the usual suspects...

The Steffen-Bublitz cats, from left to right: Wilma (chubby, adorable ball of fluff), Grendel (caveman kitty), Lando Cat-rissian (scared and/or confused at all times), and Jonesy (the silly one).

solstice stroll

Happy Winter Solstice! Mackerdoodle and I decided to take advantage of this lovely clear night and go for a late night stroll. It was a lovely walk despite being quite cold and a bit windy - but I was thoroughly layered up, so I was nice and toasty. :) I usually walk/jog on the roads in town since I have to drive to get to any trails - but I thought I'd give Mack's poor footsies a break, so we ventured out into a wheat field not far from my house and walked down a snowmobile trail (yes, this would generally be ill-advised, but there's not quite enough snow for anyone to be out using the trails yet).

wee painting!

This is from way back when - I'd say maybe around 2007? My friend Mie and I sometimes made "wee paintings." This little guy is 3x3" and I found it in with a bunch of relics from my illustration studio.
*sigh*
I so do miss having a studio... Just posted it for funsies - it's the only one I kept and I still love it.

forest friends

Some more of my homemade stamps!  I've been so crazy busy making gifts for Christmas that I haven't had time to do my self-portrait or any comics, so once the holidays are over I can finally get back on track!

gettin' crafty

I got a bit of work done this weekend, though not as much as I had hoped. For the last couple years, I've been making my own wrapping paper by drawing with sharpie and white paint markers onto brown kraft paper - but this year I'm gettin' all fancy and making my own stamps to make my wrapping paper.  I carved these stamps out of giant super cheap erasers and I must say, I think they worked out rather well.

pie art

For Thanksgiving this year, I busied myself making all of the desserts - homemade pumpkin, apple and cherry pies. Holy Yum. And with the leftover scraps of pie dough, I cut out some leaves and deer and proceeded to art-ify my pumpkin pie! We'll just go ahead and consider it edible art. Delicious, delicious art...

wild ride

Because that's how horses talk... 

So, I spent this weekend visiting friends (human and equine) that I haven't seen in a while and had a ridiculously fun time. We all went for a trail ride on Saturday afternoon then later we played some games and had some laughs.  And then there was Sunday - oh dear...  I got a chance to ride the amazing barrel racing horse, Slapshot, for the first time ever. Rode him bareback with no bridle - just a halter and reins. He is a phenomenal horse and quite lovely to ride. That is unless he's barreling down forest trails... 

Though I made it through the woods without any major mishaps, the pasture was another story... Heading up a giant hill, I think Slapshot and Calibur decided they wanted to race to the top, because once Calibur took off, Slapshot needed to follow and hr bolted up the hill.  He won. I didn't. Instead, I had a rather rough and somewhat painful introduction to the ground, A over T-K.  It wasn't too terrible at the time, but has since resulted in a bruised and sore lower back, and some pretty mean whiplash...

halloween girlies

A couple quick sketches of two of my very good friends - Jackie and Heidi, and then myself, in our Halloween costumes from this weekend. We celebrated up in Milwaukee and a marvelous time was had by all!

My 1950s getup came together quite nicely I must say, considering I didn't give my "faux bangs" a test run beforehand (I actually have bangs, but surprisingly they made it more tricky to roll the hair in front ...).  I also made my very first piece of clothing ever: a circle skirt! I ADORE it - it is so much fun to wear, petticoat and all!

CHICAGO COLOR RUN!

I successfully completed my very first 5K this weekend in Chi-town! WOOHOO!  Cannot wait for it to come to Milwaukee next year.  Declared to be "the happiest 5K on the planet" - I would say the Color Run most definitely lives up to its bold affirmation.  We all had a BLAST!  Besides the part where I got blue powder blasted directly into my eyeball... But other than that - it was just amazingly good fun.

creature feature friday!

bovid x edmontosaurus?  I have no idea what this crazy creature is that I created, but we'll just call him a "big, beefy ruminant with funky nasal air sac"...