Gone, Baby Gone

So, some of you may have noticed that I have been a little MIA in the internet world for the last two weeks. No Etsy, no emails, blogging, or forum chatting... why? you might be asking yourself, right about now.

Am I just too busy?
Not really.

Am I hard at work creating glorious illustrations... not at all!

A virus wiped out my hard drive and after spending two weeks trying desperately to save it, I had to install a new operating system (with the help of my computer genius uncle-- I could never figure out how to do anything like that on my own!!) and lost EVERYTHING on my entire computer.

The cherry on top of the sundae is.... I hadn't been saving any of my files (yes, including the pictures of my darling children) and they are gone, baby gone.

Sigh. How stupid. And senseless! I had an internet back up system included with my virus protection and I never used it once!!!

I am just thankful that I started this blog, because all of the pictures of my girls that I have included here would have been lost! And I am also thankful that I have uploaded some of my favorite pictures of Gracie and Annelie and our family to Shutterfly.com or else I would have lost everything going back to the birth of Gracie!!

Moral of the story... back up your files everyone!! I will never be so stupid again!!

She Wore a Bee Hive for a Hat

, I first want to thank all of you who wished me a happy, happy birthday! The last few days have been a treat and it is nice to have such a wonderfully community of friendly bloggers! Thank you all!

I also want to thank those of you who participated in my giveaway, which was so much fun to have and participate in myself! I am excited to say that I was lucky enough to be a winner in two giveaways and will be blogging about them very soon (... as well as a very special birthday surprise for both me and my grandmother, by another wonderful blogger!)

In the meantime, I just want to share with you all of the fun I have been having lately. I am working on a collection of lovely ladies with fabulous hats and here is the beginning pencil work of my first lady: She Wore a Bee Hive for a Hat.

I can't wait to begin working on her background! I have been treating myself to some wonderful birthday presents and can't wait to get to work on my collages! Here is a peek at what is in store for my future pictures, including this little bee hived lady:


I have never worked with rubber stamps before (well, at least since elementary school or just playing around with Gracie and some kiddie stamps) but am so impressed with how beautiful they are! I have been practicing and am currently rubbish, but I cant wait to master the whole messy ink thing and end up with some beautiful layered stamp collaged backgrounds!



I bought these (and more little goodies that you will just have to wait and see) from RhondaMum and am so excited to use them!! Her shop is just full of vintage paper goodies as well as some beautiful tags and wall hangings she has created from her vintage stash. So lovely!

I bought these labels, some from Covetable Curiosities and some from Art-e-ology, and just have to say that they are all FABULOUS! I am such a vintage paper addict!


And last, from Artsy, here is a handful of lovely vintage stamps... these will be fun to work with!

And for those of you who have been wondering what ever happened with my nursery pictures... well here is Little Miss Muffet, all finished up and looking quite startled! I don't blame her of course. That spider is quite intimidating! She will be off to the print shop and in Elegant Snobbery soon! As for Bo Peep and Jack Horner, well they are still being colored in.

Busy busy! But having too much fun to stop and take a break!!

Happy Birthday To ME!!!

Today it is my 27th birthday! Yay, hooray! I love birthdays. What better day than this, to give myself the royal treatment? Mmmm.... champagne and chocolate covered strawberries for lunch will do the trick (thanks to my Grammy, of course)!

It is a sun-shiny day and this birthday girl is going out to play, but before I go... here is an photographic ode to ME and the wonderful 26 years gone by.

Enjoy!!

Here is my family; My lovely mom, my big brother Dan, and 6 month old me! Photo circa 1981. Wow, I can't believe that by Etsy's standards, this photo would be considered vintage!!!

My first birthday. I still have this dress. I think I might just stick little Annelie in it, since she looks just like me. What a funny picture that would be!

Aw. I was a candy ballerina at age four. What a fabulous tutu!

My love for all things Parisian started when I went to Paris at the age of four. J'adore Paris!!

Gotta love grade school pictures! Here I am in kindergarten (age 5).

Photographic proof that I once had a fine flat stomach with zero stretchmarks!! Here I am at 15.

Venice! Here I am traveling the globe in my last semester before graduating university and settling down with the kiddie-winks.

No time like a wedding to be all dolled up like a queen!

My wedding!

The reason that my stomach will never be bared again: Welcome babies!

(** Please note: I still had 4 months to go, so don't sit there envying me for looking fabulous while pregnant. I gained 45 lbs and looked like crap***)

Sweet little family! Here we are when Gracie was a few months old.


And finally... It is wonderful being young, and fun, and going out on the town with my best friend (for the last 13 years) Jenni!


HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!!!

For The Birds

I have been having so much fun with my collages, but I have to say that my favorite things to draw at the moment are birds. I plan on doing some full color ones soon (I have a sketchbook full of things to illustrate at the moment, so who knows when I'll find the time!!!) but in the meantime, I have been making some sweet little tweets to share!

I love this one. I called it Bird Song. Mainly because I couldn't figure out what to call it. I hate naming artwork. But I like the picture, and I did explain the title in my shop description:

--- A sweet little bird perches upon a branch and gets ready to sing a melancholy love song. And what a lovely place to sing. This bird, drawn in ink on bristol board, is collaged to a background featuring vintage text from a 1904 copy of Shakespeare's Cymbeline. The sweet colored pencil roses add to the romantic vintage feel.---

Here is another bird collage. I have the original in my shop, but will be selling prints as well, after I go to the print shop next week. This one is called "Bird and Blossoms." My creative titles obviously know no bounds.

