Cement Snail!

This summer I wanted to show some folks that a cement sculpture could, in fact, be made from start to finish in 5 days or less.  

Here is the result:

I admit that this guy isn't 100% complete (I want to extend the mosaics down to where the shell ends) BUT it only took me approximately 5-6 hours over the course of 5 days (so ~1 hr/day) to get this far. I'm confident that if I weren't teaching other things at the same time as I was working on this, I'd have finished this guy AND made another 1 or 2 sculptures.

A blast from the past!

This is a paper mache lion I made for a long long ago NYE party in Milwaukee.  I liked him enough to drag him through several apartments and all the way to this current house of mine... sadly, he'd become mouse-eaten and tattered enough that I had to say goodbye to him earlier this summer.  BUT, not before I took some pictures!

Partial Quilt

Before assembling the four panels:

After assembling the four panels, but before attaching a border:

I'm waiting for this to come back from a lady who is machine quilting it for me. It's really hard not to send the lady weekly inquiries about the progress on this thing :) I'm super excited to get it back, even though it means I will have some 40+ feet of binding to make and sew on...... remind me again why I didn't just have someone else do that for me, too?

Handmade postcard!

 
For a swap-bot swap this spring.

Another bug on another ATC

 
I do not like these colors.  Oh well.  It's just an ATC.   (One of the best parts of ATCs = no/low committment ;)

And now... the post you've all been waiting for.....

Sooooo......I made steampunk twinchies for a swapbot swap. They even turned out quite decently steampunk, I thought... and then I got this rating:




Now, the $64-million dollar question is.... Do *you* see a frog here?  




Or perhaps a less leading question, what are the critters that you see in these sets?




I *intended* them to be (left to right, starting in top row):

spider, owl, bird
chicken, owl, spider

Is that what you guessed?


(this still makes me laugh and laugh and laugh :)

Abstract Twinchies!

Made for a swapbot swap earlier this year.

Stained Glass - 2013 Garezera 3x3

In order to keep up with and demo stuff for a lady who was making a stained glass window hanging in our class, I put together this during the workshop in Michigan.  Next time, I will use the framing tools in order to ensure a stained glass item that actually is *rectangular*.  I'm almost inspired to begin those 4 glass panels for the cabinet in my kitchen.... almost.

And now.... for something different!

In January, I made a savory birthday cake for my party.  Several brave souls were willing to try it, and I like to think that they even ENJOYED it!  I certainly did.  It was a nice break from the usual sweet things found at a birthday party.

Another tile from last year's 3x3 in Garezers

Playing with patterns - 2012 Garezera 3x3

Every so often I realize I've not done a very thorough job of showing the stuff I've made.... this mosaic is from the 2012 workshop in Michigan.  (Another case of OMG I NEED AN EXAMPLE NOW which resulted in a tile that I quite like!  Of course, i might not photograph all the ones i *don't* like.....)

Mosaic tile - 2013 Garezera 3x3

One of several tiles made during this summer's 3x3 in Michigan.

I need examples to demo on (so i don't have to demo anything on a students' work), so I end up with a couple of these a year.  I don't think I photographed the smaller one I did (but i gave it to my mom, so maybe i can get a picture of that one from her).

More fused glass! 2013 Garezera 3x3

Anytime we needed to fire the kiln and there was spare room on the shelves, i'd quick quick put something together to try out this, that, or the other thing. Sometimes I'd be thinking about some way to try something new or a slight twist on something i saw while helping/teaching folks during the day.  This is what i ended up with this this year - I see at least one more glass button coming out of this (lower right corner) and perhaps I'll set some of the wavy blue/green cabs in some metal jewelry... but the rest is one big question mark.  They may just sit in a bowl in my office for a while until I figure out what to do with them.

Glass Buttons, take II - 2013 Garezera 3x3

These are glass buttons from 3x3, too, but instead of drilling holes in the glass, we attached the glass to button backings. Well... and the tall one in the back is more of a .... knob..... than a button.  Hmmmmmm.

Glass Buttons - 2013 Garezera 3x3

Another new glass thing to try - created while in 3x3 this summer.  I intend to use these as decorative elements on some custom sewn items.... which will hopefully make an appearance on this site, er, later.  I'm not sure how *much* later since there's a small glitch in the plan..... and as usual, I have about a zillion other things in the works at the moment, too. Fun fun!

