Love, Forever

I love doing commission work. Yeah, it's fun to make whatever I feel like and work to my own deadline (or, ahem - a gallery's). But commission pieces have an added value - an extra done of heart and meaning.

My latest - a wedding cake topper for our good friends who got married in Big Sur last weekend. The theme of the cake was a nest, and I've been asked to create a pair of birds for it. Cool!

The wedding's colors were chocolate brown, mustard yellow and red, so robins fit nicely into the color scheme.

 The nest is store bought (Michael's, I believe), with a wreath of flowers that was taken apart and assembled on it.

 Whatever you do, please don't ask me about the wings...

The cake's decorator was the bride's aunt from Australia, and she didn't see the nest or the birds until the day before the wedding, yet everything came out absolutely perfect. And the best part? It was a lovely day, and a very lovely wedding. Hooray!
More photos here, on Flickr.

It's That Time of Year Again

Yep, it's that time of year again - plush show time. And first one for this year - Plush You.


This year, I'm making these little girls. I'm experimenting with making as much a variety with as little difference in patterns. Wish me luck!

Her name is Helga

Sew Mama Sew, apart from being a great shop and a resource for all things home sewing (with free tutorials, patterns and weekly giveaways as an added bonus), has also given me yet another opportunity to brag about my new machine. Brag? Nah... Me? I'm just helping people looking for a new sewing machine to buy. It's for the greater good. Really...


Ahem, well, without farther ado, The Sew Mama Sew Sewing Machine Meme:

Introducing: Helga

What brand and model do you have? Viking Emerald 183 (yep the same one they're giving away! Let me just say "wow")

How long have you had it? Six months

How much does that machine cost (approximately)? $800 But it was on sale for $600 at Joann's at the time

What types of things do you sew? Plush, clothes, a bit of home decor stuff, lots of small things

How much do you sew? How much wear and tear does the machine get? On average 6-10 hours a week

Do you like/love/hate your machine? Are you ambivalent? Passionate? Does she have a name? I love Helga to bits. Love her-love her-love her. This machine is solid and is very smooth to operate. I often say it can sew without me, all she needs me to do is press on the pedal.

What features does your machine have that work well for you? I like the ease of stitch selection and adjustment, and the Stop and Fix buttons. I like that it's electronic and gives me some indication of what's wrong when something is wrong. That was a big frustration point with my old Singer 8280. I also love the drop in bobbin.

Is there anything that drives you nuts about your machine? Not really. I'd say the manual is a bit vague, but so far that's it. I haven't tried sewing knits with it yet, or making button holes or some-such, so who knows. Oh, it's also not the prettiest machine in the world, but it has a brick-ish charm.

Do you have a great story to share about your machine (i.e., Found it under the Christmas tree? Dropped it on the kitchen floor? Sewed your fingernail to your zipper?, Got it from your Great Grandma?, etc.!)? We want to hear it! It was a Xmas present from my darling husband. He knew I was saving up for a new machine as a part of trying to make more of my wardrobe (instead of small children in china), and decided that the gift budget we set for the year was not to his liking. Yes, he is a catch, and for your information - I have some fighting skills. I've been paint-balling, watch out.

Would you recommend the machine to others? Why? Absolutely. I know it's pricey, but a refurbished machine or if you did a tradeoff at a Joann's store might help drop the price somewhat. If you don't need the embroidery stitches (did I mention it has some of those?) you could possibly go to the lower end ones in the Emerald range, but I believe none of them are electronic. Yeah, it's kinda fancy-nancy, but it just makes things a bit nicer and smoother. Also, it's a sturdy beast, unlike a lot of machines at the same level (like the Singers), it feels like an old school machine, built to last. That's also the main thing I read in reviews about it as a big big bonus.

What factors do you think are important to consider when looking for a new machine? What you're planning to sew, how much are you willing to spend (with the understandinprobablyhave to sacrifice some comfort and quality,), what other sewers feel about a certain brand and machine (learn from other people's experience). I'd definitely try and find a place to test-sew on the machine you're considering. Comfort and ergonomics are important and hard to gauge if you're not sitting in front of one. On that note, remember that the sales people are there to make a commission, so don't let them sell you on a machine that you were not planning to get, is more than you need or just plain doesn't work for you.

Do you have a dream machine? This one! I hope it will last me a lifetime of sewing. I do sometimes fantasize about my grandma's old black and gold Singer, though. Those are gorgeous machines (not to mention the sentimental value).


