DIY: Pottery Class at Olive's Mud Puddle

From start to finish, I loved every minute especially the time creating with Tony. 

The initial form and creating...

First firing in kiln...

Painting 3 layers of color...

After 2nd firing...

And a layer of cream was added to mine and I outlined some words on Tony's in sharpie which resulted in the final pieces... 

Keepsakes to last a lifetime:)

WHAT A DAY: March 21, 2015

After seeing the movie "Gunman," Tony lovingly agreed to do something artsy with me. So we headed to Olive's in Ft. Mill, SC to create some clay birdhouses. 

Starting from a house shaped slab, we worked out some great masterpieces. 

Tony made a Gamecock house; however I failed to capture the end result. He did a great job for a non-artsy person. His mom would be proud. 

I made a little love shack :) and turned it into a birdhouse vase. 

Then added elements of our relationship so far. Faith is a big part. 

Light is my 2015 word. 

Xo and flowers and love all arrived in my life this year too.

I love this man so much. BIG SMILES!!

Although I did tell him I would go paint the houses solo, since I could tell he was losing interest after the first hour when he was simply rolling out clay. 

DIY: Framed Cards

I adore Sunny Carvalho!  And her artwork is precious and priceless. I especially loved the cards she makes, so I ordered a few on her Etsy site along with some stamps and a glorious necklace. 

To display her art, I spent a whopping $4. 

Frames from Mighty Dollar=$2. Lace ribbon on sale from Donna Downey Studios =$2. I already had the hot glue, pink scrapbook paper, and nails. (The cards were $3 each...total bargain...but you can use any photo to put in the frames.)

This is the result:

And they go perfectly on my framed wall corner. 

The necklace is a Mermie with a pup...me and Barkley :)

And stamps would also make great framed art. Oh the ideas are churning now. 

SUNNY CARVALHO: Thin Lizzies

The day finally arrives for my Random Arts weekend in Saluda featuring the artist Sunny Carvalho. Day 1 involved clay dolls...the SUNNY way :). The process was new and different and FUN!!

Sunny says her dolls are meant to look like Homer Simpson at this point. Lol. 

At lunch, the back patio was so calm and serene and beautiful to eat in (despite getting the wrong sandwich and having to eat avocados :(

Once we continued, the dolls started to take more shape and evolve. I was so happy when they were dry. The wet paper towel was my friend that day aside from my table mates. 

I've been in a tribal mood lately so my girl had a headdress. Now on to the legs and arms...the worst part in my opinion. As you can see I sorta gave up and just let them be wonky legs. 

The final resting point of the day was a dried figure that was unique in her own way. I called her Betsy. No clue why. 

Sunny had her gorgeous jewelry and paintings and stamps and accessories there for sale. So I snagged up this lil necklace gal. I call her Precious (yes insert movie voice here). 

And I completely adore this stamp.

Once I left, I grabbed food where I saw a restaurant since the small town is limited.

And then thanks to my detouring mapquest, I got lost a little. And thank goodness the cottage owner had a brief direction reroute since my lovely iPhone battery dies so quickly. :(. 

But I finally made it. And it was adorable. And serene. And just what I needed. 

TV channels were sparse so I started back up with finishing my doll. 

She started to look a bit caked with makeup here so I had to tone her down some. 

And I think she needed a few tribal marks before being finished.

WELCOME TO THE WORLD BETSY!