Glass Barrettes - 2013 Garezera 3x3

Trying out a new thing to do with small glass cabochons.  Barrettes!  

Made these during 3x3.  I've yet to wear them.... I'm curious to see if they do OK or whether they end up too heavy to wear comfortably.  Hey - I'll wear them tomorrow!

Inchies - abstract watercolor

Watercolor Inchies for a swapbot swap earlier this year. I was inspired by another swapper and even made the little custom envelopes from watercolors I'd made a while back and didn't know what to do with.

"Stained Glass" ATCs

Two "stained glass" ATCs for a swapbot swap.

First attempt at FELTING!

BEFORE:


AFTER:



A really awesome friend of mine noticed me oooooh-ing and aaaaaaaah-ing over her felted cuffs this past winter and she *TOTALLY SURPRISED ME* by getting me the same kit so I could try it, too! This method of felting was crazy-easy. You essentially tack the roving onto a special piece of paper that will eventually disintegrate (in the last step of the process). The before (roving)/after (felted wool) is really only noticeable in the closeups.

Metal Owls

Much much earlier this year, I started playing around with owls.  I have plans for these things, just..... need to make time to finish them :)

Inchies - OWLS!

I signed up for a teenie tiny owls swap.  Each of these is 1 inch x 1 inch.  Somehow that's a whole lot smaller than i had *thought* it would be. I think I like making twinchies better (2 inches x 2 inches).

Ugly Rug!

Earlier this year I worked on recycling some of my favorite shirts that were dying....  first attempt at a rag rug = DISASTER.

wow, hello lumpy rug.  I unwound the whole thing moments after this picture was taken.  Second attempt is looking better, but is not worth photographing just yet......  also, the cats destroyed part of it when I left them alone for a couple weeks with minimal intervention......

Burned Bird ATC

Slightly misleading title. The TREES were burned before being glued down, not the bird.  This might possibly be my favorite ATC so far.

Owl cameos

Experimenting with owls & cameos. Need more practice. Also - i need to try new glues. These glues ended up with unexpected results (1) The underlying glue loosened the pink & green paper dye (so the white pieces did not stay white - they were a bit streaky) AND turned the some of the papers semi-translucent. ARG. (2) The Mod Podge on top managed to smear glitter all over instead of keeping it in only the cameo border. DOH.

ATC - more pink & green fun

Decided that pink and green weren't so bad and that this paper/pen combo was REALLY satisfying. I think I made a few other pink/green ones, but.... I seem to have lost them. Huh.

Pink ATCs

OK. Pink and green.   I couldn't do JUST pink (although the original theme I signed up for was "pink").  Note that neither of these is the ATC that I actually sent out.....  I seem to have forgotten to photograph that one.  It was similar to these with some added antique gold marker, too.

April Art = Experimenting with ATCs and burned paper

I started experimenting with ATC's in April, too.
 ATC = Artist Trading Card.
 It's a pretty neat concept.






The theme for these two was "Burned".  SO they had to include some kind of burned something. It's hard to see in these, but if you look close, you can see where the edges of the paper are charred.  It was surprisingly hard to get intentional burn marks without simply incinerating the whole thing.

April Art = Decorated folders

OUTSIDE:


INSIDE:


OUTSIDE:


INSIDE:

April Art = MAIL ART

In April I finally caved and joined Swap-Bot... which resulted in a lot of ephemera in this household.....

April Art! Silk-screened T-shirts for the art night posse

I think my favorite way to print t-shirts for friends is by telling them to supply me with a t-shirt (whatever size/shape/color THEY like).  I enjoy the variety that results :)

Here was an attempt to weave together metal (copper wire) with glass in a "warm glass" kind of way. The stuff that looks like paper is a form of glass, too. Glass powder glued on to a particular kind of paper. It's... odd stuff. I'm not sure how to use it to get any result that I like just yet. I'm not sure where my pictures of these *after* fusing have disappeared to.... they weren't that impressive anyway.

The big glob on the right is intended to be sliced apart and rearranged, too.  Someday.

Some fused glass experiments from February

Those disks were an experiment with frozen frit.  I'm not done with them yet.  Now I'm going to slice them with a wet-saw and rearrange them and see what happens.

Silkscreening happened!

Silkscreening happened at my house in January!