Feel free to ask me anything else, BTW! I'm no expert, but if I can get a chance to chew your ear off with my smarty-pants-know-it-all-ness I'll most likely take it. Be warned.

And the "Maybe the Best" Award goes to...

1. Maybe the coolest nail polish color ever: It's OPI "NY Apple Red" (or some such), but it says more tomato to me. It's the pedicure I got at the end of a long spa day Ant got me for my birthday (he's definitely the coolest husband). And yes, of course it's a cup of coffee in the background. Dah.


2. Maybe the cutest plush pattern ever: It's Katy Kitty (with an extra coat pattern!) from Larissa of Mmmcrafts on Etsy. This is one heck of a well written pattern! It's very easy to follow, super cute, and I didn't even alter it much, I know, it's a shocker. Strange, how I drew very carefully inside the lines as a kid, but I refuse to follow any pattern without some sort of alterations as an adult... I'll ask my psychology student friend. But I digress, super cute, please buy it and support this super talented lady (or any of her other patterns). I made this for my best friend for her birthday and she loves it. Now I just need to make one for myself.


3. Maybe the tastiest banana bread in the world: - the low fat banana bread from The Veganomicon. Hands down. Make sure to add a bit of soy/rice/almond milk (for extra gooey-ness) and some walnuts and chocolate chips. I'm making an average of a loaf a week. I kid you not.

4. Maybe the best TV show: The Shield (well... maybe the best after Dexter, depends on what season you're talking about) The Shield. Excellent show, but sheesh... not for the weak of heart or stomach, though. It's like a mix between The Sopranos, Law and Order (do you really need a link?) and Dexter. Funny though how it's all shot in Los Feliz, Silverlake and Sunset Junction, which is all a ten minute radius from us, on foot. Yeah... Got to love LA.

Hey! Whatsherface is back (maybe)

Hey look! I'm still around! Dear, oh dear - have I been gone this long?
Life has been really busy since we got back from Christmas break, and I can show you none of that (yet, at least). Busy, but good busy. My, oh my...
So what have I been doing? Drawing, mostly. And sewing with my beloved Helga, working out, drawing some more, working, sleeping (very little, usually on the couch), growing another year older (last year of my 20s, people!), getting addicted to new TV shows (House and The Shield), drawing even more, playing paintball (yeah, sis, I'm a job'nick, but i can hold my own on the paintball field!), cooking and making new friends (between drawing sessions).
What can I show you? This little cake topper I made for our friends' Amanda and Phil's wedding (photo courtesy of the happy couple and their wedding photographer. That's the day our camera died, seconds before the wedding ceremony started. Of course).


I have more to share, I promise not to vanish on you quite so often. If I misspell stuff more than my usual though, please forgive me, I must have drawn all night again.
Ciao!

Merry Christmas!

Merry Christmas, my dear readers! I hope you all are having a great, relaxing day, got all the presents you wanted and are having a really awesome day in general.

This is how our morning looked:


The top gift is what I got Ant (A De Longhi espresso machine, an elegant cup set, Intelligensia coffee, home made ganache for mochas and some other bits and bobs), and the bottom... MINE!


It's a Viking Emerald 183, and I'm SO stoked. Especially because one of my goals for the new year is to modify and make more of my own clothes. It's about twice as big as my old Singer 8280, which Ant bought me for my birthday a couple of years ago, and it's seriously a number of steps up. It has so many functions I didn't even know you could have on a machine, and it's electronic. Whoa!
Isn't Ant the best? Look how satisfied he looks. Justifiably so.


Thank you so much baby! You rock so hard AC/DC's got nothing on you!

Hi kids, I have some cute for you

Man, has it really been almost a month since my last post? Is it really almost December? Sheesh, time flies when you're having fun (and we are. Fun and way too much work, as usual...). I owe you many a story, but for now, I'd like to interrupt this blog slumber with an announcement - you ready?

I have plush to sell!
If you ever wanted to buy any of my plush creations, check out what's available below. To avoid confusion, mishaps and disappointment, please read all the details below first:

This is how I'm going to do this:
1. You look at the plushies available below, fall in love with one and want to buy it.
2. You email me at michal AT michalwright DOT com and tell me you're interested. If said plushie has not yet been sold, I'll give you my paypal address so you can make a payment. Please note that this is done on a first come, first serve basis.
3. We'll determine shipping costs before any money changes hands, based on your shipping address (yep, I'll ship internationally. Why not?)
4. Until payment is made, I will not consider the plush sold nor ship it to you. I will hold a plushie for you for 48 hours, unless we agree otherwise in advance.
5. If no payment is made in 48 hours, the plushie will be taken off hold, and if another person (the "next person in line", sort of) is interested in it - it will be sold to said person.
6. I'll get back to you either way within 12 hours. Yeah, I'll check my email more often. Promise. : )
7. If you're interested in gift wrapping, Christmas delivery or any some such, please let me know.

