Not sure what the Monthly Muse is. Each month I will be your Muse by providing an inspiration challenge. The idea is to step outside your comfort zone, try something new and have fun. This group is open to all artistic mediums.

Playing along is easy…you can join in any time throughout the year. Upload your photos to Flickr, add them to the Monthly Muse Flickr group and tag them with the corresponding monthly tag. For example this month’s inspiration will have the tag MM3.

Today I wanted to share what Veronique Hoffmann (Fimomaus) created with this color palette.

The combination of the crackle look with the flowers (in the photo below) is very eye catching. Veronique definitely wins the prize for participation in the color palette a week challenge. Ok, there’s not really a prize, but if there were, she would win it. She was far and away the best at keeping up. Be sure to check out Veronique’s other work.

While mommy and baby were at the hospital, we had our two year old grandson. I forget how much energy a two year old has…wore me out. Yesterday we had his slightly delayed birthday party.

Now on to the new monthly inspiration project…

The Muses from Greek mythology are the goddesses who inspire the creation of literature and the arts. Each month I will be your Muse by providing an inspiration challenge. The idea is to step outside your comfort zone, try something new and have fun. This group is open to all artistic mediums.

Playing along is easy…you can join in any time throughout the year. Upload your photos to Flickr, add them to the Monthly Muse Flickr group and tag them with the corresponding monthly tag. For example the first monthly inspiration will have the tag MM1.

And here is the first Monthly Muse inspiration. Mesh and denim shades (Marina, Dark Blue and Twilight Blue).

I think her owl sewing kit is just the cutest thing and they are available in different colors.

This fun spider web tote bag is perfect for this time of year.

She even has things for men, like this flame eyeglass case.

Since tomorrow is the beginning of October, which means breast cancer awareness month, we can’t forget the pink. Protect your Kindle with a fabulous cover like this one.

If you work with polymer clay, you should read Carol Simmons’ recent blog post about the POSSIBLE future loss of zinc yellow and cobalt blue and weigh-in with your thoughts. While this issue mainly involves Premo polymer clay, it comes down to a numbers issue (number of sales), which somewhere down the road may affect other brands of polymer clay.

This is something that I brought up in this post when Polyform Products first announced that cobalt blue and zinc yellow would continue to be available through three online retailers.

“Unfortunately the sales will probably not end up being enough to support continuing these colors. The main reason being the limited availability. While the die hard professional artists will order the colors to be able to continue their color palettes, hobbyists will probably not bother.”

Now, let’s take a look at the even bigger picture. Polymer clay artists have worked hard to get to the point where polymer clay is considered an acceptable art medium. Then consider, said artists, having a limited color palette to work with. Imagine for a minute that Vincent van Gogh had denim blue instead of cobalt blue as a primary color to work with for his “The Starry Night” painting. It would be pretty drab, wouldn’t it?

I’ve been asked over and over again if I will continue to do seasonal color recipe ebooks with the “new colors” if it gets to the point that cobalt and zinc yellow are no longer available. The short answer is NO. The longer response is that I may continue to do color recipe ebooks, but they won’t be based on a specific seasonal color palette like they are now because there would be too many colors that can’t be matched without cobalt blue and zinc yellow.

I’ve been lax in sharing some of the pretties from the Color Palette A Week Flickr group (CPAW), so let’s play catch up.

This is just a small sample, be sure to check them all out on the Flickr group.

This week’s color palette.

You can get in on the fun by checking out CPAW on Flickr. You can join in any time. Challenge yourself to complete all 52 weeks of the challenge or play along as time allows. Think outside your color box this week.