Rainy Sundays at the Studio

Well, it has been a while since I updated this blog (shame on me!) and since Facebook is trying to show as few people as possible my updates, I wanted to do a little picture/story dump here again :)

I've recently updated my website www.Shirleys-Studio.com, which has been collecting dust for a few months due to some errors which are fixed now ^_^
We've changed a few pages so it's easier for me to post new pictures and stories. Wheee!

Now, onto some updates!

Titus

Little Titus and his noble steed made a trip to the pond today. 

I'm glad the toad didn't got tempted to jump into the water :D

Angus 2.0

Angus got a little color in his face and a new kilt with darker colors. 
The previous one was nice but a bit too bright for my liking. 

His pipe came in with the mail yesterday and I am so happy with it! I'm thinking about altering or painting it a little more, since it's from a party store and very plastic looking.

Now he needs his staff and some more details and he will be ready to run around outside :D

Mask Mania

I posted a picture of this mask in the making aaaages ago, which made a few of you think I had been in a terrible accident (Woops!! Sorry bout that!). It might have been the linnen, tape and bandages I used to create the base *big grin*

The mask is now covered in paper maché and painted, but still not really at my liking. I'm going to create a new mask and alter some things I ran into with this little fella.
Trial and error, right? ;)

"The Tree", a never ending story!

Onto another paper maché project I've been working on for months and finally got myself to order grass and moss and such to work on it some more. This tree is about 40 cm high and the trunk is about 5 to 7 cm wide.

It's still going to be a very time consuming project but I can already see how the final form it will be, even though at times I really wanted to throw it in the garbage. Glad I didn't! 

The glue I used to add the moss is drying as we speak and next I'm going to add high grass, little stones, mushrooms etc. Then the leaves of the tree will be added.



 As I'm laying the hand on the last few commission pieces, the annual Castlefest event (Fantasy event in the Netherlands) is just around the corner and there is still a lot I need to create before I can attend with a peaceful heart and a big smile (days before the event I'm a grumpy Troll, beware! )
I hope to keep up with the blog again during a busy scedule and I also hope to create some trolls for adoption in the meantime ;)

Thank you for reading!
Shirley

Grover's place!

Remember this little guy? :D

In august, this little fella (scarlet -chested parrot) fell out of the nest. We (my partner and I) actually thought he passed away but when we came closer, his little tail moved. We took him home, kept him warm and fed him with a syringe. 

This is right after we found him;


The weeks of very intensive care that followed (including veeery early feedings @.@ ), we saw him visibly gaining strength, grow a beautiful feathery coat, eating food on his own, trying to fly (lots of stuff broke because he bumped into it.. he's a little clumsy :D ) and become a very happy, healthy and curious bird. 

We call him Grover. Yep! The blue muppet from Sesame Street! 



We decided to keep him at our own home and build him his very own aviary, Grover's place. That's why there was so much work around the house.

And since we fed him, he's very tame and thinks we're his mom&dad. He sits on our head/shoulder or near us when he's out of the aviary. We brought home a very pretty albino ladyfriend to keep him company. He loves to fly around with her and he actually started feeding her. That's a good sign, that means he likes her! :D

She's not as tame as he is, so he tries to "learn" her to come near to us. He will sit on our head, fly to her and then fly back onto our head, like he's showing her it's safe to sit there. So cute. 


Just look at that little face. He's completely soaked from taking a bath, looking like a mushroom and he doesn't understand why I'm laughing :D

Right now he's growing his new feather coat (young scarlet's do not grow their original color yet while growing up) and will get a very pretty cobalt blue head, white chest and black beak. 
Hope to show you some new pictures soon!

So proud of this little one! <3
 

Castlefest 2014

Just a week ago I was shivering, being nervous and scared how Castlefest would turn out. I would never have guessed what happened that weekend!

Friday I set up the booth, after testing out a few times before in the living room, it turned out differently, but it worked out well enough :)

The first hour  of Castlefest was full of nervous giggles and shaking but after an hour I could let that go and accept what was happening. 

The responses where overwhelmingly positive, it was like stepping into a completely different world. The people where so friendly and open minded. The evenings we drove back home, I really needed that calm and quiet hour to deal with what happened during the day. I normally receive much love and positivism online, which was already very special to me. Receiving it face to face was intense!

I've met amazing people, I also met people who have been following me for a while, some even brought the sweetest gifts, thank you so, so much! It's already special for me but you guys really gave me wings!

I would like to thank Natasja and Mark, for giving me the opportunity to experience this amazing world. The team that made Castlefest happen, the volunteers who worked so hard to give everyone a amazing experience. The sweet exhibitors who had booths next to us. The visitors who brought so much positive spirit to the event. People that adopted, commented or took pictures of my Trolls.  And of course, last but not least, the people online who gave me strength and energy boosts to be able to create Trolls and therefore experience Castlefest. Thank you guys with all my heart <3

For more pictures of Castlefest, click the picture below :)

In the meantime we're on holiday and today we drove home to feed and take care of our animals (it's about a one hour drive from our caravan)

We noticed one of the young birds left the nest too soon, the parents didn't look after him so he was weakened. We now feed him ourselves until he's strong enough to go back, he went with us to our caravan and look at this little warrior now! <3 

He keeps us busy while we're taking babysteps back to the "normal world" :D

Have a great weekend everyone! 

