across me and love me.

That sounds great, really, but I'm at least trying for realistic.

Plus, Rabbit and Cocoon have the Miami Marketta a local art/craft/local produce market. I've been looking at The Village Markets for a possible space next year but I want to check them out too.

So here's my favourite bits:

Be inspired by things, rather than design SouthSouthWest
Believe in yourself (cause if you don't, why should anyone else, right?) Claudio Kirac
Inspiration, Imagination, Innovation. The three I's Claudio Kirac
Do what you love (or would you rather spend your life hating what you do 40 hours a week and living for your weekend. Make life the weekend) Claudio Kirac
Challenge people's preconceptions, if they can pigeonhole you they can dismiss you (the epitome of 'keep 'em guessing) Dare Jennings
Find the art in the object (how true. Art can be found in the strangest places, it doesn't need to grace the walls of a gallery to be art) Dare Jennings

Personal musings in italics. They were much better versed than I :P

If you have a chance, check these guys out. They are creative, dedicated, talented, inspirational and generous. They are who I will be.

One day.

New swap!

2011-05-17T23:01:00.005+10:00

This little guy has been driving me nuts over the past few weeks.He complains, he knocks his jar off the bench, he tries to eat passing souls.

Quite frankly, I have grown so weary of his incessant whinging that I have come perilously close to squishing his fuzzy imp body. Luckily, I was partnered with an imp-wielding warlock in the World of Warcraft OTT (one tiny thing) swap. She has happily taken him off my hands to help keep her focused during raids.

Polymer clay over wire armature, acrylic paint, faux fur, marker, wire.

4th birthday already?!

2011-05-07T16:42:00.001+10:00

My little X turned 4, wow.

To celebrate we had dinosaurs galore. Dinosaur cupcakes for preschool (that was a cheat since I used dinosaur sprinkles on chocolate cupcakes, lol), dinosaur balloons for his birthday BBQ, dinosaur birthday cake decorated in fondant dinosaurs.

I swear, what that kid doesn't know about dinos is not worth knowing.

Layered chocolate and strawberry cake (by request) filled with cream and fresh strawberries, covered in buttercream and fondant dinosaurs. Special thanks to Sylvia at A Baked Creation for the inspirational dino sculptures!

Then we needed dinosaur cookies of course...

I found Brachiosaurus, Stegosaurus, T-Rex and Triceratops cutters so we had them in red, yellow, green and blue royal icing. Thanks to Nigella Lawson for the cut-out cookie recipe, it was a total hit!

I made my own royal icing for the cookies, a few tablespoons of sifted icing sugar mixed with half a tablespoon of Pavlova Magic (a cheap and easy-to-find replacement for meringue powder) and a drop of water, coloured with gel icing colours.

The BBQ was a hit! With sausages, hamburgers, salads and great company it was a bright spot for an Autumn day.

More Voidwalker joy!

2011-04-18T11:13:00.002+10:00

In addition to finding my voidwalker sculpture as a Featured Project on Craftster, I have also been featured in the latest edition of the official World of Warcraft magazine.

I was interviewed last year and sent through photos of my work and have been eagerly awaiting the publication. I was honoured to be one of the half-dozen WoW crafters to be chosen as featured artisans.

It's amazing how much has come out of one last minute Christmas present for my brother, I never really considered myself as a skilled sculptor but I am beginning to rethink that. Perhaps I should be flexing my sculpting muscles some more!

A special thanks to WoW magazine :D

Featured Project!

2011-03-29T22:23:00.000+10:00

Surprisingly enough my humble little voidwalker from World of Warcraft has made the featured projects on Craftster! I was stunned to log on tonight and see my little guy up on the front page.

Such an honour to be named on the front page!

Gah! I forgot about the morning tea party at kindy tomorrow!! Recipe incl.

2010-05-28T01:45:00.000+10:00

11.30 pm and I realise that X has a morning tea party at kindy tomorrow. He needs a funny hat and a plate of something. Crap...

Given that I am the worst morning person I know (well, apart from the hubby :P) I figure I better get this done tonight.

1 funny hat needed. Yeah right, getting a clothes-minded 3 year old to wear a cool hat you spent hours on is nigh impossible. The alternative? Snag husband's old black beanie and adorn with previously cut out Ben 10 fabric swatches that already have the fusible applique interfacing attached. Woo Hoo! If he doesn't want to wear a Ben 10 hat, I'll eat the damned thing.

1 plate of something yummy needed, no eggs (thanks to allergies in the kindy). Let's go the tried and true egg free cake mix that I used for Xavier's birthday cake. It's quick, easy, needs no weird ingredients and frankly it's bloody yummy :D. Darling husband gets roped into helping so I figure we should make a third of the mix chocolate and dye it black, a third vanilla green and a third vanilla yellow. Beats the hell out of making a dozen sandwiches that are likely to go soggy and I use a minimum of low-gi sugar so the little morsels are not even bad for them.

Here is the recipe:

Makes 1 large slab cake (see Lightning McQueen) or use half the mix to make 36 mini-cupcakes like the picture

4 cups of plain flour
2 cups sugar
3 1/4 cups cocoa (reduce if you make multi-coloured cakes or omit for a vanilla or flavoured cake)
8 tsp baking powder
3 tsp vanilla essence
1 cup vegetable oil - I use rice bran oil. It's light, good for you and has no flavour. I have also used olive oil, you do not taste the oil in a chocolate cake but I would avoid it for a lighter flavoured cake.
3 cups water

I don't do anything fancy with this recipe:

Pop all the dry ingredients into a large bowl and mix a little
Add all the other ingredients and mix well (for multi-coloured cakes separate your mix into batches before adding the cocoa to one batch only)
Put mix into cupcake liners/trays/cake pan (grease pans of course, unless you use silicone trays)
Bake at 170-180 Celsius for about 30 minutes for a single slab cake, approximately 15 minutes for the cupcakes. This will vary between ovens so check your cakes periodically, cakes are cooked when the tops spring back after gently touching them.
Drizzle with a little icing and away you go!

