Crocheting is a hobby of mine. I’m not very good at it and my stuff always come out wonky, but I find it relaxing.

Most of my stuff ends up becoming cat blankets whether it was intended or not!

You can see some of the ideas that crochet inspired at the following sites:

Zazzle:

Gifts for Crocheters
by ValeriesGallery

Redbubble:

Teepublic:

http://tee.pub/lic/UDcv38bttLY

And my Etsy shop:

https://beautifulcuteness.etsy.com

Do you crochet? Any tips?

For everyone, what is your favorite hobby? Let us know in the comments!

When I was working on this particular design, my husband came in to my office and said, “Oh! Is that a cat wearing pants?”

I had to inform him, no, its a kawaii style werewolf.

This werewolf started out as part of a design that contained a group of monsters. The monsters in the group included

• Kawaii Style Werewolf
• Kawaii Style Vamprie
• Kawaii Style Mummy
• Kawaii Style Frankenstein

The original design came about as part of Spoonflower’s weekly design challenge. This particular design challenge was called Monster Mashup. The instructions said to make a design featuring monsters.

You can see the fabric design here:

https://www.spoonflower.com/en/fabric/15194740-monster-vampire-ghost-werewolf-kawaii-pattern-by-beautifulcuteness

I then decided to pin off each monster into their own design.

Kawaii Style Werewolf is available in the following shops:

Zazzle
Werewolf Kawaii Style Halloween
by ValeriesGallery

Redbubble

https://www.redbubble.com/shop/ap/148591810

Society6

https://society6.com/art/werewolf-cute-kawaii-halloween-monster?curator=beautifulcuteness&utm_campaign=2574&utm_source=sharedlink&utm_medium=social&utm_content=ddp_from_artist_studio

TeePublic

https://www.teepublic.com/t-shirt/47854062-werewolf-cute-kawaii?store_id=2488167

This is a great design for Halloween. Halloween theme clothing is a great way to join in the Halloween Spirit without having to wear a costume!

What is your favorite monster? Does this design look like a werewolf or a cat in pants? Tell us in the comments!

Penguin Rock and Roll band is the result of a sock design challenge I started a few years ago. (For those of you who don’t know, when I was in a design rut, I decided to take pictures of my socks for the month of February. The idea was I would do a daily design based on the socks I wore that day. Only things didn’t work out that way and here I am a few years later trying to finish it. Oops.)

I wore these socks on Valentine’s Day. As much as I like the penguin hugging a heart idea, I didn’t want to just copy the design. I was working on something and caught a glimpse of Kitty Cat Kawaii Band file and thought to myself, “I have a cat band, a sloth band, a unicorn band and a cthulhu band, so why not a penguin band?”

Thus, Penguin Rock and Roll Band was born. Of course in order to have a penguin band, I had to create Penguin Playing Guitar, Penguin Playing Bass and Penguin Drummer.

The other bands also have art pieces of their individual members for sale.

Musical Penguins
by ValeriesGallery

Penguin Rock and Roll Band, Kitty Cat Kawaii Band, Sloth Rock Band, Unicorn Kawaii Punk Band and Cthulhu Kawai Music Band are available on Zazzle, Red Bubble and Imagekind.

Which band is your favorite? Penguins? Cat? Unicorn? Sloth? Cthulhu? Let us know in the comments!

Surfer Penguin is a continuation of The Sock Project I decided to do in 2013. For those of you who don’t know, in 2013 I found myself in an artistic rut. I decided one way to combat the rut would be to take a picture of the socks I wore everyday during the month of February and then do a design based on the pair of socks I wore that day.

Originally, I had planned to do a design a day. Oops!

Anyway, here is the sock that the design is based on:

For some reason, a penguin and the word chillen made me think of a penguin relaxing on a beach with a surfboard while watching the sunset.

Surfer Penguin on the Beach

by ValeriesGallery

Even though I’m not much of a beach person, I’ve always found it relaxing walking on the beach during a sunrise.

This design was originally done in marker. It can be found in my Zazzle shop, Redbubble and Imagekind.

What do you think of Surfer Penguin on the Beach?

On October 19th, 2021 my Robot Christmas Card my Christmas Robot Snowflake Bleep Bleep Funny Card was awarded Design of the Day on Greeting Card Universe. The design was featured on the greeting Card Universe Home Page for the Day. I posted about it on the Valerie Gallery Facebook page.

  It’s an honor to be chosen considering how many talented artist and wonderful designs are on Greeting Card Universe!

  This is the second time one of my designs have been chosen Design of the Day.  The other one was Doctor Superheroes Doctors’ Day card in February of 2015.

  The “Bleep Bleep is Robot for” series was actually inspired by my “Roar is dinosaur for” series.

  I came up with the “Roar is dinosaur for” series because one day I was moseying around Target and noticed that a lot of the items had dinosaurs on them.  I decided it would be a good idea to come up with a dinosaur design of my own and thus, the “Roar is dinosaur for” series was born!

