And Now For Something Completely Different

Yep, I've been slacking.  I will fully admit that I haven't painted a feather since April of 2012.  I've done some dreamcatchers and I've learned some traditional beading.  I've learned brick stitch and how to do rosettes from a fantastic Mohawk woman.  I've taught myself peyote, square, spiral and how to do free-form flowers.  The pouches I've been doing have everything stitched together so delicately you can't see the sinew on either side.  I'm still learning though, so no photos of leather work till I decide whether I'm going to keep it up or not.

Anole

 I have to say, that even with that I haven't been very busy lately.  I've been out enjoying life.  I've started helping out the museum I work at with a new Facebook Fan Page and a Page On G+.  That means taking loads of photos, doing some editing, and lots of research!  It's taken me in a different focal direction that I think I needed to appreciate my own work a bit more.

Cicada

Though I can tell it's time to get back into getting dirty again.  My hands have been itching to go.  I have a few pieces that I need to get finished up and a few more that I need to get working on.

On a good note, I may not have been painting, but I've been able to catch some wildlife that has been coming around me lately.  So I've shared a few of the photos so you can see what I see.

Pandora Sphinx

There are little green anoles everywhere, and I do mean everywhere.  On windows, on the porch, in the museum, in the bathroom, on the car...everywhere.  I can't complain as they eat a ton of mosquitoes every chance they get.  They are kinda cute too.

There are cicada's flying into my porch just about every night.

Tersa Sphinx

Most amazing story, I had a Pandora Sphinx moth attach itself to my shoulder for about two days.  He sat there as I worked, did laundry, cooked and cleaned.  It was a very odd experience, but I know it had a deep significance. 

The Pandora Sphinx, sitting with me

Shortly after my Pandora friend passed away, a Tersa Sphinx moth came to stay with me for a while after returning home from work.  They are both Sphinx Moths, also considered hummingbird moths.  Fantastic creatures!

A visiting Tersa Sphinx

And lastly we have had American Green Tree Frogs just as many places as the Anoles!  Every window in the evening has had a frog.  My porch has at least two at any given time.  Though the photo I have was a tiny little one that I almost passed right by.  It was so tiny it could have fit on my thumb nail!    Don't be fooled by the size though, we can hear these little guys calling out from several yards away as if they're in your ear! 

American Green Tree Frog, look how tiny!

While I haven't been painting much as of late, I certainly have had a lot of animal visitors.  There have also been snakes, egrets, hawks, owls, and praying mantis' that I've not gotten a good shot at.  Maybe they're going "Here...here's some good inspiration...GET BACK TO WORK! =)

3 Feather Wolf

Way back in December, I had a request for a fan painted with wolves.  Two cubs if I could.  She wanted it by April for her man as a gift.  Now to be honest, I am ridiculous when it comes to commission pieces and I make myself nervous to the point I'm scared to work on it.  So that being said, I waited till mid March to start it.  Apparently...I work better under pressure

It turned out really great!  It was a bit of a challenge to work across three feathers.  I don't have the photo of the ends because the shafts still need cleaned up and wrapped, but hopefully everything in this go round will eventually make it much easier to do another fan in the future!

Hatching Baby Dragons

 There's a new line of creation that have been started!  Little baby dragons!

They're not my normal medium of work.  I'm more of a 2-D kinda gal all and all.  But my other half started playing with polymer clay and I wanted to give it a shot.

It's a lot different than the regular clay I am used to.  It doesn't harden on you, or dry out and crack.  But that can also be one of the biggest pains in the rear!  There's been a couple times I've had one just about done, sitting on a shelf, and someone (or some cat) bumps it.

And let me tell you...picking fur out of polymer clay.  Does anyone else remember that if you had pets and playdoh as a kid...of it fell on the floor it was pretty much done for?  Unless you like furry creations that is.

But while he makes little gnomes, and really strange figures, I decided to take a cute and adorable route and try my hand at little dragons.  The ones on the very top image are my first two.  I started out with the large one.  She took a few hours to finish, mostly because I kept knocking little details off.

About that time, Branden, my partner in crime, decided he was going to make dragons that fit inside bottle caps.  Not to be outdone, I made a tiny little baby; which you also see in the first photo.  The little one was surprisingly more difficult, as it's hard to hold teeny tiny dots for details.

After the first one, they kind of exploded.  I would sit and watch an episode of something on Netflix and make a dragon.  This can be a bit interesting when someone asks "How long did it take you to make one" and your response is "Somewhere around an episode of Bones".

But really, once I got a few down, I started to try out a few different styles.  Some have multiple colors in the wings, one has swirled fins instead of wings and paws, one is even fallen over.

I haven't found a particular style that I want to stick with just yet, or if I just want to continue to make unique ones.  Either way, I hope that you find them as enjoyable as I do.  For purchasing options, follow the link to my Etsy shop.  Feel free to request a different color or something unique.  Challenges are always fun!

Etsy Is Up and Running!

As of Thanksgiving, Red Tail Arts is on Etsy! CLICK HERE to see all the new and exciting pieces on the Etsy site!

Bob's Dreamcatcher

 Dreamcatchers have long been associated with native culture.  Traditionally Ojibwe (Chippewa), they now span into nearly every tribe...each one putting their own twist to the beautiful craft.

This was done for a friend of mine down on the island.  He wanted a unique piece for his wife's birthday.  All I was given was that it was to be big, she liked purple, and sea shells.

