New Chickenpants Round Up!

It's Monday! Time to account for what I've been doing all week. (Sort of.)
I've started illustrating portraits of the Chickenpants. Have I mentioned that yet? Anyway, here's the latest one:

It's Big Jim Chickenpants, No. 2! My goal with these is to create a portrait of every.SINGLE.Chickenpants.EVER. However, this last portrait has taught me that sometimes this is really hard. So, we'll see. (Click on him to see him larger so you can actually read the poem.) But I did just buy a bunch of new Prismacolor pencils, so I'd better use them. (For those of you who know me well enough to read between the lines, you know that this means: encourage me! compliment me! send me happy thoughts & comments! i'm a total baby! wah, wah, wah!)
To help with this crazy endeavor, I've updated the HALL OF CHICKENPANTS:
the Flickr page where I try very hard to put a copy of every Chickenpants ever made. If you don't see your CP there, it's probably because I don't have his/her photo for some reason. Help me out, drop me a line!
This post has dragged on long enough, so no individual CP recaps today! Several new Chickenpants were released last week, and the total number is perilously close to 300. THREE. HUNDRED. CHICKENPANTS. Holy cow, that's a lot of chickens. Additionally, the shop itself is perilously close to 350 sales. (Again, HOLY COW!)
I think you know what this means. Festivities, fireworks, etc etc. More on that soon. Stay tuned!

(Also, psst! There's still time to enter our Craft Leftovers giveaway!)

New Chickenpants Round Up!

Inspiration Friday

I am in love with the blog EatYourKimchi.
Two Canadians living in South Korea, and bringing you cultural gems like this:


I love the idea of making a growing mini dioarama. 8 Skeins of Danger's lady made this one, and I think it is perfect:

Dana's Window Sill
Originally uploaded by 8 Skeins of Danger

Fascinating artist Jack Olson took us on a tour of his new studio this week via his blog. Fun!

And finally:
Cutest laundry day ever!

Via Cute Overload

Have a great weekend, everyone!

Inspiration Friday

Craft Leftovers Giveaway!

I have something fun to share with you! The super generous Kristin of Craft Leftovers Monthly has given me a few copies again to give away to YOU lovely lovely readers.
The March issue is jam packed with awesomeness, including a pattern by yours truly.

Ok! Wanna win? Here's the scoop:
Simply leave a comment below to be entered. We'll pick a winner on Wednesday, March 10th.


For extra points, (that is, extra comments + increased chances to win), you can also do any of the following:

1. Blog about the contest! 2 extra comments!
2. Tweet about the contest! 1 extra comment!

To get those points, do one (or more!) of the things mentioned, then come back here and leave an extra comment(s).

And I did mention I had more than one of these to give away. We're giving a copy away on The Needle, too! Hop on over there and leave a comment! Double your chances.

Leave me comments. Win things. Yay!

Craft Leftovers Giveaway!

Big Rock Ranch Recap

Last Friday, I got to do something that made my geeky little heart go pitter patter. I got to walk the hallowed halls of one of George Lucas's ranches!
And oh, my gosh, the secrecy! That man likes his privacy. Signing in at the lobby, you have to agree that you will not take any photos. (Or probably blab about it on the internet. I should have read that thing more closely.)
So in lieu of photos, I made this:

And now, unfortunately, we must rely on my story telling skills.
The first thing I noticed was the fence. The county girl in me said "Sheee-yoot. That there fence cost some money. We must be here." It's an extremely nondescript, albeit quite nice, fence. Then there's a nice, but very low profile gate. There are no signs. It would be very easy to just drive past. You can't see a darn thing from the main road.
So, anyway, the buildings. Oh my gosh, the buildings! They're gorgeous. And huge. Huge perfect Craftsman style buildings.
Everything inside was done in impeccable Craftsman style. It was like walking into an art history textbook. The lobby had some amazing Japanese antiques. The hallways are lined with gorgeous old movie posters.
We wound up basically just eating lunch there. In a ginormous, beautiful room. They had a guest chef that day (Indian food!), and all the microbrewed sodas you could shake a stick at. It seemed like everyone ate together. "See that guy over there with the backwards baseball cap?" Our host said. "He's the director."
When I was a geeky teenager, working or Lucasfilm was my number one impossible dream. (Er, okay, maybe that was two or three down the list, somewhere after getting to marry Han Solo, but still.) Seeing it in real life was just...amazing. And I really wish I had photos to show you.

Big Rock Ranch Recap

Marchtacular begins!

