Inspired by Anatomical Hearts, Love, Sayings & an Olive

Happy Valentine's Day! I meant to do this post well in advance of V-day, but of course I never got around to it. I am going to try to explain my train of thought concerning the inspiration of some of my new items and hopefully you'll be able to follow along.

When I created my Valentine's inspired items this year I started by thinking of hearts and anatomical hearts. I didn't want to try to make an exact anatomical heart, so I started with an actual heart shape and added valves coming out of the top in a design that appealed to me. I call it more of a representational heart since it is far from anatomically correct. Next, I thought of what I would put in the hearts which led me to thinking about words associated hearts and love.












Love in my heart
Lust in my heart
Joy in my heart
Passion in my heart (Unfortunately, "passion" didn't make the cut because it was too long)

From "love in my heart " I started thinking of "My Heart is filled with Love" which made me want to literally fill the anatomical heart with the word love. I added the hearts as a fun accent and to add some color since I new I wanted it to be black on white. It made me think of graffiti or writing on a chalkboard (like when your teacher used to make you write the same thing over and over).

The black on white and black on red clay that I used in the previous pieces reminded me of last year's XOXO design, so I decided to take that pattern to another level with my "Love to Give" necklaces featuring the same pattern inside the anatomical heart. The X's and O's represented the love that was stored up waiting to be showered on someone. ( I think we've all been there).

Finally, I figured if I was adding to last years XOXO design , I should also think about doing something with my popular "Wood You Love Me" series. The obvious idea was to create a faux bois representational heart pendant called "Wood You Have My Heart"

The silly play on words from that series made me think of another silly love pun "Olive You". I had actually been thinking of making something with that saying ever since I made some custom olive cufflinks for a customer last summer. I never figured out how I would do it though. I thought of putting an olive sitting in the bottom of a letter U, but I thought it was a bit too corny. With the valentine's inspiration flowing, a light bulb went off and decided I should turn the pimento into a heart (Duh!). So I took my original design from the custom listing and added the heart. I just loved the thought of a man giving the silly sweet necklace to a woman. It would be sure to bring a smile to her face. Cufflinks will be coming soon. Wouldn't they be sweet for a wedding.

Well, I hope you were able to follow along, as my mind can be a bit manic when I am creating. I will be keeping these items in my shop as well as adding a few more love inspired items that I didn't have time to finish. I figure Valentine's day is nice for celebrating love, but we should celebrate on the other days too, so my love items are here to stay.

Be Inspired By Hearts

Well, I am not usually a big fan of Valentine's Day (My birthday is the next day, so I am usually more interested in that). I am not the mushy type and I am kind of from the school of let someone know you love them everyday and not just once a year. My dh usually provides the requisite card, chocolates and flowers, but today I have really been feeling the love. Not only did I wake up to a sweet card from my boys, and a great card from my dh which actually serenaded me with the song "Ain't No Woman like the One I Got" (you gotta love the singing card). I also got a big heart box of chocolates, so coffee and chocolates it was for breakfast (and lunch! and an afternoon snack). Then when I checked Etsy, my pear pendant was on the front page and it netted me 58 hearts and 2 sales!!! 58 hearts in one day is definitely a record for me and I am really feeling the love. While I do love sales, it is still exciting to know that someone likes and appreciates your work, even if they don't buy something it's still an acknowledgement, so hearts actually do mean a lot. I just broke 3500 hearts earlier this week which kind of blew my mind. So.....since I am feeling the love, I wanted to share a little with everyone else. Here are some inspiring heart items I found on Etsy. I personally heart them all!

































































Even though Valentine's is almost over, take a little time to incorporate a little heart into your work this week and share the love!

Happy Valentines Day! If only I could send chocolate by e-mail!! I guess these pics will have to do!















