My most important creative space is inside my head.  I am constantly working on something, no matter where I am or what else I am doing, which means I never get a chance to get bored!  At home, I usually commandeer the lounge table and make batches of jewellery in front of the TV.  There are two rooms of my house dedicated to my crafts, too - I have one room where I store my stock and my 'ingredients', and then there's the office, where I work on the PC and keep the printers essential to getting a high quality image for my work.

The great thing about what I do is how little physical space it takes up when I'm actually doing it, though - I only need a flat space to put the curing items onto, and the rest I can really do on my lap or on the arm of the couch.

The great thing about doing the artwork myself is that I can do it anywhere - at work before and after I start, in a cafe with the Crafty Foxes group, sitting in bed with my laptop... 

There, now you know - although I'd love a studio so that I can work on my painting, and a workshop where I can build more displays and work on the soldering work I would like to expand, and a sewing room to make my market costumes and displays, all I really need is somewhere to sit and about a square metre of table.

Te Arikinui Dame Te Atairangikaahu, the late Maori Queen.

Wow!  I can't believe how fast the donated pieces have sold!  I still have the oval ring to list, otherwise you can view my other pieces in my Felt store here.

Thanks for reading!!  And don't forget to leave a comment to go in to win a prize...

Well, first of all, the good news as far as the family is concerned - no one was physically hurt, and the damage to our family's buildings and property was minimal - lots of wonky chimneys.  By now, though, the endless aftershocks are wearing people out, the kids are terrified and the adults are frazzled.  And there's still a lot of work to be done.

I'm proud to be connected to the students who have been helping with the clean-ups, donating their time to help those who can't do it all themselves.

As I'm not trained in civil defence work, like my brave friend Nat who has just been deployed to CHCH, but I want to help out, I have become involved in the fabulous Felt... like helping out crafters aid movement.  We are donating crafted goods to raise funds for the Christchurch Earthquake relief fund.  Even though it may only seem like a drop in the bucket, still we are glad and proud to be doing our part from all over NZ.

Please visit the Felt shop and the Facebook page if you would like to know more, and spread the word!

Apart from helping load the contributions of others, which I will be doing today, I have been working on something myself, too.  I am donating a couple of pairs of beaded earrings from my old range and will see if I can sell some at work too.

I have also been inspired to create a piece of art related to the quake:

As you may have noticed, several of these pics contain a cat in the background.  Well, what cat wouldn't want to be right in the middle of whatever you're doing?

And Shasha makes such a great model...

These are the items that I will be donating, and you can find them at the Felt Aid store here.






They are:
A double-bailed pendant
A boxed set of earrings and pendant on ball chain
A large square ring
A medium oval ring

(Kitty not included, sorry)

Check out my Felt store for the rest of the range.  And thanks for reading!

And check out the rogue daffodil growing by the side of the driveway!  Happy Spring, NZ!

Doesn't he look lovely?  I nipped out to get a quick pic of him this morning - and lucky I did, we are now in the middle of a massive hail and rain storm, so he may have gone by morning...

So, thinking I was saving on time and money by avoiding postage costs, I downloaded a pattern, blissfully unaware of the amount of work (and printing!!!  56 pages!!!) involved.  My cats were thrilled to be provided with a new toy and somewhere to nap (hence why I have not been able to actually cut any of it out!):

Did you notice the cat-shaped depression in the middle?  Billie is sleeping there right now.

The next morning, I was off to the Made in Petone Craft Market at Sacred Heart School, which was excellent - and the other stalholders had some amazing quality, handmade stuff, too!
The cats helped me to pack the car in the morning - Billie and Shasha were both kind enough to explore the boot beforehand and supervise the loading from the roof.

After the market, I started on my next giant pile of work - commissions! 

I have had a lot of lovely commissions to make recently - a pair of cufflinks based on the cork of a Champagne bottle and photos of the location where it was consumed as a gift from bride to groom - and we can assume that the Champagne was celebrating their engagement!  I have had several bracelets to make, including a lovely idea where a mother has used her young daughter's artwork, another piece with photos of them both from a daughter to her mother, and some portraits.

The photos are a bit crappy due to the poor light - it's been rain, rain rain recently!

Luckily, I took a break to check my emails and found that, not only had I made my VERY FIRST SALE ON FELT, but I was on the front page as part of the Father's Day gift ideas, how cool is that?!

Of course this resulted in a giant panic, because I had just sold my last pair at the market that day, little suspecting that anyone would actualy want to buy them off Felt!  That meant I had to really scramble and assemble all the ones I had left - I managed to make 10 pairs.  Phew!

Most of Sunday was spent making commissions, but also cupcakes for the SPCA fundraiser.  They tasted awesome - I made a quadruple batch of lemon and white chocolate, with LOTS of lemon juice and zest, and got to use the Kenwood mixer I inherited from my great aunt Myra, a legendary baker.  Sunday, I hope to be using another of her appliances - her sweing machine, which I have not had a chance to use since it came back from reconditioning a couple of months ago.

