New Work - October 1st

Ahhh, it is my season! Autumn is in it's full, brilliant glory right now. Leaves are falling, days in the low 60's, nights cool and crisp. And today, finally, rain is falling!

I'm so ready for the holiday season and having pushed a whole slew of custom work out in September I get to begin the month with a few days of just happy-making work!  Letting my mind wander and take me wherever it wishes to lead me.

The "Ledgerkeepers" writing project is going well too.  I upped the daily word count to 1000 and hit it all but once in the last few weeks. Some days nearing 2000 words! Stories are taking shape, the "history" of the Bewildering Pine is rounding into shape and I've been exploring mythologies, folk tales and geography so much more too. I had hoped to have some digital sketches to show but would rather wait until I have a few completed so I can keep them coming at a regular interval.

For now, here are a few of the September creations that came and went thru the shops.

I hope the Autumn season finds you enjoying all it offers in your "neck of the woods". :) And I hope to catch up on blog commenting soon too. This time of year is always so terribly busy in preparation for the holiday rush and with the writing project added, it seems I have so little time for anything but my work these days. . .

Enjoy and, as always, thank you so much for stopping by!

nicolas

A requested ankh amulet that, once completed, I liked so much that I am going to be offering it in the shop this winter. :)

I adore making these Hecate statues! Just one or two requests a year but I never turn them down. :)

It took me awhile to realize that my gargoyles have been looking more familiar lately. . . then it hit me it is because that face, that smile, is totally JOXER from Xena, Warrior Princess. Oh subconscious, how do you do it?

And I think my Foxgoyles have been coming into their own recently too. Abstracting animals is really a challenge!  Simple lines, less fuss. . . better results I think!

A simple place for relaxing and day dreaming!

I'm no classic ancient world sculptor . . .  but I loved taking on this Artemis request! Her  mighty bow is actually strung with fishing line!

Found these lovely little Patina-glazed tealight holders recently and they are perfect for making little "castle "cupcakes! :)

Fairy Houses Upon Stars abound again this year, of course!

And the newest of the "Little People", a Domovoi Elf (with friends in the background)

I'll be posting an update in a few days about "Alexandra the Great" ( and some great pics of her next to a snail that was her size when we first rescued her from a lake of vinaigrette dressing) but, as you can see, she is thriving and BIG and living in a lovely glass coffee pot these days!!  :)

A Snail's Tale

 A few weeks back, while enjoying the first salad of the season prepared entirely from our little container garden, we found a tiny, tiny (less than pea size!) snail in the bottom of the salad bowl, swimming (swimming may be a strong word for it) in remains of the lemon-honey vinaigrette dressing. . .

Certain we had caused the demise of the little one but still, holding out hope, we set her out to dry on a leaf of one of our orchids and went about our day. At dinner, she was still there, not having budged at all. Neither of us could bring ourselves to dispose of her so we went to bed and, the next day, had pretty much forgotten about her in the rush of emails, shipping and making.

That night, as we sat down for dinner, Sofie noticed that she was gone! She thought, perhaps, that I had discreetly removed her but when I said that I had forgotten about her altogether, we started a frantic search. Had the cat found a tiny new plaything? Had she dried up and fallen to the floor? Did we imagine her or was she just a dream?

Turns out, none of the above. . . she had come back to life from her "death-by-dressing" and found her way onto the plastic plant tag in the orchid pot. She had crawled about a foot from leaf to tag! We got out a quart mason jar, put in a layer of organic soil, a rock, a piece of garden lettuce, carrot tops and parsley and half an eggshell and gave it all a good soaking. . . she took to it right away and explored to her heart's content without a sign of fear. . . which is why, after deciding she should stay,  we named her Alexandra the Great!

And now, two weeks later, she is thriving and has become our new permanent house guest! She's grown so fast and we delight in giving her fresh greens and eggshells each night as well as soaking her world a few times a day. We've been reading up on snails and it seems they can live 12-15 years. . .  OK, I wasn't expecting that long of a stay from our houseguest!!

She's a marvel, having grown about 4x her orignal size in these two weeks. Most of the sunny days she hides under the half-eaten lettuce leaf or curls up beside her favorite rock but yesterday she was out and exploring during the day and I took the opportunity to get a few macro shots of her (she is still really VERY small!) to share.

Another of nature's unending small miracles. . . Alexandra the Great. . . we can't wait to see how big she gets and have already been shopping for a larger home/empire for her future, larger-snail, self. : )

Alexandra the Great conquers yet another obstacle!

LOVE the shell spiral and colors. And her amazing antennae!

Thanks for dropping by!

xo
nicolas