Picnic For Two

Here are a couple more little woodland fellows for your viewing pleasure.  As I was posting these pictures, I was thinking I should have made a picnic basket.  Another time maybe. 

The skunk does, in fact, have eyeballs.  They just didn’t photograph so well for some reason.  Little stinker. 

My woodland fellows sure do love their junk food.  No wonder the baby owls are so fat.  All they ever eat is doughnuts, hamburgers, ice cream… I did think about making healthy snacks like apples and carrots.  But pancakes and hot dogs were just more fun to make, and to look at.  I guess that is what my little critters will be eating.  So sue me PETA. 

It Is Possible…

that I have gone a bit overboard making little woodland creatures to live with the fat owls in the stump.

It kind of took me forever to make a dear that looked like a dear.  All my first attempts looked like cows.

I love her little spotted bum!  You could just pinch it huh?  Stay tuned for more little woodland fellows. 

Stumped

This little project has been in the works for a few days now, and I am SOOO pleased with how it turned out!  I know it sounds really nerdy, but I was just in the mood to sculpt something. 
I have always loved sculpting things.  When I was little I was addicted to Play-Dough.  It’s true.  On my first day of kindergarten, I still remember that there was Play-Dough on each students desk right next to their name tag.  We got to spend the first few minutes of class playing quietly with it at our desk.  On the second day, I was distraught to discover that the Play-Dough wasn’t set out like it had been the day before, so I asked my teacher where it was.  I was devastated when she told me that we wouldn’t be playing with Play-Dough again anytime soon.  I had hoped that school was where you went to play with Play-Dough everyday! 
I got older and graduated to modeling clay.  My dad still has a few little doggy sculptures that I made for him when I was eight years old.  They sit proudly on his bookshelf at work. 
I took a sculpting class in college with my roommate.  I discovered that I really wasn’t as good at sculpting as I thought I was.  Especially when it comes to subtractive sculpting (objects created by removing excess material to reveal a form within, for example: ice sculpture).  Wow, I have SUCH an appreciation for artists who can do that.  But, I still like working with my hands, and playing with clay, just for fun. 
So, like I was saying, I was in the mood to sculpt something so I made a little family of fat owls. 

And then the fat owls needed a home, so I sculpted them a cute little stump to live in, and a few mushrooms to sit on.  Spencer reminded me that an owl’s natural habitat is in fact, high above in the trees, not low to the ground in stumps.  I reminded him that stumps are very cute and that this stump has central air and heating and hardwood floors, so of course my fat owls would rather live there than up in some boring ole’ tree.

Shoot, I would live in a stump as cute as this one.

Especially if I could have cute fat owls such as these for roommates.

Merry Christmas

How the heck did it slip past so quickly?  There were so many Christmas-y things that I didn’t get to do yet.  I had more Christmas stories to share, and more Christmas treats to give. 
There wasn’t a lot of time to spend with family this Christmas.  Our trip was quite short.  As a consequence, I didn’t take as many pictures, nor did I spend any time on the computer.  So my little blog has been neglected of late.  But, our time spent together was wonderful.  Every time I get to see my family, my heart whispers, “treasure these moments.”  Time together is just so precious.  The older I get, the more precious it grows.
I’m afraid I’m in a bit of a slump today.  It always takes me a bit of time to get back into the swing of things.  I miss my family the most after I have to leave them.
In the meantime, I am grateful for the Christmas season when the world pauses to remember the birth of our Savior.  I am thankful that because of his sacrifice, we can be with the ones we love forever.  That is what makes leaving my family a little easier, knowing that even when we are far apart, our bond is eternal. 
So though it’s a little late, I just wanted to say, “Merry Christmas.”  I hope your Christmas was a special as mine was. 
  

Cupcake Candle Holder

I don’t post tutorials very often, but here’s one I did for a project a while back.  Enjoy! 
 
Step 1: Create the base of the cupcake. Just mold the clay into a cylinder shape. It doesn't have to be fancy, because in the end you are going to cover it up with the cupcake wrapper anyway.

Step 2: Now we will be making the cupcake top. First, roll your clay into a long snake shape. Make sure that it gets more slender towards the end and is pointed at the tip.
 
Step 3: Coil the snake around itself.  Make sure you wind loosely, so there is room for the candle to fit into a hole in the top.  Also, be sure to end with the pointed tail up. 

Step 4: Now we're going to make some little rose embellishments. Roll another coil much smaller than the first one, perhaps about as wide as a toothpick. Then flatten the whole piece. Coil the piece around itself. As you go wider, wind loser so that the rose is tighter in the center and loser towards the outside edges.
 
Step 5: Now we are going to make the wrapper for the cupcake. Cut a piece of paper about 1 1/4" by 10". Then fold it every 1/4" accordion style. Glue the end pieces together, forming a ring to fit around the cupcake base.

Step 6: Bake your cupcake. Once it has cooled, I painted a layer of glaze over the frosting top. I also tied a bow around the paper as a finishing touch. Simple but beautiful!