Hey! It's March! Bulbs are starting to pop up everywhere. Buds are back on trees where they belong.
And Ninjapants are getting back in the coop again. Oh, almost spring!

That's right, Ninjapants are back! And they are in the shop right now. Click on any of the pictures to learn more about that particular Ninjapants.
O. Snap Ninjapants - #287

Haiku Ninjapants - #286

Takai Ninjapants - #288

Sakura, The Deadly Blossom Ninjapants - #290

and finally
Togarashi the Red Ninjpants!

This is just the start of Marchtacular. There will be more new goodies coming soon. Stay tuned!

Marchtacular begins!

Inspiration...Hey Wait!

Okay, look. I'm not really here. Right now, as this thing posts I am...
At Big Rock Ranch!
Okay, I know that doesn't mean anything to most of you. And they don't even have cows, so what sort of a ranch is it?
It's...one of George Lucas's ranches! It's right next door to Skywalker Ranch! (So to speak. The George owns an awful lot of land.)
What do they do there? I don't really know! But, I'll have my camera & a Chickenpants handy, and I'll be back with a full report soon.
(The odds are pretty excellent that I'll be posting things to Twitter and Flickr as I go. Live reportage!)
See you next week!

Inspiration...Hey Wait!

Ode to bread

I once ate a simple lunch with a friend. Just salad and some nice french bread. My friend took a bite of the bread, and then let out a deep sigh. "Why do women love bread so much?" she mused. If I was Dave Barry, I would say at this point "I am not making this up!" Well, I'm not.

I don't know. In our house, everyone loves fresh bread. The healthy, presliced 12 grain stuff we could care less about. But the gorgeous still warm round loaves from bakeries...holy cow.

We feel like we have to eat the whole loaf in one sitting. "Hey, it won't be any good tomorrow. We might as well enjoy it! It's what the baker would have wanted."

You know the saying "Wine is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy"? I think that could just as easily apply to bread. Hey, it's in the bible. "Give us this day our daily bread." BREAD! Not cereal, or meat, or booze, or bacon - delightful as those things may be.

I love bread so much that I decided to try to bake my own bread. In loaves. Whole grain! Because...um...health. It turned out like doorstops. I had two of them. The dog wouldn't even touch it.

I gave up on the whole grain flour and moved on the the hardcore powdered white stuff. Sweet success! After just one try, I made a passable foccacia.

There's a lesson in here somewhere, but it'll take more coffee for me to figure it out.
Happy Wednesday, everyone!

Ode to bread

Tuesday. Chicken Day.

I was tempting fate with that post last week. And it makes sense, too. You can't write a post that's all "I loooove you I looooove you I looooove you Sunshine don't ever go awaaaaay" without making Murphy's Law kick in.
Yes, the sun is gone. Winter is back. Unbecoming sweatshirts are back. Open weeping is back, too.

But! I have some awesome things to share with you! First up, I was sent an awesome card by Terry Janes.

Chickens! At work! Ahhh! Yes, my studio needed this.
If you want to see more of her quirky photography, she's got an Etsy shop, of course!

In other chicken news:

I don't have a caption for this. All that's coming out is squealing. Cute Overload's got your back, though.

Stay warm, everybody!

Tuesday. Chicken Day.

New Chickenpants Round Up!

Yes, it's that time again. Time to lasso together all the new Chickenpants, line them up, and present them to the internets.
And there's a very special animated treat at the end of the post! Woo!
New this week:

Rocco, #216

Sporty!

Honey, #215


Julian, #212


Gus, #210

There's just something about that belt buckle...

and
Michael, #244

The release numbers are a little odd because these guys spent some time at shows. I've just recently got them back, so now it's really time for their debuts.

And finally, the long awaited new Chickenpants stop motion short: 2 Fast, 2 Furious: Living Room Drift!

You can also watch the video on YouTube or Flickr, if you prefer.

New Chickenpants Round Up!

Inspiration Friday

❀ Cartoons on post its= brilliant. Cartoons on post its about CHICKENS? Love.


✿The Photojojo newsletter brought http://noticin.gs/ to my attention. An online game where you take photos of things around your neighborhood, and then there are scores. I'm on my first cup of coffee here, and the words doing isn't. Is cool!

❀ Amazing article about project planning over at Craft Leftovers. No, seriously. Worth memorizing.

✿Flaming Lips house! Fab! When can I move in?

And finally: the cutest video ever.


Have a great weekend, everyone!

Inspiration Friday