Hair New Era

It's Wednesday when we show to the world what is on our work tables that we're working on. Julia had the fantastic idea of this weekly hop around the globe - you can find all the details on her blog, Stamping Ground.


Doesn't this canvas look awful?? I was working on it for days and then were quite happy how it turned out - until I tried to adhere the photo of Mama Owl to it that would have been the final touch. I used Modpodge which was a stupid choice in the first place because it's not strong enough for matte photo paper. When I used a brayer to flatten everything evenly, some of the Modpodge appeared on the photo - it looked awful. I tried to save it, but no such luck. So I ripped it off - of course it didn't come off completely!


The stuff to use for adhering matte photo paper is soft gel - and of course that was the one I did NOT have. So I stopped by the art supply store on my way to pick up Kaefer from school and then tried again to adhere the photo (newly printed of course!) to the canvas. Fortunately it worked this time. The last finish were those three metallic letters on the left and finally the canvas was finished. And I'm still happy with it.

Hello to the biggest snoop around the world, hosted by the Queen of Snoops, Julia at Stamping Ground. Every Wednesday we look at other artist's worktable, and I can tell you, it is a lot of fun and a source of inspiration.


This canvas has been sitting on my desk for two weeks now, pretty much in the same condition. Which translates to: I haven't worked on it. Not a bit. I haven't even thought about it. My mind was completely occupied with our garage sale that we had last Saturday, and I'm happy to say that it was a very successful one and we got rid of a lot of stuff. So all the work was worth it, but I neglected everything else, especially my blog and visiting other blogs and leaving comments. I don't even mention painting or doing anything creative. (But I sold a few of my handmade cards at the sale as well!!). After the garage sale I realized I hadn't taken any photo - that would have been a good one, a shot before and after. Oh well...

So I hope to get back into blogging and networking and painting and... I started this week with listing some of my handmade cards in my Etsy shop, so I did at least something. It's surprising how much I missed my blog and the blogging community. But - the sale is done, I will still list a few items on Craigslist, but that is done quickly. Hopefully someone buys them, otherwise they will go to my favorite charity. I so enjoy the space in our garage! By the way, the box of scrapbooking and craft supplies that I showed you last Wednesday is almost empty now - only a few items are left. That certainly was a big seller. To my utter surprise, the two boxes of GERMAN books were sold within the first ten minutes! And the guy who bought one box of vinyl records at my yard sale three or four years ago came back on Saturday and bought the second box! Returning customer!!

Alright, I've kept you long enough - now go and visit all the other artists and see what they are up to.

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Hello dear WOYWWers, yes, it's me, obviously not a regular anymore. I haven't been here for the last few weeks (two? three? even more?). The reason is simple - I've set up and opened my Etsy shop and that obviously took all my energy. It's a quite fascinating adventure, pretty much work is involved, but I expected that and really like it. However, I did not expect to sell anything in the first few months, and I already sold a mixed media painting and one of the small journals! That came as a surprise - I am very happy about and deeply thankful for it.

But you're not here to hear me ramble but to see what's on my worktable - it's this:


I'm working on another girl, a little Halloween witch this time. She will get green hair and a typical witch's hat. Somehow I want to include a cat and perhaps an owl - or a crow. I'm thinking of working more on the background and to make it a little more "halloweenish".

Do you want to see what's on other worktables? Just visit Julia's Stamping Ground and find the "guide".

Hello WOYWWers, how are you? I hope all of you can enjoy the summer (except for those on the other side of the globe - hope you have a good winter!) and also find some time to relax and lean back.

Nothing much on my desk today -


- just a little card that I made for a mail art project and that will be sent tomorrow.

Very short post today - have a wonderful WOYWW! And don't forget to look at the other desks around the world. A list of participants can be found over at Julia's blog. Enjoy the ride.

Hello WOYWWers - yes, it's me. After not participating in WOYWW for three weeks due to that darn surgery, I'm finally back. I actually wanted to be back last week, but then I had a pretty bad day and didn't feel like blogging at all. But today I'm in good spirits, and it's just great to be back in the craziness that Julia at the Stamping Ground has started two years ago.

I never have had a chance to show you the PiF I got from Jennie at The Artistic Stamper - it's a little journal that she altered, and I think it is so beautiful. I love little journals, so this was exactly the right thing for me! Jennie did a really fabulous job.



My daughter saw the little journals that I had made some time ago and asked me whether I could create two for her dolls who are obviously very active journalers. She loved the one that is lying to the left and wants one in blue and one in green. She was very specific in her "order".

These are some of the little journals I made; the base are the small composition books that you can buy at Staples and Office Depot (and probably many more other places as well). I sold them at a Christmas bazaar and these are the ones that are left.

After the big anniversary last week I guess we are "back to normal" again. I never had so many WOYWW visitors to my blog as last week - it was quite fascinating and I visited some artists for the very first time - and it took me until yesterday!

