I'm giving away a miniature tree sculpture! Want it? :)

WOW it's been a while since I gave my blog and its readers some love. Soooo...how about a giveaway?
Now open for entries on my Facebook page---


The prize:  Miniature Tree Sculpture/Pincushion
Where to Enter:  http://www.facebook.com/FoxtailCreekStudio?sk=app_289264554441128
Details: U.S. residents 18 and older are welcome to enter. Winner to be chosen on Friday, 02/15/13

Description: A late summer tree stands tall on an earthy mound, ready for the beauty of autumn to come and change its colors. A mushroom and tiny stones can be found under the shade of the tree.

The tree trunk and branches are hand-sculpted from clay and painted in acrylics. The spongy foliage is softly felted with several shades of green, and the ground is felted with the same custom-mixed batch of wool, along with some small dark brown patches where the soil peeks through.
The white mushroom is also sculpted from clay and has tiny brown spots.

The whole scene is securely attached to a wooden disc that I've sanded smooth and painted dark brown. You can place this miniature scene anywhere you like... use it as a pincushion or as a sweet little home decor or office desk item.



I'll announce the results next Friday; thank you and good luck! ♥

Baby Bear in cream is finished!

He's all done and ready for adoption. Best wishes, little bear! :o)

♥

Lots of new stuff for Autumn...

Good morning world! I've been busy with lots of new stuff, so this is sort of a catch-up photo post :)

Curious Bear in progress  - I'm thinking he will have a wool plaid scarf and come with a little felted pumpkin like the ones in the next photo. He will be part of my Ebay endeavors :)

These felted pumpkins are new in the shop:

This slightly spooky wool pumpkin pincushion  and the sculpted black mushroom pins are also new--

I'm definitely enjoying gearing up for Autumn, and I'm SO ready for sweaters and boots :)

Wishing everyone a great weekend!!

♥

Pines on the River - A New Design

Morning all!
I finished a new miniature nature design yesterday; the idea has been tossed around in my head for quite a while now so I figured it was time to just DO it. This is all needle felted wool except for the pine tree trunks which are made of florist wire. The whole thing is 3 inches wide and about 3 inches tall:

Back to CreativeLand for me...have a great day!
♥

Mother's Day Shrooms

So the clay goodies I hinted at in my last post aren't ready yet (waiting for more supplies and then a photo shoot, can't wait!) but I did get some more mushroomy things made! :) I love having the opportunity to give my felted mushrooms little personalities, and these 'new mom' scenes were just the ticket.
So far I have a a boy and a girl, and I'm working on some twin scenes right now. It's amazing how just a little bend of the stems can evoke some kind of protective feeling.

 

Finished! Tree Stump WIP photos part 2

Yay! The tree stump and mushrooms display is all done and it shipped out today to go to its new home :) If you missed part 1 of this, you can see it here.

I took a few more photos this time than I did for part 1, you can click on them to make them larger. Here goes!

Here I'm starting to shape the base with core wool (this is where the tree stump will sit). I pretty much just make a coil and keep felting it together with the needle as I go, adding more wool until I think it's large enough.

Tree Stump WIP photos

Hello there! I'm up at 1:30 a.m. working on a custom order (I seem to work so much better at this time of night, I don't know why!). I'm making a needle felted tree stump with mushrooms growing from the side, and it's going to be displayed as part of an exhibit in a mushroom library. I've never heard of a mushroom library before...what a neat place it must be! Anyway, I thought I would take some photos of my progress; the photo quality isn't too hot since it was at my work table instead of in my fancy-schmancy (read: cheapie) light box, so please overlook that! :)

This is the tree stump I made from core (un-dyed) wool in all its nakedness. I start out by making a basic cylinder shape and then add bits of wool for the roots, and deeply needled lines to represent the texture of bark.

Here I'm putting the first layer of brown wool over the core wool stump.

Mushrooms are ready after an all-nighter :)

Hi there! I know in my last post I said I was going to bed, but...yeah...that didn't happen. I couldn't sleep knowing that these little guys were just waiting to be out in the world :)

I took some photos and started editing them, and I was having so much fun that I didn't notice the time...I got to bed around 9 this morning! Anyway, I got a few mushroom sets listed in the shop before I conked out, and I just finished putting another one up (after a nice nap and some coffee).

