What was I thinking?

2009 Christmas Village

2009-12-15T10:46:00.007-05:00

Welcome to my village obsession! This was my first attempt at carving an entire village out of styrofoam and I am thrilled with the results. The village is 10' x 5' in length, it has an ocean, waterfalls. 3 running trains, 65 houses. hundreds of trees. lights. people and other accessories, and a christmas light-show.

Hope you enjoy and Happy Holidays!

Bail-out Rescue plan that makes sense!

2008-10-12T10:34:00.008-04:00

I received this bailout plan via email and I feel it is one that is truly blog worthy. Originally written by Birk T.J. Birkenmeier. I am all for it! OK.. I know this will never happen but one can dream.

"Here's a bailout plan that makes sense!

"I'm against the $85,000,000,000.00 bailout of AIG. Instead, I'm in favor of giving $85,000,000,000 to America in a We Deserve It Dividend.

To make the math simple,let's assume there are 200,000,000 bonafide U.S.Citizens 18+. Our population is about 301,000,000 counting every man, woman and child. So 200,000,000 might be a fair stab at adults 18 and up..So divide 200 million adults 18+ into $85 billion that equals $425,000.00. My plan is to give $425,000 to every person 18+ as a We Deserve It Dividend.

Of course, it would NOT be tax free. So let's assume a tax rate of 30%. Every individual 18+ has to pay $127,500.00 in taxes. That sends $25,500,000,000 right back to Uncle Sam. But it means that every adult 18+ has $297,500.00 in their pocket. A husband and wife has $595,000.00.

What would you do with $297,500.00 to $595,000.00 in your family?

Pay off your mortgage - housing crisis solved.

Repay college loans - what a great boost to new grads who need loans.

Put away money for college - it'll be there

Save in a bank - create money to loan to entrepreneurs.

Buy a new car - create jobs

Invest in the market - capital drives growth

Pay for your parent's medical insurance - health care improves

Enable Deadbeat Dads to come clean - or else

Remember this is for every adult U S Citizen 18+ including the folks who lost their jobs at Lehman Brothers and every other company that is cutting back. And of course, for those serving in our Armed Forces. If we're going to re-distribute wealth let's really do it...instead of trickling out a puny $1000.00 ( 'vote buy' ) economic incentive that is being proposed by one of our candidates for President. If we're going to do an $85 billion bailout, let's bail out every adult US Citizen 18+!

As for AIG - liquidate it. Sell off its parts. Let American General go back to being American General. Sell off the real estate. Let the private sector bargain hunters cut it up and clean it up.

Here's my rationale. We deserve it and AIG doesn't. Sure it's a crazy idea that can 'never work.' But can you imagine the Coast-To- Coast Block Party!

How do you spell Economic Boom? I trust my fellow adult Americans to know how to use the $85 Billion We Deserve It Dividend more than I do the geniuses at AIG or in Washington DC.And remember, The Birk plan only really costs $59.5 Billion because $25.5 Billion is returned instantly in taxes to Uncle Sam.

Ahhh...I feel so much better getting that off my chest.

Kindest personal regards,

Birk T.J. Birkenmeier,A Creative Guy & Citizen of the Republic

PS: Feel free to pass this along to your pals as it's either good for a laugh or a tear or a very sobering thought on how to best use $85 Billion!!"

Slot Machine Cake

2008-08-25T14:09:00.007-04:00

I made this cake for my Step Dad's birthday. This was a challenging one for me because it was the first time that I actually used butter cream frosting to decorate an entire cake. I am a huge fondant fan but Mom wanted butter cream.

I feel that it turned out pretty good even with all the trouble I had; butter cream that wouldn't crust with the high humidity, my jackpot cakes slid down the gum paste because they wouldn't dry, so I had to remake them at the last minute.