I'm still playing in my art journal -


I love this heart stamp - one of the "discoveries" during the "She Had Three Hearts" Workshop with Christy Tomlinson.

Blue - I do feel a bit blue. I had a terrible stomach pain attack Sunday a week ago, and on Thursday I had an ultrasound. The diagnosis is that I have multiple gallstones, one of them is 2cm big and stuck in the neck of the gallbladder which doesn't seem to be good. My doctor would love to see me in surgery sooner rather than later. So I'll have an appointment with a surgeon on Thursday and hope to get more information then. In the beginning it really scared me, I had nightmares and felt overwhelmed. After I had talked and e-mailed with several people who went through this as well, I feel a bit calmer. But still a bit blue... I found that it's very therapeutic to be creative and have worked quite a bit in my art journal. It really helps. That, and working in the garden.

Oh, and here's the latest photo of the owls. They are nine weeks old now and seem to be very ready to move on. They're really big now and can fly very well. I guess they won't be around very much longer. We believe that they are boy and girl; I named them William and Kate.


If you want to snoop around the world and see other artists' desk, you just have to hop over to Julia's Stamping Ground to get the whole scoop. Have fun! Happy WOYWW!

I'm working on my art journal again. Recently I've been turning to it again and again for a very simple reason - I'm currently taking Christy Tomlinson's "She Had Three Hearts" art journal class, and just like her "The She Art Workshop" did, this class inspires me a lot. Whenever I watch Christy's really good and fun videos I feel my fingers itching, ready to mess around in my art journal. For a pretty long time I was a bit stuck, but now I am full of ideas. It feels darn good.

If you're interested how last Wednesday's art journal page turned out, just click here.

So - my PiF is ready to get mailed to the next participant on the list whose name has a * - I really love this idea and I enjoyed creating my PiF with WOYWW on my mind. Happy special WOYWW everybody!

Hello WOYWWers, the last WOYWW before the anniversary!! Woohoo! Are you excited about next week?


This week I'm working on my art journal again. I've neglected it for quite a while, but am back now. I'm gessoing pages so that they're ready when I want to create a bit, and I've started this background with craft paint (orange) and heavy body acrylics (teal). I've also started another 5x5 canvas that is sitting on top of my modpodge jar.

If you want to know how the owl canvas turned out that I started last week, you can see it here.

The WOYWW's home is Julia's blog Stamping Ground where you can find a list of all participants - take a look and then visit all the other crafty people around the globe. It's a great journey.

So, we're getting closer and closer to the long anticipated second anniversary of WOYWW where the creative world spends the day sailing around the globe and looking at other creative souls' desks. And all this thanks to the wonderful Julia of Stamping Ground who consistently makes this blog hop possible every Wednesday. Julia, you rock!

My mojo had gone out the door for quite a while. I hadn't been very creative - I was either working out in the garden or I spent considerable time with the owls. As some of you might know, the "fallen" owlet had been released back to the site, and it's doing well. Last time I saw them on Saturday, and both owlets were cuddling on a branch with the mom close to them. The family really is reunited. I am so glad about that.

Yesterday, though, I was really frustrated. For one, the bad weather has returned - rain and cold, I actually had to switch on the heater because the house was so cold. And I'm NOT living in Minnesota, no, this is "sunny" California! Huh! That didn't really anything good to my mood and I was feeling useless, had this "I'm not good enough" mood - it was highly unpleasant. Then I grabbed my art journal and started to play around with my water colors - and that actually helped!!!

So I got out a small canvas, 5x5, and some acrylics.


And what is missing here? Yes, you got that right - an owl! I'm thinking of creating the owl with fabric, I have some nice fat quarters that I'm going to cut up for that. Sooner or later I had to start creating owls after spending so much time with the owl family.

Oh - and I made an owl book today - uploaded my owl photos and made a photo book at Shutterfly for my Dad's birthday.

I think my mojo is back.

Hello WOYWWers, it's 101, only three more weeks to the anniversary and the PiF. I can't wait...

Nothing to show you this week what's on my work desk since I'm mainly working in the garden, watching owls and preparing the last of my German lessons that I will teach tonight. After that I'm done with teaching for the season until October. I'm ready for a break!

Last Thursday I taught the "Tag It" class and these are the tags we made that evening. I actually had six tags, but somehow one has disappeared and since I didn't take a picture of it before class I cannot show you that one.


The "warm-up tag", the owl tag, of course, was inspired by the wonderful owl family I'm currently following. Last Sunday, while in Mendocino for Mother's Day, we bought a spotting scope and now it's even more fun to view the little owlet and its parents. If you're interested to see pictures of the owl family - they're Great Horned owls - there are several posts of them below. For the seastar tag I used a watercolor crayon - I love the ones by Caran d'Ache. This technique was completely new for the participants, and I'm always happy when I can teach them something they haven't tried before.