NOTE: for the multi-coloured cakes I used half this recipe. Before adding the cocoa I split the mix into 3 reasonably even amounts in seperate bowls. 1 part got about 1/2 cup of cocoa and a dash of black food colour, 1 part got a dose of leaf green gel food colour and the last part got a dose of yellow gel food colour. In each cupcake liner I put a small amount of chocolate mix, then a small amount of green mix over to one side and then yellow mix over towards the other side.

A 3rd birthday, already??

2010-05-06T21:31:00.000+10:00

My amazing little boy is growing up. We celebrated his 3rd birthday on Wednesday with a Lightning McQueen cake (edible icing images make a time-poor mum very happy) and party at kindy and presents at home that night.

The poor little guy has been sick for the last week, first a cold and then horrible wheezy asthma that always makes me nervous. So birthday time was a relaxed family night at home where he opened his little gifts and was totally thrilled with the train/car set we got him.

I stumbled across a fantastic wooden train and car set at an op-shop complete with track, roads, vehicles, houses and boom gates. And the most amazing bit? It was five bucks. Yep, that's right. And that included the great plastic tub with wheels that it was kept in. X loves it to bits and even wanted to stay home today to play with it. Given his obsession with kindy and his desire to go every single day, that was quite a complement for the gift!

I also finished a quilt cover which you can see at the bottom of the picture. I have been meaning to make a quilt for him since he was born but I am not very experienced. I made him a quilt cover instead for a standard single doona - which will dry quicker after washing during the chilly winter - and he loves it. I will post pics asap.

mmm... silversmithing

2010-05-04T21:49:00.001+10:00

I finished my class for silver jewelery in April and I am so happy with the results. It was a great 3 Saturdays in a row kinda thing and I got to brush up on the skills I learned back in 2003 as well as learning new things.

We made a wedding band style ring, a linked chain bracelet and solid cuff bracelet. I also got to fix my thumb ring which had split.No fancy pre-made stuff for our class, we started from scratch with silver plate and wire and worked it into wearable jewelery.

I now have my table and tools set up so I can start making jewelery for a new store. I have some mixed media pieces designed; resin and sterling handmade cameos from my own custom sculptures and miniature prints of my artwork encased under clear resin with sterling silver frames to begin with. Once these are sculpted, moulded and made I will move onto etching metal sheet with my black and white drawings.

All of my jewelery with be based around my artwork; making it wearable, useful and beautiful. This way if you a love a piece enough to hang it on your wall, you can carry a little piece with you as a pendant, brooch or earrings. I want my art to evoke feelings in my customers, if my work reminds you of something great or makes you smile, why not take it with you so you can look at it through the day?

So, the class got me back into gear after a few months of scaring myself silly with 'what ifs'. Ok world, I'm ready.

Let's do this.

A new logo for me!

2010-02-25T16:01:00.000+10:00

I finally got around to designing myself a logo. I wanted something that represents that I am an artist (the paintbrush and pencil) and that I am predominantly influenced by whimsy, nature and myth (the floral flourish, poppy and moth silhouette).

I chose orange as it is one of the colours of my favourite little friend, the orange banded tiger moth (the silhouette shape) who often visit me at home when I am feeling conflicted or down. I paired it with green, one of my favourite colours, which makes the design a little extra nature-ish I think.

What do you think?

My latest tiny Griffon

2010-02-21T22:08:00.000+10:00

This little griffon is a girl, I haven't named her since she is a gift for a fabulous friend who gave me a pushbike.

I have included some before-paint pics too so you can see her naked :D.

To show scale

New girly griffon meeting Griff, my first tiny griffon sculpture. Awww.

She is polymer clay (mix of Fimo and Sculpey III), wire, acrylic paint, felt, chain and a cats-eye bead. I am quite happy that I could recreate the style of my first griffon. She is definitely different though, a little chunkier for one, but try not to mention it to her face,

How to turn cheap white shoes into rockin purple skully flats

2010-02-14T22:23:00.001+10:00

I found these cheap white Kmart shoes for $6.00 a pair. They are totally comfy but I wanted purple, NOONE has purple! Then, either by some covert Australian conspiracy or crafty fate I couldn't find purple shoe dye anywhere, *sob*.

I wanted my purple shoes dammit! And then, pondering the possibilities and reaching the conclusion that all rockin purple flats should be emblazoned by skulls, I figure I could jump in the craft cupboard and use some existing materials to reach my dream.

Acrylic paint is actually really great for faux leather and I have used it many times to antique book covers and the like. The trick is to not 'paint' but rub the colour into the fabric so it absorbs as much as possible.

I masked off some hand drawn skull pictures on each shoe and after the masking fluid had dried I mixed up some acrylic paint. One tip is to mix a colour a little darker than you want, since the white will show through a little unless you really paint it on and that leaves the shoes open to cracking and peeling. Dab on the paint with a soft cloth, covering the shoe completely and then dab off the excess with a clean cloth. You want the material to absorb the pigment and then remove the excess. It will take a couple of coats but each coat should be so thin that by the time you have finished a coat on one shoe, the second shoe will be ready for another coat.

Each coat should dry to a mild tacky finish before adding another coat. If you want a pastel colour, dampen your cloth and dab into your paint. Rub the paint into the shoe and buff off, leaving a light coloured dye.

When the shoes are completely dry, remove the masking fluid. If you are careful, you could use a sticker in place of the masking fluid.

I finished these shoes off by painting the rear seams and where the shoe meets the sole with a fine paintbrush and then touched up the skulls with a white paint pen around the edges and added my final details with a fine point permanent marker. I buffed them with a beeswax furniture polish to seal them and add a little moisture back into the fabric.

Cool huh? And reeeaaaly comfortable.

My new wheels!

2010-02-08T22:13:00.000+10:00

My outstanding friend and co-worker Carole is going to give me her bike! Yay! I have never seen it but it's purple :D and that is all I need to know.