My good friend Georgia from By George! Adornments is moving overseas, so I made her a travel-themed gift:

The image is made up of a collage of a Victorian lady sitting on her trunk, a pattern of circles, a map of Europe and a Victorian-style corner detail, nd on the back is a Steampunk-style cog and clock pattern with the Italian proverb "Viagi Lunghi, Bugie Grandi" which means "Long Voyages, Big Lies", because we look forward to hearing the big lies from her trip.  I boxed it up in one of my lovely Riker Mount boxes with a background that I made up with a collage of travel images and other travel quotes. I also made her a commission piece 'Squid Ring', which you can see pictured as well.

Then, about halfway through the morning, I took a break to check emails and AAAARGH!  I had another sale on FELT!

So first thing on Monday I went out and got some courier bags.  Now comes the bit I regret a little - I was very efficient and got both sales packaged and addressed and ready so that as soon as the payment cleared, I could send them out. The payment for the second sale cleared but I'm still waiting for the first one - and the buyer still hasn't even answered my messages.  That makes me sad, but also angry - she seemed so keen that I have now wasted a courier bag on her!  At least I didn't send it out...

I did so well at Petone that I had to make a whole lot more stock, woohoo!!!


So that's what i've been doing over the last couple of days. I've made a giant batch of awesome earrings only to find that I had less earring bails than I thought left over, so that sucks... I had to pick which pieces got to go to market tomorrow, and which ones have to wait.  Now I have a bag the size of my fist full of unused, finished pieces.  Oh well, it saves me a step - once I can afford to order the bails, all I'll have to do is attach them to the finished glass pieces!



I was going to get pictures of all the work I did today, but I got sidetracked and missed the light - and then...

HAILSTORM!

What an awesome storm!  I was just sitting here, hanging out with my cats and thinking about the sneaky pizza I had just ordered when FLASH, BOOM, RUMBLE!  Then after about a minute of rumbling, so loud and intense that things were ratting and shaking on the shelves, I realised the rattling was continuing outside - HAIL.  I love hail, it's so intense and... bouncy!

I certainly felt (briefly) guilty when the poor pizza delivery guy arrived mid-storm.  But it could have been worse - I could have had to walk out there and get food myself...  Have you noticed that, no matter how good the idea of (cheap and nasty) pizza might be, the reality can never really match it?  At least that never happens with the real thing...

I was also interested to hear from a friend that, while we now have a steady, thumping rain down here in Wellington, not far North in Wanganui, they now have their dose of hail too.

Now this does mean that I don't have any decent photos to share with you tonight - I'll (try to remember to) upload some after the market tomorrow.

Today, I boxed up a great big lot of pendants and I have a whole lot of earrings almost ready to have their hooks added (I've added them now), just in time for Frank Kitts tomorrow.  I also have a large number of new rings, with some new ring shanks, meaning I can add even more variety to my offerings. 

I also decorated a whole lot more tins and boxed up some propellor rings.

I've been working away at this blog entry all evening - watching Food TV and working on stock for tomorrow.  There have been several changes of the guard from the kitties - Shasha was on the back of the couch, then made me clear my lap of earrings, only to change her mind (a cat's prerogative, after all) and head for the pattern.  Having been duly photographed, she has now moved on again to her fluffy green cushion next to my pile of fresh stock for tomorrow.

On top of everything else, I've been planning a Halloween party (with a little help from my friends) for which I am drawing a graphic-novel-style invitation as the back story. 
And Sunday we are sewing some market costumes (oh, I can't WAIT to show you my fabric choices...Green, purple, corduroy, paisley, and retro patterns!)
How on earth I'm going to fit everything in, I have no idea... But I'll tell you all about it, eventually!

I've also loved the bright colours in my friend Alice's blog, who also spends time crafting with kitteh.  Her cheerful madalas have cheered me up no end in the grey and rainy parts of this weird-weathered week.

What a massive post!  I told you it was a busy week!
Well, I'm off to try and thaw my feet in the bath now - the temperature has dropped so drastically today that I've gone from t-shirt to blanket in only minutes! 

xx

Cat & Kitties (a L'Alice)

Here is the first of two portraits I have done of Te Arikinui Dame Te Atairangikaahu, the late Maori Queen.  I have chosen to develop this piece rather than the other because of her welcoming, happy aspect.  I can almost feel that, under her cloak, her arms are out for a hug.

Guide Maggie is a fascinating woman, too.  There are a large number of pictures of her around, and a lot of literature about her.  I like this picture of her, she looks like an interesting person.

In the picture I drew this from, she is leaning against a post, which I have yet to add.

You can read a bit more about her and many of the other women here.

Huria Matenga, heroine of the wreck of the Delaware, was the first subject suggested to me when I mentioned I was going to do this series, and I can see why - her story really stick with you.  Read it here.

In my picture, she looks as if she's about to burst out laughing, so I need to fix that a bit...  :P

Maybe she'll look a bit more solemn once I've shaded her in again...

So I have to go over the lines in black pen, then erase the pencil, then go over all the lines again.  I have photocopied the image at each stage, so you can see the process:

Check out the crazy thing my scanner did!  I think it got a bit stuck...


Anyway, now I can get on to my favourite part - the colours.  Now, I have coloured these very roughly to show what it could look like, but acutally there are still several hours of touch-ups left.  I have to make sure that all the lines are complete, get rid of any pesky white dots, and make sure that all the different zones of colour work well together.  But as a quick overview, here you go:

So you see, when you look at the original, there's still quite a bit of work to be done!