Please email me with any questions.
Happy shopping!
Michal


Yorick"Monstrously Nice" for "Crammed Organisms", 2008
Original design, synthetic fur and wool felt, cotton, polyfill, Hand Sewn.
Remember when your mom told you not to take candy from strangers? I hope you listened well. Because if you don't watch out for Yorick kids, you might end up in a Kid Stew. Yummm...
SOLD

IgorF"Monstrously Nice" for "Crammed Organisms", 2008
Original design, synthetic fur and wool felt, cotton, polyfill, Hand Sewn.
Igor has a present for you, and it's exactly what you want. You'd better wait for Christmas though, because what Igor wants, is to make you into meatloaf. Yup
SOLD

Stella"Monstrously Nice" for "Crammed Organisms", 2008
Original design, synthetic fur and wool felt, cotton, polyfill, Hand Sewn.
Stella loves to bake. She makes the best cupcakes you've ever eaten. But watch out, or you might end up in one of them. With cream frosting and a cherry on top.
Available from Wizard Sleeve Toyz here.

Olaf"Monstrously Nice" for "Crammed Organisms", 2008
Original design, synthetic fur and wool felt, cotton, polyfill, Hand Sewn.
Olaf knows kids like bunnies. They're so cute and soft and cuddly. And so are kids, as it turns out. Especially ones that have been made into stuffed toys. Monster children need toys too, you know.
SOLD


AlexOriginal design, wool felt, cotton, polyfill, Hand Sewn
Price: $50

Buonas noches, Señor Muertez!

I was recently accepted into the cool Dia de Los Plush show, at Red Hot Robot in Phoenix, AZ. Honestly, it was a short notice and I really had no time at all to even think about it, but I was intrigued. My art work, in case you're not very familiar, tends to be cute on the side of sweet and i've been trying to bring it a bit "to the dark side". I want to make it more edgy, a bit darker, more cynical and a bit creepy. Hence the child-eating monsters and the interest in a show that's inspired by the Day of the Dead.
Some research, some eating "Dead Bread" (provided kindly by one of our PA's wife) and a lot of gringo (read "white Jewish girl from the holly land") head scratching - and in came Señor Muertez,


(more pictures here)
He's Death's accountant (i've been watching too much Dead Like Me lately), and he's a crafty little guy. He made his own headdress himself. No, he didn't, actually. I did. And yes, it did take forever.

Adoption day

Why did I disappear and what was I doing?
I was fostering these three babies:

Toby

Princess Lulu

Mr. Muffin

Yes, raising baby monsters is no easy feat. Just figuring out what each of them will eat was complicated. And then there was the feeding schedule, and baths, and playtime, and sibling fights, and fleas, and vaccination, and teething... Sheesh! Now they're big enough to fend for themselves, and they're making their way to Seattle, to Plush You. Hopefully, all three will find a loving monster-parent who'll be ready to give them a good home. How can you resist this lovely face?


(More pictures here)

Kristen already outed me, but here's the official announcement - we're going to the show this year! We're going for a four day three night vacation in Seattle. Except for the main attraction on the 10th, any other fun events to look out for? Anyone else coming? What do people do in the Starbucks State?

A million different things

Yeah, a lot is going on chez nous lately, a lot of the "I need to think about it" kind of things. I really can't seem to be able to wrap my head around one thought and come to a solid conclusion. I can't seem to even agree on, start, work on and finish one single project. So I guess it's going to be yet another random post, eh?

- Thanks for the kind words about Max. I was crying for a whole week, and still choke up about him being gone every once in a while. It's strange how, considering what a zoo we're running, this quite (well, after he was fed his snacks) little guy is so badly missed, and what a huge hole his death tore in my heart. Poor little guy...