Now I need to make her a thank you gift, she loves my little Griff so I was thinking of a gift involving something similar.

This is an amazingly generous gift and such a great surprise. I was going to op-shop a bike but this way I get a great girly bike in a fabulous colour and I know it has been taken care of.

I can't wait to post some pics and get stuck into pimping my ride!

A loooong day

2010-02-07T23:23:00.002+10:00

I have had a very long day, a long weekend actually, sculpting shapes for my new jewelery/art endeavor. If i can get this to work the way it looks in my mind, I will have my first shop items before you know it!

How did your weekend go? Any new crafty avenues?

A new month, a new challenge

2010-02-05T21:37:00.000+10:00

Craftster's latest challenge is to make something tiny, no more than 2 inches in any direction. Should I or shouldn't I?

I am going to ponder my options and see iif I can come up with something super. That's the real challenge, deciding on something unique and innovative. All the artisans at Craftster are so multi-skilled that it takes something really inventive to catch their attention.

Pampering body powder and powder puff - tutorial

2010-02-03T14:56:00.000+10:00

This week's tutorial is in the spirit of Valentine's Day. Something decadent and pampering for a loved one or for yourself.

Our project is a sweet-smelling body powder made from kitchen ingredients, no fancy stuff or chemicals, just the good stuff. Plus, an adorable powder puff to make it extra special.

Approximate time for powder and puff: up to 30 minutes

Materials:

A wide-mouthed container with secure lid
Fun fur in your choice of colour/pattern
A handful of wadding of soft fabric scraps
Needle and thread
Cornflour
Bicarbonate of soda (baking soda) - optional, not pictured
Your choice of scented oil

Tools:

Scissors

Steps:

On the reverse of your fabric, trace around the lid of your container twice to make two pattern pieces

Cut your shapes. TIP: when cutting fur fabrics, carefully snip the backing fabric only, NOT the pile. Otherwise you will end up with a fun fur haircut on your finished piece
Spike up the fabric so none of the pile hangs over the cut edge and pin the pieces together with right sides facing

Sew around your edges with a simple stitch, you could use a sewing machine for this part but it took me less than 30 minutes for this whole project including hand-sewing. Leave a small gap to turn the puff back out the right way.

Turn your piece right-sides out and stuff with your wadding. If you do not have wadding available, use a handful of soft fabric scraps or cotton balls.
Stitch the puff closed carefully. Once again, ignore the pile of the fabric and stitch only the backing fabric.

Grab your container, make sure it's clean :D. Half-fill with cornflour and add a teaspoon or two of baking soda if you like. Baking soda has deodorising properties and is refreshing on the skin.
Add a few drops of your favourite scented oil (or perfume), replace the lid on the container and shake well to combine. Check the scent and add a little more oil if you like.

Pop your puff in the container and seal it up.

Add a label or message if the powder is a gift and you're done!

TIP: if making the powder ahead of time, you can infuse your cornflour with herbs or spices. Pour cornflour into a large container with a secure lid and add your choice of scents, eg. cinnamon sticks, vanilla pods, lavender or rosemary sprigs. Shake well and allow to infuse for a week.

TIP: no really, don't try regular flour. Honestly, you will end up covered in papier mache glue if you dust yourself with flour and sweat in the night. Not attractive, especially for Valentine's Day.

My offerings for the Inchie swap

2010-01-31T17:56:00.001+10:00

I joined my first Inchie swap earlier this month and sent out to my partners last week. It was a lot of fun, though I was nervous at the beginning since I really didn't know what I was doing.

Don't know what an inchie is? Check out this link.

We were all in groups of 8, so we each made 7 sets of 7 inchies to send to each person.

I approached my inchies like tiny works of art. And really, and inch is pretty freaking tiny when you are trying to draw. I did a few sets of continuous art, broken up into squares and a few sets of individual inchies that fit together in a theme. I like continuity, I like repetition and I love how each person I swapped with now has a part of a larger piece of art, shared with like-minded people.

I am a totally sucker for customised packaging. To the point that I am considering posting a cutom packaging design service when I open my online stores.

Here are the envelopes I printed out, just a piece of heavy computer paper (210gsm).

The inside:

I cut out each little square and the inchies are stuck between the folds of paper with a little blu-tack. A custom design also gave me the opportunity to make a special frame for my little bonus, a magnet inchie to pop on the fridge.

With all of my swaps I like to send out a little extra, a practice I intend to follow into owning a store. Little surprises can be really inexpensive but leave a wonderfully happy feeling with the recipient. In a swap situation it makes you both feel happy about giving and receiving something special and in a business perspective it gives added value and leaves a really good impression in the buyer's mind.

I am pretty pleased with the results, those little pieces of art are quite addictive.

Today's work in progress, bunnies for an Easter mood

2010-01-30T20:21:00.000+10:00

I have been thinking about my upcoming tutorials and keep coming back to Easter. I thought I would try out a simple sculpting project to see if it would be suitable for a tutorial. Polymer clay and some basic sculpting tools and viola! Bunnies.

This was also my chance to try out Fimo clay, until now I have only used Sculpey III since it is the only one easily available at my craft stores. I found some Fimo a while ago at a store a little out of my way.

The Fimo was much firmer and resisted fingerprints quite well. It needs a little extra kneading time but I have found that once a blob is kneaded, it stays softer than the packaged block for the next time you use a piece. I thought it would not take sculpting impressions but was pleased to see even my softest strokes stayed on the clay.

In progress

All fired up, lol. Accented with acrylic paints in raw umber and gold, golden bunny has some metallic gold stamping ink on him too.

To show sizing

I am quite pleased with the results. I think the white bunny would be a suitable form for a tutorial, he is a carved egg shape basically.

I would appreciate your opinions. Do you think a tutorial would be good?

Bandaged hand = quiet play time

2010-01-30T19:03:00.002+10:00

So I have spent most of this week with my hand smothered in tiger balm and wrapped up with a bandage. Probably an RSI injury but I will know more next week after some tests.

