Happy Birthday, Baby!!

My newborn is now ONE!! How did that happen? I have no idea.

She is now running around the entire state of Texas in her new silver and pink mary-jane sneakers (birthday present from her Grandma), chatting up a storm (but only making sense when saying Mama, Dada, Nana, and dog) and all around creating havoc around the house (especially since discovering how funny it is to snatch Gracie's "people" and run as fast as she can in the other direction... her new favorite pastime).

Here is a little tribute to my sweet, little Annelie Cecelia born one year ago today!!:

Gracie loved stickers. And she loved her newborn sister. Obviously the two should go together.

This is just about the only picture I have of Gracie smiling since the day she was born. Annelie... well that is another story!!!



Annelie was born with the "who are you?" expression. At one year... she still makes that face at least 15 hours a day.

I'm smitten with my pretty little Annelie!


Her big sister is so much fun to play with!!!


The best part about being a parent, is you can put your kids in stupid headbands and take pictures and they don't have a single say about it. Of course, they can cry the whole time... which they do...


She is a happy little thing as long as she is being entertained and getting her way!


And here she is... All grown up.

Delicious Things

I am currently in the mood for cupcakes. Lots of sugary, colorful, frosting topped cupcakes. My shop has a few of them, but there will be plenty more very soon as I am off to the print shop with my Delicious Things collection! Yum! The best part: They are all 100% fat, calorie, sugar, artificial sweetener, and high fructose corn syrup free. The cupcake of your dreams, in one sweet little picture!!


If my little cupcakes don't do the trick... and sometimes they wont, be sure to head over to Fat Daddy Bake Shop and pick up one of these bad boys!


You can find the most delicious cupcakes in the world (including Corys Confidentially Classified Candy Bar Cupcake as shown above) at http://www.fatdaddybakeshop.etsy.com

Go ahead and indulge!!!

Dollhouse Days

Gracie has people. We call them her "peeps." She loves them and has named every last one of them (and there are close to twenty of them). ""You want to play 'my people' with me?" is the most commonly heard question in our household.

At two and a half, the imagination and concentration that Gracie displays on a minutely basis, never fails to amaze me. She will sit in front of her pop up dollhouse (which my grandmother gave me for my 6th birthday... being a pack rat does have its rewards) for hours upon hours, and create an entire world for her peeps.

The princess and the pirate cook dinner together. Uncle Dan (named after my brother, who is not actually black despite the fact that her Uncle Dan "people" is) spends a lot of sitting at the dining room table, and all her people are compulsive house decorators.

I love Playmobil. They were the "people" that occupied my childhood for years and years. My own peeps are long gone now, thrown away when I reached my middle school years, but when I saw that Gracie's imagination and hand/eye coordination was ready for them, I couldn't wait to begin her collection. And she has been infatuated with them since she got them a few months ago. She has little girls with teddy bears and baby carriages, Mommy and her kitchen with a stove and refrigerator and a whole pile of dishes. She has a pirate set complete with a parrot and skeleton, she has a school set, with desks and chairs. Nowhere does Gracie go, unless her people are in her hand (usually about four or five of them at a time).

To honor all the dollhouse miniature and "peeps" loving Etsians, here is a tribute:

Besides playing with my playmobil when I was a young little thing, I used to create intricate fairy villages out of sticks and stones, flower and mud. This sweet Fairy Tea Corner, by PandoraJane is my little dream house!! How seriously cute is that? I am also smitten with her Fairiana Shell Grotto set. But I wouldn't recommend giving it to a two year old!!

You can find these at http://www.pandorajane.etsy.com

These sweet little dollies are oh so adorable! I just love Tate and Tierney, this little set of Teeny-Tiny Sisters found in the shop DawnAlice Designs. You can find a whole slew of these pretty little gals (and little gents, too) in all ethnicities.

You can find these at http://dawnalicedesigns.etsy.com

Looking for a miniature quilt for your baby's room? Love Nest Design has this sweet little thing which is smaller than a playing card!

You can find this shop at http://www.lovenestdesign.etsy.com

Enjoy!

Off I Go!

And I am off!

I only have three prints right now, and a couple of original ACEOs, but I have four more pictures at the print shop (including Titania, Queen of the Fairies), so I will have them in my shop soon!

Very exciting stuff.

Come on over to Elegant Snobbery and say hello ( or at least click on all of my items so it looks like my pictures are very popular).

Titania, Queen of the Fairies

I just wanted to show my latest snob! I just finished her this morning and am completely in love. This is Titania, Queen of the Fairies, and her crown is just divine, in my opinion. Her bodice is pretty fab as well. This illustrated collage is made with colored pencil, ink, and pencil on drawing paper and bristol board. I love her little butterfly companion.

I will take her and a handful of my other drawings to the printer on Thursday. Hurray! I also have three more that are being printed up right now, so hopefully I'll have a nice little collection of originals, prints, and ACEO mixed media collages. I can't wait to open my new shop! I am just waiting on a banner design by Rio Oso Designs (She also made my Tootsie and Grace banner) and then I will be off.

And before I go, here is my latest ACEO art card. I call him "Sweet Serpiente." Isn't he adorable?

Collage A Day

The Etsy seller Magic Jelly started a flickr group called Collage A Day and issued the collage a day challenge where you make a collage every day for 30 days ( a lot of participants are spending no more than 30 minutes per collage... Mine might take longer! I'm new to collages!)

I decided to give it a try, since I am going to be opening my new shop Elegant Snobbery sometime this week (yay!) and all my work has been illustrated mixed media collages. I am having so much fun drawing my snob collages which I will post for you all to see soon, but I have also discovered the world of ACEOs (Art Card Editions and Originals-- or trading cards for artists, which are only 2.5 in. by 3.5 in. in size).

Anyway, I hope you like my first Collage A Day contribution, which is the little ACEO shown above and called The Frog King. He is a mix of colored pencil, ink and drawing pencil, all collaged together on drawing paper and bristol board.

A Kind Surprise

The kindness and appreciation within the Etsy community never fails to impress me. I had so much fun putting together the holiday gift guide you may have seen on my blog this holiday season... it was just like window shopping for me and the items that the artists contributed were so fun to look at.

I was so surprised and touched when I received a message from Marcyanna the other day, thanking me for including her in my gift guide. And even better, she sent me two of her darling alphabet animal prints (G for Gracie, and A for Annelie) as a token of her appreciation!!
I just received them in the mail and they are just ADORABLE!! I can't wait to run out and buy frames for them. And Gracie was just tickled pink when she saw her little giraffe.

Thank you, Marcyanna!!

Here is a little looksie into Marcyanna's shop, filled with her alphabet prints and some breathtakingly fabulous photography.

You can find her shop at http://www.marcyanna.etsy.com