White Circles Blanket – From the Gumball Blanket Pattern, with white at the center circle of each square.

Check out the pattern for sale on Ravelry or Etsy, or look into ordering this blanket as a handmade, custom item.

The color placement is inspired by an Origami Wall Art piece on How About Orange blog. When I saw her paper folding tutorial, I just had to make a blanket. Inspiration is everywhere!

Gumball Blanket – First version sold to a lovely lady in Buzzards Bay, Maine.

Check out the pattern for sale on Ravelry or Etsy, or look into ordering this blanket as a handmade, custom item.

I love this blanket because it was one of my first prototypes, and it became a top seller in my custom shop. To make this blanket, I make all of the center circles, then “dip” them in the second color round, and lay all of the circles on the floor, arranging them until I am satisfied with the color placement. Then I take a photo and use it for reference. It is important to me for this design that all colors are used an equal amount of times, but I can bend my rule if I can convince myself that it still looks great!

I add a simple edge to this design because I want the background to be a palette for the color, and because I don’t want to detract from the pretty four-point star formation where four squares meet.

All folded up and ready to ship! The crisp, clean “large scallops” edge really makes me happy.

Central Texas has pretty mild winters so I have no right to complain, but, between that and the allergies – I have been a total shut-in for a week now! The good news is it’s given me time to work on pieces in the shop for those of you who would rather order an item and receive it in the mail ready-made rather than printing and cutting them out.

I’ve just added some tuxedo cupcake toppers, gumball machine cupcake toppers and gumball machine table sprinkle confetti! The tuxedo toppers (see image above) are great for weddings, bridal showers, proms, cotillions, Valentine’s Day parties or any black tie affair. The gumball machine toppers (which I LOVE) each have a handfull of fuzzy, colourful ‘gumballs’ on them. They are perfect for brightly-coloured parties, kid parties or candyland parties. Throw in the gumball table sprinkles and you’re ready to roll!

And here’s a little inspiration board for each piece so you can imagine the possibilities!

tokimekiwaku:

i don’t understand why more people don’t know or talk about gumball this show is so good i do not understand??? 

(my favorite episode is the one where richard gets a job and the prank one)

Try Some

In Try Some, Ben Steele’s low culture―high culture homage, the quintessentially American gumball machine is front and center in a controlled museum environment filled with graceful figures by Henri Mattisse. “Try Some” says the hatch door covering the candy exit. And “try some” is part of Steele’s message: try some of all life has to offer. Art is for enjoyment and just like a handful of candy, it can give you pleasure and satisfaction.

About the Artist:

Ben Steele

Ben Steele was born in 1977 in Kennewick, WA. He graduated from University of Utah in 2002 with a BFA in painting and drawing, continuing his education at the Helper Workshops under the instruction of David Dornan and Paul Davis. The summer workshops led to a multi-year internship with Dornan and Steele relocated to Helper where he has been living and working as an artist ever since.

Steele considers himself to often be on the outside of the art world looking in. Rather than fitting any specific movement, he’s best described as an Art Chameleon, using his work to comment on the history of art as a whole. To do so, he incorporates many different processes of painting and isn’t tied down by any one style.

With an education built upon classical training, however, he enjoys utilizing the techniques and processes of the old masters with a contemporary sensibility. What results is a paradoxical reverence for art with playful and sometimes acidic commentary.

See more, or order art by Ben Steele

© Rollie LaMarche – Come visit my site to learn more about art, artists and picture framing.

Who shaved, painted, and TP’d Principal Brown? We’ll, that’s ‘The Mystery,’ ain’t it? Luckily, detective Gumball is on the case! Expand your DVD collection with 12 amazing episodes from season 1 of The Amazing World of Gumball, including “The Club,” “The Ape,” “The Car,” and of course, “The Mystery.” In stores January 15th. Pre-order it now!

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What’s your favorite episode of The Amazing World of Gumball?

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Clothes by Eva Franco

Sweater by Eva Franco

Dress by Eva Franco

I

Gumball pillow

Sushi pillow

Pizza pillow

d

Cardigan

Mug

Mini car

Mini car

I’ll share the results in my next post, byee

Our Special Edition Hat Stands are still very popular with sellers. They like their size and style for displaying hats and wigs for their photos. Also popular has been our Custom Lego Gumball Machines and our Custom Lego Sewing Set. People love the unique design. The gumball machines work well for Lego minifigs and the sewing set will work great for small dolls.  They also make cute displays in other types of miniature dioramas.

I’m always trying to think up ideas for new items, so if you have an idea you’d like to share or a request for something you’d like to see offered, be sure to leave me a brief comment on this post.  Let me know your thoughts and ideas and I’ll see what I can do!

When a vision collides with the frustration of bringing it to life.

When a conviction sears, you will stop at nothing to pursue the solution.

I’m looking for someone that I honestly don’t know how to find.  I’m not sure who it is.  I mean…I thought I did.  But there are times when you wonder if you are right.  I don’t necessarily mean an individual.  It could be a group of people.  An organization.  A business.  Maybe just a group of friends.  A church.  A university.  The list is as open and endless…

I’m looking for people who are fed up.  People who want more for the world around them than what they’ve seen and experienced so far.  People who believe that the systems around us that are broken and failing need someone with the courage to step up and do something about it.  Not to stop at bringing awareness, but pursuing tangible change and making it happen.

(You can visit www.GumballWall.com after you read the post to learn more.  Don’t worry…you can finish reading…

I’ll put the link at the bottom too.)

Let me share a story with you that might help this journey make more sense…

“When one heard this…” Another man…”Was preparing…inviting…”.  He was excited.  When the preparations were made he couldn’t wait to see everyone come that had been invited.  But as fast as that excitement arrived it was taken out of him and replaced.  It must have shocked him.  The next emotion, I mean.  For someone to experience such happiness, joy and expectation at the great things coming from this “thing” they would experience together.  The fellowship.  The closeness.  The memories made together.  The tangible change thing…remember?

