Mysterious Carnivale

Ladies and gentleman may I have your attention please. It seems, due to unforseen circumstances that our show must be delayed for a day. You can use your silver ticket above, to gain entry to the grounds if you choose. We have set up tents and you can rest there while you wait. All of the food and drinks and refreshments (eye of bat and ear of oh what was it...frog I think...or maybe it was newt.) Anyway, everything is FREE and you can wander around wherever you want. The actual show won't begin until tomorrow though, so if you want you can just come back then. We have had such bad luck (too many broken mirrors to tell you about here) this year. Part of our acts got waylaid along the roadside, and some of the acts have outright quit, or are threatening to...the Mistress of Ceremonies is insisting to change her contract to read "Queen of Ceremonies" so we have to see our lawyers...and so it goes. A real hullabaloo. So we're going to try to put together a ragtag bunch of performers for you and our show is very much smaller than we had hoped. But we will get the show on the road so to speak tomorrow.

So, if you stay, remember, everything is FREE, and if you choose to go back home, I do hope you will come back to see what we have to offer.

There is a black bird which will be a giveaway and a name will be chosen from the comments section next Saturday. Please feel free to leave a comment at any time to be sure you are IN for the drawing. The bird will be shown later on, along with whatever acts we've managed to cobble together. And so with that we bid you adieu for this evening, and may you all have the magic stardust in your eyes. Good night from the fairyyellowbugqueen and her helpers. We do hope to see you soon, *hugs* Norma

Drawing Challenge [78] Birthday

Birthday Bird

Our theme this week for the drawing challenge is 'birthday' which was chosen by our talented and generous and wonderful host this week, Stefanie!! Because it really is her birthday today, and because I have just started the rush to make the bevy of birds I make to sell during the Christmas Season (store orders), I decided to make a small gift of a bird for Stefanie for her birthday. This black bird will not be the birthday gift (I actually put this together as a giveaway for a blog hop I am doing later) and I'm showing it just so you can see what a bird looks like. Stefanie will be getting blue, or yellow, or red, or pink, or whatever the muse dictates. I know that Stefanie will like it no matter what.

The message on this black bird says "be willing to know what you know." and for a black bird at Halloween time this is very helpful. There's a lot of ghouls out there!! Bwaaaaaaahaaaaaaa!!

This bird is a part of the drawing challenge and really, the only thing I can think of to allow it to qualify, is that it was designed by me in the first place. Even though I have been making these for years. At least they are new to this drawing group. So, fellow artists, I hope you like my bird. And Stefanie, I hope you will like your birthday bird when you get it. (I have to make it first, HA!!) To see more creative offerings with this theme pop over to Stefanie's blog which is highlighted above, and you will be taken to the players for this week. I know you will enjoy this! Hope to see you again soon, *smiles* Norma

Winner of Cat Clown painting is...

Kim of Tabby's Place. I'll be contacting you Kim, and now all I have to do is finish the painting without ruining it completely. Shrug. I got so excited about posting the giveaway that I did so without realizing that I had completely forgotten to paint on the ever so important whiskers. Hello!! So, with a steady hand I'll apply them and then it will be ready for the post.

A big thank you to all who left comments. You make me feel just great! Hope to see you again soon, *smiles* Norma

Drawing Challenge [77] Mandala

What is this? A spirit being coming from a spiral of star dust. She has her hand held out in a STOP signal. What does she mean? What does she want to say? The bird heard her message and came back to earth to tell us that we must stop harming our children. We must stop. This is the plea from the universe in any event, and the spirit being came a long way to give us the message.

Painted on used tea bag paper with acrylic paint. To see more mandalas, pop by Nadine's blog where she, as the host this week, will link you to see all of the players. This is guaranteed to be a visual and exciting and inspirational time. It is one of my favorite things to do. Thank you Nadine for choosing this wonderful theme of mandala, to keep us challenged!! *smiles* Norma

Moonlight Party Under the Big Top!

I am just sitting at the outer edges of this blog hop extravaganza folks! I hope you all have had a blast blog hopping and visiting the wondrous sights and amazing creative endeavors to behold. My little booth sits at the end edge of the EXIT area, where there is a little painted canvas of my circus cat. He had a minor part in various acts under the Big Top so you may have missed him. But he is overjoyed to have been painted and to be given away to someone who wants him. If you would like this painted canvas, just leave a comment below on this post and I'll draw the name next Saturday. Here he is in his finery:

This is my first complete 'real' painting so of course I see the lumps and bumps but I won't mention them. Kitty is a happy boy. The canvas is just under 3"X5" and is painted in acrylics.

Thank you for dropping in today. To see the plethora of fun circus events for this "Moonlight Party Under the Big Top" pop by Wendy's blog, 'Bliss Angels.' She'll be linking you to all of the circus-goers!! See you soon I hope! *smiles* Norma

Cat Clown being painted [WOYWW 172]

Yesterday I started a little painting of a cat wearing his work gear...a clown hat and ruff. He is a circus cat you see. He'll be my giveaway for a blog hop (see my side bar) that I am doing. The crunch is on to complete it in time for the hop. Here's my work space:

And here's his face. I've yet to name him:

For those of you who know me, you know I love to work on used tea bag paper. Often I use india ink and watercolor and pastels and pencil crayons. But this one is in acrylics solely.

Thanks for dropping in today. I hope to see you again soon. If you want to see a whole bunch of interesting, fascinating, inspiring, wonderful, creative and charming sometimes, work desks, click on here, to Julia's wonderful blog "Stamping Ground" where there are well over and hundred...and counting...spaces for you to visit!

Drawing Challenge [76/Spider]

HALLOWEEN HAIKU decorated envelope... The theme this week is 'spider/web' and I must admit I loved this week's challenge. As I was falling asleep a few nights ago, haiku started weaving their way through my thoughts so I jumped up and wrote them down. Thankfully. As the next day I'd forgotten anything haiku. I decided to illustrate one of them:

You can see the haiku on the envelope. Here's a close-up of the stick insect with 'spidey' riding on top:

Won't the stick insect be surprised when he learns that the spider is alive. He thought that he'd found an abandoned shed spider skin and that it would be an excellent Halloween costume to go trick or treating in. Spidey was just taking a long nap and when he woke up he was being carried to someplace that had music and nice smells and singing and laughing and an amazing fireworks display. Oh what a hullabaloo! To see other great and inspiring and exciting art done by the 'players' this week, drop in to see Renilde. She is our host this week and she chose the theme.

Remember, anyone can join in the fun in the drawing challenge activity. All you need to do is sign up to let the host know you are playing along, so that she or he will be able to put you on the players' list and link back to your blog so that folk can come visit you!! Ariane always has the information about who is the current or upcoming host, and the dates, and the themes as well.

Here are the other haiku choices that I had:

*1* Jumping spiders... Like cats on a hot tin roof

*2* Spider web fishing net. Caught one!

*3* Spider and Bat; Scaredy cat friends.

I'll be giving away this decorated envelope so if you would like me to send it to you addressed to you, or just left blank so you can address it yourself, or if you want me to address it to someone other than you...just leave a comment below, and I'll draw a name out of the hat next Saturday.

Thanks for dropping by today...see you soon I hope! *smiles* Norma