So, what do you do with a wrapped up hand and a pushy little kid?? Whip out the cars, dinosaurs and pirates. Yep pirates too. You can just see a blurry Xavier in the background with his own bandaged hand so he can me like me :D.

Apparently the little green dinosaur did something nasty enough to warrant the attention of a pirate cop. Lighting McQueen can be seen fleeing the scene of dino's escape attempt.

Fun times!

A wonderful way to start the day

2010-01-27T11:27:00.000+10:00

This morning when we woke up my first thoughts were of a yummy breakfast. One that I don't have to cook! Since the weather has been outrageously hot over the last few days I thought a McDonalds breakfast would be great. Plus, our local restaurant has a wicked playground.

So we trooped down to McDonalds, indulged in some yummy food and then gave Xavier free reign in the playground. To my surprise it was air conditioned too so the temperature was pure bliss.I got to relax in the cool, Xavier got to explore the playground (which included kid-sized helicopters so he was in heaven) and we all got a yummy meal with no washing up.

Not bad for $20 and an hour of play.

The little things really do make a difference. Xavier was happy for the rest of the day and Stephen was thrilled he got a dose of hotcakes without having to ask!

Paper Waratah flower tutorial - Australia Day project

2010-01-25T21:48:00.001+10:00

Happy Australia Day! Ok, well Australia Day is really tomorrow but I wanted this pattern to be available a little early. These tiny paper Waratah flowers are really easy to make and you can do the earring set in under an hour. Plus, you probably have all the materials on hand! How cool is that?

Also mentioned at Craftster.org...

Approximate time for 2 earrings: up to 1 hour

Materials:

1 piece of office paper in your chosen colour, or 1 piece of decorative scrapbook paper cut to size (I used a plain piece of red copy paper. Dress up plain paper with a stamp or draw some squiggles)
2 x 5cm (1 inch) head pins, any metal
A pinch of seed beads to complement your paper colour ( I chose red)
2 x sequins, any colour you like (mine are pearl white)
earring findings of your choice - these earrings can also be attached to plain sleepers instead of earring hooks or studs

Tools:

craft knife, or scissors if you prefer
round nosed pliers to close the loops
desktop printer

Steps:

Start by downloading the pattern to your computer and print onto your paper.

1. Cut out each piece and stack according to size. For each flower there will be 4 x extra large pieces, 2 x large pieces, 2 x medium pieces, 2 x small pieces and 2 x base pieces.

2. Pierce a small hole in the centre of each piece using a craft knife or thumbtack.

3. Fold the flower petals up into a soft cone.

4. Gently curl the points towards the centre.

5. Mould the base pieces into shallow bowls and curl the petals back. I used a half-sphere measuring spoon for this but your fingers will do fine.

6. Thread a sequin onto the head pin. Add a base piece, followed by a seed bead.

7. Add the next base piece followed by a seed bead.

8. Thread on one of the extra large petals, followed by a seed bead.

9. Repeat this process, progressing down through the petal sizes.

10. Thread the final small petal and follow with a seed bead.

11. Push the flower gently to the base of the head pin. Grasp the petals, not the base pieces, and firmly mould the flower into a cone shape. Don't be shy here.

12. Using an index finger, hold against the side of the flower and press downwards. This flares the base a little and makes for a fat-bottomed flower. Repeat all around the flower until it is even.

13. Use your pliers and make an eye in the headpin. Secure to your earring findings.

NOTE: You can also make a plain, upright flower. Thread the pieces from smallest to largest, followed by the base pieces. Secure with a crimp bead and give to a loved one.

If you make your own please let me know how they turn out!

Also, I do apologise for the copyrights on the pictures and the disclaimer on the pattern. I really do not mean to be rude or distrustful, but being the internet you never know when someone will swipe your tutorial and claim it as their own. This is purely to discourage unsavoury characters and to hopefully prevent others from profiting from my hard work without my permission.

Social networking - time consuming progression

2010-01-24T23:50:00.000+10:00

I had some grand plans about getting some new posts up tonight until I realised the amount of background work that is needed for this social networking foray.

In order to post my Australia Day project I need to make available a pdf pattern file. Hmmm... ok, off to MediaFire to make an account and get the file uploaded and ready. Hang on, while I am at it, let's get that Flickr slideshow added to the blog so if I can actually entice anyone over her I have something to show. Crap, gotta sign up for Flickr too and then upload the photos. No, wait! I need to add a copyright to my images and make them smaller so I don't go over my account limit. Oh dear, while I have everything open I should probably send all these sites to the one email address so if anyone comments I don't need to check a dozen emails.

Wow, what a job!

So the result is I have done hours of work and have very little to show for it. Typical :D

At least my little blog is looking good now, especially with help from bloggertemplatesblog and their easy tutorial on how to add social networking buttons to posts. And bloggerbuster's super simple rundown on adding a Flickr photostream of your photos. A serious thank you to all bloggers out there that can simplify the jargon for the rest of us.

On that note, any comments or suggestions about my blog would be very welcome. Constructive stuff of course!

Indulging in a bitchy rant

2010-01-24T23:37:00.000+10:00

So I'm reading a Cleo magazine today, not something I usually indulge in but I was successfully suckered by the free dress. Reading through the articles I was amazed that reality TV stars get so much coverage. Lets get real, these people are not celebrities, they are not all that interesting and yet they suffer from the delusion that they are the envy of all living people and as such deserve some sort of special cloud to float around on, gracing us with their mere presence. Come on, really?

I won't name names just in case the people in question believe that any publicity is good publicity. What astounds me is that these people actually get book and TV offers just by being self-indulgent douche bags selling out their whereabouts to cheap tabloids in the hopes they can garner some semblance of self respect by being better known than the next Joe who walks down the street. *gag*

*sigh* having gotten that out of my systems I feel decidedly bitchy, a wicked little feeling that. lol. Perhaps I shall cruise the web for more annoying characters to strengthen my bitchy muscle :D.

