Purplecat's Blog

Mon, 28 Dec 2009 14:15:54 GMT

WHEEEEEEEE!!!!!!!!!!!!

Runs around in a circle frantically.....I love COFFEEEEE!!!!!!*

*caffiene equals jet fuel for my internal systems....I am particularly sensitive to that sort of thing. I cant even eat coffee flavored icecream before bed or it keeps me up*

Sun, 27 Dec 2009 22:08:05 GMT

Got a wild urge to sculpt last night....I blame it on Lyosha, lol. Her owl drawings are incredible, and always have so much personality. I made a passing mention of my temptation to sculpt them.....and I'm pleased to say there'll be an owlet project....I'll be sculpting some owlets inspired by her drawings. We're also wanting to have little cards to come with each of them. In the end it'll be a project of such epic cuteness as to cause cavities!!!!! Mwhahahahahaha.....

Also working on the Clockwork Mouse..who's coming along bit by bit, slow and steady. I'm wanting to do the molds for him and the clockwork snail at the same time. So he'll be a main focus for the next week, maybe a bit more, depending on how things go.

Anyway, pictures!
Lyosha's hatchling drawing and the rough form of the first sculpt.

(omg, posting these side by side I seeee mistakes *grabs sculpting tools with mad fervor* it's funny how you'll see that stuff in a photo, but not in person so much)

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Clockwork Mouse! (still has a ways to go)

Sat, 26 Dec 2009 19:15:28 GMT

Yeeeaaawwwn........warm fuzzy lazy feeling of not doing terribly much is nice.

Played WoW.....sculpted a little.....took a walk, watched a few movies...feasted on pizza, then last night made peach chipotle taco salad...mmmmmmmm..... Read most of a book, gave the girls a bath..and will probably practice my slug imitation some more this evening.

Chris and my ten year wedding anniversary is coming up on the 30th..and I need to make a few plans for a cake. I wish I could afford some of the gumpaste roses I saw on a edible flower site....but not this time around...as they cost a bit more than I have at the moment. We may have a late cake, when I can afford for the flowers I want on it.

Ten years....and to think people were tellin us left and right not to get married. I'm so glad we did. Sometimes it's hard to believe that ten whole years have gone by.

yeaaawwwn...stretch...mmmmmmmmm...where'd the cookies go?

Thu, 24 Dec 2009 21:43:13 GMT

PapaJohns now has an online feature, that gives you points according to how much you've spent there in the past year. This is an enlightening, and frightening feature. Who knew we spent so much on pizza and hotwings? (nope....I'm not givin the amount of how much we've spent, lets just say it was disturbing)

Despite this.....I'm still oddly craving hotwings.....

Wed, 23 Dec 2009 16:14:37 GMT

Couple of new things.

Tue, 22 Dec 2009 19:18:19 GMT

Put the last clearcoat layers on the batch of stuff I've been painting the last few days.

Whew...I'll be happy when they're boxed up and stored on the stock shelves. They still need the stamps and little felt footies put on them, but I'm thrilled the paintwork is over. I'm tediously trying to work my way through my casting shelf. I've had a TON of castings sitting around waiting for cleaning and paint. There's no such thing really as pouring just what you need... there's always just a little plaster left over, which I use to fill one of the smaller molds, if there's enough. Sooo....i've got overstock on several of the smaller pieces, castings that I really should put paintjobs on. Not to mention a few extras of larger ones too. They'd begun to pile up a bit.

Had a tasty dinner last night, even if it is just fancy ramen. I even think it's sorta pretty! nom nom nom

Mon, 21 Dec 2009 18:33:11 GMT

Paintpaintpaint paint paint paint paint

Lots and lots of paint.

There's still plenty of snow on the ground, and it's freakin COLD outside.

This picture is just perfect for today.

Sat, 19 Dec 2009 23:48:49 GMT

I love the internet.

You never know what you'll find.

Speaking of which, I found this picture online and made excited squealing sounds....Maybe I'm just sushi obsessed. But I think it's awesome.

Sat, 19 Dec 2009 13:36:43 GMT

Snow!

Woke up to snow covering everything outside! The sky is whitish grey from the cloud cover, and everything else is white from snow, giving a very monochromatic portrait out the windows. It's actually still snowing, a steady fall of small flakes, which I hope continues.

I really love snow.

Sat, 19 Dec 2009 00:20:17 GMT

Today I worked on the clockwork bird castings that were poured yesterday, cleaning them up and baking them. I usually clean up any casting flaws twice, once before baking and once after. Just looking them over with a fresh eye will pick up little things I might miss otherwise. I actually put basecoats on a couple of RoseGuardians the other night, in a new color which I need to finish up soooon.....

The crab tank is a-bustle with activity, I put some krill in there, a change from the hermit crab chow they've had for the last couple days. They really do eat better if you swap out what's available every couple days. It's also fun to watch their little antennae go wild when they pick up a new scent.

