Sailor Sam has come to life....

Smiling Sailor Sam SnipPet is finished and has packed his bags to head to the UK! Paws crossed that he has a safe trip to his wonderful home.

Cupcakes and bunnies du jour :)

I cannot begin to tell you how happy I am right now. I battled severe back pain for about 12 days and yesterday, I was finally pain free and functioning normally. So, first I cleaned the house and then made some cupcakes :)! I also went cat trapping to try to finish TNRing a nearby colony but had no luck...won't even go into the wild goose chase debacle that occurred :(. And today, I am thrilled to be back at the art table. Thank goodness!

Here are the cupcakes of the day...chocolate mint!



and two custom rabbits completed and ready to go to their new home.

Next project on the table....

First of all, Happy First day of spring!!!!!!! I have been counting the seconds for warm weather, flowers and chirping birds to arrive and it is finally here. I am BEYOND thrilled that the snow and ice are over for now. It is so nice to see my feral kitties rolling around in the sunshine and napping comfortably in the grass. I can't wait to join them in the yard and clean up the flower beds and get some new lovelies planted. But for now, I have lots of work waiting at the art table.

I am working on a few custom rabbits and this very special "Sailor Sam" doll. I am creating this by request for a wonderful children's book writer and illustrator. I will give more details about her and the significance of Sam soon. Here is my sketch of him and the armature I built last week.

Alice has stepped off the pages...

...and come to life! I just finished this custom order Alice doll. She is 8" tall and will live in her very own "Alice's Palace" in Atlanta.

I have never done a sculpted piece in black and white, so this was a challenge and also very fun. You know I LOVE color, but it was nice to not have to worry about picking the perfect colors. I used black paint, ink and pastels to get desired illustrative effect.

Spring forward with the STJ update!

Devil Cat and Spring Bunny will be making their debut during the Spookytime Jingles' update tonight!

It's all about cake lately...

Cake toppers, cake decorating, cupcake baking.....my life seems to be all about C-A-K-E!! After cats, it is my favorite thing :). I started my second session of cake decorating at Hobby Lobby last week. It is the "Flowers and Cake Design" class. So far we have dabbled in making fondant and royal icing flowers. In addition, I am starting to make cupcakes weekly from my new vegan cupcake book, Vegan Cupcakes Take Over the World. My husband, his professor colleagues, my cat lady friends, my art buddy and her daughter are all my taste testers. So far, so good...getting stellar reviews! And I just finished up another cake topper. One of my Cheshire Cat on the Mad Hatter's hat pieces for an Alice themed baby shower.

Here is a little peek at everything "cake"!



S'mores cupcakes in leopard print holders...



Chocolate with peanut butter icing....



Final cake from first decorating class...

A little magic for the Pfatt Update!

Ta Daaaaaaa! I pulled a rabbit out of my hat for the Pfatt Update today...ha ha, please excuse that terribly obvious pun!! The Pfatt Marketplace opens up today at a new time: 10 a.m. Pacific (11 Mountain, noon Central, 1 p.m. Eastern).

TNR Update...Body Shop Cats

I realized that I never reported on our second round of trapping at the body shop down the road. We TNRed 7 cats awhile back and then returned 2 weeks ago to try to get the rest taken care of. We headed out on a Friday afternoon and within an hour, we had 4 cats trapped. After that, went to a second location...an apartment several exits over, and managed to quickly trap a female that desperately needed to be spayed. We returned to the body shop and trapped a new little guy that had been hiding in a drain. Unfortunately, we were unable to get the final adults (the torti queen mama and a wary black male kitty). My car battery died while we were sitting back there in the pitch dark so we thought that was our cue to head on out. Never a dull moment during our cat trapping adventures!

I checked in on the cats last weekend and noticed another new cat....a thin, scared brown tabby who appeared out of nowhere when she smelled the canned food I put out. So, 3 more kitties to fix before we can move on to another crew. We will probably be heading out there this weekend with our trusty drop trap....a MUST for those hard to catch kitties!

The release! Run free, sweeties....



Cute little guy at the top of the drain...

Alice Madness on the table...

I finished up my Pfatt and STJ update pieces, but it is too early for a sneak peek, so I thought I'd share my other works in progress today. I have been working on a miniature 8" Alice doll for a very special customer. She requested this Alice to look like the original long necked Alice illustration, so she will be painted in black and white. This piece has been a good challenge for me! Paws crossed that it will turn out well in the end. I am also working on one of my custom Cat on the Mad Hatter's Hat cake toppers. It is for an Alice themed baby shower. Love that!

Hope everyone is having a happy, creative week :)!

A Happy Ending/Beginning....

Brian and I delivered our precious foster kitty, Marmalade, to Good Mews in Atlanta last Friday. We left Lexington at 4:30 am and hit the road with a very scared little boy, but he calmed down quickly and was an absolutely excellent traveler!!! He sat quietly the whole trip and enjoyed chin scratches every few minutes :).

We checked him into Good Mews later that morning and sadly said our goodbyes. It is always awfully hard to let go of a foster especially one as adorably handsome and sweet as Marm! BUT we knew that he would have MANY kind volunteers showering him with love and that he would find a forever home very soon. How soon???! Well, I got notification last Saturday that he was going to be adopted by a very nice man. Amazing! He is supposed to go home with him tomorrow so I am anxious to hear how it goes. I hope Marm's new dad will contact me.

Nothing better than a happy beginning for a frightened stray kitty who will no longer suffer on the streets.....

Today's WIPs....

Devil Cat, Magic Rabbit and Spring Bunny are all in the works....