On a lighter note, I completed the photos and tutorial outline for my Australia Day project. Just getting that far makes me feel good, I hope to have the whole thing up and posted tomorrow night. The project itself will be paper waratah (flower) earrings, a cute little project that should take less than an hour and leave you with an adorable Australia Day accessory.

Misery loves comfort

2010-01-23T22:05:00.003+10:00

What is it that makes me miserable? Feeling guilty, feeling like a failure, feeling like I could have achieved more.

If I set myself a task and don't complete it I give myself an excuse. You know the ones. 'I didn't exercise today because I hurt my foot...' to which you will receive sympathy from others. But let's be totally honest, you could have done something right?

'I didn't get that craft done today because I was so busy at work/the kids were playing up/I didn't feel well...' to which you will receive a supporting 'oh yes, I know how hard it is.' from others.

I spout off excuses to myself and end up making myself miserable because deep down I know the truth, I could have done something. And I don't even bother getting the sympathy responses!

Even if you broke your leg, wouldn't you feel proud of yourself if you grabbed the hand weights and did a few reps on the lounge? If the kids are demanding attention wouldn't you pat yourself on the back if you got them involved in a craft and then put in some time on your own project simultaneously? Have we become so accustomed to searching for excuses that we fail to see that the excuses are not valid reasons and only make us even unhappier?

No one else cares if I don't exercise, no one really notices if I don't give enough time to an artwork because no one knows I planned it in the first place. The only person monitoring my progress is me, and I am the one that fails myself by not just getting out there and doing it. Anything.

Are we afraid of being proud of ourselves? Now that is the million dollar question. Am I afraid of being happy with myself? Delving into places I would rather not venture I would tentatively say yes, I am afraid of being proud of myself. No, I don't know why yet.

I had a wonderfully supportive mother growing up (who is still my greatest fan), my husband stands beside me in my projects, my friends compliment me and my brother always has lovely things to say about my work. Why in hell have I conditioned myself to accept misery??

The whole cycle is ridiculous. I know i feel better during my day if I exercise in the morning.Yes, it means getting up earlier (which I loathe!) and entertaining darling son while I jump around in front of the screen, bopping along to the music. But X is happy to munch on a banana and declare, as he jumps around, that he is exercising too. It doesn't stop me doing it and afterwards I feel proud of myself, so why do I avoid it so often?

Part of me has a constant fear that happiness always comes before a fall. Should I be happy, something bad will follow. Mentally, a ridiculous concept to give time to, but emotionally, a background fear that is hard to shake. The truth being, of course, is that bad stuff will happen. Yep, it sucks. Shit happens, even the bumper stickers say so. Does it happen because we let ourselves be happy or feel proud of ourselves for a moment? Hell no! All we secure for ourselves by sabotaging our own happiness is a constant supply of misery, fun stuff.

Have I, as so many others in our younger generations, fallen into the bottomless pit of laziness? Do I want everything to just fall into my lap without effort? Well, yeah, of course. Stupid question! Who wouldn't want everything for no effort? Do I expect everthing to fall into my lap without effort?Hmmm, I guess I do. Wow, that's stupid.

So, my task (should I choose to accept it) is to just get out there and do it. Don't look back, don't worry about what will follow my bout of self-contentment, just do it. Way to go Nike, you finally got me repeating crappy sports mantras. But the sneaker-dudes have a point.

As a result, I did feel crappy today (thanks little son for sharing your Kindy germs...) but i got stuck into my idea for my Australia Day craft and its turning out pretty good. I didn't get to everything on my list, but that is what tomorrow is for. I will do it, I will feel proud of myself and I will enjoy the feeling.

Get out there today, do that thing you planned on and let yourself achieve something. Pat yourself on the back, smile in the mirror and plan your next achievement for tomorrow. The days are rushing away so quickly now that you need to slow them down and fill them up with stuff, stuff you can look back on at the end of the week and list the things you achieved. Be one of those annoying smiling people who can do everything they set out to do so your friends can go on about how they wish they had time to get that sort of stuff too if it weren't for - fill in the blanks - . :D

Be happy.

Good Intentions

2010-01-21T22:41:00.003+10:00

I had such good intentions at the start of the year. I was going to blog every day, I made a list of the tutorials I planned to post, I was going to promote my links everywhere I could and garner a fabulous following thus enabling me to open an outstanding online store that would always be sold out due to such great demand.

Then the doubts set in.

Could I really do this? Am I good enough? Is my work really desirable? How can I get enough traffic to my sight to really make a difference?

I panicked, I avoided my blog and I went into hiding.

Then I realised that it doesn't matter if I blog to thin air. Who cares? So what if it takes time to find people actually interested in my ramblings? To hell with everything, the only person I can possibly fail is myself and that is by doing nothing.

I will heartily admit that I suck at failing. I am not graceful, I do pout and I am my own worst critic. But you know what? It's not me I need to convince, it's all of you (assuming you are there). Enough people have given me positive feedback that I need to bite the bullet and get on with it.

Even my tarot cards tell me that.

Over and over and over.

If it is possible to piss off guides with repetitiveness I sure am on my way.

So here we go. Bring it on world, here I come.

Green and Gold - acrylic on canvas

2010-01-05T23:13:00.004+10:00

I live on the Gold Coast in Queensland, Australia. Most people just think of the beach when considering my home town; don't get me wrong, our beaches are lovely, but not nearly all we have to offer. Within half an hour either of each other are the bright blue and gold beach and the lush sub-tropical rainforest. I love that! Also, our wildlife is spectacular.

A few years ago now the local council had a debut competition - artwork of any medium that must represent the gold coast. Entrants would go into an art show and the winner would have their piece used in promotional material for the Gold Coast.

My husband and mother got spiffed up with me, all excited and eager to see my work in it's first ever art show. We get to the venue, "where on earth is my piece??" I asked my husband. We looked around and found a staggering array of artwork, many pieces completely figurative and certainly not representative of the Gold Coast, but apparently belonging to the airy, over-dressed and fluffed up 'artists' floating around.

