One World One Heart Giveaway 2011!

Hello FRIENDS!

Wow, it's that time again! The Echanting and Amazing Lisa Swifka of A Whimsical Bohemian is hosting OWOH, and I'm sad to say it's the last year (PLEASE CHANGE YOUR MIND, Lisa!)...

This is my THIRD YEAR participating in this wonderful event, in which bloggers from all over the world "Blog-hop" and meet each other.  For those of  you who might not know who I am--a short intro:

My whole life has been entangled in art. I started as a child, painting, drawing, and storytelling. I grew up to become a performing artist, and now I have come full circle back to the arts. Since I love folklore, fairytales, and old lore, Vagabond Creations is a reflection of that--the items that I love are the sorts of things you may perhaps find in enchanted forests.  I also love nature, animals and farming, and so lots of my time is split between art, animals, and agriculture!

Anyhow...I am so glad to meet all of you! And I hope to visit all of your blogs. So, I have a tiny friend who is looking for a good home, and she is my giveaway!

HERE IS "CUPID"

Like all my dolls, she is 100% cloth that has been painted acrylic, and embellished with buttons.

Here is her back. She has hearts painted on her jacket, and a button on her hat if you want to hang her as an ornament!

She is a tiny thing! Here she is in my hand for size measurement. 

 

She would LOVE TO GO HOME WITH YOU!

Here are the rules to win (please note these are pretty much standard rules for OWOH):

1. You do NOT need an active blog to partipate.
2. Please leave A COMMENT here ON THIS POST ONLY. Comments left elsewhere on the blog will not be counted.
3. PLEASE LEAVE YOUR EMAIL ADDRESS along with your comment, EVEN IF YOU THINK I HAVE YOUR EMAIL. I had a situation last year where one of my initial winners did NOT leave her email, and sure enough I could not find it, so I had to go to another winner. So please, make it easier for BOTH of us by leaving an email :)
4. Only ONE comment per person please!
5. I will pick A WINNER FEBRUARY 17th!  Good luck to all of you :)

Also, please see my OTHER OWOH giveaways on my OTHER blog http://beyondvagabond.blogspot.com

THANK YOU!

I'm Late...For a Most Important Date!

Oh Dearie Me!

          Where has the time gone? I'm like Cinderella, running right up to the stroke of midnight, I'm so late with this post!

I apologize, friends...I truly DO have work to show you, but to be fair, I constantly forget how much WORK goes into my work!  Somehow I'd like to think that *POOF*--whatever is in my head can go straight out into the world. 

I forget how slow I am at painting and..honestly, what I call "The Virgo Factor" (read: perfectionist tendencies), tends to make me fuss with the littlest detail.

Particularly this go-round, I also had to deal with woodburning, and how MUCH burning has to happen to achieve the right affect....you'll see what I mean momentarily.

(click to enlarge)

But first--you remember this owl?

TA-DA

Here she is in all her glory!

This is "Special Delivery"--I'm not sure why I call it that, since I think of storks delivering babies, but I suppose the heart is a special delivery, and I equated this favorite owl species of mine not coincidentally; I love the heart shaped faces on these wonderful creatures. 

The whole scene painted in acrylics, but the heart also has ~*GLITTER*~ on it, which you can see here (or at least I think you can see it, if you click to enlarge):

And, I threw a bit something extra in, with these ribbons, which are bedecked with bird and leaf charms!

Then, I decided to incorporate ANOTHER owl into a star wood-work, this time (or is it, once again?)--here as my favorite children's poem, "The Owl and The Pussycat.":

 Here is where there was wayyyy too much crazy woodburning! I love the effect, but wow, did time fly with this one!

The first Owl and Pussycat I did was quickly snatched up by Marie Patterson, whom I adore!

