The Great Winged Moose or the Great Antlered Bird?

Either way, you wouldn’t want to cross paths with this Magnificent Beast!

It may look sweet, but this monster is most definitely a carnivore.

A Predatory Haiku:

By light of the moon

The teeny monsters cower

‘Neath my antler-wings.

I found this video through Listicles – one of my new fave websites. It’s a compilation of lists – any kind of list you can think of. Lists of 120 flavors of KitKat Bars (Muscat?), lists of pun tattoos, lists of illustrations of pneumatic trains? That’s just been posted within the last week. I could spend hours perusing.  I LOVE lists; they are so tidy, so organized, so encapsulating.

This video is from a list of their top 10 animated shorts.

It is created by Argentinian artist, Matias Vigliano.

TheHead / hand-drawn animated short from parquerama on Vimeo.

Totally reminds me of the Sea of Monsters from The Yellow Submarine.

Inspiration abounds!

There’s always a good reason to give. Thankfully, I have my beloved Plushteam to remind me of this. This month’s team project has been to donate plush to the Mothers Matter Project, a part of the Lauren Rose Albert Foundation. The foundation assembles and distributes tons of baskets of necessary items to Mothers in hospitals, shelters, etc. It’s a great idea, and I’m glad to help out! I sent in a bunch of Mini Maggots, Fuzzybottoms, and the Bubble Spawn.

Do you feel like doing some good? There are still a few Haiti Earthquake Relief items in the Plushteam Etsy shop, as well as some other St. Patty’s Day goodies. Buying handmade = doing good for the entire world!

In other news, I’m getting some feeling back in my sewing fingers. My Schmancy Olympic challenge is almost done, pending the arrival of the new scissors I ordered. Sharp scissors are important, and the ones I’m currently using are C-R-A-P. Then what’s next? Who knows!

I can’t tell you how many times people have seen my Spawn pieces and assumed they were teeth – crazy, misshapen, often demonic teeth, but teeth nonetheless. I’m all about letting people see what they want to see in my artwork – every individual experiences the world differently, and that’s just their way of connecting with what I do. I love it. I invite it.

But the Spawn are not teeth. Which got me to thinking, perhaps this is the people crying out to me for teeth? Maybe that’s what they want? Why deny them what they want?

A few weeks ago I made a first pass at a prototype for the tooth fairy companion pouch. Put your loose teeth in it, hang it on the wall, put it under your pillow, whatever, and when you wake up in the morning, you’ll find your teeth have been replaced by shiny treasure!

This was also my first experience with zippers – something I once considered to be an insurpmountable obstacle turned out to be not so bad.

When I was a kid losing my teeth, the Tooth Fairy always left me fat, shiny 50 cent pieces – the most elusive and rare of the US currency (or so I thought at the time). I loved them, and to this day I still have my collection of them.

Of course, one of those is made of plastic and was not given to me by the tooth fairy but by a friend long after all my teeth had fallen out.

Another friend gave me this fifty-center, with Ben Franklin on it:

I would have loved to have a pouch like this when I was building up my tooth money collection!

A  Nocturnal Haiku:

A flutter of wings,

Your bicuspids disappear,

And treasure spews forth!

((**PS – I know a certain little niece of mine, recently having begun teething, who is going to have the cutest, most wonderful tooth fairy pouch in existence when the time comes!**))

I need to shake things up. I don’t think I’ve picked up a needle and thread in . . . weeks. That hasn’t happened for the past 2 and a half years. What’s up with that? The longer I avoid my sewing table, the harder it gets to even contemplate approaching it again.

I need some inspiration. I have definitely been a voyeur in the craft world for the past few weeks. A peeping tom, if you will. Here are some the unsuspecting artists who I’ve been secretly admiring from afar. Maybe their works of brilliance will jolt me into rediscovering my creative mojo.

I could spend a long time gazing at the vibrant illustrations of Simon Wild.

Or the august, Vermont-inspired works of Ryan Fowler of Native Vermont Studios.

I guess if all else fails, I can pick up one of these Good To Know zines from the esteemed Pikaland Etsy shop – How to Overcome your Creative Stumbling Blocks. (Those of you who spend time in my sidebar may have seen her site already.)

Until then, I’ll keep doing doing the creativity rain dance . . . and wish for a downpour.