We asked the people on the door what was going on, nearly in unison with a gaggle of other left out artists. The response was, there had never been a guarantee that all work would be displayed (*cough*bullshit*cough*) and they were very sorry. Obviously put on the spot and without any power to choose which pieces to display, the staff at the door were nonetheless made the scapegoats. Many local artists quietly voiced their extreme displeasure that night, particularly when questions about the obvious lack of adherence to the brief many of the displayed pieces advertised.

The shamefaced staff did their best to appease all but it was quite obvious the organisers of the event had not even read their competition entry rules and handed the reins over to self-important local artists with little talent but plenty of connections. It was what a Sopranos fine art mafia competition would be I guess.

One of the works was a photograph of high heeled shoes on the sand. Hmmm.. yep, that represents the Gold Coast.

When we went to pick up my painting there were once again many unhappy artists and the staff were quite obviously sympathetic to the fact that we had, indeed been promised a display but had been left out at the last minute. When I went to my piece and my mother 'quietly' mentioned how so many of the pieces did not meet the brief but mine had, the lady at the counter looked quite embarrassed and was noticeably surprised when I took possession of my work. She commented how well my work represented the Coast and inquired about my age, the answer seemed to surprise her since I was about 23 at the time.

Anyway, I have a work of art I am proud of and my mother refuses to relinquish hold of, lol. I can comfort myself in the fact that the winning entry of a common photo of Surfers Paradise beach would never stick in the minds of viewers like my Green and Gold will.

So, as a homage to my town you have 'Green and Gold' Acrylic on canvas, completely handmade. Even the frame. Size approx 120 cm x 60 cm.

Left side: the Natural Arch. A natural bridge of stone carved from eons of water, about 30 mins from me in the Springbrook National Park.

Middle: Rainbow lorikeet. Local and sometimes annoying little buggers. Can be found everywhere - beach to rain forest. Yes, you can have them as pets but only from registered breeders and NOT from the wild (as some people do)

Right side: 'The Spit' surf beach famous for its enormous sand pumping jetty reaching far out into the sea and where many a fisherman has spent long hours trying to catch something brag-able.

The scene is a blend of the best of the Gold Coast's environment and includes natural and man made phenomena. Bringing the two halves together is a native parrot flying from the shady confines of the rain forest to the buffeting expanse of the surf.

Let me know your thoughts.

December craft challenge entry. Gingerbread toadstools and spicy snails

2010-01-02T21:51:00.002+10:00

Ok, so when I first saw this challenge advertised I had two questions.

1. What type of house could I make that is out of the ordinary (kinda like me)?
2. How the hell do you make a gingerbread house?? :D

This is my first ever gingerbread anything, except for cookies. I have not even tried a kit, so if I broke any cardinal rules of gingerbread house making, I apologise.

I made sure to fit the bill for this challenge: the walls, ceiling and toadstool roof are all gingerbread, as is the little second storey toadstool. The snails are gingerbread and the garden is royal icing, Smarties, Jubes jellies, Roll-up flowers and pretzel fence.

The highest point is about 22cm (9 inches) so it is a little small.

Toadstool-y goodness

Left side (note the adorable raspberry mushroom candies! DH's lucky find for me.)

Right side

Snails with cachous eyes

Proof of gingerbread innards ;)

Gratuitous artsy shot.

Just to defend myself, it IS supposed to be slanted, just like a real toadstool ;D.

Since I was a gingerbread novice I treated this like a sculpture/cake decorating project. I found a good gingerbread recipe online and started by using some dishes and alfoil as moulds to put the gingerbread on. The house body, flat ceiling, toadstool dome and little toadstool body and dome are all results of moulding gingerbread dough around various objects for baking. Secured together with the traditional royal icing I think it fits the bill pretty well.

Here are the other entries.

There are some really great entries but I still believe my design was pretty damned innovative. I kept to the brief and had walls and roof from gingerbread, all the parts were edible and the major design feat WAS the gingerbread house, not the decorations around it. But hey, I'm biased :D.

Front lace-up crochet knee socks - tutorial

2009-12-30T18:59:00.001+10:00

I participated in a craft swap where my partner had wisted a pair of lace-up knee socks. The design was very basic and I had seen many variations around but none that had proper heel shaping or a comfy toe. I made up this pattern as I went along - with much trial and error - and am really pleased with the result.

Bear in mind I am not a professional crochet artist nor am I very experienced in writing patterns for others. What makes sense to me may not make sense to someone else so let me know if you have any queries.

This is the yarn I used, a basic yarn from a discount store. I have idea what to call it but I hope it helps :P

the cuff says:
10x10cm = 18 rows and 13 stitches. 7mm/2 UK needles

Crochet pattern – intermediate

Yarn – open to suggestion, the first row you crochet goes from the top of the sock to just before the toes so add or subtract stitches accordingly

Starting on one side of the laces

1. ch 59. sc in 1st st from hook. Sc to end, ch 1 and turn

2. repeat (1.) for another 7 rows

Heel shaping, side 1

3. sc in the next 16 sts. 2 sc in the next st. sc to end, ch 1 and turn

4. sc in the next 41 sts. 2 sc in each of the next 2 sts, 16 sc to end. Ch 1 and turn

5. sc in the next 16 sts. 2 sc in each of the next 4 sts, 41 sc to end. Ch 1 and turn

6. sc in the next 43 sts. 2 sc in each of the next 4 sts, 18 sc to end. Ch 1 and turn

