I got a bit of Christmas shopping done yesterday.  My husband has three nieces who are grade-school/middle-school ages.  I don't know what toys they like, but I feel safe buying them clothes.  So I picked out tops or sweaters for each of them, then brought them into the studio for a little personalizing!

All the girls have long blonde hair, and only the oldest has pierced ears, so I decided on hair accessories.

Here's my results:

This summer, my bff, my daughter and I went to Galena, IL for a girls' weekend.  Galena is an old river town resurrected into a tourist location.  There's lots of cute shops in every category, great restaurants, some historical sites (US Grant's home), some B&Bs, etc.  We checked out everything!  One of the hot trends in gifts, home decor, fashion accessories, and more this year has been owls.

My most recent book effort is nearing completion.  I've written a canework book that is appropriate for beginners and for those who want to explore color and design in depth.  Last summer, I shared some peeks at projects on this blog.

I recieved the nearly complete book mock-up from my editor today.  It's time for a careful review to make sure it says everything I want to and all the instruction is clear and understandable.

Hello again!  Wow, I can't believe it's December already!  Where has this year gone so quickly?

I'm very pleased to be back this month blogging and honored to be on board for another year with the Sculpey Design Team!

What have I been up to?  Well, actually, developing a new line of jewelry and lots of production work for the new and the old lines. 

Like many artists, I like to try other media occassionally.  I came to polymer clay from textiles, so I took lots of fiber classes in college.  Later, I have taken watercolor painting classes, and on my own, I've explored other painting and mixed media.  One of my current outside polymer interests is making mixed media paintings including close-ups of women's faces. 

One of the classes which I am teaching at the Bead & Button Show is my Leaf Fossil class.  The class makes use of sheet molds of foliage.  It's one of my favorite classes to teach, and seems to be fairly popular.

Its time for me to get ready for the largest consumer bead show in the US!!  The Bead & Button Show, sponsored by Kalmbach Publishing, who bring us Bead & Button, Art Jewerly and Bead Style magazines is coming up quickly.  The event is a week of classes, shopping, learning, teaching, beads, jewelry, clay, wire, metal, and on and on.  It is in Milwaukee and this year's dates are June 2-10.

                I’ve been around the polymer clay world for over 20 years.  In the beginning of my experience as a clayer, our corner of the art world was filled with excitement.  It often felt like a race.  Designers were intent on exploring and mapping the possibilities of this wonderful medium.  We were interested in developing the next new technique, the next application of principles and materials from other media into our beloved polymer clay.  My first book in 2004, Polyme