An amazing gift

This month I received an amazing  birthday gift from my friend Maria Armanda , a beautiful bird cage

 I was so happy with this gift, I found it absolutely magnificent, now I have to create a special interior  to accomadate such beauty. And here are a few photos so that you can judge for yourself.

Obrigada mais uma vez Maria Armanda.

Pastries for my shop

First of all thank you very much to my new followers, I´ve been a little absent  lately but I decided it was time to take some days of vacations to help me recovering of my broken foot.

My miniature production was so reduced last months, what I can show you for the moment is the pastries I made in June for my shop, the shop it self is awaiting for better days, but when ready I have lots and lots of pastries to decorate it.

 

All the cakes and cake stands are made of FIMO and SCULPEY

A sketch

Today I found a study in my files I´ve done before decorating this japanese lacquered tray, I´ve done it years ago but  I still like it. Gouache over paper (scale 1/1)

Lacquered tray, hand painted with egg tempera over gold leaf  l/1

Also when I found today the photo of  my last oil paintings, I wished to restart soon, my recovery from the brooken foot is doing well. Thank you all to the ones who were concerned about me.

Oil paitings in scale 1/12

My 2nd adventure in the Pastry World

These last months I had to avoid the real world of desserts. Because of my broken foot I had to make some diet, I didn´t want to get  more weight, and I  succeed, but I took some revenge, as I had my box of FIMO kept at home, one day talking to a friend who also appreciates good pastry I decided to do again some desserts to compensate myself, and I was lucky to have by the hand some material to distract my mind from my problem. 

I´m very fond of good pastry in the scale 1/1 and unfortunately in my Country the confection of pastry is very industrial nowadays, although we have very good pastry-cooks in expensive Hotels and Restaurants which are recognized internationally.

In this Blog World I´m very attentive to  Blogs regarding original desserts, and  lately I´ve seen wonderful works in this area, congratulations to all of you.

Now I will show you only some of my experiences in this area, I did a lot of cakes but some of them are still unfinished, this is a work that I think I will repeat and hope to improove . All the  following cakes are made of FIMO and SCULPEY. For instance the Lilac Fantasy one of my preferred, is  inside made of "Chocolate", and then all covered with thin round petals. All of my cakes are original. 

Marzipan Star

Orange Sensation Cake

Lilac Fantasy

Angel Cake

Quetzalcoatl

Fruit Selection

Cake stand

 

Wedding Cake

In my projects I have two room-boxes and one Corner Shop which I intend to decorate as Pastry Shops, and a few years ago I bought in Thailand three pieces of  furniture and some cakes to decorate this last one. By that time I liked the cakes very much but now I think I will keep them hidden because I´m not fond of them any more, but now I´m glad I have already enough cakes for the three projects, later I´ll show you more.

Cakes I bought in Thailand

My Corner Shop

A gentle gift from Australia

This week I received a very gentle gift from Australia. Norma from   - http://www.makeminemini.blogspot.com/, wished to send me some souvenirs for my grandchildren (one of them has two months). When I opened the parcel  I was delighted with the contents,  thank you Norma, I apreciated your gift so much,  and the little koualas are amazing.

One more wellcome to my new Followers

 

Sorry, I´ve been so away from my blog, but I´m still recovering from my "accident" and I´m so stressed because I didn´t start yet to work in my studio, but my process is doing well with the phisiotherapy,.

So today I would like to thank you to all my new Followers, thank you for visiting my Blog.

As for the moment I have no important new work to share with you  I decided to show you some of my small porcelain boxes painted years ago, although they are not miniatures, some of them have miniature paysages, and I remembered to show you these because I´m thinking of painting some miniature paintings for my projects. The only problem is that painting on porcelain, is a slow process, because the colours have to be prepared with oils, and the porcelain must be fired at the kiln at 730º to 830º at least for three times , and I have so many projects in hands, but we are allowed to dream aren´t we?

The Paysages have between 2 and 4 cm

A miniature rose to my new followers

One month is already gone, I spend my days quite entertained, between reading, sewing some pieces for my country house, that I will show in due time, consulting my art books, taking notes for new little projects to complement my "big" projects, and this weekend  when my husband brought to me a few roses from the garden, and I was so glad that  they inspired me to do my first miniature rose , does it look like a rose?

And here it is and I dedicate it to my new followers, thank you very much for following my blog.

Also I was temptated to do some jars for one of my greenhouses, they are rather colourful because I´ve used some decorative papers, glued over watercolour paper and then duly cut into the form of the jar, I remember these jars when I was a child,  they  were  in white enamel, but I decided to decorate them. Later I will put some touches of decorative motifs in accordance, and varnish them, although they are made of paper I was surprised that at the final they got quite consistent.

I forgot to say that the rose was done with white rice paper, then I found it was to white and asked my husband to bring me one of my small watercolour boxes, he asked me already if I wanted all the studio mooved to the first floor....., so I painted a few touches of yellow and rose very diluted and then I thought that I had to put a few leaves, so I got a paperpunch and cutted a few leaves also in white, then I painted it and in result I think that I have to repeat the roses, I never thought to be able to do them properly by I think I can, with lots of time and patience.

My work in backstage

Today I decided to share with you some of my work in "backstage" I hope you like it, some of the works are originals others inspired in by gone artists but I always like to mention it.

Some of the pieces I´m going to show

original

Lacquered Chippendale chest of drawers

To decorate this Chippendale chest of drawers I used two techniques, one for lacquering the panels and the drawers -  and other of "faux finish" in which I painted over gesso to resemble wood, my "secret" is always the same, too much layers all of them duly worked with sand paper until no traces of brush are seen, too many hours of labour but the final is very rewarding.

Wood screen covered with silver leaf and decorated with tempera, the silver leaf was applied as always over the "lacquered" surface.

Original

The screen was decorated to complement the console, so I choosed the colours to match

Frame and Easel by Maria Armanda

Oil Painting

Original

Frame from my friend Maria Armanda, lacquered by me in the techique of décapé  with touches of silver leaf, and oil with roses at the biginning

A master piece carved from Maria Armanda in wich I concentrate all my love for miniature painting in order to honour her work. The wood was very carefully painted in several coats of beige with lots of work of sand paper but a very delicate touch because of the fragility of the wood. Then I used tempera to decorate the details.

Original

The finished tray with some of the detail brushes I used

Lacquered Screen with Pillement decoration

Originals

Two little chest from Paulo Gomes, the one on the right is already decorated and one table I ordered from David from Iriarte, which is still awaiting to be decorated

Next time I will share some more photos.