New Year wishes...

May your life be filled with love, peace and happiness and lots of  art making.

 May 2012 be the beginning of a world ruled by compassion, peace and harmony and respect for our beautiful planet earth.

Above is a little mixed media piece that I sent into a show at Westmont College in Montecito.

My favorite Christmas present this year...a beautiful heart shaped soap from a local shop.

A walk around the neighborhood....toyon berries...

hollyhocks blooming ....

prickly pear cactus.....

and my latest hooked squirrel.

Hope your New Year is filled with wonderful new adventures!

Happy Holidays!

All good wishes for a lovely Christmas Holiday!

Loved this hand made card I found at the Renegade Show in San Francisco.

Kitty says "Merry Christmas!"

Happy Winter Solstice!

New owl that flew off to the East Coast for a Christmas gift.

Two wooly owls that I just finished up last night. Can't seem to stop making things!

Not the prettiest shot of our Christmas tree but I managed to get it decorated with my mostly handmade ornaments from friends. We are off to our store's Christmas dinner party tonight. Both boys are home now and I've already made two different kinds of cookies. Love baking for the family.

Wanted to show you our "Squirrel" bird bath. This was my anniversary present this year. The birds and squirrels both seem to like it.

Penny gave me one of these for our Hookers Christmas gift exchange with a beautiful necklace inside. I went to World Market-Cost plus and bought more. I love the designs and messages.

I also got some fun wrapping paper...this fits in with where we live and some of the wildlife around us in the National Forest.

My son likes owls so most of his presents are wrapped in this owl paper.

On the way to Berkeley I stopped in Paso Robles and enjoyed this cute shop called Firefly. 

Lots of nice handmade items.

Fourth St. in Berkeley was my first stop in the Bay area. Loved this funny window. The next day I got to go to the San Francisco Renegade show which was lots of fun. I had to shop quickly as I had two guys anxious to get home after finals. So fun to see what the SF artists are up to and support the arts and crafts.

Fourth St. trees with decorations at dusk on Friday.

Now I need to clean off the table and move the boxes of wool out of the living room!

All good wishes for a healthful, peaceful, and  prosperous  solstice and holiday season!

Kitties, ceramics, and more...

Ten little kitty ornaments I made for a friend in Florida. Now happily on her family Christmas tree.

Two spotted cats who have eyes for each other. Now at "Imagine" in Santa Barbara.

Loved this pottery by Catherine Valance at the Waldorf Winter Faire.

Another platter by Catherine...

Dolls ...Christmas angels at Waldorf

Beautifully made pins, pin cushions and more made from kimono silks.

We even had our own angel make an appearance!

Monday night we had our Creative Females Holiday party at Penny's wonderful home.

Always love seeing Penny's art filled corners, especially at the Holidays

Anne always makes us a special bag of cookies to take home and devour later.

Some of Penny's amazing glass sculptures.

Just a little of the great Christmas decorations Penny shared with us.

We had a fun gift exchange and decided to have a quarterly "hook-in" instead of the monthly Monday night meetings.

And today I am off on another adventure to the San Francisco area. If time permits I want to check out the Renegade show in SF and some of my favorite spots in Berkeley. Son, Jason is ready to come home for the Holidays for a whole month. So I will be driving back down the coast tomorrow.

Have a great weekend!

Waldorf Winter Fair Dec. 10!

Hoping for a Magical weekend! One more art and craft show to go! Two of my art buddies are selling at the Waldorf Winter Fair and I just couldn't say no. So I am finishing up some things that I started and didn't have time to finish for the other shows. Heart ornaments...still need some additional embellishing...bird ornaments are a work in progress, but the chenille bunny is done.

Mary Henson's Christmas Fair

Here is Mary's wonderful home where we had the last art fair.

You can get a peek into the dining room where 3 of us were set up.

The outdoor pool area where Mike has his wind chimes and cat tails.

The kitchen and family room area where we nibbled on delicious snacks, soups, chili and hot cider and tea.

One woman in her 80's worked on needle felted mushroom pin cushions and we had live harp music as well.

Fun to poke around a friend's home and take photos....

Spider on the outside wall by the driveway...

And my little suitcase of critters awaiting new homes at the show. The first two days were a bit slow for me   and then Sunday was great. Friends stopped by to say Howdy and make some purchases which was much appreciated. Now on to the next one and then some special orders are calling my name, must do before Christmas!

Art Fair Today!

Mr. Gnome got hooked up just in time for the next Art Fair starting this evening.

If you are in the area I hope you can come by. It will be at Mary Henson's wonderful estate, 

"Cotes de Lances', 387 Ortega Ridge Rd. Montecito, Ca.

Friday, Dec. 2nd 5-8pm

Saturday, Dec. 3rd, 10-5

Sunday, Dec. 4th, 11-4

New cats will be there!

A few new owls too!

Two new dogs...

and maybe a new hooked squirrel if I can finish this little guy up in time.

Queen of Arts Revisited

Had a wonderful day over in Ballard, CA at Syd McCutcheon's country cottage Art Show and Sale.

I managed to make some more owls and a few new hooked items and had a really good show.

My outdoor display at the beginning of the show. We had incredible weather, 79F and bright blue skies.

One of my best customers, Kelley took home Mr. Cat.

I sold  few of the wool applique scarves that I had hanging behind my display.

Things seem to be calming down a bit today. Jason is back on his way to Berkeley and Dennis is working on our breakfast nook. I have another show to do on Friday, Sat. and Sun. in Santa Barbara so can't relax quite yet.