Finally Friday- whew

I have been trying to get ready for our guilds yearly retreat, Sandy Camp.
It is challenging with a bouncing 2 1/2 year old that has no idea why I am ignoring her. Like I would. She has finally lain down for a nap, thus my frivolous time writing a little blog. ;-D
That is why I haven't been posting in the morning, I usually schedule posts the night before. I finally get to work after dinner and that is what I am doing when I should be writing my blog.

I always get a slew of ideas when I am writing a how-to, preparing for a show, getting ready for a class, packing for a trip, or anytime I am trying to focus on the impending job at hand that I am running out of time for.
So what I wanted to show you is a piece that came out of that time.


I have a few sculpts that I did years ago and I was making molds from them to sell in the Sandy Camp store. This one has always been a favorite of mine.

A happily content Green Man in the Cernit Nature color Basalt (502 in our Clay Factory store) smiles happily.

This was taken from an architectural influence and  replicates a piece of a building for you to wear.

The piece is medium size.

It is stained or antiqued with black Ne-opaque acrylic paint.

And then it is blushed with Super Bronze Lumiere. I have made a few in different stone and metal colors.
This one is in my Etsy store now
http://www.etsy.com/listing/82858271/greenman-brooch-1

A Green Man is a sculpture, drawing, or other representation of a face surrounded by or made from leaves. Branches or vines may sprout from the nose, mouth, nostrils or other parts of the face and these shoots may bear flowers or fruit. Commonly used as a decorative architectural ornament, Green Men are frequently found on carvings in churches and other buildings.

The Green Man motif has many variations. Found in many cultures around the world, the Green Man is often related to natural vegetative deities springing up in different cultures throughout the ages. Primarily it is interpreted as a symbol of rebirth, or "renaissance," representing the cycle of growth each spring. From Wikipedia.com 

I didn't get the whole blog written either had to put it away and start again later.
So friday is almost over now.
Have a wonderful weekend.

Wednesday Wonder- They've nailed it

I have been so tired. I tried to write this last night. but I was nodding at the keyboard and had to come home and go to bed.
So today I try again.
I used to be known for my crazy fingernails, I loved having them done but mostly the massage to the hands and forearms that came with, for another 8$. Totally worth every penny in my book... then.
Challenges came up and that was one of the things I had to let go of.
Que sera, sera!!

Here is Doris Day belting that little ditty out.

My dad's favorite saying,which I truly love, is Caca pasa!! Put that in google translator. ;-D

Well anyway, back to the wonder.
Finger nail art has come a long way since my time with the crazy nails.
This photo comes from a great blog called "Fine art blog" which has not been updated since 2009. It is very disappointing, but there are so many awesome things to look at there.

All kinds of women on these.

I bet these ladies do not do polymer clay, LOL!

Polymer clay ruining your polish? Use the quick dry polishes or the gel coatings in the nail salon.
I do have a question though, how does she wipe?

LOL, sorry, I have always wondered. The things that entertain me now, LOL!!

These are beautiful, but how functional can they really be?
A few have things added to them, but a lot of them are just different types of gels.

These nails below are just pure talent and gels.

Notice, little hamburgers, tacos, pizza, and fries on these babies. I could work with these ;-D
This comes from another site that looks very interesting site "Just Cool Pics"

And for you Hello Kitty Fans.

You know you gotta have these ;-D

See more incredible nail creations here.
http://justcoolpics.blogspot.com/2009/09/finger-nail-art.html
The Simpson's, Mario, Candy, The ocean and more.

Do you want to do your own? Here is a company that says you can, with stamping.
http://nailartstamp.com/index.htm 
Very interesting process too, check it out here
http://nailartstamp.com/My_Homepage_Files/demos.htm.
This gets my mind going, love that.
They have kits too. They are at the LA Fair in Pomona until October 3rd ;-D

And at About.com
http://beauty.about.com/od/perfectnails/qt/fakenails.htm
it seems I am totally up to date with my plain, no painted or gaudy nails... little did I know!
Shh, don't tell anyone, this is between you and I, they are painted black right now. It is only a couple of days until October. ;-D Right? I will just tell everyone I am practicing for the holiday.
Want to see some amazing stuff? Google "Nail Art photos".

Here is another great page from "Fashion Trends, Fashion Way Blog" just in case you are like me and have had to let all of your fashion mags go because of hard times, LOL!!
This will keep you up to snuff on everything.
http://www.daxoz.com/tag/nail-art-designs-in-2011  Here you will find the fashion nail trends for 2011.

You know, now that I look at this, who would have thunk that a series of interesting challenges would have kept me from becoming a fashion faux pas? LOL!!

How can it get any better than that?