Tick tock!

The last day before the Castlefest event, we went to Lisse yesterday evening to build up part of the booth. Friday morning all the Trolls and decoration will travel with us to fill up the booth with magic :)

The past week was a crazy rollercoaster, the final trolls are sculpted and the last decoration pieces are collected. The house is a horrible mess right now and is crying desperately to be cleaned, woops! :D I've done the last bit of grocery shopping today and am working on some pre-sculpted things to show tomorrow as a demo.

I'm very, very excited for tomorrow!

For those visiting my booth this weekend, here's (red circle) where I will be standing :D 
Feel free to come visit me and say hi!










On sunday the lovely lady of Twinkeling Forest Miniatures, Joyce, will be showing her amazing dollhouse miniature work. She has a Facebook page with her lovely work, it's certainly worth it to have a look!

And finally, 
I want to thank all of you for your support the past couple of weeks, I really enjoyed sharing this process with you and I hope to continue my blog after the summer holiday :)

For now, I'm about to jump into this new big adventure which will be awesome and I hope to share lots of pictures with you guys as soon as possible!

WHeeeee!! Fingers crossed! 

Baby Boom!

The new clay arrived! Yaaay! *happy dance*

I've accidentally ordered the wrong color, but I was so surprised by the outcome of the baked pieces that I decided that it's my new favorite!

The colors are a lot more vibrant than the color I used before, so that's a plus! 

The past week was a very productive week which flow I hope to continue all the way to Castlefest :D

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Last week I finished the Grotto's I was working on, I took them with me to our garden, they seemed to like it! 

These are actually my favorite flowers, I have no idea how they are called in English! I can't seem to find the right name after a google search. They are called "IJsbloemen" in Dutch :)

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I've made some Potion bottles, I'm using them as necklaces now, but I may just use them as potion bottles for the trolls, not sure yet :)

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The past week and this week are filled with little baby trolls! I made a batch of cocoon babies;

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And I'm currently sculpting full body baby trolls. My partner suggested to put them in bird's nests, which I thought was a good idea!

I've bought some coconut fiber, moss, glue and most important, iced coffee (so important!)  to get started. 

After fighting with hotglue and thread for about an hour, this is the end result!

And the second one;

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Last but not least, this little friend joined us! He's waiting for new clothing which he will get this week :)

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That was it for this week, thank you all for reading! ;)

Mold Madness!

Sooo yeah, I am out of clay. That was unexpected.. LOL :D 

I'm currently waiting for fresh blocks of clay to arrive in the mail, in the meantime I'm working on a small batch of Grotto's, keychains and Trottles from my remaining resin. 

Almost everything is about to go empty! (Except my ideas and inspiration, whehw!)

This Grotto is about to get sewed together and his hair glued on. Because my glue was empty (REALLY?????!!!) I bought a different type of glue of which I thought it was better, but meh, it doesn't stick anything together, not even my fingers! o_O 

So I need to get a new container tomorrow :) 

These are sealed and almost ready for a body! I need to use gloss on the eyes and teeth :)











Last week almost all of my ordered things are in, except for some decoration on the table, which I expect to arrive around friday :)

Look at this! Whaaaa!!! I never thought it would come this far to actually have my own banner in my hands. It's so crazy and still unbelievable, but it's so awesome!!

My partner also ordered a T-shirt to wear at Castlefest, turned out pretty cute! It's a drawing of Rupert, made by Creepynurse on Deviantart!

Sooo that's all the news I have for you this week. The last weeks are so stressfull but I'll make sure it will be a very magical booth in August! I've spend the past days dressing Trolls, but I'll show that to you guys next time ;) 

Love and a happy week!

Getting there!

Wheeeeew!! It was a very busy yet fun week!

First, I want to show you how the big doll (Called Nevan now!) turned out!

This is a work in progress picture of one of his gloves. They are so huge they almost fit me!

And here he is! All finished and ready to come with me to Castlefest :D I'll take some better pictures of him soon, these are just quick snapshots with my phone.

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I posted a picture of a bottle last week that I wasn't very fond of yet. Thanks to some great advice/inspiration from two readers I decided to try out something fun!

Last week was full of butterflies and toadstools !

I will use the other half of my bottles for making Trottles.

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Now that Castlefest is getting closer, I wanted to sketch and try out the decoration of my booth. 

I've made a picture of one of the tiny details I will put down.

 The color of the cloth is going to be black, the measurement of the booth is off because this is just a test to see how it will turn out :)

I finally ordered everything I need to decorate the booth so it will be delivered in time, I'm so excited to see how it'll look all together!

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Last weekend we bought new lights for our tent, it looks so magical! I'll take a better picture soon, here we were still in the process of attaching them to out tent ;)

We also went to a amazing garden called "Ampies Berg" in the Netherlands. This is a private garden, started by two brothers, inspired by Austria's nature.

They worked for over 50 years on this and it was so awesome to see! The highest point is about 15 meters ( 49 feet) tall! Everything you see is build by hand, every rock and every flower. Wicked!

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So now onto a new week full of sculpting and finishing the last dolls, wish me luck, this is how my desk looks now! @.@

Thank you for reading! :D