ATC Swap - dogs [dachshunds]

I've been practising my ink work on ATC's for a Drawspace Swap on the topic of dogs. I decided to do .......what else.........all dachshunds. Most are Standard Smooths, but I also did a few longs and minis. Here are a few of the cards I've done so far.

I have been enjoing trying to get the expressions right and keeping the dots small enough. Until I am in the middle of playing with the images and the ink I forget how much I really do enjoy the process of making these ink images.

More Winter and Pieces ATC's

Here are some more of the Winter and Pieces Swap cards.

Called this starting the beanie

This is a crochet cluster

These are peg dolls made from
bits and pieces

some cotton reels

and finally some chess pieces

I have been extremely fortunate in winning a draw prize from Melody Lamb - a wonderful miniaturist. The little frog porcelain ornament arrived yesterday in the mail and it is beautiful!

I would recommend any and everyone to have a look at her beautiful miniature artworks on her blogsite at http://melodylamb.blogspot.com . At the moment she is doing a series of winter birds - and has the story on there of a little baby house sparrow that she hand raised - so cute!

More ATC's

Wow!! Last month here in Oz was a scorcher! We broke temperature records!

It has finally cooled down, but I think it lulling us into a false sense of security, then at Christmas it'll be a stinker!

Anyway I have been doing ATc's for a few swaps all at once - still doing some for the pieces swap and so here are some more game pieces that I have done for that one.

Dominoes

Rubik's Cube
Twister Spinner


I have changed tack on the Winter trade and decided to do some on knitting. I am knitting beanies for newborns at the moment - part of the knitting for charity that I do - and I thought that it would be a great idea for the cards - just couldn't hold the knitting and sketch at the same time LOL!

And the last swap I have on my hands is one on giraffes - I didn't think I could come up with enough ideas for it but I managed - so here are a few of my giraffes - stuffed ones, romantic ones and hungry one's. I am continually amazed with the fact that I can come up with so many images just from hunting through photos on the net, and everyone else on the swap comes up with images that are individual as well. I guess it is this swapping of singular ideas and styles that keeps me swapping . I love these tiny individual paintings!

I have been making cards for a monster swap and had to wrack my brain to think of what was scary to lots of people and I came up with these for a start.

I love the fact that so many everyday things can become scary objects in our minds, a nasty grin or odd look, add a little darkness and our imagination takes over big time!

Happy Halloween

I have realised that I haven't posted any of my pastels........they aren't new, but I am proud of them - most are on full sheets of Colorfix, except for the tiger's eyes below - it is about 17" x 9" (if I remember right) - I wanted to get that look as though he was watching through a gap in the grasses - I wanted the eyes to follow you around the room, I don't know if I got that, but the eyes can give some people the willies!

I started doing pastels of companion animals, and this bassett was the first one that I did - he is an Australian Champion - I just loved those soulful eyes, couldn't resist him, really.

This is my first ever nude - I was planning to do a pair - male and female - for my bedroom, but my best friend was so admiring of her that I made it her Christmas present a little while ago. I enjoyed doing this so much that I did another and will probably do a few more.

This second nude I just had to experiment with the play of light - I loved doing it ....but pastel dust all the time on the black Colorfix was a real pain in the proverbial!

Well I have done a couple more ATC's for the swaps I am in, but have been running relatives to and from hospital appts lately and have some more chauffering to do next week, so will be slower with these swaps. For the 'Pieces' swap I have decided to do childhood games - those things that we could never play with when we wanted because we had lost the important pieces!

And I am trying to get used to the new softer Polychromos pencils and I think I am getting better with the blending - this native hibiscus was fun to do.

Today I was trying to get rid of one those hideous malaware attacks that somehow snuck under my Anti-virus Protection. The Protection people were great though and step by step told me what to do and I now thankfully don't have the rotten little pop-up associated with the malaware popping up every few seconds and making it impossible to get anything done on the computer.

With dial-up it took me half the day though to download the program I needed to do the deed then get the log back to the guys in the know ...........I hate not having any speed!! But at least the job is now done and I can surf around again in relative safety!