Happy Monday- updates

I hope you all have had a wonderful week and an even better weekend.
I have been very busy.
We have our annual retreat for the San Diego Polymer Clay Guild coming up and we are all trying to get ready for it.
I have been packaging things for the store that we have there.
Making things, and getting ready for the demo I am going to do.
I am going to demo flower petal canes. The necklace above is something I made from those canes.
I love how this turned out and the canes are simple fast and fun.
I have also been playing with the new book I won from Nicole at Beadwright's blog. Of course I would get something new and exciting to play with when I am supposed to be concentrating on the guild retreat. ;-D
We packed all of our goodie bags last Friday and had a great time doing it.
This is our 13th retreat and we are having a Halloween theme, so I am very excited.
Our committee is a group of 13 wonderful women and we have a great time together too. How can it get any better than that? I enjoy myself so much I actually look forward to seeing everybody and doing the job!

I have also started making some Xmas presents, it is pretty hard for me to believe this year has flown by so fast.
I need to start now, otherwise I will not get everything done.
So this last week has been nose to the grindstone and things prioritized out of the week and others placed in front of those, late nights, and working, working, working.
I am still here and hoping you all are doing very well and life is treating you with kid gloves and ease.
Have a great week.
Smile at someone this week and share your light with them.
Change the world.

I made this! Halloween Album, part 2

LOL!! I guess I didn't hit the post button oops!

I hope you all had a great weekend and I wish you all an even better week ahead.


This is continued from part 1 here
http://mariesegal.blogspot.com/2011/09/i-made-this-halloween-album.html

And this is the rest of the album I made.
I forgot to show the inside front cover and 1st page.

The skull pulls out and can be written on and a picture added.

This is another page and I got to use one of the all over punches that Martha Stewart makes. They are very cool and work really, really well.
The card behind is red and the spider and web is the punched out black paper.
Ravens marching along the bottom of the page.

Another skeleton page. This is one of my favorite punches, Jodi and I call this iron gate, probably not the name but we like it.

This is a great page and the colors are standard Halloween. I love it. A photo will fit under the moon and bats on the right page.

This one is a favorite. I love the whole book. The vampire and the moon are printed on plastic. The tombstone is also.
Two paper is silver and gray are for photos and writing.

 This is another favorite. The witch is one of the best pre made decorations I have seen for Halloween. The cloak is velvety.
How about that spider web and spider boarder? Another Martha! She rocks on these punches in my opinion.

And the final page is back to the raven theme again.

The book is full and it was so fun to do. I mean how much better can it get when you go hang out with a dear, dear friend and make something awesome that makes you smile too!!
Lucky me!
Have a good week.

I made this! Halloween Album

Here is the Halloween book I told you about, from when Jodi and I got together a few weeks ago. I took some of the skills I have learned from Jodi and combined them with the Coptic book binding I taught myself and some new ideas to make this Halloween scrap-book.
I love the holiday and I finally got to make something for it in the paper area.
Jodi would not let me put bats all over the houses we made at Christmas for my family. I know there is good reason behind this, she always has those.
I just have a hard time seeing that from my point of view. I mean, don't you think that everything should have skellies, bats, and wicked cool fences and ghosts and pumpkins, candy corn and witches all over it, all of the time?
See, I knew there would be tons of you that agreed with me. After all, the colors for Halloween are just divine, right?
I can see Jodi in my mind, shaking her head right now and not in that up and down "yes" fashion either. ;-P

I used this monster colored green paper with crows(ravens) all over and spider webs too for the covers.
I used my thin chip board but double-sided taped 3 pieces together.
This is quarter sheet of paper book, 4 1/4" by 5 1/2". I then covered with that awesome green paper.

Like so.

Double sided tape to adhere.

Covers done on the outside. Chose very cool raven paper for the inside.

I used Distress ink to age the edges of the outside and the inside of the covers.
Gives it that spooky feel!

This is a full sheet 8 1/2" by 11" of card stock scored down the length in the middle.

And then scored down the middle of it the other way! Jodi learned and shared with me about the ball stylus on the score board. It works great, better than my bone folder. Howard carries these in the www.ClayFactory.com  of all sizes. We have double-sided, like this one shown, and single sided too.

It is folded and holes are poked in the middle fold. This is the page opened up here. This is one signature in the book. I did this to make pockets to hold things.

I used the Big Bite to punch the holes in  the covers for the eyelets.
I make a template to make the holes 1/4" in from the edge on the cover where I am going to make the holes.
I lay the template on my score board and make the scores evenly spaced so I can see them.
I will have to make one later so you can see how I mark and place the holes.
Another tutorial!

Here the holes are punched in the cover.

Here you can see the eyelets and the binding. The pages are in.

Here is a different look at them.

I glued two pages together either on the side or on the top and made pockets to put things in. I made the page on the right a diagonal pocket.
And the one on the left a side pocket. I glued another piece of paper to the front on the left to make another pocket for the Happy Halloween tag.

