Wretched Wednesday - Garden of Good and Evil

This week's Macabre Monday challenge is

Garden of Good and Evil.

I wanted to make a dimensional project out of clay,

but wasn't sure which direction I should go with it.

I have been looking for a frog to zombify for months.

I was inspired by something I read on the Frog Queen's blog,

and thought how cool she would think I was if I made a 

zombie frog.

Problem was, I never could find an acceptable ceramic frog

specimen for this project. So, I decided to just make the damned

thing myself! 

Here is my silly clay version of a zombie frog. 

I'm not sure it translates well, but he is eating

a frog hand. That's his tongue wrapped around it.

I decided to make a garden background for my

amphibian of the living dead.

I used the awesome graveyard scene from 

Delicious Doodles, and colored it with the

BV range of Copics. I added some Tim Holtz trees,

and some MS border punches, and then mounted it onto

black card stock. 

I used vellum and glimmer mists to make the full moon.

I UTEE'd the die cut trees and used some iridescent

embossing powders to make them appear moonlit.

I used a butt load of foam dots to give this piece lots

of dimension.

I had to add a nice washing of brown paint

to give the frog some character and bring out his details.

Plus my son insisted on blood. I tried to keep

it on the lighter side, but it's so much fun to

add the blood - it's hard to know when to stop!

So, .....

what's lurking in your garden??

Mainstream Birthday

I just looked at my calendar, and I have

quite few birthdays coming up!

I had some "yet to be inked" rubbah that kept

squealing at me, so I inked their little butts up!

This image is from Paper Make Up Stamps, but

I bought it in rubber during their close-out before going

completely digital, so I'm not sure if she is still available.

Her name is Olive.

She has a sparkly cupcake.

This image is also from my rubbah order

from Paper Make Up.

Her name is Francesca.

Cocktails anyone?

I hid a botched coloring job on her dress

with lots of Doodlebug glitter.

It matched purrr-fectly.

Now I have to go make some photograph cards.

I have a ton of photos of fleurs and trees and schtuff.

I need to use them in some way, so I make cards

with a simple sentiment and a lovely photo taken by moi.

These are perfect for those people who don't really appreciate

all the work that goes into a handmade card, but get butt hurt

if they don't get one. I love my SIL, but she is one of those

people that don't really appreciate art, and will throw away

a handmade card as if it was from the Dollar Store.

No offense taken, but she doesn't get a fancy schmancy card from me.

It's never too early...

...to start shopping for the next holiday.

I have made a couple St. Pat's Skullz.

One is a magnet and the other is an ornament.

If they generate any interest on Etsy, I'll make more.

Check out my Etsy shoppe for more info.



Valentine's Day left overs

Even though Valentine's Day is over,

I still have few projects to share with you.

I made a few VDay cards this year which is a few

more than I usually make.

This is one I haven't shared yet.

I used a stamp by Anna Marine

for Sweet Pea Stamps called, L.O.V.E.

She actually colored up nicely. I am usually quite

intimidated by Sweet Pea images.

I also worked on a custom order for a set of ten 

Valentine's Day ornaments.

The Skully couple was fun to make.

I love the moustache!!!  

I'm not much of a *heart* girl, but after a while

they got much easier to make.

I like this one.  

I made a roly poly bug holding a heart,

and this little spider girl too.

She has a puffy heart on her belly.

Since these were late and my customer ROCKS,

I also made a St. Patty's Day skull with a bowler hat

and a shamrock in his eye.

It's nice to add a little added surprise for good

customer behaviour. 

I'll be showing the St. Pat's skulls in a later post.

I'm making more for my Etsy shoppe.  

 

For me?!

I will admit that I hold my husband to the

Hallmark created traditions of Valentine's Day.

My husband is really good about buying me flowers

for no particular reason throughout the year,

but other than that, nadda.

So when February 14th rolls around he knows after 25 years,

that he better put some effort into it.

This year, he gave me flowers, and candy, and he even made a

card (out in his work truck using a folded piece of copy paper

and a ball point pen, but he did make it himself). Very sweet.