If you're interested how the canvas turned out that I showed last WOYWW, "the girl who loved dogs" - you can find the finished project here.

If you actually want to see real work desks full of creativity, hop on over to Julia's blog who has an entire list of wonderful creative people and enjoy your visit to them.

Wow - WOYWW has three digits now!!! We are at 100!!! Only four more weeks to the anniversary and the PiF - I just finished mine today.


I have the feeling that my work space looks the same every week, which mainly is due to me not cleaning up. A really bad habit, I know.

I'm working on the canvas on the right, "Girl who loves dogs". However, I can't draw dogs - I can draw pigs, but not dogs. I had first thought of using stickers, but this is kind of tacky (!); especially since all my dog stickers - and there are not many - are of puppies. I want grown dogs. So I stamped dogs ( well, actually coyotes, but that's close enough) and am going to cut them out and make templates. I have started to experiment with heavy body acrylics and discovered that I L-O-V-E them, so I'll use those for painting the dogs (aka coyotes). That will give them a nice texture.

If you want to see more desks of wonderful creative people all around the globe, then please hop over to Julia's blog to find a pretty long list of lovely participants.

One more week and we'll have the 100th WOYWW - thanks to our wonderful Julia who every Wednesday motivates people to show their desk to the world and let each other find inspiration by visiting work desks around the globe.


Nothing much on my desk. I have started a new canvas for a girl, this one will be a dog lover - at least that's the plan. I never know where it will take me the further I get along with the work. I actually should work on tags since I'm teaching a tag-making class next week and it's still not completely designed. I have sort of lost my energy for these classes... I am so much enjoying teaching the German class at the moment that there doesn't seem to be much room left for the other classes. Perhaps it's also getting "old" and I'm looking for something new to teach. The problem is that I have to give in my class proposals extremely early, when I really don't know what I would love to teach six to nine month in the future. Or perhaps I'm just a bit burned out and simply need a break. I know that in the end I will enjoy teaching this class just as I did all the others.

Enjoy hopping around the world and visiting so many different desks. Until next Wednesday.

Hello WOYWWers, how are you all doing? I hope you have a wonderful Wednesday, hopping from one creative desk to the next, thanks to our wonderful Julia, the Queen of Snoop. I'm currently having a hard time getting around the desks, there is so much going on here, and on top of that it's my daughter's birthday this Easter, she'll be 13, oh my. A teenager!


And it's her birthday I'm working on, or better say little girls that her friends will receive who will come over on Monday afternoon. She has invited four friends, so there will be five girls, that's manageable. Each of the "tag girls" represents one of her friends and I'm glad that she could recognize each single girl when I showed her the tags. She also wants to do a scavenger hunt, this time about the Olympic Games. Oh boy. She was very enthusiastic about the 2010 Winter Olympic Games in Vancouver - I mainly remember Apolo Ohno, and just a few others (the German bobsled team and the German female speed skaters). Nothing is left in my memory about Beijing. But hey, ask me about the Summer Olympic Games back in 1972 in Munich - I remember those very well. I was 12 years old and a fan of Mark Spitz!

Hello WOYWWers, yes, it's Wednesday again... How are you? I hope you are doing well and enjoying this ride around the world to peek at other peoples' creative workspaces thanks to the wonderful Julia.

This week I'm working on "Helping Hands for Japan". I had first seen this on Rhonda's blog, then went to the Facebook page. If you're on Facebook, you can join, too. Artistically created hands will be auctioned off at the beginning of May, and all the funds will go to the Red Cross to help victims of the earthquake/tsunami/nuclear catastrophe in Japan.


The tags you can see in the upper left corner are humble beginnings for a tag class I'm teaching in May. I also want to start another girl canvas. Let's see how far I'll get by the end of this week.

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Another Wednesday!!! This IS getting fast...

Hello WOYWWers, how are you today? Do you have spring feelings or does winter still have a strong grip in your area? I am happy to say that we have had some lovely weather, I've been working in the garden a lot and I even had my first few naps in the hammock. That clearly spells good times for me.

Thank you so much for all your wonderful comments last week. I am sorry that I can't get around to everyone, but I try to visit as many desks as possible. It's something I thoroughly enjoy and I always get my Wednesday inspiration.

So, on my table today - another girl. Now, what a surprise...


 I seem to be pretty addicted to making these girls. This one is almost done - the phrase has to go on there
(something along the lines of "she loved tending to her garden") and something else that I am still not sure of, and then it will be done. Before I said that I am a rather slow worker, but this canvas was done rather quickly; especially the background was completed fast. Needless to say that I enjoyed it very much again.

Please visit the Queen of snoop, Julia, to find a long list of other creative people who show their busy or messy or tidy desks. Have fun!