The pocket on the left is a top loader and I glued the side together to do that. The pocket on the right is a top loader too and then I used another piece of paper to make another pocket on the front. With the tag in it.
I am going to stop here because Blogger is throwing a tizzy, too much going on for its poor little brain to handle.
I will continue this in the next post!
You can see though, I am having big fun! You can also see how a lot of techniques come together for even more fun for unique twist. I love when that happens.
Have a great weekend yall'

Look at this! DissyB's Bazaar

I won another thing just recently.
I won on the Mary's Graces blog here
http://marysgraces.blogspot.com/
And Mary's Graces is having another giveaway and it is over today at noon PST. You still have time if you go there now!

I won this from Diane also know as DissyB.
I got it in the mail today!!
Thank you, thank you, thank you, Diane!

This is called a Tart Tin Mary.

It is little and oh so cute!

I also won the gorgeous bandana in the background. How can it get any better than that ;-D

Thank you Miss DissyB. I love them. I glued a magnet on the back of Tart Tin Mary she is going to be my "Mary of the calling Fridge".

May she guide me to the healthy food, the water, and the things that nourish this temple of mine.

I just found out that Mary glows in the dark too. Yay!! Perfect for night-time raids too.

You can find Diane at Etsy in her DissyB's Bizarre Assemblage Bazaar
http://www.etsy.com/shop/DissyB

And you can see this talented woman at her blog here
http://www.dissybsbazaar.blogspot.com
You will love her blog it is very informative and interesting.

Finished on the 15th- the Fave Crafts Blog Hop

www.favecraftsblog.com/finished-on-the-fifteenth-favecrafts-blog-hop-for-september/

Welcome all you Fave Craft Blog hoppers. My name is Marie Segal and I am a craftaholic, no no I am a polymerholic, no, I am just a holic.
I love working with my hands and this is my brain on crafts and arts. I can not help my self, I must play with Clay, beads, wire, paper, paint, pearl-ex, air dry clay, clay, clay, and clay, card stock, gel mediums (all of them), glass, recycled goods, found objects, cameras, computers, punches, stamps, gold leaf, foils, eyelets and brads, scissors, paper cutters, words, gardening, food, cakes, fondant, book making, scrap books, albums, canvas, score pads... I think you are probably starting to get the idea.
Nothing is off-limits and everything is fair game and fodder for my mind, my heart and hands.
I have been doing this craziness for 45+ years now as much as I can and as long as I can and with as many products as I can.
I do love clay though and it is probably the thing I do most often and the longest. You will find much of that and all of the above and even the stuff I forgot in this space, with little tales from my life, opinions, and pictures, with circles and arrows ;-D.
So get your self some refreshments, and stay for a spell while I incite a riot in your mind. After all I need some company in this journey. ;-P
We will laugh and cry, but mostly laugh. I mean it couldn't hurt, right? It is just about the only thing I trust in this day and age and it does help me stay out of trouble... mostly.
This thing I do has brought me through so many trying times and it has also helped me find solutions in life and friends along the way. It keeps me sane when I am stressed (well.. it keeps me out of trouble, mostly).
I am on a life long process of building skills.
You can click on the blog hop button above and go back to Fave Crafts blog to see other artists and their things that they have finished this month.


Here are some of the things I have finished from the last 15th to this 15th.

Last 15th I did a tutorial on making Millefiori canes influenced by Atomic age designs.
Here is the last one
http://mariesegal.blogspot.com/2011/08/fave-crafts-blog-hop-black-and-white.html

I finished this with all of those canes I made.

The tutorial for it is here
http://mariesegal.blogspot.com/2011/08/atomic-age-influence-votive-holder.html
 

I made a book.

Here is another book
http://mariesegal.blogspot.com/2011/08/my-coptic-bound-book.html
And here is the one above
http://mariesegal.blogspot.com/2011/08/ok-it-is-official.html


I made this tiny book

You can find it here
http://mariesegal.blogspot.com/2011/09/hi-immmmmmmmmmmmm-back.html

I made this book with clay covers.

I made this skeleton key. It is in my Etsy store
www.mariesegal.etsy.com

I made this Coptic bound photo Album for a wedding.

You can see all of those items above here
http://mariesegal.blogspot.com/2011/09/monday-updates-091211.html


And lastly but not leastly.
I made this Tin Can Box from a recycled 4 ounce Ortega green chili can

You can see it here
http://mariesegal.blogspot.com/2011/09/tin-can-box.html

Thank you for stopping by and spending some of your precious time with me. I am so honored to have you here.
Come back again.
Be well!

Tin can box

This is something I have been working on lately too.
It is made from a Ortega 4 ounce diced green chili can.

I like how it is hard to find the can.

It is also very busy, I like busy like this.

It has little feet on the bottom and they have angels in front of them.

You can see how big it is when I hold it in my hand.
Perfect for special treasures.

I am liking this very much. It was fun to make. It is using recycled materials. I think it is beautiful.

You can see the can now!
Have a great Tuesday.
Create a new way today.