However this ornament stays truer to the poem:

The Owl and the Pussy-cat went to sea     In a beautiful pea green boat, They took some honey, and plenty of money,     Wrapped up in a five pound note. The Owl looked up to the stars above,     And sang to a small guitar, 'O lovely Pussy! O Pussy my love,       What a beautiful Pussy you are,           You are,           You are! What a beautiful Pussy you are!'

Pussy said to the Owl, 'You elegant fowl!     How charmingly sweet you sing! O let us be married! too long we have tarried:     But what shall we do for a ring?' They sailed away, for a year and a day,     To the land where the Bong-tree grows And there in a wood a Piggy-wig stood     With a ring at the end of his nose,           His nose,           His nose, With a ring at the end of his nose.

Dear pig, are you willing to sell for one shilling
    Your ring?' Said the Piggy, 'I will.'
So they took it away, and were married next day
    By the Turkey who lives on the hill.
They dined on mince, and slices of quince,
    Which they ate with a runcible spoon;
And hand in hand, on the edge of the sand,
    They danced by the light of the moon,
          The moon,
          The moon,
They danced by the light of the moon.

In any case both of these pieces of work SHOULD be available tomorrow... but until then, I'll be prepping for tomorrow's...or, umm, later today's...One World One Heart Giveaway! Hopefully I won't be LATE for that!

PLEASE join me HERE TOMORROW!

So, you might be asking yourself why the heck I'm posting TODAY, asking for your to return TOMORROW.

Well, as usual, I'm HOPELESSLY behind, but there are a few of you who have expressed interest in some of the works I mentioned in the LAST POST (everyone DID visit there, right? Because there were quite a few new and fun art pieces I finished).

In case you missed it -- I had this beauty in the making (and I AM almost finished!):

AND a few NEW wood spoons are coming along, like this one:

AND, I will be finishing a couple of larger "Owl and Pussycat" pieces and more Valentine hearts. Now, there's a bit of urgency to all of this because SUNDAY I will be offering up something lovely for OWOH.

And...umm...I suddenly have quite a bit of woodburning to do. My mother decided to become a BIG supporter of this new little art burning endeavor of mine. Yes...a BIG fan. In fact she sent a BIG package to me the other day--with THESE INSIDE:

 One part of me is excited and grateful...the other part of me is screaming "help!"

Needless to say, I will be wood burning until I am old and gray for AWHILE--but I'm sure I'll finish burning ALL of these BEFORE the snow around here melts!

And, in order to make room for all of these upcoming goodies in the Etsy shoppe, perhaps one or two of you might want to take a few goodies out of there? Umm..please? :)

In the meantime, stop on by tomorrow to see some of the finished art!

Winter Weekend Wood Working!

 Enchanted tree art...still looking for homes!


Hello Lovelies!

          I hope today finds you inside and TOASTY, as it appears much of the country is in the midst of serious winter lock-down, the likes of which are unheard of here. I shudder to think that later TODAY I am spending most of my day outside in something like 5 degrees Farenheit weather! PLUS, there's MORE SNOW in the forecast!


But for now, I wanted to show you the fruits of a WHOLE weekend of art labor!
I do believe I mentioned that this year I would make more time for art, and I had that rare opportunity when the whole weekend presented itself! Apparently, I got QUITE carried away with the woodworking, and so I've got new slew of Woodenware:


First--there was this box, that I mentioned in my last post:

Wood Burned "Stars And Birds"

YOU CAN FIND IT HERE

Now...the rest of the woodenware!

TA-DA!  

Up for grabs today:

"Fox Hunt," a deeply woodburned pendant, ornament, decoration.

The Fox is actually hunting birds (indeed--NO animals were harmed in the making of this art piece!).

Slightly smaller than the heart and hare pendant seen in the pic at the top of this post. 

One sided, can be worn as jewelry, or to decorate the home. This took a bit of work to get the dark color.

SEE MORE HERE

Because I liked the way "Fox Hunt" came out, I then did a slightly lighter burn for "Rabbit Run". Rabbit and Star motif. Same size as "Fox Hunt." One sided, and can also be worn as jewelry, or used as an ornament.

