Alive and kickin' !

I went a loooong time without updating. There have been an awful lot of things happening left and right and it all boiled down to me reassessing what road I want to take. There has been a shift of focus in things I want to do and this will reflect heavily in what I will put in the Serpentaires blog and shop in the future. But don't panic : there WILL be new things.

I haven't been idle theses past months. I worked my way through dry-point, etching and linocut techniques, discovered I have about zero interest in lithography, and had one of my pieces selected for the art school's exhibition at the end of the year. It's an embossed version of the linocut below. Unfortunately I wasn't able to retrieve it before the school closed for summer - ad I also discovered prints are incredibly hard to scan and photograph. they look much, much better in real life.

There was also a lot of sewing, costuming and pattern-making, and you should expect a lot of that to show in the stuff I add to the shop in the future. There's actually a BIG project brewing and a new crew member in the Serpentaires team. You should go take a look at her work ! In the meantime, there have been a lot of "smaller" projects...

That's just a small part of it, actually. better pictures of two outfits are still waiting in my digicam. But I suspect that will be the content of another post, as it's meal-time for little G.

Oops, I'm late !

I hope you had a wonderful Christmas ! It's not quite over yet at our place, we celebrate with my parents, my adorable co-creator Lady Fi and her family on the 31th, so the fingerless mitts above are still waiting under the tree.
I've been filling the little free moments I have with needlework experiments...

... just some embroidery samples, fashioned after victorian designs. I'm working on a tablecloth for the 31th - and of course, thinking about how I could turn that into something for the shop. Who said monomaniac ?

Rise of the undead and what I do with patterns

So, my digicam-that-was-dead is again not-quite-dead-yet. Yay ! Proceed to rising not-quite-dead and well, pictures !

This is to prove that a) I have taken up knitting again for some last minute Christmas presents (the fingerless mitten shown in this picture has since been finished, as has her sister. But neither the light nor the baby were cooperating to take pictures of the finished objects) and b) I do strang ethings with patterns. Like...
- turn a scarf pattern into a pair of fingerless mittens (granted, I knitted the scarf last year)
- heavily butcher them (see exhibit A, my avant-garde gown,, a mix of a Truly Victorian and a Reconstructing History pattern
- lose them and sometimes find them when I don't need them anymore. I'm almost done with reconstructing a 1872 half-crinoline out of bits and bobs of period instructions. And last week I stumbled upon Laughing Moon's bustles patterns.
- lose them and never find them again, I have a chronical issue with Past Pattern's edwardian straight-fronted corset pattern. I KNOW I ordered it twice already. I just haveeno idea where both patterns went.

Inspite, or maybe because of this twisted relationship to patterns, I have every intention to make this pair's of mittens pattern widely available to the customers in our stores... When I have enough time to polish it up :)

This blog just got a lot more interesting... *sarcasm off*

Not posting much lately, right ? The reason for that is currently sleeping next to me - he obviously decided to start the night early after babbling all day. :)
Let's see, what happened over the past few weeks... I took care of little G. I had my second printmaking workshop, printed a few more editions from the Medusa print I showed you last time. I took care of little G. I put up the Christmas tree. Took care of little G. Designed and printed the birht announcement cards (what ? Two months late ? No way ! Where did the time go ?) Took care of... See a pattern ? *broad grin* I have things in the works but it's taking me ages to finish them. And then, when I meant to take a few pictures to show you around my current life and even maybe *gasp* list something new... then... my digicam gave up the soul. And I still haven't ordered the new one - well I guess that's on the menu for tomorrow.

(I have my secret Santa's present under this tree, but I'll be strong, I'll wait until Christmas !)

