Etsy Treasury Favorites

I'm loving all the treasuries I've seen lately that are using turquoise as the main color in Halloween themed collections. Make it official....turquoise is the new orange!! And here's one of my favorites. Please take a peek and enjoy!!

'Day of the Dead' by wintergarden

Thanks buckscountyframes for the inspiration!

Teal Harvest - Fine Art... buckscountyfra... $30.00	Dia de los Muertos one-... FrozenMusic $75.00
HALLOWEEN SUMMER VAMPIR... Crowsmack $16.00	BLUE FIRE Necklace, La... DorotaJewelry $32.00
Skeletal Lovers 2 - ano... tenderbeasts $25.00	Spider in Web - Handmad... lesperancetile $10.00
Wizard Staff Green Fluo... AlbinoHippo $120.00	Hair - 11x14 Photograph... studiocvh $45.00
Ghosts of Salem - 5x7 ... ara133photogra... $15.00	TYPOGRAPHY - there'... brookewoolley $15.00
FRISKY WALKS undead pri... MATTY8080 $16.00	FREE SHIP REAL CICADA S... REALBUTTERFLYG... $29.99
In a Pastel Halloween D... wondrousstrang... $18.00	Copper Enamel Skull Pen... Venbead $25.00
LAST CHANCE Halloween R... deepfried $5.74	Soap - Glowing Legionel... CleanerScience $8.50

Generated using Treasury HTML code generator by Whale Shark Websites.

New tiny tile - Homage to a Spider that I squashed.

It's always fun for me to reinvent a piece that has been done before - especially when it's a piece that I originally created! After I entered a large hand carved tile I made into the "Tile Challenge" for the Etsy Mud Team, I decided the image would be a great addition to my tiny tile collection of magnets and ornaments. Who wouldn't LOVE to hang a little spider on that Holiday tree? Sign me up!

Original carved tile, measuring about 7 1/2" wide and 9 1/2" tall.

So I got out my wax and carved it smaller, poured a plaster mould, pressed that into a thin slab of clay, fired, glazed, re-fired it and, "Hello again, Mister Spider!"

Tiny version - measures about 1 3/4 wide" x 2 1/8" tall.

Here they are together....Father and son? Mother and daughter? Who knows for sure, but I can tell you this - they're both dead. Here's the original story that I posted about my inspiration to carve the large tile -

Homage to a spider that I squashed

This handcarved tile measures approximately 7 1/2" wide X 9 1/2" high, and about 3/4" thick. It was carved in a tan stoneware clay as homage to a spider that I squashed. In all fairness to myself, it clearly crossed the personal space boundaries posted in my studio policies. AND, it came upon me without notice, and JUMPING at that, so it wasn't pre-meditated squashing, but it was well deserved. I don't make it a habit of squashing spiders, and when they appear near or on me when I'm outside, I usually just brush them away. I admit this one gave me quit a start. Hey, even Miss Muffett, who I hear was known for her calm, collected manner, reacted in a poor fashion when surprised by an arachnid.

The tile is glazed in a gloss black on the spider body, green shino on the "web" border, and glossy clear in the background and spider markings.

You can find them for sale in my
Etsy Shop!

Song of the Day - Robert Glasper Trio

A continuation of our trip to NYC, now 2 weeks ago! After a visit to the Cooper Hewitt on the upper east side of Manhattan, we made plans to meet up with Don's sister and brother-in-law for some evening entertainment at the Jazz Standard on 27th Street. We took a lovely and very entertaining walk down Madison Avenue from 90th to around 42nd Street, until my feet screamed "TAXI"! We arrived at the Blue Smoke Restaurant in time to sit and have a cocktail and appetizer before the they let us into the Jazz Standard, which is located in the basement. The Blue Smoke's menu is also served downstairs before the band begins, and Rick and Jaye arrived in time to order food and drinks, and we all enjoyed a delicious dinner and were wowed by the Robert Glasper Trio! Here's a short clip of some of his music.

Don and I after the show at the Jazz Standard

Rick and Jaye

Tiles for America

Don and I have spent a lot of time in NYC over the years. Since our distributor, Waterworks, has a few showrooms there, and we work with a number of architects in the City, it's not unusual to make a day trip of it. But we also have family who live in NYC, so it's also a destination for family fun. There are parts of the city we know really well, and parts we really don't know at all. Greenwich Village is one of those areas that we just haven't spent that much time in. So it was nice to have a good reason to walk about the Village after we dropped our tiles to a new restaurant that will be opening soon, on Greenwich Avenue. We actually explored the night before and got the view of the evening crowd versus the morning crowd - there was a very different feel to 7th Avenue from night to day!