The cake itself was made from seven 9x13 and one 8 inch round. I included yellow, strawberry and marble cake with a banana cream frosting. Everyone seemed to love it. I used ju ju beads to trim the cake to make it look like little lights and gum paste for the rest of the decorations.

I had such fun making this one even with the few problems I had. There is nothing better than seeing the finished product and how much my Mom and Step Dad loved it.

Bush Gives Up Golf in Solidarity with Grieving Families of US Troops!

2008-05-17T12:39:00.004-04:00

What is wrong with President Bush? His latest stupid comment has left myself and I am sure many others outraged. In response to President Bush's "great sacrifice" of giving up golf in solidarity with 4000 Families of the US Troops that have died, Americans need to show President Bush's the same respect as he did to these grieving families of by IMPEACHING HIM NOW! Then he will have all the time in the world to play golf 24/7.

So in honor of the 4000 families that lost a loved one to Bush's War here is my latest T-Shirt creation! "Bush Gave Up Golf!" It is now available at my shop Susie D's Designs .

A weekend at St Augustine, Florida

2008-05-05T11:07:00.030-04:00

To celebrate our fifth anniversary and my husband, Joe's birthday we decided to take a weekend trip to St. Augustine, Florida. We had the best time there and definitely would recommend this trip to anyone.

(Photo: The City Gates with the St George's Inn on the right )

We arrived about 1 on Friday afternoon at the St George's Inn, we were immediately met outside by the innkeeper to help with our bags and check us into our room. The inn is located in the historic district directly across from the City Gates, Castillo de San Marcos Fort and the Huguenot Cemetery, the view from our room was breathtaking and this location was perfect for getting around the rest town.

Our room was the mini suite on the third floor, the room was wonderful, filled with beautiful antique furniture, the most comfortable king size bed that I have ever slept on and a whirlpool bathtub. The only drawback in staying in this room was the climb up the three flights of stairs all weekend. By the end of the weekend, boy, were my legs sore. Thank God for the whirlpool tub!

(Photo: Fort Castillo de San Marcos)

As we began to wander around the town, I immediately began to feel like we went backwards in time.

St George's Street, which is pedestrian only, is lined with the original architecture from the 1800's along with cobblestone alleyways. Everywhere you turned that was something wonderful to see: Great Artistians Shops, Good Restaurants, Old World Pubs, I immediately began to think that a weekend wouldn't be enough time to take it all in.

(Photo: The Oldest Schoolhouse, St George St)

We wandered the town for a few hours then decided to stop at the Columbia Restaurant for lunch. The Columbia is know award winning Spanish/Cuban cuisine and we weren't disappointed. We had their famous Original Cuban Sandwich (Smoked ham, pork, salami, Swiss cheese, dill pickle and mustard on hot Cuban bread) with their Columbia's Original "1905" Salad, both were absolutely delicious.

Other restaurants that we dined at that weekend were; The White Lion Restaurant and Pub, they were reasonably priced and had the best crab cakes that I have ever tasted, and Harry's Seafood Bar & Grill where we tried the Jambalaya, if you looking for a spicy dish this is definitely one I recommend and their portions, I swear, could feed three people. Harry's was a little more pricey that the other two but worth every penny.

For the rest of Friday evening, we wandered the town & shops, taking in all of it's charm.

(Photo: St Augustine Lighthouse)

On Saturday we did a few the tourist attractions, bought our trolley tickets (definitely recommend sightseeing via the trolley tours) and off we went.

Our first stop was the St Augustine Lighthouse, we climbed all the way to the top to take in the view of the coastline of St Augustine. With over 270 stairs and my fear of heights, it was quite of climb, I am proud of myself for making it to the top!

(Photo: The Fountain of Youth)

After that climb, we were off to drink from the Fountain of Youth. Upon entering the park, we were offered a free sample from the fountain, unfortunately, I don't appear to look or feel any younger from it.