Artist credits:
I heart Ninja Robot cup by Danmade.etsy.com
a valentines black heart mini plush by batteriesnotincluded.etsy.com
Pink Hearts on Chocolate Brown Felted Ankle Booties by prettylittle.etsy.com
Would You Love me Ring by me (blockpartypress.etsy)
Hearts and Love strapless top by spiderlilyclothing.etsy.com
Valentine CupKozy by cupkozy.etsy.com
Valentine bracelet by huntersdesigns.etsy.com
I've Got Something to Say Print by BrowningtonForest.etsy.com

Inspired by Love and a PCAGOE Challenge

It's PCAGOE challenge time again and in honor of this month's theme was "Love". There are a lot of places I could have taken this challenge. These are a few of the words that floated around in my head while I was brainstorming; love lost, true love, unloved, passion, motherly love, kissing, elation, forever, commitment.... I have been planning to do some wall pieces for a while and decided that this challenge would give me the motivation I needed to get it done. I had a tree in mind (Yes, I do have a tree fetish) for my first piece and already had it sketched out in one of my sketchbooks. I then was inspired by my new XOXO design and decided to make the tree's "foliage" a bunch of hugs and kisses. For some reason I have been inspired to use mostly black white and red with my XOXO design, so I decided to stay with that color scheme. I plan to make the circles painted on the canvas a common thread throughout my canvas series, but for this piece they symbolize the cycle of giving and receiving love. The story behind the tree is that it has a lot of love to give (represented by the hugs & kisses) and is just waiting for someone to share it's love. I think most everyone has felt this way at one time in their life. Just bursting with love and wanting someone to give it to. I added the "Love Me" circle to emphasize that it wants and needs love in return!


We had 43 entries into the challenge this month, and seeing all the different interpretations of love was really inspiring. There was puppy love, the feeling of bubbles in your stomach when you are in love, mothers love, romance, passion, hearts, heat, summer love and even love potion. Make sure you get over to PCAGOE.com to check them all out and of course vote for your favorite to be entered to win a fun polymer clay prize pack! Here's a sneak peak of this month's entries. You can see each one of them up close here.






















Take a little time this week to create something inspired by love or make something for someone that you love. Use some of the words and themes used by the PCAGOE entries as a jumping off point and don't forget to vote!!

Inspired by a Thesaurus?

One of my New year's resolutions was to blog more consistently and I was so proud to get 2 posts in early last week and thought I was well on track to meet my goal.... then my dh got in a car accident and flipped his truck 3 times. Thankfully he is OK, but the truck is totaled. I have been spending much of my time taking care of him, so my computer time has very much been reduced, but I'm back until the next disaster strikes (feverishly knocks on wood).


I have to start working on my entry for the PCAGOE February "Love" Challenge, so that coupled with almost losing my dh last week has had me thinking and brainstorming about love. I already created some fun things for Valentines Day, so I may incorporate my XOXO design in my piece. I have something in mind, but will I have the time to get it done?

A fellow PCAGOE member, pollyhyper, turned me on to a fun site, Thinkmap Visual Thesaurus that can help you brainstorm visually with words. Just type in a word and the thesaurus will give you some related words that can really help inspire some ideas. Love is a pretty broad word and can be used in several ways and can inspire any number of ideas, but if you are like me, you get too many ideas all at once and need some help narrowing it down. I found the visual "spiderweb" helpful in getting me to narrow my focus. Here is what you get when you when you type in "Love"
Click one of the red dots and you will get a whole new chart. Here is what I got when I selected emotion:

From this chart, the word heartstrings caught my eye and made me think of the phrase "pulling at my heartstrings" and now I have a visual in my head of something I would like to create. I don't know if it I will enter it into the challenge, but either way, this little exercise has helped inspire me to create, which is what I hope it does for you too! So take a little time this week to explore the online thesaurus and see what words inspire you. Create something inspired by the words you choose or find a way to actually incorporate them into your art.

Here are some items I found on Etsy that use words (just click on the picture to be taken to the artists site). I wonder if they used a thesaurus to pick them? A dictionary? Well, no matter where they got their inspiration, their use of words have inspired me:

























PS : My new XOXO rings (sort of a word, right?) are featured on Cuteable today. Stop by and leave a comment! This design will also be coming soon to the shop as magnets, cufflinks, hair pins and pendants. So check back often!