Deep Sea Merit Badges

I'm really excited about these little goodies that have just been uploaded into the online shop...
Deep sea merit badges! The image is a cropped print of a starfish from "Stella's Dive". It's housed under a glass bauble and surrounded by a pretty spiffy porthole I sculpted by hand, treated with copper paint, and gave a soft verdigris for a loved-but-aged appearance.Add a smashing bit of red corduroy (recovered from an out-of-print upholstery fabric book headed for the trash) and you have a pretty swell little brooch for your best jacket.
These are super limited edition--I only made 3--and are in the shop as I type. I'm so tempted to keep one for myself, but will (try to) refrain from doing so. {update: all sold now}

In other news, I spent the past two days helping a dear artist friend of mine with her own art show. It was so fun--and held in the *coolest* house (which is actually a haunted old Victorian that's been vacant for many, many years). I wish I had remembered my camera because the inside was so old and decrepit that I suffered massive sensory and artistic overload. You could actually feel the eeriness oozing from the stairs--pretty wild. And I guess they just wrapped up filming an upcoming zombie movie there (various rooms still had fake blood splatters on parts of the walls!). Gosh, it was so neat.

Have a splendid weekend, guys!