The 15 acre park consists of a Planetarium, Timucua Indian Exhibit, Gift Shop (where you can buy bottled water from the fountain), and Snack Bar. In addition to the exhibits, you can stroll through the grounds, feed the peacocks and view statues of Ponce de Leon and the Timucuan chief and see where the original landing site of Pone de Leon.

Our final excursion on Saturday was the Ghost Tour of St Augustine. We did the 8 o'clock walking tour, which was fun, though there were a few too many screaming kids for my taste. I took a ton of pictures but I think the screaming kids scared away the ghosts. Therefore I didn't get any good photos on the tour. But if you are into Ghost Hunting like Joe and I, we recommend taking the 9:30 tour, discover the hot spots, then go out on your own. That's when I took some unbelievable pictures which I will share in my next blog. So make sure you check back!

Home of the Hulio

2008-04-29T14:05:00.002-04:00

When I was asked to create a design for newly formed Hulio Club, I never imagined that I would have so much fun doing this. The ad above features the Hulio Club Board Members and their Hulio-ettes and I had an absolute blast in creating it. Thanks Guys!!!

This is just the beginning... rumor has it that the Official Hulio Club Members will have a calendar out later this year. I will update more happenings with the Hulio's at a later date along with the information of how to become a Hulio and what it means to be one.

If you want to check out the line of Hulio Wear, it is available at
Susie D's Designs at Cafepress.com

You'll be seeing me and Hulio down by the schoolyard....

The Problem with Being a T-Shirt Designer

2008-04-28T15:22:00.014-04:00

Since the creation of Print on Demand (POD) sites like Cafepress.com, Printfection.com or Zazzle.com, etc., along with the internet in general, designers have become increasing at risk of having designs stolen by uncreative, lazy thieves that apparently who don’t have a conscious. These thieves blatantly steal another artist’s work, upload them to one of these P.O.D.’s and claim the idea as their own.

This has not only happened to me but to many shopkeepers where I display my work. It is really disturbing to work hard creating original ideas and slogans, only to have someone copy them and sell them as their own. Oh, they may change the font, add some crappy clipart but the original concept is yours.

One of my designs “Ha! Ha! I get to go home with the DJ!” was the most recent victim of an uncreative, lazy thief. I created this design last fall after doing extensive research to make sure that no one was doing anything similar to mine concept. There was nothing even close to it anywhere! Then this design rose very quickly to become one of my top sellers.

Unfortunately, top selling items are the most at risk of theft because these thieves search POD’s for the top designs then feel that they can intrude on your success and try to make a profit from it.

So a few days ago I decided to upload some my designs to Zazzle.com just for the fact that they have some items not offered at my preferred POD Cafepress.com. So when setting up my account, I happened to do a quick search for to see how many DJ Shirts I would be competing against. Low and behold, there was my “Ha Ha I get to go home with the DJ” design copied by one of their shopkeepers. Mind you my design has been up and selling for about 6 months and this shopkeeper just “created” copied this design in March 2008…grrrr!

Since there was no way to contact this shopkeeper, I reported them immediately to Zazzle with all the pertinent information regarding my claim to copyright and asked for them to remove the copied design. At the moment they are looking into it. I am not optimistic for the fact "slogans" or "short phrases aren't covered by the copyright laws so the chances of getting this design pulled is slim. For me, it is more about the principle of the matter than anything else.

I am sorry for ranting on and on... this just makes me so angry! Maybe it's time for artists to ban together and try to change the copyright laws! Right now, I feel that the present copyright laws favor those uncreative thieves and allows them the freedom to steal our work!

Have your cake and eat it too.

2008-04-02T11:48:00.008-04:00

Well, I may not be the "Ace of Cakes" but I feel my second "real" attempt at cake decorating came out pretty well, considering that I haven't taken any cake decorating classes at all.

I created this cake for the Bingo Committee's April Fools Dance, that my husband, Joe and I were DJ-ing at Hacienda Village, New Port Richey, Florida. I thought it would be a nice way to thank them for having us DJ the dance by surprising them with a cake. Everyone really loved the cake and the night overall was a great success.