The branches are from the shrubbery right outside my front door, so the hoop creation was the easy part.  The shells are mostly collected right off the beaches in Hatteras Island, with exception of the cowery and little snail like shells from a cannibalized, and very tacky, necklace.  The beads are all glass in shades of purple and green (being his favorite color).  And the feathers are pheasant, guinea hen, and wild turkey.  As for the size, it's a bit over a foot at the widest spot.

Wedding Bells

I was asked recently to participate in the bridal party of a dear friend's wedding.  We have been friends for a long while.  I don't know exactly how long, but it's been a long number of years.  We've been there through good times, bad times, and all of the other times in between.  So to me, the exact number gets lost in all the other important stuff.
As her wedding gift, I offered to make her the necklace for her special day.  She had always been into the Renaissance style; her dress and veil was even as close as she could get!

Being her wedding colors were green and purple (green for the groomsmen and purple for the bridesmaids), I chose amethyst for the main stone.  Some of them are chevrons, some balls, and some little chips.  The two little glass leaves are just a splash of green to bring the colors together, as well as a few silver accents through the piece.  The rest of the necklace is freshwater pearl; which is one of her favorite "stones".

While it's not traditional Renaissance style, I tried to create something to make her feel like a Queen!

Feathered Sunshine

Finches in general have a beautiful song.  We would always have several of them when I lived up in Pennsylvania every year.  Where as they're small birds, their bright yellow colors always made them easy to spot in the crowd of sparrows and chickadees.  They also have a very distinct flight pattern, so even if you can't catch the yellow across the sky, you can follow the wave like pattern...flap flap flap drop flap flap flap drop flap flap flap drop.  I'm not sure why that always amused me as a child, but I thought it was the funniest way to fly.

This goldfinch is perched on a branch of dogwood.  I haven't seen any since I've moved to the island, but I'm hoping that one of these days, I'll spot one amongst the birds that visit the museum gardens.

Writing Spider

As I believe I had stated before, I'm not fond of spiders.  I personally have a strong dislike for the 8 legged creatures, even if I understand where they fit in the ecosystem.  However, we have very large visitors to our porch every year that I've become quite accustomed to.  We have several writing spiders grace us with their presences every year.  And while they are on the large size of spiders, I've gotten to kind of like them.  I still don't like them that close to me, or would be willing to hold one...but I've stopped trying to swat it with a broom.  They make huge webs, with a thick zig-zag pattern down the center.  Every now and then, we catch them bouncing up and down like they're using their web as a trampoline.  I'm not sure whether they're trying to attract bugs, test the strength of their work, or just having a bit of fun.

A Lovely Amur Leopard

Way back when I started this painting, I had in mind to gift it to a woman that is doing some work for me.  However...it kept looking horribly disfigured.  I'd see what was wrong, try and fix it, but to no avail.  It would just look screwy in some other way.  Only after I sighed and said "fine, it'll stay here, I just want to get it done" did everything magically work out.

Big cat medicine is temperamental...it does exactly what it wants when it wants.  I guess this is just yet another example!

It's a Little Bear

I was doing little clay sculptures one night (when they're done I'll post them as well) and any time I went to do a bear...it started to look like something else instead.  And while that can happen with paint...I have more play room than with a chunk of clay that wants to be a badger or a frog.

More Double Earrings! This Time in Pheasant

There's not much to write on here about the new feather earrings.  I have a small collection of pheasant feather and guinea hen to do crafts with, and while all of these are in pheasant...the others are soon to come.

 The earwires are still surgical steel, but plated in gold or silver.  I've never been fond of gold personally, but they seem to look very nice on some of the stone combinations

 One of these days, I shall make several of each design, but for now I'm just trying out different color combinations.

While they are somewhat easy to do, and it's fun to have conversations on Skype while I'm working, they still can take a bit of time.  The most delicate part is making sure the feathers are facing the correct direction before they're set.

Carving Coyote

I'm more known for my 2-D artwork, especially with the painted feathers over the past few years.  Branden has been working in sculpture for as long as I've been drawing and painting.  But, me being the competitive artist that I am, wanted to try my hand at carving and sculpting.  It took me a bit to learn the tools...mostly because I am horribly stubborn and want to learn on my own rather than having someone looming over my shoulder.

This was my second attempt at carving; I think I spent two to three days working on it.  You'd never know by the simple, stylized design.  Even though soapstone is relatively soft as far as stone goes, it's still a temperamental medium to work with.  I didn't want coyote out of it when I started.  The original piece was twice as large, and I had big ideas...and then it cracked.  And what I was left with on one half of the remaining sections, looked to me like a coyote howling.  So I took away what was impeding the look of a howling coyote, and now I have this little guy.  Sometimes, it's more fun when you can still make something out of misfortune or mistake.

One Of The Signs That Spring Is Coming

For the past few nights, I have gone out for a moonlit walk, to find a tiny green tree frog sitting on the porch chair.  Being the porch is screened in, I don't want the little thing to somehow get trapped without food, so I pick him up and put him right outside the door.  It's an ordeal that takes a few minutes usually.  The little frog is about the size of a quarter, and likes to cuddle down in my palm to warm himself a little before hopping to the plants.

It's one of the many signs that spring is finally breaking through the cold.  The turtles and the frogs have come out after burying themselves for the winter.  I'd normally say that you can see the plants going into bloom, but around here, our flowers bloom throughout the year and a good portion stay green leaved if they're not flowering.