Great Gifts

Hello,
As promised, here are the photos of the great gifts I received this year. The first is a gift that I bought for myself from the lovely Danita. I have wanted something of hers for a long time now but I was waiting until I found the perfect piece for me. I hung it in my bedroom, right next to my bed. Please visit her work on Etsy as well as Ebay. Just type in Danita! The next....and the best gift is from my sister. She gave me a wonderful custom collage by the artist Claudine Hellmuth. She has been featured on Martha Stewart and also in Home Companion magazine. The collage is of my sister and myself when we were little girls. I have the sketch pad , of course, and Mandy has a little hand bag because that's what she makes. You can see more of Claudine's work at www.collageartist.com and you can visit my sister's website at www.mandybbags.com. Well, I hope you were as lucky as me to receive such wonderful gifts! Have a Happy New Year!!!

A Wonderful Christmas

Well I hope you all had a wonderful Christmas. I received the most beautiful gifts this year. I'm lucky to have a sister that took the "Handmade Pledge" so my gifts were particularly great this year. I will take pictures today of everything we received because most were purchased from Etsy and they are FABULOUS!!! So much more exciting than getting something store bought.
The Saturday before Christmas my family and I traveled to Roaringsprings, PA to visit a relative of my husbands. It was a dismal, foggy day but the scenery in the mountains is always beautiful, no matter what. The part of NJ I live in is pretty developed so to see acres and acres of hills with cattle and sheep wandering is something I cherish. I am attaching a photo of the view outside of my husbands Aunt's deck. Like I said, it's a little foggy but I liked the effect.
I was a busy little Christmas night painter so check out my Etsy shop for my newest offerings!
Have a great day!

The Home Stretch

Christmas day is almost upon us, and if you are like me, you still have a million things to do. I think I'm going to have to stop painting for a few days to get some things finished. Here is a new angel painting that I finished the other day and is now for sale on Etsy.com. I finished a second angel this morning but I still need to do the photos. I'm thinking of putting her on Ebay and see how that goes:) I'm always up for a challenge! Well, we are traveling this weekend to visit out-of-town relatives so I'm sure I won't be posting anything new until after Christmas so have a happy holiday!

Thanks!

I just wanted to make a quick post to thank my Etsy customers...I prefer to call you friends, for all of your kind words. I woke up the other morning to 19 new emails from Etsy purchases and congrats from friends for my work being featured on the Etsy home page. It's ashame I missed it but maybe next time! I would like to give a special thanks to Etsy shop hmiracle for selecting me to be in her treasury. I have been very busy trying to keep a few new things in my shop for everyone to look at and maybe purchase but it seems they are being snatched up as soon I put them in. You are keeping me on my toes:) Next Christmas I will be more prepared...I promise.
Thank you again for your encouragement and I hope you enjoy my work!
Good Night!

This Is How I Work

Hello Friends,

I don't know about you but the things I love most about reading other blogs is seeing how they do things....behind the scenes stuff. I like to see what their studio's look like, what their creations look like half finished. That's why I put pictures of my messy work area! It's almost always is a mess. I don't clean it up until I am starting on a new project or until I don't have any more room. Unfortunately, my work area happens to be my dining room. So everyone that visits gets to see what a sloppy artist I am! I am going to work on making it a prettier place after the holidays so look for a photo soon!

I am attaching a photo that I had my brother in-law take the other day. This is my little guy Alex. He refuses to wear clothes when we are home or at his Grandma's. Don't get me wrong...he would strip other places as well but I keep explaining to him that it isn't socially acceptable. In fact, as I am typing this, he's asking me if he can please take his pants off:) I put him to bed in PJ's, and in the morning he comes out in underpants and socks. We went to visit my Grandmother the other day in a nursing home and of course it was 100 degrees. My sister took my nephew's pants off to cool him down (he's only 4 mos. old) and Alex starts taking his off too. I had to explain that Cooper is just a baby and it's ok for him to have no pants on but not 4 year old boy's. He didn't agree but he kept his pants on anyway.

So I figure this photo shows two things about me at once........1. This is how I usually work, with Alex sharing my chair and jumping on my back. 2. My son refuses to wear pants!

Well, I hope you enjoy this little glimpse into my life!

Have a great night.

Christmas Nostalgia....