Maya is looking every bit like a normal healthy kitten. Which is incredible considering all the problems the poor little ball of fluff has had to endure. Between the severe malnourishment, diarreah, and then having all the hair on her bum fall off....not to mention her tail being broken...all before 6 weeks old....she's had a rough start. She's got a tiny round belly now, where a shrunken and emaciated middle was before...and we can no longer see her skeleton. Her eyes are bright, alert, and she has learned to play, pouncing fingers and toes alike. She's even eating hard food now, and successfully been littertrained. I'll try to take a pic soon, I really need to post one of her lookin super cute and healthy.

Thu, 17 Dec 2009 17:12:19 GMT

Today's a day for doing mom-duties.

The house needs a good solid cleaning, Donovan is coming up on report card time again, which means I need to start organizing all the work he's done. We've also been discussing a reward system for Donovan, for when he's done especially well, or worked really hard on homework, being good, etc etc. Chris and I came up with the "ticket system". Kids always seem to have a fascination with the mail, and delight in getting something, so Chris will have these kid reward tickets at work, so he can mail a couple to Donovan, that way he gets mail, and knows there's probably something cool inside. I'm still pretty tickled with the idea, because the tickets were fun to make, and are all things that are stuff Donovan loves.

The golf is something Donovan and Chris do together, the movies are something I do with him. the sushi tickets are just me hinting to chris what I'd like for dinner, lol. Miyako's is my favorite restraunt. Maybe I'll get tickets too....rofl.

I know these are just silly little things, but I'm postin them anyhow for fun. I wanted to put borders on them, but havent figured that out yet, I think they need spaced further from each other for that to really work anyway. Ah well.

Oh! In between mom-stuffs...I'm actually doing pours today. The first pours of the Dragonotter, which are looking pretty good so far! Also pouring more clockwork birds.

Wed, 16 Dec 2009 15:46:43 GMT

Still working on my griffin....I really need to think of a sculpture name. I'm terrible at naming things. I'm really trying to work on my anatomy with this piece, and posing. I'm wanting to really make this piece the next step forward in my learning. I'm constantly referencing live animal shots, and trying out tools for different textures, which i've not used much in the past. She's very very rough at the moment, and naked of detail..but here's some quick snapshots of her early form.

Let me know what you think of her, and if there's any mistakes you guys might see.

Tue, 15 Dec 2009 18:44:36 GMT

Ever hear the quote..."I often give myself very good advice, but I very seldom follow it."

I think I'm the living example of this quote.

Now I have this bad habit of holding tools, or paintbrushes, or an extra pencil, in my mouth. I'll swap out to another tool, but knowing I'll need the one in hand...I put it in my mouth so I wont lose it in the usual clutter of tools sitting about my workspace. This way I can also grab it quickly to get back to work.

This is not a good habit..and I know it.

Wellll.....today that habit got me in trouble.

I superglued my lips together.

NEVER EVER hold a tube of superglue in your lips. Oh, I know better, and thank god i was able to get it off....my lips were chapped and the skin that came off with the glue only caused minimal bleeding. I put it there without even thinking about what I was doing. And then cursed myself as a stupid oaf as about a half second later my brain kicked in.

I will admit, I locked myself in the bathroom when I realized what I'd done...so as not to explain to my children just how stupid their mother can be at times.

Little habits you have that you do without actually thinking, can get you into BIG trouble.

Mon, 14 Dec 2009 19:41:36 GMT

Got up, drank my coffee....walked Donovan thru his math homework, sculpted while he did his sums...then sat down for story time..where Donovan read a book out loud, he's improving greatly with his reading. I hardly had to help at all. I sat the girls down with some crayons and coloring books, praised their pictures then pulled a children's necklace out of the printer.....sent Aurora to her room for putting it there, sculpted some more.

I'm trying a few new things with this large griffin sculpture, among them is a new technique for sculpting eyes. I snapped a couple quick pics, both of the crystal covered snaildragon Donovan made with a crystal growing experiment, and a facial shot of the griffin.
I'm trying for more expression in the faces I sculpt, which has been a particular challenge for me. Keep in mind this is a super rough stage...but I thought you guys might enjoy.

Crystal covered snaildragon (Donovan's crystal growing project) To be honest I wish I'd snapped a shot when we first took it out of the liquid, as alot of the intense purple color leached out of it as it dried. It's very washed out looking now.

Here's that facial shot.

Sun, 13 Dec 2009 16:42:04 GMT

I always find it frustrating that I'll be struggling to sketch out an idea for a sculpture....and it's harder to sketch out the concept than it would be to sculpt the entire base form!!! I'd really love to be able to do lots of gorgeous sketches for sculpture concepts...like I've seen the professionals on conceptart do. They'll have sketches of each angle, drawn to the actual size of the piece about to be done. This makes their sketches an actual blueprint for the sculpture, which they can even measure from! Of course...they're uber awesome, and have had more experience.

