The House Plants

I really love houseplants but my cat, Byron has proven to me that I can't keep most of the plants I'd love to have. Violets, ferns, moss terrariums, they've all fallen victim to the wrath of Byron whose greatest joy is nibbling, pawing and toppling my plants.

I'm not nearly as interested in this organic, rooted cat grass as I am eating the violets your boyfriend gave you.

The best example I have of this sort of tyranny against plants is a visit he took to my family's house where my sister has a few indoor herbs. I left Byron there for a month while work was being done on my apt. During this visit, my sister called me twice.
The first call went like this,
                             "Hello?"
                             "DO YOU KNOW WHAT YOUR CAT DID?"
                             "What?"
                             "HE POOPED IN MY BASIL PLANT! HE KNOCKED IT OVER AND POOPED IN IT, IT'S IN THE MIDDLE OF THE FLOOR, ALL DUG UP! HE POOPED IN IT!"
That was the point in the conversation I couldn't respond because I was too busy laughing.

The second phone call went like this,
                             "Hey"
                             "HE DID IT AGAIN! HE POOPED IN MY OTHER BASIL PLANT!"
Needless to say, I found the whole thing hilarious, but I also knew I wouldn't be getting any basil plants for my own apt.

Sneaky cat, probably pooping in there.

Luckily for me, succulents are hearty enough to withstand him while being easy to proliferate and absent of floral odor. Which of course means that until I can find a home with enough sunny window sills or ceiling planters for both my cat and my plants, I'm restricted to some tiny spots where I place as many tiny plants as I can.

The greatest love story ever told?

It's also an outlet for my plastic figurine collection that I also can't leave out because of Byron.

"I might be safe here..."

But I can hope too, right? Here's a temporary little set up that lasted about 4 minutes,

Thought I'd try a little scene with the moss & trees my sisters got me but it lasted about 4 minutes

Oh Well.

As an aside, I am in the process of making Etsy store updates so there is a bit of activity going on over there- and more to come.

Featured in Etsy Finds: The Hot List

Hi All,
Last post I mentioned I had a little possible press coming my way and here it is:

click for dynamic, clickable links version

Just a little segment of the e-mail but I've gotten a tremendous amount of positive vibes, kind msgs and overall support from it! It's just proof the little things really do count :).

Also, this Friday, I've got a (cotton) bird especially for Easter going up in the Etsy shop,

Actually, it doesn't need to be for Easter, so long as you like mischievous, disguised birds.
It's in the blue and white print I love (and have used for the alphabet birds).

 

I've also been featured in a couple very sweet, spring-inspired treasuries:

"hello denium" treasury by lorinichols

"I'll Fly Away Oh Glory" treasury by Saintwolf

 

Ok, I've still got a lot of non-sewing to do so I'll post an  in progress shot of my newest project next time. I haven't made any other animals since my fish so here's a hint: it's not a bird! :p

Obligatory New Years Post, 13 Days Late

Happy New Year!
You're over it already? Sorry.

I went home to Philadelphia for Christmas but got snowed in and spent 4 extra days there. With no creative outlets for a week, I lost my mojo. I made it through a hellish ride back to NY that lasted an extra 3 hours (I get very, very motion sick on bus rides and spent two days recovering), exchanged some awesome presents, seriously brainstormed, thought about my New Years Post, dove into finishing some things I started before I left and then caught the flu- the likes of which I had not suffered since I was a kid.
The past week I was achy, weak, had a constant headache, slept the days away and watched A LOT of movies (most of which I can't even remember). By the end of it, I could have sworn it was going to be warm out, Springtime, verdant and lovely- no dice.
It's ok though, there is a lot to be done before Spring and while I've never been a "resolution" person, I'm going to share them anyway, or at least the general ideas (my actual list is compiled of incoherent word strings).
I think these are pretty good fundamentals so hopefully I'll stick to them.

THE LIST

GET "WITH IT"- Prepare for holidays in a timely manner. Participate in the "craft culture". Promote friends, promote myself. I spent several rushed December days trying to make things for the holiday when the ball should have been rolling in November. The mere idea of even participating in a show didn't strike me until early December.
I'm not remorseful though, this year took a lot of soul-searching and research.  Time to implicate it now.

WEBSTUFF- Oh, I've been wanting to have a new website for a long while now but it was never the right time and I didn't have enough content. I made one a very long time ago for a digital art class [http://homepages.nyu.edu/~cas361/ if you're curious but it is officially defunct] but I can't access it anymore and now I've actually got some work to show. It's very different from any site I would design now and was rushed due to class requirements so it's time to make something nice. 
And yes, I also want to stylize this blog because it's probably the most boring looking "art blog" you've ever seen.


GET CONCEPTUAL- I have a lot of concepts in my sketchbooks- A LOT and while I don't consider myself a genius, I barely touch upon ideas that could be very interesting (at least for me to make).
Being commercially viable and popular has (in the past) felt like a completely different monster from the things I'll actually produce, these deeper meaning ideas are also much more time consuming to execute but I'm realizing more and more I'll never get over my "weirdness" about making dolls, or shyness about considering it "art" without chalking it up and devoting some time to depth.

EXPLORE MORE MEDIUMS- Paper clay, paper, more drawing, more painting, getting back into metal, design fabric; as well as making prints, postcards and other media. I'm not going to cut out sewing but there is definite room for expansion and enhancement. Implicating more mediums will also help illustrate all those ideas I was talking about before.

All of these things are kind of related and build upon each other. They are all based upon developing craft but also interacting with others and I hope to do both. We'll see.


For now, here are the latest additions to my Etsy Shop:





Black Thumb Terrarium- Succulent No. 1


Black Thumb Terrarium- One Tree No. 1


Black Thumb Terrarium- Succulent No. 2




 
Black Thumb Terrarium- 1 Tree No. 3

And I also added a giraffe I made a while ago but am listing for the first time:


href="http://www.flickr.com/photos/crystalsuh/5352256818/" title="baby giraffe by crystal A suh, on Flickr"><img src="http://farm6.static.flickr.com/5208/5352256818_e7d635cc16.jpg" width="400" height="399" alt="baby giraffe" />

6 Inch Baby Giraffe

Whoops, Missed A Day

But it was for a good cause- productivity!, I'll post on what I was doing later (double post to make up) but for now, yesterday's intended post:

Succulents

Here are some leaf cuttings I took that have begun to sprout. Do I sound too nerdy if I say I was thrilled?

They've also been affecting my other hobbies.

This is a pair of succulents I made.

This one I modeled after a jade plant.

This one after an echeveria. You can buy this one from Etsy if you feel so inclined.

More Terrariums

To say I've been obsessed with plants (particularly moss terrariums and succulents) would be a complete understatement so here are some more that I've made in the past couple months:

To be fair, the salt shaker one was actually made before the others.

This is the latest, a desert terrarium with giraffe

I added beads to this one to mimic a river, this was a suggestion from Will.

Maybe the "river" was good for it because it sprouted

And this is not a terrarium but my air plant.

Air plants are amazing! They don't need soil to survive, just a weekly- biweekly soaking in water for a few hours. I'm actually a little worried about this one in the shot glass, it used to be twice the size until my cat, Byron fished it out of it's soak and tore it to bits.

I guess he thought it was a fish?

This picture is right after the attack when I soaked what was left.