7. sc to end, ch 1 and turn

8. repeat (7.) for another 4 rows

Calf shaping

9. sc in the next 5 sts. 1 sl st, ch 1 and turn. 5 sc to end, ch 1 and turn

10. sc in the next 10 sts. 1 sl st, ch 1 and turn. 10 sc to end, ch 1 and turn

11. sc in the next 15 sts. 1 sl st, ch 1 and turn. 15 sc to end, ch 1 and turn

12. sc in the next 20 sts. 1 sl st, ch 1 and turn. 20 sc to end, ch 1 and turn

13. (should be 69) sc to end, ch 1 and turn

14. sc to end, ch 1 and turn

15. sc in the next 20 sts. 1 sl st, ch 1 and turn. 20 sc to end, ch 1 and turn

16. sc in the next 15 sts. 1 sl st, ch 1 and turn. 15 sc to end, ch 1 and turn

17. sc in the next 10 sts. 1 sl st, ch 1 and turn. 10 sc to end, ch 1 and turn

18. sc in the next 5 sts. 1 sl st, ch 1 and turn. 5 sc to end, ch 1 and turn

19. sc to end, ch 1 and turn

20. repeat (19.) for another 4 rows

Heel shaping, side 2

21. sc in the next 18 sts. St 2 tog to decrease (repeat another 3 times). 43 sc to end, ch 1 and turn

22. sc in the next 41 sts. St 2 tog to decrease (repeat another 3 times). 16 sc to end, ch 1 and turn

23. sc in the next 16 sts. St 2 tog to decrease (repeat another 3 times). 41 sc to end, ch 1 and turn

24. sc in the next 41 sts. St 2 tog to decrease (repeat another 3 times). 16 sc to end, ch 1 and turn

25. sc to end, ch 1 and turn

26. repeat (25.) for another 7 rows

27. finish off

Toe

^pointing to the sides

Step 1
The toe is kind of improvised, so bear with me

1. hold the two sides of the sock together and slip stitch to join them

2. sc all the way around the edge and join to the beginning of the row

3. sc to to the side, decrease by crocheting 2 stitches together (repeat) and sc across the back and decrease again on the other side

4. sc to the centre and join

5. repeat (2. & 3.) until the toe is a comfortable length, and stitch the remaining opening closed

Tips

- For a wider gap between the laces (to show off lacing better) do fewer rows at 26. & 2.

- For smaller calves, skip steps 9. & 18.

- For longer or shorter socks, chain more or less at 1.– this will throw out the pattern slightly, but use your imagination ;P

- This size will fit a few different sized feet, the crochet stretches quite well so once you have sorted out the correct yarn, the pattern will fit most ladies’ adult feet

- Any hole will be suitable for the laces. To make more of a feature of them, choose holes about an inch or so in from the edge of the sock

- One side of the lacing will look a bit longer than the other, but will have the same amount of stitches. This is because one side began as a chain. Just tug the sides a little and lace them up and they will become even.

- Have fun and try some fancy stitching too. Some lace work on the top would be great and even trying to put the lacing on the back would be cool too.

- Normal disclaimer: Please do not use my tutorial without my permission or copy my design style for profit. Make as many of these socks for yourself and friends but please do not make them to sell or sell the tutorial. You know, crafty karma and all that.

Paper favour bags - Tutorial

2009-12-29T19:32:00.000+10:00

I wanted to share these favour bags I made for my wedding in September 2007, I am so thrilled at how they turned out.

Made of regular A4 computer paper printed with a Photoshop brush and glued into shape. The tags are also created in Photoshop and the 'love' beads are rolled paper beads with the word printed on. All tied up with a piece of variegated purple cotton crochet yarn they looked pretty good. I popped in 4 large choc coated cake balls wrapped in purple cellophane and they held up really well.

I had a few of these to make so I made myself a sturdy little cardboard box frame out of an old chocolate box. Mine is 9cm wide x 18 cm high x 5.5 cm deep and it makes a nice wide little rectangular bag.

Print up your page and lay it right side down and pop your box on top. Note the thin black line at the top of the box? That's to line up the top of the paper so all the bottoms are the same and the bags are the same height. Crease the edges well.

Run a line of glue down the right side of the paper. Or use a glue stick but remember the paper only overlaps a few millimetres.

Fold the paper over and press to adhere the glue. Then align the paper to the line at the top.

It takes a little while for white glue to dry but glue sticks are nearly immediate. I made a few up to this point, pulled it off the box and moved on to the next while the glue dried. It can be tricky getting the paper to slide back on the box though when the glue has dried.

Tip the box on it's end and fold in the bottome like you would wrap a gift. Crease the paper well and add a few dobs of glue in the corners.

Fold the flaps over and secure with a little tape. Remove from the box frame

Cinch the sides and you're done!

If you are making a few you might like to fold them up for easy storage. Lay the bag down and continue to fold the sides.

Keep the sides folded in and press the bottom towards the back of the bag so there is no crease on your nice printed front.

Ta DA!

I bet these would make great gifts bags for Christmas gifts, and a nice way to present assenbly-line gifts too. Have fun!

Normal disclaimer: although the paper bags are obviously a universal design, please do not use my tutorial without my permission or copy my design style for profit. You know, crafty karma and all that.

Cake balls (truffles)

2009-12-28T00:55:00.000+10:00

Ingredients:

Four packet cake mixes, made according to the instructions OR four medium-sized cakes of your choice made from scratch
Four cups of icing sugar (a.k.a. powdered or confectioners sugar)
A little vanilla, cocoa, spice or essence depending on the flavour of your cakes
Approximately 1 1/3 cups of melted butter or firm margarine
A little milk
2 x 375g bars of chocolate to coat the balls. I used 1 bar each of white and milk chocolate.

SUGGESTIONS:

Turn a basic butter cake into something yummier with a dash of orange/lemon/lime juice (replacing some of the wet ingredients) OR a teaspoon each of cinnamon and ginger for a spicy kick OR half a teaspoon of orange or peppermint essence to a chocolate cake.
After dipping, drizzling or coating your cake balls in chocolate, roll or sprinkle them with crushed nuts/sprinkles/shredded coconut etc. Try a small pinch of orange zest or edible glitter for fancy cake balls and crushed sweet biscuits or animal sprinkles for the kids.