I ...on the other hand...seem to be sketch deficient. The sketches I post publicly are really the best of my sketchwork, while there are legions of messy scribbles hiding behind the scenes. I actually prefer sketching in clay. Clay cooperates with me better ...while pencils seem to be the illusion masters......leaving me going, "I know it curves here, and it's not possible for the paper to curve...but I have to be able to trick the eye into thinking that this flat piece of paper has this object here, how do I make it look right?" with clay, it's simple..."oh, it curves here...mush it." I am pretty straightforward by nature...so this fits my personality better.

Ok...so anyway, after getting hugely frustrated with griffin sketching, I went ahead to sculpting my next large piece. A 12 inch tall sculpture of a griffin in flight. Tilted with wings fully spread. She's not ready for pics yet, even beginning pics, but I'll be sure to take some when she's more presentable.

Sat, 12 Dec 2009 20:47:45 GMT

Update...3:30 PM

Oy. Ok...so I think we're FINALLY done. We had to take a nap last night, then got up and returned to working. So the valve on the tub broke, on the hot water side. We shut everything down and did some reading, went to Lowes...got some advice which turned out to be....not as helpful as it sounded when we were getting it. He was trying though. While the water was already shut down...I had the BRILLIANT (sarcasm here) idea of going ahead and replacing our kitchen faucet. I'd bought the stuff to do so nearly a year ago, but had been procrastinating doing the actual work. Two simple jobs right? Shouldnt be too bad....

Ok....so, at around 2am we get the valve on the tub fixed and THINK we've got the kitchen sink faucet assembly replaced. We turn the water main on...and a pipe in the wall breaks free behind the bathroom faucet. Under the sink (the kitchen) is spraying water...and leaking. Ok, time to turn the water main back off.

So...we bust a nice hole through the kitchen wall, behind our stove to work on the bathroom pipe issue.... And work more on tightening and fixing the joints under the sink. The sink would have been an uber easy fix....except somehow...the valve under there started leaking after we messed with it. So....back to the store for more parts. Yay.

SO, with a hole in our wall, and a torch...among other mysterious plumbing doohickies....Christopher does some soldering magic back in there I was ecstatic I didnt have to partake in. he knows how to solder things...I dont. I know about gaskets, and plumbers tape, and O rings and washers and stuff...but I dont know how to use a torch outside of cooking applications.

So....we reach a point where the valve under the kitchen sink has been replaced....the valve in teh bathroom has been replaced....the sink in teh kitchen is installed..and there's a freshly soldered joint in the wall connecting to the bathroom. We've gotten the feeling the house is working against us.... Every time we fix something, a new problem pops up.

It's time to turn the water main back on, again.

So, i think we were both holding our breaths when I turned the main on, and he checked our work. No drips...no spraying, seems everything is ok. Well..there is the hole in the wall...but for now the stove can just hide it.

While we were at it...we replaced the power strip that quit workin the other day...and now the toaster seems to be staying on indefinately.....til you manually turn it off.

O_o That's life for ya.

For now we're happy to have water, coming thru non leaky parts. I think we'll be checking it in a paranoid fashion for the next week....but for now, I could hop up and down with joy...if I werent so darn tired.

Sat, 12 Dec 2009 06:41:00 GMT

Update....2AM

ok...we fixed the faucet...and working there caused a pipe inside the wall to break apart....oy. Soooo, now there's a hole in my kitchen wall...so we can work on it from behind, rather than replacing the shower liner.

This suddenly became an advanced project.

Song for the day.

Sat, 12 Dec 2009 02:13:56 GMT

So.....the water in the bathtub started gushing with no explanation this evening. Gushing hot water. Sooooooo, we turned off the water supply and turned off the water heater...then became short term plumbers.

I've read a couple books, and dealt with some small incidences before with this sort of thing...like replacement stuff...but it's stressful when you have a job sitting there that really has to be fixed, and you have to figure out how to do it...cause there's no way in hell you can afford to pay someone ELSE to do it.

Hopefully this will go well....the guy at Lowe's was pretty helpful...I think so anyway. I suppose you dont really know if someone's been helpful til they're information has been used, and it worked.....

Found what seemed to be good info on the net, and in my plumbing book. We're also fixing the leaky sink while the water's off....God knows this could turn into a major mess if we screw this up.

Ok...so anyway, my plumbing break is over, cross your fingers for us out there....we could probably use it.

Fri, 11 Dec 2009 03:50:53 GMT

I wonder how many actual kinds of pie there are?

I like pie.

Wed, 09 Dec 2009 19:45:07 GMT

*does the happy dance*

goin on a date, goin on a date, nah nah nah.