- On a more cheerful note, my little garden is doing super well (shocking, I know). One of my tomato plants is in full bloom, and if the pests let us, we'll have some tomatoes this summer! Yum. Since I wrote about it last, I had to rip out my entire lettuce box and the radishes box because the buggers started munching on them already. They seem to have forgotten about them this time around (knock on wood). Maybe the heat is as bad to them as it is to us. Either way, I have enviro-human friendly extermination plans. I'll try them out and let you know how it goes.

- After a long, grueling search, I finally bought me some new shoes:
It's a great pair of Naturalizer Ganache. I have an expensive taste, what can I say... The cool thing about them is that Ant spotted a tiny stain on them, hardly visible, and got me an extra 15% off (he's indeed a keeper, and can you believe he's actually gone shoe shopping with me? Wow... I hardly have patience for myself when I go shopping...). Not so cool? That I decided to wear them right away for another two and a half hours of cruising the Glendale Galleria and the Americana, on a hot day without any protective socks. Ouch...
Alas, this purchase will not tame my burning desire for these beauties. Did I ever mention I have an expensive taste?

- I've gone back to cooking, with a real vengeance. We've been trying to eat healthier these past couple of months, less processed, less "something out of a bag" (probably helped that Ant got rid of the microwave when we moved), as much organic as we can reasonable afford. My parents' last years' birthday present of some quick dishes cook books has been very useful (thanks, folks!), for recipes and inspiration. I even decided to give tofu a second chance (but not broccoli, that's never going to happen, mark my words). And when I discovered the Veganomicon (via Anna. Thanks Anna!), besides the geeky giggles, I knew I hit gold. Then Amazon did one of those tricks when it reads your mind and presto - The Joy of Vegan Baking and Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World somehow ended up in my shopping cart. How did Amazon know I've been searching for baking recipes egg-allergic people can eat? True magic.


Ant's never had a cupcake in his life (or a birthday cake, but that's a whole other tragedy), so he really wasn't getting my giddiness over the cupcake book. For my first attempt, I decided not to go all nuts, and made a basic chocolate cupcake with cream cheese frosting (except for dying half of it a orange and swirling it our toothpaste style). I swear he must have thought I was crazy, but after scarfing down his second, he summed it up like so: "Interesting... It's like a cake - but SMALLER". Yep, now he got it.

And by all accounts, he's totally hooked too, because he had no objections when I asked to go shopping for the above icing supplies, extracts, natural food dyes and colored sugar sprinkles. You're all over to the dark side now, babe. Mwha ha ha...

- Last weekend I made yet another attempt at putting the way ideas in my head on paper in some organized fashion, so I cut swatches from all my garment fabrics and put them in one of my many scribble notebooks, with some sketched and ideas as to what they will become (eventually, hopefully, one day). I'm pretty proud of myself. Now, If I can actually get some sewing done that will be nice...





The above stripy pink and red number is what I'm working on right now, but it's a whole other (horror) story for a whole other (lengthy) post.

- We're completely in love with our neighbors' dog Duncan. He's a Basset Hound, which we love anyway, but he's also the friendliest, drool-iest, floopy-est big footed puppster you've ever seen. He always come to greet us when we see him around the complex, and he's always up for a belly rub. If we were meaner people, we'd totally steal him. Totally.

- And since you haven't seen the cats in quite a while, here are some new feline photos for your viewing pleasure (courtesy of Ms. Pampered-Face Suki, who recently has been giving us the stink-eye every time we dare ask for her royal attention):


I'm actually bening sneaky with these pictures, as they also showcase our finally-finished bedroom (can you believe we've been living here for more than six months already?). The picture on the wall is this Matte Stephens piece. We also have this one hanging, but you can't see it in the photo.



Behold, a rare moment of feline domestic bliss:



See ya around!

I love...

... How a scribble...


... Turns to this...

... Which turns to this...

... and then to this...

... and finally to these:
Yorick

Stella

Igor

and Olaf

(more pictures here)
These are the monsters of "Monstrously Nice", my submission to Crammed Organisms.
I love how they came out, but I swear - never again will I commit to something I so blatantly have no time to do. I had a month to create a portfolio and these guys, and for someone with a day job, well... not quite possible I'm afraid. Don't get me wrong, I'm super excited, super thankful and happy to have been accepted to the show, but I really finally need to learn how much I can do at any given time. I seem to always think I can cram more work into the time I have, and the end result is usually a massive lack of sleep, a filthy house and a very neglected husband. You'd really think that in twenty eight years (yeah, I almost forgot - it was my birthday last week) I'd learn my time-space limits. I need a Tardis, I really do...
And how are you? how are your creative juices doing these days?