Happy Halloween!

 I wasn't going to bother carving a pumpkin this year, but a few hours before Oct 31, after watching an extreme pumpkin carving show on the Food Network, I got inspired.  I felt like doing something goofy, so here's what I came up with.

I love Halloween, not for the scary stuff or dressing up, but for the pumpkins and decorative gourds.  We finally got out to Forneris Farms, a 5-min drive from us.   They have a great Harvest Festival with an excellent corn maze.  Of course, we didn't get out of there without buying pumpkins and gourds....lots of pumpkins pumpkins and gourds.  Our house now has pumpkins all over.  We keep them as decoration for as long as they'll last, which is usually until Spring.  Here's a sample of what our home looks like at the moment:



We have more pumpkins spread around the house.  I may have a slight addiction.  Thankfully, my hubby likes them, too. 

Mandala purse is finished

I finished the mandala purse.  Here are front & back photos.  I will have this for sale at The Majestical Roof's Art Market this Saturday.  If it doesn't sell there and/or the store doesn't take it, I'll post it on my Etsy store.

Front view, open

Front view, closed

Back view

In the view above, you can see what the lining looks like.  The whole inside is lined like the lid.

Halloween/Autumn Art Market

I'm signed up for my first craft fair in a long time.  I'm excited!  I'm almost done with the mandala purse, so that will be ready for sale.  It came out beautifully, if I do say so myself.  I'll also have the extrusion jewelry (shown on a previous post), as well as a new rainstick I'll be putting the finishing touches on this week.  Plus, I'll have a nice selection of polymer clay and gourd items -- see my Etsy store & Flicker blog (links on the right) for previews.

This market is hosted by The Majestical Roof, a great little gallery store carrying handmade stuff by local artists.  If I get enough interest in my wares, they'll carry some of them in the store!  So....Please come out and support me! 

Hope to see you there!

Hardly Strictly Bluegrass

I've been keeping so busy, that I haven't gotten around to posting anything here.  I added a few Autumn-themed items to my Etsy shop, however.  I haven't gotten much further on the mandala purse, but I'm hoping to work on it this Saturday.  I made some Autumn-themed inchies for the Greater Los Angeles Polymer Clay Guild's swap.  Can't wait to see what everyone else made.

I spent last Fri-Sun in San Francisco at the Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival.  It's held in Golden Gate Park and has six stages of bluegrass and other music.  There were legendary players and new (to me) groups.  Robert Plant (here, with Patty Griffin), Earl Scruggs, Bela Fleck, Gillian Welch, and others all put on excellent sets.  And I was happy to be introduced to DeVotchKa -- what fun music!  The weather was absolutely gorgeous all weekend (surprisingly).


All around, there were young bands of bluegrass musicians playing unofficially for whoever would listen.  I heard these three later that evening with their other band members; and, yes, that's a washtub bass the guy on the right is carrying.  It was great to see so many new bluegrass bands and so many younger people playing banjo, mandolin, violin, etc. 

 To top it all off, there was a hand-cranked penny machine with two HSB designs.  I'm a card-carrying member of The Elongated Collectors, so this was a very happy surprise for me.  One of the designs was from last year--those weren't being given out, but the operator let me squish a few of those when he saw how into squished pennies I was.  Yay!
 
By Sunday night, Carl and I were both completely exhausted.  I'm only now-on Wed-feeling somewhat rested.  It was totally worth it!

Mandala Gourd Purse

Last week, I started a new gourd purse.  I decided to go with a mandala theme.  I've only done the pyrography and cutting/cleaning so far.  If I have time, I might start the painting tomorrow.  Or not.  Hubby is coming home from the Denver Gem & Mineral Show tomorrow, so I suspect crafts will have a low priority.

Front

Lid

Back

Catching up - Part 2: Gourd Fairy

I was determined to enter something new into the California Gourd Society competitions at the Welburn Gourd Festival.  My original idea hadn't panned out as I envisioned, so with a week until the festival, I took another look at the competition categories and saw one of them was "Fairies."  That was it!  I'd make a little fairy out of jewelry gourds and whatever I had in my craft stash.  I finally found a use for some beads I had bought over 15 years ago!  They were strung on wire to become her arms and legs.  A couple of $1 scarves I picked up at a flea market set the color scheme and served as her skirt layers.  The only thing I went out of my way to buy was the hair.

Front view

 Here she is!  Her head, torso, hands and feet are made from four gourds.  

Back view

Her wings, wreath, and wand tip are polymer clay.
   

At Welburn with her ribbon!

She won second place in the Fairies category!   Not bad for something I finished at 3am the night before the entries were due.  :-D

Playing with extrusions

A few months back, I was playing with extrusions to inlay in a gourd.  The colors which looked so bright separately, ended up looking too dark together.  Not enough contrast, I think.  It seemed a shame to waste them, so I put some slices onto the turquoise clay I had used in the blend and brightened it up with some mica powder.  I'm quite happy with the result.

I've also been playing with making kumihimo cords to match.  They're fun to make.  I gave a demo on them at my polymer clay guild a couple months ago and we had a blast :)   The middle pendant is on a custom-made kumihimo cord.  I'm keeping the set with the rubber cord.  The rest I'll list on my Etsy store by next weekend.  For the pendants, you can have your choice of kumihino or rubber cord.