Zombie Bunnies and Fang Bows

So yesterday I shut off my phone and turned off the laptop for most of the day to get some designs done. More experimenting with stuff than anything else really. The most useful thing I learned was what a difference materials make. I bought some felt on a whim in Tesco to make some cupcake boxes but the cuts were too small so I ventured to my new favorite craft shop 'Tangled Up' to get some bigger sheets of felt. Yes, they were bigger but to my surprise the Tesco brand were way, way better. Now if only Tesco would make their sheets bigger :(

I made a few patterns, one for a zombie bunny and one for a bag. I was watching the third episode of the new series of Tru Blood while I was sewing and this gave me the inspiration for my fang bows.

Here's a few pics:

This was my first attempt at the zombie bunny with the felt I don't like. He's cute, but I think I'll keep him for myself to put on some random item of clothing as I wouldn't like to sell the little guy.

This was my second attempt with the Tesco felt. Much better. I like this guy alot ... he's going to go on a few bags I've been playing around with on the sewing machine. Might make some brooches from these as well and also play with the size and scale. They will eventually all be made from green felt with more zombie characteristics put through them, but I didn't want to waste my small cuts of felt on experimentations :p

My first attempt at the Fang bow. It's still a working progress as I might get some beads to drop from the fangs.

This is a bigger and prettier bow I attached the fangs to. I may play with the fangs more as I feel you wouldn't exactly know they were vampire teeth unless it was pointed out to you.

So, I've learned that most of my time is spent on experimentation. A note for myself for the future. But I know that once I have something figured out it can take me 10 minutes to complete when there's no mistakes, backtracking, or wondering where I can tuck that little piece out of the way.

Big smiley happy waves :)

Aoife x

A House Warming Present

One of my oldest and dearest friends, John, bought an apartment in Dublin about a year ago. Since then I've helped him Ikea-ise the entire place. I love his apartment and was set to live there with him this year, but life events took me on a different path.

He wanted an original commissioned Aoife Blake painting because he's my friend and he should damn well want some of my art :p
He told me he didn't care what it was like or what it was about as long as it was from me. So I thought long and hard and came up with this image of my mums hands. John is very religious and I thought he would like it. I took a few shots and he picked the one he'd like so I started to paint the one he wanted, which was this one:



I started the painting and as I went on I just didn't like it for his apartment. It would sit nice in his parents house, and maybe that's where the inspiration for this particular image came from because I always picture John in his house in Ballincollig.

So one day, while I was shopping with Dawn, I came across an image in a shop in Cork that was perfect for John's sense of humor. It was cute, a little dark, a very funny. I took the image from the shop and tweaked it with my own design. Hence his house warming present was born:





Now, if only he could get his skates on and have a proper house warming party I could actually give it to him :p

I think the birds are going to make a few appearances as I may have already started a few sketches for a collection of these. This one will never be re-done as it's for John and John only. <-- (John recently gave me permission/practically insisted on me painting more or printing card versions. Well, there ya go!)
Aoife x

KimDot, My New Shop Name

I have decided to set up a new etsy shop, with a new name. While I really like the name 'Original Button' I've decided to name my shop after my dog who died almost a year ago.



She was amazing. My niece is prone to seizures and Kim would always know when she was having one before we did. She would run to the side she might fall on and protect her. She always slept out side our bedrooms if we were sick and the clever little thing would smile. Yes, smile. Dalmatians are one of the only dogs that can do this. People would think she was growling but it was a big welcoming happy grin.

So, in honor of Kim the amazing dalmatian, I have re-named my shop KimDot. It's cute, it's short and it means something very special to me. My logo also clearly has hints of dalmatian in it ...

Aoife x

A Valley in Connemara

Myself and Bill packed up his van and headed to a beautiful valley in Connemara. It was amazing driving there at night, the mountains looked very eerie in the dark. Here are some shots from the night:

The decorations in the tents were fantastic. Though I forgot to get some pictures of the wood and string decorations they use. Silly me.

