New Glass!

Here's a pic of a fun art piece I made in glass. This urban nightscape has a quiet, but slightly ominous feel, or at least I think so.

Card Art

I haven't pulled out my card making supplies in a long time. A friend of mine's desire to make some Christmas Cards prompted me to haul out my stash and craft the afternoon away with her and her intended. Despite not having touched paper in a long time, I was pretty happy with the simple, retro looks I came up with. I also am including a pic of a B-day card for my father's 60th B-day next week.

More Glass!

more glass work

First, let me say that my photography skills need work...badly. So, I apologize for the really awful photographs. Try to look at the art, rather than the picture. These are two more glass platters I created this fall. I'm pretty proud of them.

I haven't done any mosaic work of late, but ideas are brewing. As soon as school calms down and I find my rhythm, I'll get back into the art space and start breaking things and putting them back together in new ways.

More Recent Work

Here are some of the works I've created recently. The first is a teak bowl I picked up at a local thrift shop. I loved the lines of it. In the center are four handmade Mexican talavera tiles. That focal point is encircled by corresponding colors.
The next piece is a small table inset with a green ceramic Buddha, with waves of light celedon green circles radiating outward.
The final piece is a fused glass platter I created in a class I took this summer.

New Work

Now that school is out, I've been spending lots of time in the Art Space (aka "The Garage). I just finished these two pieces. The first is a childhood guitar for a friend's birthday. It was her guitar and the lizard is her tattoo. The second is a set of house numbers for our house. I'm really pleased with how this one turned out. I used two different grout colors for the first time. I'm pretty pleased with the progress I'm making.





I also scored several more cool substrates yesterday. A couple of birdhouses, a pair of mannequin legs, and a couple of cool wooden bowls. I have enough to keep me busy through Christmas!

School's Out For the Summer...

...and that means I can now take time to play! Yippee! This is much more pleasant now that we installed a window air conditioner. It's supposed to be over 100 tomorrow! My "studio" stays nice and cool. Turn on the radio and I snip, clip, and mosaic away!




These two are just a couple in a series that I am doing for fun/learning curve. I'm playing with vitreous as well as broken china. They are quick, easy, and make me smile. The backing is some leftover tile backer board from the remodeling project I saved from the dump. I will probably do some house numbers using this too.





The following pics are of the birdhouse work in progress. I will likely grout it tomorrow with the same light dusky/dirty pink I used on the yellow/purple vitreous. I'm critical of this one. I am not overjoyed with the front but am not willing to rip it out and start over. I started there and I should know better. Always start on the back! Oh, well.

Interesting substrates

Here are just a few of the pieces I have brewing in my mind for the summer. Ultimately, I'd like to have a decent size body of work to start shopping around to local galleries and craft shows.



A couple of mannequins I picked up from Craig's List for a song. I've already started wrapping the male torso with plaster-infused cheesecloth.




I haven't decided if this little guy is going to be covered in tess yet. He is a resin sculpture that hides under the hot tub steps.


She's an odd little mannequin I found on ebay. I think I'm going to have to prime her face first because she is kind of creepy looking right now.


A yard sale birdhouse.


A friend's little childhood guitar.


Wig head.


Small outdoor table that needs redoing now that I know better what I am doing. Hopefully at least!


An odd little snail planter found at a yardsale.

In addition, I need to rip out and replace the big picnic table mosaic because the tess is delamination from the plywood. This time, I'm going to double layer hardibacker and do something completely different.

DONE!!!!!

The bathroom is FINALLY done. We worked our combined tukus's off this weekend to finish this project. Paint, shower doors, accessories...all finito.

Take a look at the before and after.

Before


After

Bathroom Update

Andy finished up today. Now, we wait for the guy to come refinish the tub, then I can prime, paint, and install the clear glass shower doors. I'm thrilled with the way it has turned out so far. I've picked a lovely, pale aqua color to go on the walls. Hopefully, I'll be able to prime and paint this weekend.





These are pics of the two new doors we put in. The front door replaced an old 1950s three small light door. The slider was a really old, crappy, aluminum one that was put in all backasswards. Both of the new doors are MUCH better. I cannot believe how much difference the light in the front door makes to the whole front room.

The bathroom

This bathroom remodel has been a complete bear. Now, please understand, we have only one bathroom, so this took a lot of planning. We waited until spring and the warmer weather. We have an outdoor shower and hot tub, which has made cleaning up not so bad. Where the danger really came, was the two days we have been without toilet facilities. Believe me, the practice of "bucket and chuck it" ain't much fun!

The demo was a complete "roaring whore" as my contractor Andy calls it. This house was built in 1957 and the bathroom was designed to withstand a nuclear winter, I have decided. It was your basic 1950s black and white tile bath. Here are the pics of the before.




The large hole over the sink was where I pulled out the old medicine cabinet three or four years ago. I had been meaning to tile it and fix it and stuff, but never seemed to get around to it. So, I just propped the old mirror in the hole and live with it. We had replaced an old rotting vanity with a new, low end, big box store, expresso cabinet and a medicine cabinet over the toilet. I had painted this tiny little room about four or five times, and unhappy each and every time. It was more than ready for a real update.

Now, the demo was to pull out all the old tile on the walls down to the studs. What we didn't know to begin with is that the tile was hiding damn near three inches of 50 year old concrete. Concrete continues to cure its entire lifetime, simply getting harder and harder over time... Behind this wall of concrete is razor sharp steel mesh nailed into dimensional studs. This was a near crippling experience. It took us almost two weeks to complete the entire demolition. Hammers, sledges, and even a hammer drill were put to use on this thing. We hauled out three or four truckloads of demo waste.







The first thing Andy did was retile the tub surround and replace the old crappy fixtures with new ones.




Yesterday she laid the new floor over the old floor, after leveling everything.


Today, she grouted the floor, installed most of the beadboard, and most importantly, she installed my brand new toilet that is supposed to be able to flush a whole meatloaf!! I am a happy girl.


Tomorrow, Andy will do some electrical work, finish the beadboard, install the cap, install the square pedestal sink and fixtures, fix the hole, move the light fixture up, install a mirror and shelf, and leave me ready for painting. Next week, I have another contractor coming in to reglaze the tub. Once that is fully cured, we will install frameless shower doors. Then I can paint, and it will be ALL finished....whew! I will post more pics as I get them. The beadboard, doors, and trim will be white. I think we're going to go with a more robin's egg blue for the walls, and a white ceiling.