Oh, have you seen Lydia?

My new blog for Tattoos only.. follow it... you'll have some fun!

Come see the new blog!
Originally uploaded by GAYTHA

Oh, Lydia the Tattooed Lady...

You can see it here:
http://lydia-the-tattooed-lady.blogspot.com/

The Hipstamatic

I admit I'm an iPhone app junkie. If it looks fun to use, doesn't cost an arm and a leg, and helps feed my creative streak, I most likely have it. Last summer when my home pc died, in an effort to keep up I'm my email, and still be able to do things I love like photography, art, and Photoshop. Then I found the Hipstamatic. Like those great toy cameras like the Holga, this app processes you iPhone photos to look like those moody pics from our teenyears and childhood. The app also links you to a store to purchase gels for the "flash" and an array of other lenses. Digital never lokoked so analog.
I took this photo on a dog walk in the Mountain View Cemetery.

Busy happy New Year!

The past few months have been so busy, an update is now in order. We're so overjoyed by our pet Squeeks, she's like a happy alarm clock in the morning, and a character to play with in the evening. I ran across this article on the Badrap blog, and thought it should be shared with more people.





In the tattooing department; when it rains, it pours. That said, I've given and gotten some sweet ink lately. Here is one I really got a kick out of.


Over the summer my computer died, and it wasn't user friendly enought for me to type out blog posts on my iphone, so I just let them slide. Now I have a 1TB hard drive, and bare-bones software. My music is still patchy, and I'm still trying to get my itunes to work properly. Silence has been the popular tune lately.

The velvet painting remained on hold since summertime, and I plan to resume them this week. The portraits I dabble in here and there- I just need to build the confidence that I won't be butchering the beautiful faces of these amazing drag queens.
I finished the doggie area of the back yard, and will hopefully post some before and after photos. I'm also working on getting rid of things that I don't use, or have no use to me. This included editing my etsy shop down to small vintage items and just art. I looked at my books for last years etsy sales, and ended up learning I lost $100 to it. As much work as I put into the vintage aspect of my shop, I decided to quit the vintage sales and focus on my art. I did sell a tiki painting on etsy that i was going to have in my art show, it was the "Cheeseburger" painting. I think I may just go for it and paint another.
My lovely and amazing painting of Peaches Christ was "lost" by the Oakland Art Museum and the East Bay Express people along with a large tiki painting, and the watercolor of the medusa tattoo I did on my friend Brenda. Needless to say, I still need to get them to pay up; but it may be to my advantage- advertising. I know some people, so I will pull some strings. The loss of thta epic painting still has me really bitter, and it stilted my momentum on the painting. Since then I've got unfinished Metal Patricia and Heklina. I know once I'm done with those two, I can relax into doing a couple of large tikis and follow up on some cheeky paintings of monsters and maybe some criminal portraits. I haven't made a solid deadline for the show, so maybe I will work on that asap.

80%

The infill on the fence took me six hours to install. My mom helped out a little here and there. I had to cut each individual board on the fence so it would be level across the top; because the ground was uneven.


Pictured above was the beging of the infill. The following photos are the finished product.





The old lady next door has been complaining about the change in our yard. It's funny- now she can't look at it!

Delays and moving onward

Today I finished the frame of the fence. I took a little bit of extra time because it was raining and I was cutting the wood in the garage. So, that proved to be time consuming. I was relieved since it wasn't as cold as the previous days. I wish I had more carpentry skills before starting this project. I made a lot of silly mistakes yesterday, that could've been avoided if I'd more experience. By the time I was screwing in the last few rails, I had a pretty good system down.
The neighbor kid stopped by to talk tattoos. He's been visiting my mom here and there to say hello and smoke a cigarette. I'm grateful that he visits her and I asked her to tell him I'd give him a tattoo for free. I just feel like it's a nice way to show him my appreciation.
Tomorrow is supposed to have a lot less rain; and I'm gearing up to cut the posts and hang the infill on the fence. I'm going to end up having to trim off 7" from each board. That will be fun for a 12'x15 dog run. Then once all that is done- I'm planning on begining the gate. I'm hoping to finish the gate by Saturday.

Building a fence

After quite a while I decided to come out to visit my mother in Minnesota. I've been working seven days a week all Summer long. So, naturally, once school started I had to begin planning some sort of vacation.
Plane tickets are super cheap- and my second cousins had been wanting me to bring out my equipment to tattoo them.
So the first day I was in for it & ended up tattooing for twelve hours straight. The next day was my second cousin's (Kella) 21st birthday. We celebrated it at my cousin Debbie's house in Zumbrota, Mn. My mom and I hauled the lumber she'd arranged to get from Kella's dad.
The next day was spent gathering supplies. It snowed. I can't say that I like the snow or the cold much unless i'm inside all snuggled up.
This morning was spent digging post holes then Debbie came by to help. Without her help, I don't think that we would have gotten all of the posts set in cement before sundown. That was awesome.

Help the dog win a contest!

Yeah I know, I entered in a cute dog contest with my baby. I could win a free trip to Hawaii!!! Help a girl out!
I entered my dog Squeeks in a contest on my favorite radio station, 98.1 KISS FM. You can seriously help me by going to their website right now and voting for Squeeks. It only takes a second and it would put me that much closer to winning the grand prize of $10,000! You can find my dog here: Squeeks ... and please vote each day, each person is allowed to vote once per day.

Thank you for helping me and SQUEEKS out!