Here are some photos; these are listed in the PinTops/Terrarium Decor section of the shop:

I want to say a special thank you to Kinga Nichols of Crimson Frog Designs (she does breathtaking beadwork, please check out her work when you have a minute...your eyes and your creative spirit will thank you)! She encouraged me to keep going with this product line when I was (unbeknownst to her) second-guessing the whole idea, and she also turned a light bulb on for me and said that these little mushroom caps would go great in terrariums. Thank you Kinga, my kindred 'sprite'! ;)

I still have more to photograph and play around with, but you all are probably sick of hearing about mushrooms so I'll leave you alone for a while! =)

Wishing you a wonderful day ♥

Almost ready, sneak peek!

Hello and Happy Saturday!

I think I'm finally happy with the painting techniques I'm using on the mushroom cap pin toppers. Here are a couple shots of the ones I particularly like:

The ones in the top photo have a matte finish and seem more realistic to me, which is what I prefer. However, I know that not everyone loves the same styles that I do, so I also did some that are glossy with lots of spots (bottom photo)...they seem to belong in more of a fairy tale setting somehow. :)

You may notice that a little green leaf found its way in the group as well...I sculpted a couple of those and they were so much fun that I'm sure I will make more.

Some of these will be available in the shop by Sunday night once I get some proper photos taken (for those kind souls who are patiently waiting) ♥

Also, I'm excited that it's Daylight Saving Time here this weekend...I LOVE it when the days are longer and it's still light out at 8 p.m.! Makes the day's possibilities seem endless.

Have a wonderful evening!

How I spent my morning

Seems I'm a bit mushroom-happy lately. I spent most of the morning sculpting these caps, and I used a sewing pin for the details. These are waiting to be painted, photographed and listed as accessories for the pincushions in my shop.

A fun way to spend my first day of self-employment =)

♥

Mushroom Land

Hi there! Just a quick post to show what I worked on this weekend--tiny clay mushroom caps! I sculpted 25 of these babies, most of them measure only 1 cm. I can't wait to start painting them all kinds of woodland colors and putting them in my pincushions ♥

Quick photo of orders in progress

I've been so fortunate to have several orders for my pincushions the last few weeks! Here's a shot I took while I was in the middle of a pine-tree-making-frenzy...these little guys are waiting to be added to pincushions and then they will be shipped to their new homes.

Oh, and after I made the texture tools I talked about in my last post, I couldn't seem to stop sculpting little cottages...these are in various stages, some need paint or other finishing touches, but I like how they look all together like a little village :)

Time to get back to it so everyone can have their goodies by Christmas =) Bye for now!

♥

Returning to Clay - making texture tools

It's been so long since I've really dug into my clay, aside from making tiny eggs for my bird's nests. This week I had a dream about adding some clay elements to my wool pincushions (don't you get the best ideas from dreams??)...so I broke out the stash of clay in my studio and have been having lots of fun the past few days :)

I wanted to make some tiny little cottages, and I wanted them to have a nice rocky or sandstone-type texture. Time to make some tools! I looked around the house and found several odd things to help me:

What I made this week

After what seemed like months of running into a brick wall with every crafty idea that I had, this week finally felt like I was doing something right! Everything I did just seemed to fall into place and look the way I imagined it. From the mixing of wool colors and getting the layering right, to actually having the perfect color ribbon on hand, I am one happy girl. I wish I could bottle that up, whatever it is!! Here's what I finished this week:

Birds Nest Dimensional Mini Wall Art - 3 inch hoop 

Tree Stump Mushrooms Wool Scene   

Faux Terrarium

Do you ever have those times when nothing goes right, and then suddenly, BAM it works?

♥

Needle Felting & Mushroom explosion :)

There are so many different ways to create things, and so many themes...and I seem to go in spurts for a couple months at a time, switching back & forth between all the things I love to do. I've been mostly focused on needle felting and embroidery for the past few months, while crocheting has taken a back seat somewhat! Mushrooms have been a favorite theme of mine lately; here's some of what I've been up to:

 Pincushion in a 3.5 inch terra cotta base, about 5 inches tall

 Close-up

Another in soft pastels with linen thread details (grass sprouts and pale yellow roses), about 3 inches tall

 

 Close-up

And a miniature version in a 2-inch pot with tiny embroidered cap spots & flowers

I'm looking forward to starting some Valentine's Day themes!

