What's new!

Here are some new lovelies part of the Duet Collection over in the little shop!

A "Playful" little pendant with an Alice in Wonderland flavour



"Roll the Dice" super fun and chic sterling silver, ribbon and resin earrings



Super Sweet and original just for you: Monogram Necklace in sterling silver



And my current favourite this lace and hearts resin necklace

Another batch of Swaps!

Of course the theme for the last two months has been Valentine's day.
As much as I used to love V-day, this year I felt extremely overwhelmed by the outrageous amount of pink that had covered the world like a tidal wave.
Once I got started on the pink - heart trail, there was no stopping! Here is a little taste of the pink-ness!





I tried my hand at drawing a character for the first time. The theme was Alice from Alice in Wonderland.




Swan theme



I actually added an ACEO to the shop of this painting.

Shop Update!

I have been a busy little bee and the shop is updated with a brand new collection of inspirational word pendants!



"Love"



"Breathe"




"Happy"

I believe that a positive outlook on life can truly make your dreams come true. These pendants will serve as little reminders through the day that it will all be 'ok' in the end. I think of them as little visualization boards.

And of course just in time for Valentines day



"Valentine" stud earrings

Happy Shopping!!!

Swap Swap Swappy Swap Swap

I don't have the patience lately to work on larger projects and as a result I have been diving head first in swaps for ATCs and supplies.

Here is a little peak at some recent work!

I tried my hand at Inchies



Incheies a 1x1inch little pieces of art. These are red themed. To be honest they are way too small for me to work on.


Peacock themed ATC collage



Blue Themed ATCs





Red Themed ATCs

Re-use those lovely note cards - Tutorial

I never have the heart to throw away the wonderful cards I received from friends, family, customers and swap partners. I also always run out of cards to send to those people as well.
This is why I decided to start re-vamping cards I have received into treasures that I can send out again.
Re-use, re-cycle, re-love!



What you will need:

Old Cards
Card stock
Glue
Stamps, letter stickers etc

Start with measuring out one of your cards and cutting a few new cards out of your card stock. I was lucky enough to pass by a garage sale and find an old gentleman getting rid of a nice variety of card stock.



Fold and score the new cards



Select a card that you would like to use to create your new cards, I picked this funky colourful polka dot card.



And then I cut out the funky dots



I decided to stamp the word "Thanks" on my cards, but you can do anything you like



Here I cut a note card into strips for a funky block style new card



The best part about this is that really anything goes!!!

For envelopes, I unglued one the envelope the original card came in and used it as a template.



I picked some large enough pages of old magazines I had received in a supply swap to make my new envelopes out of and traced the template on them.



Cut and glue!



and TA DA!!!
New note cards to send out to the world!!!

You can recycle all of your Christmas cards this way and be ready to send them out next Holiday season!!!



Enjoy!!!

What's new, pussycat....woooaoaoaaa

As I buckle down to focus on the last 3 months of my program, which means that all I will have time for is to Tweet and occasionally blog how horrible my life is, I decided to take this weekend and focus on my Etsy shop.

Friday I was able to drive myself through the horrible rainy day to the Toronto convention centre for the Bead Oasis Show. Being around all of the beads and materials, inspired me for this very productive weekend.

Let me present the "Silk" collection, now in Peach Freshwater Pearls!!!



The Necklace available here!



The very popular Stud earrings
I am very excited that several brides all over the world will be wearing the Creamy white "Silk" studs on their special day!

And the dangly version of the earrings will be available in the next week



Lets hope that the next 3 months are a lot less painful than I imagine them to be...my promise to myself is that once I am done I will start painting again. That would be 3 years since I last held a paintbrush

It's NYE you have to be shiny!!!

What better excuse than NYE to wear a disco ball outfit and play up my make up.
I am absolutely addicted now to experimenting with all of the make up and different colours and such out there, gone are the days of pink eyeshadow and a dash of black eyeliner.

Time to have some fun!!!










Incredibly smooth skin thanks to Revlon's Beyond Natural Smoothing Primer and liquid foundation. The primer is incredible and just perfect for a night when you know you will be photographed a LOT.

Eyes:
Colorstay Eye shadow quad in Berry Bloom
Avon Big Color eye pencil in Lightening
The shiny blue eyeliner - Annabelle Glitterama liquid eyeliner in Celestial Sky

The only thing I regret is picking up an old mascara as I couldn't find my good bottle.

Now how do I make it so that the pictures are more true to color? The actual make up was really vivid.

Waiting for Santa!

Remember how last year's Christmas tree tricked me and instead of it being 5ft it was as tall as my ceiling



Well this year, I knew that
a) if a tree is taller than me it is not 5ft and
b) if it spans from the back to the front of the car than it definitely is not 5ft tall



A little bit more my size and that much easier to sneak in and later out the apartment building ;)

and this is what happens when you play with the ornaments for too long

A bit of a Sale...

Well actually a pretty big bit of a sale... 25% off the entire shop until Nov 30th!!!

Happy Halloween!!!!

Somehow I went from planning to be a pirate for a year.... to maybe Batman (yes I realize I am a girl and still BatMAN) to a hastily put together fairy. And after a lot of great anticipation I felt extremely tired yesterday and the night almost didn't happen.
But it did and I had the perfect excuse to play with my make up ....

In cooking news...

I don't know how I caught the cooking bug, but I have and I am not sure that I want to shake it.
I think it is the new job. My coworkers love to share their food at lunch and are always bringing in new things and so I had to follow suit.
I started out with the simplest and most yummy Banana Bread



Lex's Banana Bread (named after my coworker's wife, whose recipe this is)

1/2 cup of creamed butter
1 cup sugar
1 egg
3 very ripe bananas
2 tbsp milk
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups flour

Cream the butter and add the sugar, egg, banana and milk together. Blend well. Add all dry ingredients together then add to the wet mixture. Should fit into a 9 inch, greased baking dish.
Bake at 350F for 35 to 40 mins. Simple I told you!

Apart from desserts, I have also ventured into my favourite mama recipes too.



Moussaka

and finally today I made Thanksgiving dinner for my sister and friends.



and the BIRD!!!

Happy Sunday...

oh how I wish Sundays did not end with Mondays...

This weekend I found myself living the life of shut-in as my only venture into the real world was a quick but expensive trip to the pet store followed by another quicker trip to the art supply store.
The rest of the time I was somewhere in between the piles or should I say mountains of supplies that I own.



I gathered and packaged my Journaling supplies swap



Two packages to fly of to different sides of the world.

I also completed another swap titled "Flowered ATCs: Daises"



I haven't worked on mixed media projects in a while and I thought that the best way to get myself back in the groove would be if I signed up for a few swaps.
My style is a bit different now and the whole process has evolved for me. I actually sketched, picked out the papers & organized them prior to starting. I used to just splash things together before.
The swap called for 2 ATCs and I created one slightly different to put in the Shop! as an ACEO.



"Dream Big"