WELCOME! I LOVE GOURDS! I LOVE EVERYTHING ABOUT THEM. THE WAY THEY LOOK, FEEL, AND EVEN THE WAY THEY SMELL. OK NOW THAT I MADE MYSELF SOUND LIKE A WEIRDO....IF YOU ARE STILL READING THIS....I FIRST SAW A GOURD CRAFTED INTO A HANGING LAMP WHEN MY HUSBAND AND I VACTIONED IN MEXICO. IT WAS BEAUTIFUL(AND EXPENSIVE) BUT I BOUGHT. I INTENDED TO MAKE ONE OF MY OWN. I NEVER HAVE BUT I HAVE MADE A LOT OF OTHER FUN WORKS OF ART. I THINK GOURDS ARE A GREAT MEDIUM TO WORK WITH. ENJOY!

January 25, 2010

Vases/Vessels


Like I said...I love the "natural" look of the gourds.  Making Vases/vessels is the perfect way to do that.  Plus the only time consuming part of these is the beading.  The one on the left obviously not to bad...the one on the right....I love the way seed beads look...I just don't like threading them.  (  :

January 22, 2010

Blooming Flowers in the Desert


I saw this in one of the many gourd books I own. I usually try to create things of my own vision but every once in a while I will borrow an idea and put my own spin on it.  This was more time consuming then I thought....there was a lot of carving and sometimes I become a little impatient.  However, I do love the way this turned out.  I had a little problem with some of the colors running...but I think it is still is great.

January 21, 2010

Jewelry Jewelry Jewelry

I love jewelry....I had to wean myself off of buying it recently.  I went a little ebay crazy this month but I got a lot of beautiful quality things super cheap.  I'll see if I can't find pics of some of them.  Instead of buying jewelrly I decided to make some of it.....these were all just first attemps and very simple.  I don't know anything about jewelry making so like most things I attempt I winged it.
I will be thinking of more great ideas later...I have made earrings too I just don't have a picture of them...they are one of my favorites and I wear them all the time.  It think I might also make magnets like these...I found a lot of people don't wear pins...


This necklace I bought because it had wings and hearts attached to it.  I was going to use them for a project and never did.  The necklace came in handy and that wasn't even the plan!  (  :


January 20, 2010

Burning Ring of Fire


This was such a pretty gourd...then upon closer examination....there was a big crack running from the stem to the middle of the gourd.  ARGGHHHH!  Just like life sometimes you just have to get a different perspective.  Once I did that, the flames began to emerge.  Thus the burning ring of fire.....you can almost hear Johnny Cash.

January 19, 2010

Antiques

Well, I am really going to try to get my pics organized, and I need to get back out in the garage to work on new gourds and to finish a few that I left half done.  My mom and stepdad run the Timberhills antiques and were nice enough to put two of my gourds on their site.....
http://www.timberhillsantiques.com/
They have beautiful antiques so check them out if old things are your thing.  (  :

January 18, 2010

Sewing....not my forte


My nephew had a MONSTER b'day party for his 2nd B'day.  I had intended to make a gourd with a monster on it(it didn't happen).  We bought him a cool monster bean bag and  a book but I thought it would be fun to make a monster pillow.  Let me inteject here the fact that I got a C in high school home economics and a B in shop. My sewing skill are seriously lacking.....so I opted for a very basic monster pillow.  I used some fleece, beads and other fabric  I already had laying around.  Here is mine:



Like I said....BASIC..then my husband decided to make Harper(my nephew) one...they are buds.
 

Let me state for the record that his mother and grandmother have mad skills when it comes to sewing....he definitely out sewed me.....



We had a lot of fun sewing together and I don't have a problem admitting he rocked!!


I did make the belowscarve...which turned out great...super easy...basic sewing skills needed.  Here is the blog link I found the tutorial at:

http://hopestudios.blogspot.com/2009/11/weekend-project-scrunchy-gathered-scarf.html





January 16, 2010

Children of the Moon

I a lways love to see which of my gourds people are drawn to. For this fact alone, I really should do more than 1 Arts/Crafts fair a year. One woman said this was a scary gourd and she would hate to see what I dreamed(btw~when I do sleep my dream are mostly pleasant).  Her comment made me giggle. I think lots of things are scary...clowns, antique halloween decor, poodles~ok, poodles aren't scary but I don't like them.
I like this gourd and I can't say I ever thought of it being scary. Someone else didn't either because it sold.







This gourd was created after I read the MonĂ©re, Children of the Moon Series by Sunny.  Originally I thought it was a paranormal series, which I guess it is...although it has a lot of page turning sex, probably could be considered erotica.  Good books.  (  ;

January 15, 2010

Revisiting Summer

O.K. Definitely not gourds but images that make me smile. Erin and the girls got me a Nikon Coolpix L100 for Mother's Day. Now for those of you who are photographers this isn't a fancy camera to you, but it was just fancy enough from me. The camera I had before was just your basic run of the mill. Anyhoo~I found these pictures of the trip the girls and I took to see my friend Stefanie at her mom's farm in Concordia, MO(July 2009). The pond was the cleanest most beautiful pond and we enjoyed swiming all that weekend. The dragonflies even stopped to say hello! ( :





This poor thing looks like he might have gotten too close to the fireworks.  )  :





New Moon~Wolves




There are images that I seem to use over and over again....I'm not sure whether it is because I am more drawn to them or because they are the things that I can draw the best.  (  :  Sometimes it is probably a little bit of both.  Like the dragonflies, I seem to make the wolves and moon gourd a lot.  So here are a couple of pics of two of them(as usual there are more but my organizational skills are SERIOUSLY lacking).  Mind you some aren't the best quality, and others I had to distort so you could see my great dreamcatchers that I weaved in to one of them. The one below was for my friend Topher(thanks for sending the pics~luvmuffin)