For bird lovers everywhere... here are a couple of birds I love from other fabulous sellers!!

These love birds from Boundstaff Press are so sweet! I will definitely own this one one day (as soon as I'm no longer a starving artist.... if ever...)

You can find these and birds galore, all created from block prints by artist Justin Miller at http://www.boundstaffpress.etsy.com

There is a new shop on Etsy and I am a smitten kitten! I just can't stop adoring the artwork of Kim McCabe and couldn't help but want to show off this darling little humming bird (on a cupcake... yum!).
You can find this print and all her other GORGEOUS works of art at http://www.curiousercuriouser.etsy.com

Well, the early bird catches the worm ( or in my case, the mom gets woken up by a crying baby hungry for her milk) so it is off to bed for me. Don't forget to love those birds!!

~Enjoy!

One World, One Heart Giveaway

This giveaway is now closed and the winner has been picked.....

Betzie from Time Enough!

Congratulations and please, pretty please enjoy these sweet little cupcakes!!

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After discovering some seriously fabulous blogs... and finding a list of more that I will be reading in the next few days, I have stumbled upon Lisa Oceandreamer, and her One World, One Heart Giveaway... an event filled with bloggers far and wide, all putting together little treats from their shops, with the drawing date on Valentine's day, Thursday February 14th (and the day after my birthday, just in case you wanted to know).

This set of soooooo sweet cupcake 8 x 10 prints is part of the OneWorld-OneHeart event giveaway from my shop Elegant Snobbery. The rules of the game are simple. You need only to comment on this post if you would like to take part in the drawing. You need not have a blog to enter this drawing ... but must leave another way for me to contact you. (if you haven't a blog, please leave your email address). Your name will be placed with the others into bowl, or hat, or Pampers box (whatever I have handy, of course), with one name to be drawn out. Thursday, February 14th at 8pm PST... The winners name will be posted that evening before midnight.

I will then contact you and get your sweet little winnings mailed out to you Friday!

and just for you:

.:: a complete list of the participating blogs to visit ::. Enjoy!!

Sneak a Peek

I gave you all a peek into my workspace back in October (here) , but since opening my new shop, things have changed dramatically! I thought I'd give you a little peek into my (not so) Elegant studio (also known as the dining room, although I use the term "dining" loosely as we never ever eat there) so you can see this artist at work... as well as sneak a peek at my latest sketches.


My colored pencils are the most important things in my life, apart from friends and family. Especially my DesignSpectracolor pencils which I keep in my vintage Volkswagon purse. These pencils became discontinued in 1998, when Berol was bought out my Sanford (the maker of Prismacolor-- the pencils in the bottom picture). My heart completely broke! Especially considering the fact that the gorgeous soft lead pencils are no longer on the market, and Prismacolor's hard lead pencils dominate. Oh well. I covet my treasured collection, but will just have to deal once they are gone!!

And here is what is left of poor Tootsie and Grace: a forlorn sewing machine. Well, nevermind. She will be put to good use in a couple of days as I'll be off to make some more sock monkeys!

I am hard at work with a Nursery Rhyme collection. Here are the first sketches (although my final drawings always look much like the first sketches. You will see my arrow telling me to move Jack Horner's hand over to the left, but other than that, he will look pretty similar once completed.

Poor Bo Peep has lost her sheep.... She is clearly upset about it. I just need to figure out her hands and her little hook thingie, and then she will be ready to color in.

Miss Muffet is my favorite in this collection so far. I love her hair!

Well stay tuned in the next few weeks, as I get these pictures finished, printed and added to my shop. They should be a lot of fun and I am looking forward to getting them finished!!

And in the meantime... I think I need to get to work sorting out the mess that is my dining room!!

Workspace organization makes things a little bit easier, so here are a few items found in some wonderful Etsy shops, to get you will on your way to an organized life!

I love the look of French Memory Boards, and the boards from Handmade Memories by JGuess are very sweet! You can find this board and more like it at http://www.jguess.etsy.com

I love Paris and I love adorable magnets. Tamar has them both in her Etsy shop. This little magnets are just the thing to keep paper scraps at bay! You can find them at http://www.tamar.etsy.com

And last, I have to work with my window open, as I use chemicals to melt the colored pencils into the paper (shhhhh! That is my favorite secret!). But when a windy day hits, a paperweight is necessary to hold all my stuff down! This Queen of Hearts paperweight is just the thing to keep a royal workspace under control! You can find it (as well as a king and a jack) at http://www.piccolobella.etsy.com


Enjoy!

Seriously Delicious Things

I have a sweet tooth. So does my mother-in-law, who has been visiting us from England for the last six weeks. We are together all day every day... and have been a bit dangerous in the kitchen. Dangerous to our waistlines, of course. Tea and cake makes everything better!!

For Annelie's first birthday, we got a little out of control, but man oh man, was it WONDERFUL!!! I made my famous (well, famous to me at least) brownie bites, which are brownies made in my gorgeous mini bundt pan and then smothered in my homemade cherry flavored frosting and topped with enormous amounts of chocolate candy sprinkles and a marachino cherry. Unbelievably sinful!

My MIL made Annelie's cake which was a sponge with a rich layer of raspberry and buttercream in the middle, and then topped with a lemon glaze (in a pretty feathery pattern). I decorated with a monogrammed A (Annelie is so chic!) and some flowers, with roses going around the whole thing.

Yeah... I'm not a cake decorator.... But I thought it was pretty.

And pretty delicious, too. Just ask my waistline.