A Dinosaur for Every Occassion
by ValeriesGallery

People really seemed to enjoy the dinosaur series, so I started to brainstorm more ____ is for __________ ideas.  One of the ideas I came up with was a robot.  I also have “Meow is cat for” and “Roar is Lion for”.

“Meow is cat for” can be found in the Cookie and Olivia store on Zazzle.

Cookie the Cat Meowy Birthday
by cookieandolivia

And “Roar is Lion for can be found on Greeting Card Universe.

  “Bleep Bleep is Robot for” is also available for birthdays, Hanukkah, Easter, Thank You, and I Love You.

  It’s tough to pick which is my favorite, but so for it’s a toss up between the dinosaur and the robot.  Do you have a favorite?

  Cookie, from my children’s’ book series, Cookie and Olivia, is based on my cat, Oreo.

  Oreo and her sister, Olivia came into our lives in June 2009.  My husband and I were enjoying a walk around our neighborhood when one of our neighbors stopped and asked if we wanted to see some kittens.  She also asked if we would be interested or if we knew anybody that would be interested in adopting them.  She had found a momma cat and her kittens in a box.

  I said no because I never pictured myself as a cat owner.  (Don’t tell my cats, but I wanted dogs.  Ha, ha.  Jokes on me because the cat are now my very spoiled fur babies. ) We also had plans to travel to New York to see our families and then we were off to Europe to visit my brother in law.

  However, at the same time my husband enthusiastically said yes.  He was so excited, and he rarely gets excited about anything, that there was no way I could say no!

  So, we followed my neighbor to her house and out on her back porch was a long haired brown and black cat just relaxing.  In different areas of the porch, were four kittens playing.  Two black and white ones and two tabbies.  (I still remember Olivia playing with a sparkly ball when I first saw her.)

  Our neighbor had a ten year old son at the time who had already named the kittens.  Oreo was originally named Black and Whitey.  However, I had decided long ago if I ever had a black and white animal, I was going to name it Oreo.

  Olivia was originally named Hidey, because we were told, she liked to hide.  However, a few days before, my husband had joked that if we ever got a cat, they were going to give it a regal sounding name.  Olivia’s full name is Olivia Fluffybottom the III.

  Since we had been talking about getting pets, we decided to adopt two of them.  It’s a coincidence that we ended up with two girl cats.  Our neighbor asked us which ones we wanted.  I chose Olivia because she was adorable playing with her sparkly ball and Oreo got chosen because se was closest to us.

  Don’t worry though.  Their brothers and mom are living their best kitty life with a nice lady in South Florida.  It’s weird to think there is another Oreo and Olivia out there, but boys.

Some fun facts:

• Cookie and the Frowny Face Day came about from a time I was going through a bought of depression.  I decided instead of wallowing in my misery, I was going to make something positive come of it.
• Oreo’s name got changed to Cookie in the books because I didn’t want to worry about trademark issues with Oreo cookies.
• Oreo loves to cuddle!  She also enjoys lounging in boxes, paper piles and the sun.

• She loves soft food and tuna! (Which she only gets as a treat.)
• Oreo has several nicknames. They are: Cuddle kitty, the black and white one and Sunshine Kitty.
• Not only has Oreo been the inspiration for Cookie, she’s also been the inspiration for various art pieces such as Cat Rave Dance Party, Here’s Looking At You Cat and I Can See You Cat to name just a few!
• Cookie and Olivia also have their own store! You can check it out on Zazzle.

Do you have any pets?  How did they come into your life?

  In the beginning of 2013, for a variety of reasons, I was feeling very uninspired and in a rut.  Knowing I needed to do something about it, I decided it would be a good idea to take a picture of the socks I wore everyday for one month and do a design based on them.

    The original plan was that I would do the design on the same day I wore the socks.  Needles to say, that’s not how it worked out, considering its now 2021 and I still haven’t finished the project.  Oops.)

  On the bright side, even though I haven’t fully finished the project yet, my idea seemed to work!  I got pulled out of my rut and ended up with some cool designs that I wouldn’t have thought of otherwise.  Some examples are: Grim Reaper with Flower, Bokeh Inspired Colorful Hearts and Bears Flying Planes.

  Due the pandemic and Florida summers being a little to hot for me, I figured it was as good a time as any to continue the sock picture project from 2013. 

  When I looked where I happen to leave off it was a pair of white socks.

  I had originally picked February because it was the shortest month, thinking that would make it the easiest. One thing that I forgot to factor in was due to my birthday, anniversary, and a bunch of other reasons, I had a bunch of weekend getaways planned.

  When I travel, despite all the fun socks I own, to make life easier, I pack black and/or white socks.  This way, my socks always match my outfit no matter what clothes I pack.

  Luckily, I can still come up with designs based on plain white socks without just doing a blank page.

 After thinking about it for a while, I realized I had a design with red circles on a white background, so why not white circles on a black background?