SEE MORE HERE.

And finally, for a touch of old world wood burning, I've made another Valentine-ish woodburning with hearts and birds, based on European folk art, the sort of thing native to my mother's country.

This ornament is DOUBLE SIDED. Here is side one...

Here is side 2....................

SEE MORE HERE....

So hop on over to the Vagabond Shoppe to see those and other whimsical lovelies...

Meanwhile, I am still working on what I intend to do with Vagabond Creations as a whole, but it seem as though, right now, it's being overtaken with woodburning...


Speaking of future plans...
I also have THIS painted work coming up. She just needs a few details and edging. I have to say, I'm feeling a bit shy about branching into actual PAINTED work, since most people know me as a doll artist....but I actually started out, as an artist, with painted works....

Anyhow, I'm hoping to finish this lovely sometime this week....

And then THIS is the next victim of my pyromania item being prepped with the wood burner.

It's a bird, it's a plane, it's a....spoon?!

Find out in the next post!

Until next time, friends, enjoy a magical day!

Winter Weather and Wooden Wonders

Wonderous Woodenware

Perhaps another "W" I should add is "Whoa!"

Outside there is a huge snowstorm raging. Apparently, it's been that sort of weather all winter long, in the U.S. So if you're on the East Coast, bundle up and be careful on the roads! I've officially decided to call this "The Year of the Snowpocalypse." I think it's fitting, don't you?

While the weather outside is frightful, I thought I'd update you on a few bits of news--

1 ~ First, I will again be participating in the One World One Heart Blog event.

This will be MY third time in this wonderful online celebration, and also Lisa Swifka's LAST year doing this amazing event. If you are interested in more information on OWOH or would like to participate, click on the red link, above and you will be taken directly to the site. In the past, OWOH has drawn over 1000 participants from all over the world in a wonderful display of friendship and creativity! THANK YOU LISA for this amazing idea, and all your efforts!

2 ~ An update on the HOLIDAY DOLL BALL SWAP from December. A few people have asked me who MY partner was, and I'm sorry I didn't make it clearer, because my partner SHOULD be a professional doll-maker, but instead is a humble wife and mother and DOES NOT even sell her dolls.

HERE is LOTUS's doll to ME!

Her name is Moxie, and she is a cloth jointed doll with SO many details. Isn't she amazing?

Lotus's blog is called  Whymsical Lotus--and you can also see the step by step construction of MOXIE HERE....will SOMEONE besides me please go visit her and tell her she needs to do professional work?


Finally, in my last online rambling,  NEW YEAR POST, I mentioned that I had resolutions involving my creative work!  I realized that I forgot to mention--*and I think this is important for ALL artists*--that another of my resolutions is to GIVE MYSELF credit for all of the hard work I do in creating my art, in the form of  pricing my art FAIRLY. I I know this is probably crazy, and quite the tricky field to navigate,  as so much consumer thought tends to favor  "cheaper (often foreign made) goods." But I have to believe that people will appreciate my work. Or at least I'm crossing fingers that they will. So please bear with me as I'm trying to fairly factor creation time and materials cost towards my these little art pieces....

Speaking of art,  you'll remember that I showed you my slew of woodburned curiosities! Here, they are in their individual glory!

(click to enlarge)

Vagabond Easter Ornament
SIDE 1

SIDE 2



Vagabond Valentine Doves
SIDE 1

SIDE 2


Vagabond Owl Love
SIDE I


SIDE 2




Vagabond Folk Flowers and Swans
SIDE I


SIDE 2


And the grand piece...

BIRDS AND STARS
A Woodburned Trinket Box!


....which I will try to get into the shoppe tomorrow!

Meanwhile, all the other lovelies are now in the Etsy Shoppe!
Hop on over to read how each is made! Perhaps you'd like to take them home with you?

