Monday 23 July 2012

Pink Roses & Blue Sky


Good morning, good afternoon or good evening all (depending on when you are reading this). It's a beautiful warm and sunny day here today, gosh, we haven't been able to say that too often lately have we?

Pink Roses & Blue Sky

This week I thought I'd show you a Plaque I made for a fellow bike enthusiast, I like the way the black and white boarder has turned out, it matches well with the chequered flag. 
Can you see that the 'S' in Doug's name has been done to look a bit like the Suzuki Logo? so I think you can easily guess what make (and colour) of motorcycle Doug has.

'Doug's Pad' Door Plaque

It's just a short post from me today, I'm off to do some gardening while the sun is shining, I'll be back later to have a look at all the great blogs that are taking part in Handmade Monday

Take care

Jan x

Sunday 15 July 2012

A wet week and a bit of Fimo

What a week we've had, first it rained, then it rained, then......yes you guessed right, it rained some more. Last week my husband and I set off for a few days camping!!! at a bike rally!!! on the bike!!! it was a bit...
wet and a little bit muddy!!!

A bit wet...
a bit muddy
It took us 4 hours to travel the 150 miles, partially due to the weather and partially due to the fact that we had to traverse the M25 for part of the journey.
But it wasn't all doom and gloom, in between the showers we had sunshine (not much, but it was there), lots of other enthusiasts braved the weather, some came as far afield as Belgium and Switzerland, as well as those from all around the UK and despite the wet stuff we all had a brilliant time.


A few friends at Lodsworth


We were in a beautiful part of Britain, Lodsworth in West Sussex, we popped into the village to the local community shop which was designed and built by Ben Law and some of his apprentices. You may remember Ben Law from Ben Law's Woodland House on T.V's Grand Designs.

Community Village Shop, Lodsworth

We arrived home dryish, we managed to avoid the worse of the showers, then it was the job of offloading the bike and unpacking our bags, I find that's always the worse thing about going away, don't you?  


After a good nights sleep and a lazy day I decided that I would play around with a bit of Fimo rather than get my paints out, modeling with polymer clay is something I can do sitting on a comfy sofa with a tray on my knee. 


Keeping up with my toadstool designs I done a few sketches......

Toadstool sketches
........... and made a few of these......

Toadstool Pendants
They're not finished yet, they still need to be baked. I've made quite a few and I will experiment with some of them by using a dark wash with acrylic paint to give an aged look. So watch this space.


I'm linking this post to a great Linky Party so don't forget to pop over to Wendy's Blog and check out who else is there.


Wishing you all a great and dry week

Jan x

Sunday 8 July 2012

Welcome Plaques & Toadstools

Hello to all my regular followers and welcome to my new followers. I hope you are all well?
One of my favourite Plaques, which happens to be one of the first Plaques I made as Handcrafted by Picto was a 'Welcome to our Home' Plaque.

'Welcome to our Home' Plaque

Recently I had an order for a similar plaque. As usual I sketched three designs for the client to choose from but as I liked them all and me being me I decided to paint all three and the two she didn't choose would be kept as stock for my fairs.

Toadstools & Daisies

Toadstool House with a Red Door

Toadstool House with a Blue Door

Toadstools crop up lots in my paintings, plaques and fairy doors, you might recognise these toadstools from the first picture.

Logo

I've used it as an avatar for The Crafts Forum and for  My Folksy Shop. I've also used it as part of the Cover Photo on my Facebook Page as well as on my business cards, notelets and even my PayPal invoices.


Do you have an image or design that you like to use over and over again or do you have a recognisable logo that you use in your work?

This post is linked to Handmade Harbours Linky Party, please pop over and say hello.

Jan x



Sunday 1 July 2012

Toadstools & Butterflies

Hello all, I've had a lovely week,  I hope you have too. I know a lot of the country has had some really bad weather this week but here in this part of Suffolk has been quite lucky, we have had a bit of rain and a couple of windy days but mostly it has been quite nice, not as much sunshine as we should have this time of year and not as warm as we'd like it but fingers crossed that it will improve for the rest of the summer months.

I had a lovely canvas order this week through my Wow Thank You online shop as well as a double Name Plaque order.

Name Canvas

Name Plaque

Name Plaque

I'm linking this post to this weeks Handmade Monday over at Handmade Harbour

I think I've managed to get around all the blogs that took part in last weeks Handmade Monday Linky Party, and I would like to thank everybody who left comments on my blog. I love to get comments and I love leaving comments for others but sometimes I don't always manage to get around everybody, my apologies if I have missed anyone out.

Take care and wishing you lots of sunshine wherever you are

Jan x