 

White Circles Black Background Classic Pattern Satin Ribbon

by ValeriesGallery

  Voila!  White circles on a black background was born!

  This design can be found in my shops on Zazzle, Redbubble, Society6 and Spoonflower.

  I’m hoping to wrap up the socks project sooner than later!  Seven years is a long time, but sometimes life gets in the way.

  What’s the longest it’s taken you to complete a project?

I am not ashamed to say that I have a notebook obsession! I love them.  In addition to being useful, you can find some with some great cover designs! I use them for a variety of things like journaling, writing projects, writing ideas and planning among other things.

One of the hardest things about shopping online is the inability to touch and examine products.  Hopefully you find this post helpful in getting an idea about what the notebooks from Zazzle are like.

Society6 and Redbubble also have notebooks  The notebooks with the orange slices and the Monster Bear notebook above that are from RedBubble.   The mustard pattern one is from Society6. I originally was going to write about all three company’s notebooks in one post, but then realized there was a lot of information to cram into one blog post!  So each company will be getting their own notebook post.  Stay tuned for information about the notebook from RedBubble and Society6!

The two notebooks pictured below are the ones I ordered from Zazzle.  The ones featured here are Monster Bear Notebook and Love Ewe Sheep Notebook

Here are the backs of the Zazzle notebooks.  The one with the barcode on the back is Monster Bear Notebook, which I ordered in 2013.  The Love Ewe Sheep Notebook I ordered in June of 2018.

Here is what the pages inside of the Zazzle notebooks look like:

Some fun facts:

• • To some, the notebooks may seem a little pricey and that’s okay.  I bought all these while they were on sale!  Luckily all three websites have good deals.  If you’re looking for Zazzle deals you can always check out www.zazzle.com/coupons

• • I purchased the Monster Bear notebook in August 2013

• • Currently, I am using it for a writing project about a bear that has an adventure

• • I love it when the cover of the notebook matches what my writing project is about

• The sheep picture on the Love Ewe Sheep notebook I took while on vacation in Vermont

You can find more notebooks on Valerie’s Gallery at Zazzle here!  Also feel free to check out my notebook designs on Redbubble and Society6 as well!

Do you have any items you are obsessed with or that you find really useful?  Where is your favorite place to buy notebooks? Have any questions about the notebooks on Zazzle? Let us know in the comments!

Craft stores are one of my favorite places!  They’re a great place for inspiration. One of my favorite things to do is mosey around them.  (And yes, I rarely leave a craft store without buying something.  Ha ha!)  I’m lucky enough to live in an area that has multiple craft stores to choose from.

One of these craft stores also has a huge home décor section.  Apparently, farm house décor is very trendy at the moment.  This place had a lot of items that said farm to table.  This particular craft store also had a lot of items featuring cows, pigs and horses.  For some reason, “farm to table” made me think of farm animals showing up at a farmer’s kitchen table.  This struck me as funny and thus, Farm at Table was born!

Did you know:

• If I was going to make this picture again, I think I’d make the pig a little smaller. I don’t think I’ve ever seen a pig as big as a cow!
• Farm at Table is available at Zazzle, Red Bubble and Imagekind
• This picture has hints of kawaii style. (ex. The thick black lines)
• I’m considering doing some more versions of this picture with different farm animals

Where do you go for inspiration?  Let us know in the comments!

The DJ black and white cat in Cat Rave Dance Party Paws Up is based on my cat Oreo. She is definitely the most nocturnal of my two cats.

Our cats are not allowed in the bedroom. The idea for this design came about because Oreo lately has gotten into the habit of meowing outside our bedroom door at about five o’clock in the morning. When she does this, either my husband or I will say, “Shushi, Oreo.” Or “Oreo too early. Go sleepy.” Being the good cat that she is, she usually obeys.

When we get up a little while later, the black and white cat will be all tuckered out and fast asleep in one of her favorite sleeping spots, while her sister, a tabby, is up and running around the house.

In reality, my cats are strictly indoor cats. I am too much of a worrier for them to be out door cats. Though, that didn’t stop me from joking with my husband that Oreo had a secret life as a club DJ or something and she was just letting us know when she was home. And thus, Cat Rave Dance Party Paws Up was born!

Did you know:

• The gray and white cat paws are based on Oreo’s sister, Olivia.

• Oreo is also the basis for Cookie the Cat in the Cookie and Olivia book series.

• Cookie and Olivia have their own store on Zazzle

• This is the second design I’ve made where an animal is DJing. The other one is DJ Piggy Pig.

• Oreo is also in a few of my other designs. These include Sleeping Black and White Cat, Here’s Looking at You Cat, and Cat Eyes (Black and White), to name just a few.

Cat Rave Dance Party Paws Up is available for sale on:

• Zazzle

• Red Bubble

• Imagekind

• Skreened

Do you have a pet? Do they have any interesting habits? Has your pet inspired you in any way? Let us know in the comments!