This pic was taken just after we arrived. We managed to get the van up the very top of the path where all the action was. The lights coming up were from the car that parked behind us which wedged us in ... but apparently that's the point because 'you don't want to leave until everyone else has left anyway'.

I really enjoyed talking to this girl. She was with the group in the car behind us and I was having very lovely (if not sober) chats with her. Her bag was fantastic! She got it to take it apart for the pattern and design her own, but she couldn't bring herself to hurt her little owl bag.

I love this .. I was trying to get Bill to stay in one spot for a photo, he was in one of his distracted modes where he darts about from one thing to the next looking at everything around him, so he didn't know the photo was being taken and he just gave me a big squeezie hug while it was snapped. Lovely :)

This is Bob, the girl. She's still only a puppy but she's amazingly clever and Bill has her very well trained. She followed me about the rave for a good bit and people were complimenting me on how well behaved she was, not that I could take credit for it of course. Nearly everybody there knew Bob. Bill takes her to alot of these things ... I was eventually known as 'The girl with Bob'. I loved having her follow me around that night. She came with me when I went exploring the mountains while Bill was off dancing and she was very, very funny. She kept thinking people's glow sticks were sticks to play with so while they were dancing she kept trying to grab them out of peoples hands. It was hilarious because people were in no frame of mind to deal with a jumping dog.

I loved all the walls around Connemara .... I'll climb anything and I love to hop along things, which these walls were pefrect for.

I took these shots after most people had left or were leaving. That camper van in the first one had to reverse the entire track back to the clearing, which was ages away. He made a good go at it though.

Bill's amazing home-made barbeque. He got sick of his other one so he decided to make his own from a bucket with axe holes and a grill. We had yummy burgers and sweet chilli chicken with lime for breakfast. Best food to have at 7 a.m.

Aoife x

Flowers and Bugs in the Back Garden

Today, myself and Dawn were quite productive in the back garden. We got a bit done before being convinced to go for a few pints by my cousin and a few of his friends. Of course the ant bites also helped our decision towards the pub.

I managed to get a few of my flower brooches done. I'm quite happy with them. I found some wonderful insect trinkets to put on the petals.

Available to buy here.

Available to buy here.

Available to buy here.

Available to buy here.

I really am proud of these little things. These brooches and more are for sale in my Etsy Store. Check it out :)

Aoife x

Happy Sounds

Had a lovely night. Though I think I annoyed a lot of people with my giant camera. Whoops. Oh well, I got some lovely shots that I'm really happy with. Here's a peak at a few ...

This shot was taken as it was getting bright out. I have a few along the same lines but with different movement from the people dancing.

This was my half assed drunken attempt at taking some of the lights. They had a beautiful green light that danced off the trees. I knew I wouldn't be able to get them properly without a tripod so this will have to do.

I had some lovely chats about my camera with Thomas, the man in the blue hoodie. Very nice man from Poland. He tried to take a few shots with my camera before he realized it's much harder than it looks to take night photos.

I have a few of these in different colours because the lights kept changing. This wasn't the image I was after so I have a few attempts that turned out blue and pink. Pretty cool actually.

I love this pic of me and my lovely Bill. It's a pity it's so over exposed though, you can't do a darn thing to over exposed shots in photoshop because the light has washed out any detail. At least if the pic is too dark you can lighten aspects because the image is still in the pixels somewhere .... over exposing is like the light is erasing detail. Pity, but I still like the photo :)

Then just some snap shots to cap it all off. Fun fun fun :)

Aoife x.

Another Silly Little Thing I Made .... Cupcake Trinket Box

Just a quick post about this little Cupcake box I made in Dawn's house last night while watching quite a bit of Monty Python.

It's just made from thick felt, but it works, they're quite sturdy. The pattern is a little off so parts pucker but I'll fix it soon. These will also be for sale online once I get a few different colour combinations.

Anyway .... I'm off to do my make up for tonight. Fun adventures await and I'm bringing my big camera so pics may be posted soon. Where I'm going? It's a secret :p

Aoife x