For approximately 60-70 cake balls (depending of course on your choice of sizing) I made four packet cake mixes, two vanilla and two chocolate. I used the super cheap no-name brand but feel free to use your favourite mix or bake a cake from scratch. Let the cakes cool completely (use the fridge or freezer if you are in a hurry). Break the cakes into fine crumbs, I did that by hand but a food processor would have been fantastic. You do NOT want a sticky mud cake or something with chocolate chips, raisins or fruit for these cake bites. A fruity or chippy cake might be fine but I don't think the balls would stay together very well with chunks, and a mud cake will not crumble properly.

Then add about a cup of powdered (icing) sugar to each crumbled cake, a few tablespoons of cocoa to the choc ones and a teaspoon of vanilla to the vanilla ones. Or use your tastbuds to dictate the essences :D.

To bind, add about a third of a cup of melted butter and drizzle milk in until the balls stay together when squished. Add your wet ingredients slowly, you want to avoid gooey cake balls.

Then grab a small handful of mix and squeeze in your hand until in forms a ball. Most of ours were on the big side, lol. Pop them in the fridge for 10 minutes to harden a little and melt some chocolate while you wait. I got a 375g bag each of milk and white chocolate and that let us half-dip most of them with a few totally covered, so you may need quite a bit of chocolate to fully cover your cake balls. We dipped half the balls in chocolate and laid them down on a tray covered in baking paper and popped them in the fridge to set.

We wrapped each ball in a square of cellophane, twisted the top and secured with a little clear tape cause the buggers wouldn't stay closed. They were delicious and not too sweet like the recipes that call for a tin of premade frosting, although the recipe using cream cheese might be nice. Mine were not super soft, just soft enough to hold shape and they tasted just like the original yummy cake mix.

A banana cake or carrot cake would be delicious using cream cheese in place of the butter and milk.

Sculpted voidwalker gift for brother

2009-12-20T21:59:00.002+10:00

Hi All

Here was my last-minute crafted gift for my brother. A fellow World of Warcraft player, he has an 80 Paladin, Rogue and Warlock. So close to Christmas there was noooo way I was attempting to sculpt one of his toons so I went for a Warlock pet instead.

"A voidwalker!" I think to myself, "that should be easy". Famous last words...

Sadly my local craft stores only stock Sculpey III. Seriously inept for proper sculpting but I am rather used to it by now.

So, meet my voidwalker. Foil, wire and bamboo armature with Sculpey III and acrylic highlights. Yes, the clay was blue/purple, I just gave him depth with acrylics.

Base is clay and cotton wool painted with acrylics and permanent marker.

Tag is a Photoshop creation.

He resides in a recycled glass jam jar, he does need the occasional breather but only with proper supervision since the cheeky buggers have a knack for disappearing into the shadows.

Miniature fairy sculpture

2009-12-01T23:07:00.001+10:00

This little guy was a gift to a new friend back in 2008. He is the first life-like sculpture I have ever made and I completely fluked it :D. He is good old Sculpey III, a mix of beige, translucent and gold micak. It went ok but the Sculpey is quite stickey after working it for a while so I half-baked him, sanded and scraped him, then re-fired and sanded some more. I probably made him all wrong to proper sculptors, but he came together in the end.

Yes, this is a boy and yes, he does have boy bits so please do not keep reading if you are offended!

He is quite tiny and lies on his little padded leaf. And he is sealed only with a buffing of furniture wax. His wings are acetate photocopies cut to size and glued in after baking - I can certainly improve the finish next time I think. His hair is flutter yarn scraps attached with white glue.

In all honesty a lot of dolls freak me out and I have never been one of those people who collects figurines, but he just had to be made. I learned later that he had to go to one Craftster in particular which was a little awkward since I didn't actually know her and had to start my message with 'please don't think this is too weird, but I have something for you...'. But it all worked out and now he is living with his new mummy and daddy.

Of course, being an artist that doesn't really collect figurines I have more ideas in my head begging to be made reality. Perhaps it's a matter of these little guys want to be born and I am their outlet, if you follow my thinking...

If I do make more, I think they will all be asleep. Staring vacant eyes creep me out.

Warcraft druid bear painting

2009-11-21T22:04:00.001+10:00

It has been a while since I got my paints out, after doing a lot of digital art and graphic design I have been itching to get into the physical artiness of painting again.

I have been meaning to do this painting for a while now, a representation of my husbands World of Warcraft character, a night elf druid. I am really pleased with the way it turned out, especially the background effect which is becoming a token style for me.

The first image is the closest to the actual piece but the other two show the depth of colour in the background and the face details.

Acrylic and marker on mounted canvas 60x85 cm (24x33.5 inches).

For anyone interested I have just begun a portfolio via Deviant art.

Jack-o-melon. Type #2

2008-10-30T23:16:00.000+10:00

This year's jack-o-melon!!

To learn more about the birth of the jack-o-melon (I figured it out in my own wee mind so I claim it. So there :P) Behold! the Jack-o-melon!

As you can see, we varied from the previous shape to massage the imagination into something new.

Once again, filling the house with red-glowy Halloween glee!

Behold! the Jack-o-melon!

2007-10-31T23:08:00.000+10:00

Basically, I live in Australia where pumpkins are now $4.00 per kilo but watermelons are only $1.30 per kilo, plus I don't really like pumpkin but I love watermelon. So thus the Jack'o'lantern was born!

Full of glowy red goodness...

In the making...

Front - face...

I love this much more than my previous pumpkins and it was sooo much easier to carve! And the red insides just jump with Halloween glee. There was some debate about whether the candles would work but they go great and are slowly drying out the inside. I tipped out all the excess water first and packed it full of paper towels for a few hours.

For the record, after being out in the air for a few hours these beauties are still damp inside but work wonderfully. A tealight candle will suffice but you could use a bigger candle if you really wanted to.

They get saggy after about a week and I wouldn't suggest leaving any jack-o'ed fruit or veg in the sun all day, so if you pop him out at night and leave him in the cool and shade during the day you should have a great jack-o-melon for a few weeks.

Oh, and a bucket-supply of watermelon for eating and mixing with vodka? Score!