A Little Bit of This and a Little Bit of That...

Servus, dear creative friends!

I hope the weather over at your place is sunnier! Here in Vienna it is all grey in grey and rainy. And I have just discovered that one of the windows of our flat is broken so the rain slowly seeps in...*sigh.
I am also still struggling with a cold (which always takes a lot longer with me than with people who don't have an autoimmune desease) - but somehow this is all doesn't bother me too much (which is quite a surprise to myself), so being grumpy wasn't an option today. ;)

I have enjoyed getting messy at my workdesk - and have several things to share with you, that all got finished simultaneously (and also have been worked on simultaneously during the last days) today and yesterday.


But first I would like to share with you a linocut print that my son, Georg, (13) made and that I really, really love!

He had a photograph of the insect as a model - but the whole design and composition is his.
I just love how he only partially displayed the insect, the leaf, the grass and the flower. That way the print gives this fab and lively snapshot feel.

I am also sharing my haul from Vienna's Creative Fair that I visited on Sunday - honestly I was a bit shocked as there were a lot less booths this time and the shops that I have been knowing for several years now also had a lot less stuff on display...(or maybe they just had already sold most of their stuff on Saturday...)

But of course I found some nice goodies to play with...

...some semi-precious stone and coral beads to create some (hopefully) lovely wire jewelry pieces with, some finnabair Mechanicals bits, two ink pads and an Edelweiß sticker to iron-on.

And these are two of the three finished pieces I talked about earlier.

These will both be hung on our Christmas tree (yes, yes, believe it or not - I really have managed to already create some X-mas stuff...ME! Usually I am weeks late to that party...lol).

They are both made from Calico Craft Parts and goodies that my lovely boss Helen sent along with my DT orders as little extra goodies. Yay - I have the best boss of all! :)

The little art doll guy got a wire loop that I glued to the back of his head, but the image was taken before.

I fused all the art doll parts using selfmade wire joints as the holes are quite small for brads and mine weren't tiny enough. But now I think these match the vintage look a lot better!

This is the back side - I simply covered the pieces with black Gesso and stamped a script stamp onto it in opaque white.

His face is part of a large Paper Artsy stamp ("Henry and Harriet") and the pattern of his clothes were stamped using an Indigo Blu stamp from the "Yorkshire Evening Post" set. Then I painted over the dried patterns with diluted DecoArt media fluid acrylic paints and doodled a bit with a black permanent marker and a white gel pen. The edges of the doll parts were inked with black archival stamping ink using a small piece of cut 'n dry foam.

He came to life during the drying times of my little soldered house pendant. ;)

I love little houses, I love shrines - and I REALLY love little house-shaped shrines! lol
I have taken steps images and done a collage for those who would like to know a bit about the how-to:

There's no image of the step where I applied the clear Crackle Glaze (which was before I added black Antiquing Cream to highlight the cracks), but I am sure you all know how to do that ;)

And the last finished piece I would like to share with you today is this little house assemblage. It's titled "Dear God, make me good!"

The little angel (???) is a piece from the Prima Archival Cast Milagros set. He came without horns of course...but I wasn't convinced to be honest....even though he seems to be trying really hard...lol. The other pieces are resin and metal embellishments from my stash box (the gorgeous frame is from lovely Lisa's  That Craft Place shop, the feet are from my friend Agnieszka's "Retro Kraft Shop". The all-seeing eye was bought at ebay (and is from China if I recall that correctly)).

I sculpted the little horns from Aves Apoxy Sculpt. The style of the painting is mainly influenced by Michael DeMeng's fab art!

The wooden house was a find at the sales section of a home decor shop. I am always on the hunt for alterable items and the "cheap or chipped stuff corner" is my go-to zone. Once painted even the cheapest looking things don't look cheap anymore. And the fact that it IS cheap stuff takes away the fear of messing up.

Oh well...doesn't he just look sooo innocent?

It's this time of the year when sitting at my workdesk, enjoying a cup of tea and some biscuits and getting my hands dirty is one of the best things to do. Even for the risk of dipping my paint brushes into my tea... ;)

Thanks for stopping by! I hope you are enjoying good times at your workdesks too!

Hugs and happy crafting!

Claudia xxx