But, just to be on the safe side, I went ahead and ordered

myself a little sumptin' sumptin'.

I have quite a few collectible action figures, but this one

is by far the coolest and my favorite!!!

The Dark Crystal is one of my favorite movies of all time.

The Chamberlain is one of my favorite characters.

I love it when the other Skesis yell at him to be quiet.

He keeps doing that incessant whimpering and simpering.

LOVE it!

One of my other favorite movies of all time is

The Return of the Living Dead.

When I read that an action figure of TarMan was

being released, I pre ordered it right away!

Someone please tell me that I have a very rare and valuable

wonky eyed variant of this figure.

I am the chick who gets the hair in her food at a restaurant, or

the broken lid to something or some other kinda crappy deal.

Now the wonky eyed TarMan.  

 

Haunted and Heartbroken

So let's just get the bad news

out of the way first, shall we?

A little over a week ago, my husband and I said

a tearful farewell to our first baby together,

Mickey.

Mickey was a huge part of the family for nearly 16 years.

Her heart was stronger than the rest of her old body

in the end, and we had to make the devastating decision

to help her move on.

...sigh...tears.....more tears....

Sometimes the best people in our lives

aren't really people at all.

I miss you Mama.

So I have been a bit sketchy over the past month or so.

Rightly so.

But, I am getting my act back together and am trying to 

channel my pain and sadness in a more creative way.

I give you my submission for the

Love Lies Bleeding challenge
over at HDH this week.

I chose to use this awesome image of Sid and Nancy

(beautifully drawn by Mindy Doodles)

 to represent my version of love gone wrong.

Really wrong.

I also used a Sex Pistols' song title for my sentiment. 

I'm cool like that.

Nancy: If I asked you to kill me, would you?

Sid: I don't know. How would I do it? I couldn't live without ya.

Now that's true love.....

There is still plenty of time to play along with us over at

Haunted Design House this week. 

Happiness is...

...an almost completely

filled in Copic color chart for 2012.

I finally broke down and ordered some new Copic colors and

some replacement colors too. I'm going to need another Copic

storage container if they keep coming out with new colors!

Mine is beyond capacity so I had to move my fluorescents

and warm grays to a little cup until I figure something else out.   

This chunky painting of Frida all sugar skulled out,

is by the uber talented Megan Suarez (of Dilly Beans).

It makes me happy, and it looks awesome on my mantle.

I am slowly rising from my funk, and was inspired to make

a couple cards for the coming VDay.

One of my favorite artists is Joe Capobianco.

This is his rendition of true love. I swiped it from the web

and UTEE'd it and cracked it to look like a shattered tile.

I added some webbed ribbon, a graveyard die cut,

green rhinestones, and some cool MS border punches. 

This one is my favorite though.

Who can resist the charm of Gomez?

I set the sentiment which translates to,

"My Dearest". Gomez's pet name for Morticia.

Then,  I added some webbed ribbon, a fancy tag,

a bunch of paper roses, and some die cut swirls.

Adorable image!!

It feels good to be back at it creating again.

I'm behind as usual, but I feel like trying to get

caught back up. That's a good sign.

The healing power of Janis

I have had some devastating losses in my family

over the past few weeks.

Janis will get me through.

Perspective

Just when you think your life sucks

to no end, you get a wake up call that 

puts it all into perspective.

I was totally feeling sorry for  myself today

and then I read Ginger's blog post today about a wonderful

little dude who could use some cheer.  

Please stop by Ginger's House and read all about

her student and teacher, awesome Sebastian.

Wretched Wednesday - Shot through the Heart

Here is my submission for this week's
Shot Through the Heart challenge
at Haunted Design House.

I am on a Dilly Beans kick lately. I am loving this Sugar Skull.

The images are so fun and easy to color, plus

they lend themselves to so many occasions.

I used a couple of Spellbinder hearts and cut the middle

out of one to represent the hole in the challenge.

I popped the skull out of the hole using dimensional dots.

I added some die cut flourishes, corner accents and

a glittered chip board love and a heart to try and

balance it all out.

Please join us at HDH for this week's challenge,

using at least one heart and

one hole on your creation.