We're always on the lookout for tiles, so it was a surprise to find that there is a tile memorial on the corner of 7th Avenue and 11th Street, called "Tiles For America". Hand-painted tiles are attached to the fence surrounding a parking lot, all commemorating the events of September 11, 2001.



We spent a long time here, and I was really touched by the demonstration of kindness and love that these tiles represent. Read the whole story of the memorial here. I took a number of photos, here are just a few.

A Little Trip to NYC

Last weekend my husband Don and I made a tile delivery to a restaurant that will be opening soon at 118 Greenwich Avenue. Our tiles will be set behind the entrance way, somewhere a bit obscure, or so the general contractor who received the tiles told us. We weren't clear on where exactly they'll be....but we'll be back and get a photo as soon as they open! Don was driving and decided to take the entertaining drive through Times Square...sort of. You can't drive through Times Square anymore, as they've made it into a pedestrian area last February. But the view is still over-the-top glaringly entertaining.


The noise, the people, the traffic, the unnatural brightness of the harsh lights....yup, it's fun!


And so much information is right there staring at you. Just the other day I thought to myself, "I wonder when Conan O'Brien will be back on TV?" I guess I just needed to drive through the Times Square area to find out...


This is always a fun way to get to our destination in NYC, which is usually the Union Square area, to meet up with family for our visit. Not the fastest way, but always entertaining!!

Saturday Song of the Day - Laurie Anderson

Just got back from Seeing Laurie Anderson's show "Delusion" at the EMPAC theatre at RPI in Troy, NY. The show was quite amazing and I found a clip with excerpts of it. If you get a chance, see it!

Etsy Halloween Treasury

It's definitely the Halloween season. Orange, yellow and red trees are joining the colorful decorations popping up all around town. I do love the soft glow of candles flickering through orange pumpkin skins. Here's a spooky Etsy treasury filled with wonderful treats!

'Have A Spooky Halloween!' by PaulysPalette

A Spooky Halloween to one and all! Have Fun and Stay Safe

Vintage Halloween Paper... anythinggoeshe... $10.00	Spooky Halloween Ouija ... pumpkintruck $20.00
Halloween Wreath with S... TheWrightWreat... $60.00	Spider - Small Handmade... lesperancetile $10.00
Spiders Web Necklace (g... beatblack $23.00	Burning Sky - Tree Phot... Raceytay $10.00
RED SKELETON PORTRAIT CuriousPortrai... $20.00	Spider and Web Pillow norajane $25.00
Hidden 11x14 Photograph Morbidmonster $28.00	Grichels leather bookma... grichels $10.00
ARAGOG --- Acromantula ... KirahleyKreati... $42.00	Spook-tack-ular Skull E... GreenGlassSanD... $7.00
Ghostly Graves - 5x7 - ... StudioHaus $10.00	Creepy Crawly- Spooky O... suemurraycreat... $15.00
Halloween Spider - 5x5 ... KristinReyer $15.00	Special Large - Into Th... buckscountyfra... $40.00

Generated using Treasury HTML code generator by Whale Shark Websites.

Saturday Song of the Day - "Woodstock" by Joni Mitchell

Don and I are heading down to Woodstock, NY today to attend the 11th annual Woodstock Film Festival. We're spending the night with good friends who live there, so we might just pop into a film or two tomorrow, if we can negotiate some tickets for the "sold out" events. It's such a beautiful area and the drive will be lovely on this sunny, fall day, so I'm very excited. Film reviews will follow.....someday!

World's smallest stop motion animation

I've been having a bit of a hard time keeping up with this blog, even though it's easier now with a theme a day. And, of course, there's always a good reason why I don't have time to post. Well, this post fits both yesterday's theme of "This Natural World" and tomorrow's activity of going to the Woodstock Film Festival, in Woodstock, NY.

From the site GAWKER.TV here is an amazing stop motion film. The info about the film is quoted from the site, followed by the short film. ENJOY!!

"The World's Smallest Stop Motion Film"
Creators of the Wallace & Gromit series used a 50x cell phone microscope to film this short—which also happens to be the world's smallest. It revolves around Dot, a girl who happens to be only .35 inches tall! "
Animators at the UK studio Aardman used a 3D printer to make 50 different versions of Dot, because she is too small to manipulate or bend like they would other stop-motion animation characters. The figurine's tiny features stretched the limit of the printer - any smaller and it would be hard to make distinct limbs. Each one was hand-painted by artists looking through a microscope.

Directors Ed Patterson and Will Studd attached a CellScope to a Nokia N8 12-megapixel camera to film Dot's struggle in her microscopic world. They said Nokia commissioned them to make the film in celebration of CellScope's potential to improve medicine in the developing world."