♥

Happy Saturday and New Crafties

Hello friends! It's been a pretty fast and busy summer; it's hard to believe that it's time to start thinking about autumn already! How come the older you get, the faster time flies past? There must be a scientific explanation.

I've been having fun challenging myself to new crafty things...I'm still practicing embroidery and I thought I'd try an animal. Of course I chose to try a fawn because, well, fawns just rock my cute-o-meter! The back of the piece is a bit of a mess, but it's only going on my own wall anyways, so it doesn't matter.:) This is a 4-inch hoop, and I topped it with a bow of vintage seam binding.

I also tried my hand at some really tiny-scale needle felting. I'm still obsessed with bird's nests for some reason, I seem to try to incorporate them into everything and it just never gets old to me :) This one measures just under 1 cm. The glass bottles have been in my stash for so long, and I just ran across them recently. Don't you love when you find stuff in your supply stash that you had forgotten about, and it gives you a ton of new ideas? THAT'S why we hate to throw things away, see?

I'm off to do some house-cleaning, then it's back to the crafty stuff. I hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

♥

Tiny unfinished needle felted bird's nests

Wow it's really late already...where did the day go?? But I wanted to get this posted tonight before bed.
I really love the woodland forest-y feel of these little needle felted nests. I have a couple in my second Etsy shop as stick pins, but I've been making more the past few days just because they're so much fun. I'm weird...I like having these tiny nests everywhere! These are nests in various stages of doneness; the eggs are made of polymer clay that I baked and then painted with little brown flecks (click on the pics for full-size)...

I was playing around with my camera's settings, determined to find a way to get those awesome shots that have great depth of field (DOF).I think I did it! I also have one of those fabric collapsible photo-cubes that I've been using for a long time now, but I was never quite happy with it. I just didn't like the shape and it was too constricting, so tonight, I cut out the back and the bottom of it. Now it's 3-sided and I can just set it over whatever I'm shooting, and my backgrounds don't have to fit INSIDE of it. Why didn't I think of tearing it up before? I like it much better, and I'm pretty happy with the way these photos turned out!

Ok, time for bed! I have at least 4 kids coming over tomorrow night for a Halloween sleepover. I'm really going to need all the sleep I can get tonight  -o-

♥

Best Monday Ever & New Felty Stuff

I'm usuallly not a "Happy Monday" type of person, but today is different. It definitely made up for the ridiculous Mr. Bean-type of weekend I had.

I got some new items finished for my shop over the weekend, and when I got to work this morning, I found out that one of those items had made it to Etsy's front page!

Holy cow I had pretty much given up hope on ever doing that. It was picked by Admin (wow) and this little needle felted nest pin was up there at 6 a.m. this morning....right about the time I was hitting the snooze button on my alarm clock :)

Here's a photo of some other items I finished this weekend for the shop...hand-painted mini terra cotta pots with needle felted pincushions and steel pearlized pins that I had fun dressing up with glass flowers. These are really fun to make, they combine lots of crafty things that I enjoy (painting, needle felting, beading) all in a little 2-inch tall project.

If you'd like to see the whole Front Page treasury mentioned above, you can click here to see it on Craftcult.

Yep, this is the best Monday I've had in a while :o)

More Costume Kids :)

Hello! It's been a couple weeks, but I finally got time to make a couple more little cuties....a skunk girl and a dinosaur boy. Click on the links below if you want to see their auctions.

Auction for the little skunk girl :)

       Auction for the dinosaur boy :)

I was able to take some silly pictures of my (real) fatcat Leo over the weekend, I'll get them posted as soon as I get them arranged in some kind of order. Bye for now!

♥

Another Costume Kid

I've been busy today!

The fourth in the Costume Kids series is a 3-inch little girl dressed as a bluebird, and she comes with her own nest. She's up right now looking for a new home; wish her luck!



♥