New Year Metamorphasis....

Happy New Year, My Friends!

The New Year's Eve Table at my parents' house. Hmm, you think my first resolution would be to lose weight!

Whoa! It's funny how some things never change, and it seems I'm still busy enough to be quite late with my New Year Greetings! But changes, they are a'comin'! I've picked this auspicious (if interesting) day--1/11/11-- to tell you about my plans.....


It's been a strange, steep winding road, 2010 was. Full of challenges, but intertwined with fun and imaginative things, too. I am still grateful to have moments of magic, and still be able to keep my sanity (though it's barely hanging there by a thread at times)!

2010 saw SO MANY HAPPENINGS:

1. Our 3 beehives became 6, and this was the first year we harvested honey!
2. I became a manager of a small urban farm, and oversaw the growing of veggies, herbs, even pumpkins. And we even managed to celebrate Halloween in style!
3. The last of our two family dogs died. But we got the white haired SWEETIE IN THIS POST to help heal broken hearts.
4. I grew a garden, and THREE chickens (I really need to tell that story one day!)
5. NEW TECHNIQUES WERE USED in "the art department"...and more are on the way....

Which brings me to my New Year's Resolutions. I don't know about you, but I usually avoid resolutions like the plague. Something about this year, though, compels me to be more...orderly...so I decided to set myself a few goals (we won't call them resolutions, right?). And, in fact, I'm happy to say that I've already started being proactive on a few of them.

What are your resolutions goals? Here are a few of mine.

Remove more stresses in my life. I actually managed to REDUCE a few hours of my wickedly busy day job. Which frees me up for more art, bee adventures, and looking for the dream farm. Speaking of which....

Buy the Farm. Ummm, not figuratively! If you've been reading this little journal in blogspace, you may know I have a bit of Farm Fever. It tends to manifest itself HERE and HERE. I am still looking for a little piece of farm heaven.  And, in fact, I will probably be focusing more on those blogs this year. 

This year, I intend to make THIS blog a sales page only, along with any art related posts, such as my swaps and blog parties. So if you are interested in following me (including posts on doll making!), your best bet is to *follow* my BEYOND VAGABOND blog.

Swaps: yes there will be another two this year. They do seem to fall during Spring and Wintertime. I will be announcing the next one after Valentine's day. And I also wanted to thank all of you who always seem to participate in my online art shenanigans. What beautiful, talented, wonderful people you are!


Promote myself more, artwise. I am horrible at this. Or rather, I don't have time to even advertise that I am this little folk-ish  artist. All last year, I'd watch in awe as so many of my favorite artists and friends created or  participated in various art groups, while I stayed put at my tried and true ART DOLLS ONLY group. Which is an AMAZING group, indeed! But maybe I'm selfish and want to break out a little! Can't a girl be part of the Halloween, rustic arts, folksy groups, too? I feel like the proverbial braces-and-glasses wearing kid trying to get into the cool kids club!

Hmmm...I do believe that pretty much sums up the main goals....

And now, the last bit of news:


A few *NEW* offerings!  
You might remember awhile back that I started working with wood burning techniques.  I was quite proud of my little wood ornament, "The Owl and The Pussycat," which you can SEE HERE (and a BIG THANKS TO MARIE PATTERSON for giving it a good home!)
Well, over Christmas, I shuttled the wood burning equipment with me to my parents' house, and with ALL of that free time, quite A LOT got accomplished:

   TA-DA!

More on that story soon!  In the meantime, if you're interested in these beauties, you can snatch them up at my Etsy Shoppe tomorrow!

(And, I big thanks to all of you who bought our beeswax ornaments! We still have a small lot for sale, and they make great decorations the whole year through. Get yours before next fall, as we have only allotted a small amount of natural wax from our beehives)! 

What about you? What do you wish for this year?

Big Hugs and a Wonderful New Year, my Friends!