But so that this doesn't sound like a pity party - which it frankly isn't. Really, I do have rough days when the kid is cranky for 15 hours straight, but today was amazingly good ! - well, so that you don't think I'm just drowning in exhaustion and post-partum depression, I have to thank the lovely lovely people who bought Christmas cards from me ! I have only 7 left, total, so if you want some grab them QUICK ! Lady Darkstone is coming on Tuesday and wants to buy some as well, so some designs will just be out of stock until next year !
Now to further assess that I'm on a roll, I am going to leave the kid in his father's care and grab my knitting needles for a last minute Christmas present. AND if this goes well, I might even open the "Knitting and Sewing" section of our shop in a few weeks (I'd say day, if it weren't for the kid and the looming holidays and assorted family visits).

Prints vs. Printmaking and a Question

... also titled : "I'm EXCITED !"

One of the good things about getting a kid is that I can get a small allowance to stay home with him for six months after my maternal leave. Which I AM going to do. That will take me to about the end of the schoolyear. A whole schoolyear without work... That means I was finally able to take some classes at the art school. I had my eyes set on a nude drawing class for years (my Grandma was kinda kicking my butt on this one but it always clashed with my work schedule *sobs*), and when I started scheming this art classes plan after I got pregnant, I saw the art school also offered a *printmaking class*. AWESOME ! I wasn't able to attend the first two courses but yesterday I was able to leave the kid with his father, leave the house and just worry about learning printmaking stuff and doing art for four hours.

I was just experimenting with drypoint on plexiglass, without a real plan, but I'm already really, really happy with what I got. Now I have to buy some materials for the class... this is also my entry for this week' EST challenge, "Mythology". My only problem being that I'm not sure I want to put the first print I'm really happy with up for sale. :s

This is from the "prints" category, although it won't be technically a print, but a reproduction of a digital creation. I hope to finish it sometime this week. All the work with ink and paper is done, all that's left is the computerized magic.

And since we're talking digital, I'm begging for and advice from the crowd. My digicam is dying, and I want to upgrade to a DSLR. I want a Canon, because I want to be able to talk, get advice, compare and try lenses with Argyronete and our friend B, who both have a 450D (if I recall correctly). I'd need a standard lens, and maybe a macro one to take good macro pictures for the shop (and because macro is FUN :D ). Most of all, I'm hesitating between the 500D (which seems like a step up from the 450D, and isn't tha tmuch more expensive anymor) and the 1000D (which is a bit lower-class compared to the 500, but also a lot cheaper, so that I could splurge more on lenses). What do you people use ? What would you suggest ? I'm taking non-figurative pictures and some landscpae pictures when I'm doing the one-picture-a-day-thing (I've stopped trying to call it a 365 project until I actually manage to do one year in a row), close-ups of the items I'm putting up for sale, and well... baby portraits. Soon to be kid pictures.

My current pet peeves with my old Ixus, beside the fact that I have to hit it every time I turn it on to get the screen to work, are :
- no personalised adjusting of the white balance,
- horribly grainy pictures without natural light.

Fishy dilemna

I drew this for last week's EST challenge but wrangling four kilos of screaming monster prevented me from finishing it in time to submit. And now that I can take a step back to look at it, I'm not sure anymore what I should turn it into. My original plan was to make the blue very light and use the pattern for a writing set. But I'm starting to think it would work great as a print as well. What do YOU think ?

Christmas before Christmas

As I mentioned previously, I got a very, very lovely package from the Shop Swap &Blog. My package came from Amy from VintageFern, and I was soooooo excited when I found it in the mailbox !!!!

I was so eager to open it I couldn't wait until I got back home, I opened it right in the car !

Hmmmm What's this ?

A set of pretty pretty cards ! In some of my favorite colors, that's even better !

And a big tote for me and even a awesomely cute onesie for G !

Can I say awesome ? A-we-so-me ! Go have a look at Amy's shop and at her blog. I just adore her textile creations !

Let's see what she has to say about herself and her creations...

I am a stay at home Mom to 3 beautiful girls and I am very lucky to be married to my best friend.
I started my business because I love creating and I need to be busy. It's really just more of a hobby for me, it's just a plus that I can make money with it. I get to do what I love best, being creative !
Not sure if I could say just one favorite online shop, I love Etsy !

Thank you again Amy ! I wish you lots of success with your creatiosn on Etsy !