The cake itself was made from two 9 x 13's marble cakes with butter cream icing filling then covered in white fondant. The bingo dabber and board were made from gum paste. The bingo balls were gumballs with a small disc of white gum paste to make it easier for me to write the numbers on it.

My first "real" cake attempt was an Easter Chick that I made to be used as a centerpiece for our Easter Dinner. This cake consisted of two 9 inch rounds covered with yellow fondant. The wings and face were also cut from yellow fondant.

The little chicks were also made from fondant. I saw a video on youtube.com how to make these chicks and decided to try it. (Putting the fondant eggshell hats on them was my idea.)

I am not sure "what I was thinking" that caused me to attempt decorating cakes, probably watching one to many episodes of "Ace of Cakes", but it quickly has become very addicting. I am already thinking ahead to what my next cake will be. I am fascinated with three dimensional sculpture cakes so maybe I will try that next. If I am successful I will definitely post it here.

What To Do With Left Over House Paint?

2008-03-03T23:33:00.002-05:00

Almost, everyone who owns a home most likely will have a few gallons of leftover paint that is just sitting around because unless you need to do a touch up it has no use. So what can you do with left over house paint? My solution is to create art.

The first time I attempted this was about 3 years ago when my husband, Joe and I decided to repaint our living room and I wanted that perfect piece of artwork to go onto one of the walls. At the time, we were financially strapped and spending money on art was out of the question. So I bought a canvas and went to work and was pleased with the result.

This was the start of my passion (obsession) of taking a "green" approach to decorating. I love taking the old and giving them a fresh new feel.

After this I began to give this creative touch to furniture. I would take pieces that were old and worn out and give them new life. What a great and inexpensive way to turn things that would be otherwise have been discarded and make them unique and modern.

I found this jelly cupboard at a "Trash & Treasure Sale" for $20 the finish was worn and it had a few nicks & scratches but it was the perfect piece I needed for my great room. So I painted it black and with leftover house paint, along with a little craft paint, I painted the door to match my end tables and corner cabinet.

So in about 6 hours I turned something that someone thought was trash into something I will treasure for years to come.

Below are a few other examples of furniture I have refinished both done with a combination of house paint and craft paint.

My next big project was a palm tree mural on 4 closet doors at my parent's house. Again these were created with a combination of the wall color from the room and craft paint.

They wanted a unique tropical feel to their guest bedroom and were very happy with the results. Again this project was inexpensive and in total took 4 hours to complete.

Finally, my biggest project yet was 3 old, ugly 7 foot mirrors that were glued to the wall in the entrance way of my home. We spent a year trying to decide what to do with them because taking them down would be such a messy project.

So I decided to paint a mural on them. First, I had to prime the mirrors, then with the colors that we used on all the interior walls in our home, I created this abstract work. I feel that this gives our entrance way such appeal. The great part is that whenever we decide to change our interior colors it can be easily repainted to match the new decor.

If you are interested in learning more about how to do this for yourself or if you are from the Tampa, Florida area and would like me to create a unique piece of art for you visit my website Susie D's Designs or email me at susieddesigns@hotmail.com.

As Happy as a Penguin in a Microwave!

2008-02-21T13:05:00.001-05:00

Lately, I have been "as happy as a penguin in a microwave". I sometimes feel like this poor little guy, stuffed in a cramped place and waiting for someone to push the button then BLOOEY!

OK, maybe things are not that bad. I just thought this would be a fun design to add to my collection.

As an artist, I love to create art and design based on my feelings or life experiences. Then take those feelings and create something that will make myself and others hopefully laugh.

I have been creating T-Shirt designs for about a year now and have been slowing creating a nice little business for myself. I feel that it is a great way to express myself and hopefully give some joy and laughter to others. If you are interested in seeing more visit Susie D's Designs.