Probably the closest thing we'll get to a date for our 10 year anniversary coming up, so I'm tickled we're getting to go out at all. Yays!

LUVS you sara, forevers and evers. TY for takin them for the night. :)

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 18:50:32 GMT

It's cold today, one of those days where your toes just never seem to get warm. Even with socks. There's still some residual snow on the ground outside, but it's mostly gone now. Now it's mostly just mud and ice....and cold tempratures.

Spent a fair amount of time working on the mice this morning, particularly putting the wings on the dragonmouse. I'm happy with their progress so far, but they have a long way to go. I may bundle up a bit later and go downstairs to work some (I need to paint, and do moldmaking)...but it's always several degrees cooler down there. I tend to get less downstair work done through the winter, due to the cold.

I keep yawning today, even though I've done quite alot...I hate days like that.

Sun, 06 Dec 2009 04:12:16 GMT

Got up this morning and the first snow of the season was on the ground.

I love snow.

Donovan went outside to play in it right after breakfast, and I saw this the next time I looked out the window ..... It made me smile.

Then the rest of us went outside, and chris insisted on snapping a pic of me ...

Then we then went out to do the grocery shopping, and looked around a few shops.

I hate changing diapers in public restrooms....but on occasion when you're out it just has to be done. During the warm months you can just use the back seat of the car, but not in months where there's a 30 degree breeze ....talk about a draft.....Ok, so anyway...I was so preoccupied about having to change my daughter in a strange environment I carried her right into the mens room..... *facepalm* and didnt even notice. The mens rooms had changing tables, so that's all I'm lookin at right? I get her halfway undressed when Chris sticks his head in and goes, "Um..honey, this is the men's room."

"really?.......oh %^&*" and I haul up the baby, stick her pants and shoes under my arm and make a quick run, carrying a half undressed baby to the other restroom, and finished the job.

*applause for mommy* The place was packed too...so my error did not go unnoticed.....sigh.

Seriously...where IS my brain when i need it? honestly....

Oh, did see an interesting tow truck while we were out, never saw one with pink flames and pooh bear....

Sat, 05 Dec 2009 01:01:12 GMT

Whew...I'm beat. It feels good to be done with work for the day. Between homeschooling, sculpting and working on the website (LOTS of work on the website...) I'm ready for a nap..and maybe pie...but we're out of pie.

Oh well.

For the moment I'm content to sit and watch one of my favorite movies, "Tinman". I'm hoping Syfy does as good a job with "Alice" which is airing.....sunday? Ah man I gotta look that up.....

Anyway...be sure to check out purplecatcreatives, and let me know if the changes there are an improvement! I hope so!

and here's a quick shot I nabbed of the basic mouse forms. I have to do plain mouse anatomy forms before I start working them into a clockwork mouse and dragonmouse....so they're super super rough. I'm not even totally happy with the forms yet, but the posing is good I think. Looong way to go, but it's evidence that I've been workin, lol.

Thu, 03 Dec 2009 18:06:33 GMT

Today.....started out ....awful.

The workday doesnt stop for crappy days, however. I've actually gotten quite a bit done workwise already, so that's good at least. The Clockwork Snail got baked last night, so I'll need to be getting a plaster prototype from him soon. I'm finding that more and more of my sculpting is getting done in the clay stages, which is infinitely easier on my hands, and more cost efficient. I really only do minor touchups and very small detailing in the plaster prototype versions now.

I started up my next clay project. Mice. I'm doing a small set of mice. I'm wanting one to be a Clockwork, and the other to be a dragonmouse. They're posed mirroring each other, as separate sculptures, but if set up together look like they're peering at each other, each trying to figure the other out. Individually, I suppose they could be peering at whomever is passing by. :)

I'm rephotoing a couple of pieces for the store. The phoenixes especially. I remember being rather heartbroken they didnt photo well for me initially. In the past few months I've done alot of work though, studying light usage, posing, avoiding glare, using my camera properly, and editing photos effectively to make more professional collages. I'm far from the professional standard I've seen elsewhere, but at least I'm improving. I need to get a Blue Ember Phoenix painted up so I can rephoto him as well...but all I have on hand momentarily is a Red Pyre, but it's a start.

Did a crystal growing project for Donovan's homeschooling, which turned out really well. We poured the dark dyed water off the crystals today, and they are really neat. We were supposed to just let the crystals grow on themselves, but we decided to put part of a broken murex dragonsnail in there for them to grow on instead. Crystals formed all over the dragon, and Donovan is thrilled with his "crystal dragon". We're definately gonna have to repeat that experiment with other cool things to grow crystals on.

Updated nicer phoenix pic.

Wed, 02 Dec 2009 23:06:10 GMT

Snapshots of the new Bluebird color.

They'll be available once I get a few more painted, I thought the color came out wonderfully.