Hello Friends,

Yesterday I took the day off to get my tree and decorations put up. My poor kids have been begging and begging so my husband and I dug out the stuff and set to work. And as usual, the boys (including husband) hung up about 15 ornaments, all in one area, close to the bottom, and then they were done:) Then it was my job to decorate the rest, and clean up. We have 2 trees, one in the family room where we hang all of the Rankin & Bass stuffed ornaments. The other one is in the living room. This one is supposed to be the more formal tree with all of my glass ornaments but it has turned into the Marvel Comic superhero, Sesame Street, Star Wars tree. I don't mind because I know there will be a day when I'm decorating the tree without my boys.....let me stop before I cry! I have ornaments that my mom made when she did ceramics in the 70's. I have blown glass balls that are probably from the 50's. One is a transparent blue with a little bit of lead tinsel inside. My husband hates anything old, so you can just imagine the sneaking I do to put them up. He swears I'm going to get lead poisoning!

Anyway, I am attaching a photo of my sister and I with Santa. I'm on the left. My brother was crying so he was booted from the shoot. Sissy !

Have a great day!

Parting With Art

Hello Friends,
I'm happy to say that the Angels seem to be a hit! So I'm already thinking of what the next group of winged girlies will look like. I have to confess that after I put them all on Etsy..... I changed my mind and took Anna off to keep for myself. It's unusual that I keep my own art. Most of the time I get tired of looking at them from working on them for so long that I am happy to part with them. Like I told you before...I get bored sooooo easily! This doesn't just apply to art. I've been known to have two or three open books on my night stand.....my husband is always asking me, "Are you going to finish that?" I always do. I don't like things being left unfinished, sometimes it just takes me a looooong time to get back to.
Anyway, back to the subject of parting with art. I just had an order from an Etsy friend who purchased one of my paintings for her mother. She likes it so much she wants to keep it and she would like me to paint another for her Mom. I thought it was very funny. Of course I said yes, I love custom orders. I am posting a photo of a custom order I did for an Etsy friend. She had previously bought "Windy Winter" for herself and asked if I could create something similar for her sister as a gift.
Well, it's almost 7 am and the kiddies will be up soon so I better get some work done!
Thanks so much for reading and have a great weekend!

The Angels Are Ready

Hello Friends,
The Angels are finally finished and I LOVE them! I don't usually say that because I'm very critical of my work but for once, these turned out EXACTLY how I imagined them. I put these up on Etsy this morning so they are ready to go. They are a little more expensive than my previous small angels but they took me soooo much more time. The wings took just as long to construct as the angel itself. I made the frames from wire that I bent to the shape I wanted. Hopefully you all will think they are worth it. I honestly try to price my things as low as possible because it's important to me that all people can collect art. There are plenty of artist I would love to hang in my home but at this point they are out of my range.
I need to go and work on some custom orders I have received in the past few days! I'm a busy, busy girl......have a great day;)

Making Dolls

Hello Friends,
Yesterday my little one was home with a cold. Although I felt bad that he wasn't feeling well, I'm ashamed to say that I had a very productive day because he just watched TV and napped most of the afternoon. Does that make me a bad mom???? I figure I need to take the time when I get it, right?

I'm in the process of making some angel dolls that I will put up for sale on both Etsy and Ebay hopefully within the next few days. I designed the pattern but the funny thing is, I'm not a pro with a sewing machine, so when I put them together every one comes out different. This turned out to be a blessing in disguise because every angel is unique and has such personality. I had to chuckle because I was up late and tired and when I finished painting one of the angels, I thought she resembled Giada from Food Network. So I think that's what I'm going to name her...Giada Angel.

I am attaching photos of the angels...with no wings. And also a photo of my work area after a long day (and night) of doll making. I'm a messy artist, I know.

Thanks for reading and visit me again soon!

Trying To Keep Up

Hello Friends,
Just when I think I'm getting the hang of the whole blog thing, now it seems that video blogging is the thing to do now! I give up. I can just tell you that it will be a long, long time before you see a video of me painting or anything else you may or may not be interested in seeing.

I am posting a photo of my newest painting for sale at Etsy.com. It actually snowed a little bit here last night so at 4 a.m. , I woke up and painted this. The painting didn't wake me up..... snoring did! (not mine) UGH!

I think my little boys and I are going to make construction paper chains today to decorate the house. I'll post a photo so you can see how they turned out. Maybe I'll do a video of it.........nuh uh!

Have a great day!