“But they all alike began to make excuses”.  How that must have hurt.  It did hurt.  They began to come back to him one after the other.  Excuse after excuse.  Each one acting as a body shot taken to the rib cage in a prize fight.  Each one taking more air out of him as he was seemingly now just trying to stand up, whereas moments before he was full of energy and excitement with some to spare.  When things…objects…new purchases and other relationships that served only the people making the excuses stood in the way of great potential.  Of potential unleashed within the power found in coming together.

There would be no coming together.  At least not with those he thought he had prepared for.  It would hurt, but he wouldn’t stop.  His hurt began to boil inside of him slowly, yet quickly at the same time.  Like a teapot on the stove, each moment he became hotter than the second before it.  He was quiet in this process, like the boil of the water in the kettle.  Then at an unannounced moment he erupted like the whistle and the steam from atop that kettle.  The kettle was yelling it’s arrival to more than someone within earshot of a conversation.  It’s announcement was something you could hear from a great distance.

So the invitations would now never be the same.  Never going back to any one of whom offered an excuse.  He went further.  The invitation farther.  To places he hadn’t gone before.  To places where he likely didn’t know anyone.  To places he would go out of a refusal to see the preparations he had made be wasted.  To those that had ears that would hear and feet that would journey to the table.

Yet even after all this had been done…

There was still room.  Empty seats.  Empty plates.  Waiting to be filled.

If before was a time to be stretched in his thinking, now would be a time to go right up to the edge.  He would come up to a cliff of uncertainty. The pebbles scuffed by the arrival of his footsteps would move in slow motion over the edge as he arrived in his urgency.  Stopping just in time to remain within the confines of safety, but his feet and heart extended as far as they could go to save the one that couldn’t save themselves. Someone that was contemplating that edge prior to his pursuit of them.

He would reach out and “make them come in…”  With great purpose and intentionality he would do all of this for one reason.

“So that my house would be full”.

Who’s house?

HIS house.

Not the house of the man preparing the banquet.  That would simply be the table for the physical feast.  The house spoken of here is for a feast that never ends.  A feast that fulfills more than the hunger pangs of “…the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame”.  This feast would reach the heart.

My journey to develop the concept of “Gumball Wall” is not complicated.  It’s developing the next generation locally to solve problems around the corner in their communities and around the globe.

It’s taking the problems everyone is complaining about and putting them in their proper perspective.

And it’s calling out to people who want to do something about it.

Not talk.  DO.

Gumball Wall exists to create a culture where…

“GIVING IS WHO WE ARE, NOT WHAT WE DO”.

So if you are interested in learning more, and it ends with you reading this post…I have some questions for you that I hope will stir you into action.  To contact me.  To get involved.  To ask questions.  To make sacrifices and take risks to bring real change.

Are you making a decision or an excuse?

Are you sacrificing to the movement or retreating to your comfort?

Is it about you and what you want or the masses and what they need?

Are you in fear of your lack or your God?

The former makes your knees shake, the latter makes them bend before the only one that can provide for your needs…and the needs of those around you waiting for you to respond to HIS call.

And it’s when we seek from our knees that we have the greatest perspective.

That those you think will rush to join you in the midst of the greatest opportunity to share the gospel…will make excuses instead.  They are too busy with their “field…oxen…marriage”.  Stuff, toys and comfortable relationships.

I am looking to find those that will make the decision to “Go out quickly…and bring in the poor, the crippled, the blind and the lame” with me.  Find those that will “Go…and make them come in, so that my (HIS) house will be full”.

It’s going to be hard. It will require great sacrifice.  But when you get back from the “…streets, alleys of the town…” and “…out to the roads and country lanes…” you will see something you’ve never ever experienced in your life.

I’ll admit that I can get caught up in writing for the audience.  Trying to figure out how to say things, what to say…wondering who they are reaching, effecting, challenging, uplifting, encouraging.  But the more I write, the more I realize that isn’t my place.

Mine is to repeat what I know.  To share where I’ve been.  To look for the ones who will make the decision to join me on this journey.

Because honestly…

I don’t have time to double back to those making excuses.

I’m moving forward.

If you would like to know the heart behind this post, go read Luke 14-15-24.  The words in “quotes” above?  I think you’ll recognize them.

Thanks for the ear.

If you want to get involved in where I’m going?

Let’s talk.

BrettWGould@gmail.com

Oh, I promised that link one more time to.

Here it is:

www.GumballWall.com

I lounged, almost in a pose of accubation, in the Elephant and Castle, awaiting the arrival of my dear companion, Doctor Watson.  I entertained myself by browsing the Daily Telegraph, seeking the unusual, the arcane.  This daily rag of the bourgeoisie seemed bulging with adverts for things common, as well as things apparently found only in the homes of carnival denizens.  What the devil was a gumball machine, anyway?

Ubiquitous among these adverts were the brazen claims made by the purveyors of patent medications, purported to cure all the ailments of gullible, frail, hypochondriacally crippled people with loose monies to spend on panaceas. Oh, the folly!

Half-past, and still no Watson. Deucedly irritating!  Perhaps he had been detained by one of those hypochondriacs, himself.  This was not the first time he had been late due to the demands of a woman who was distressed by the changing appearance of her aging body, or perhaps by the entreaties of a gentleman hoping to achieve those levels of performance remembered from years past.  Gad, what fools we mortals be!

As I gazed upon the patrons of the Elephant I practiced my powers of deduction, seeking only the smallest of details which would lead invariably to the revelation of their backgrounds or fields of employ.  Here was a somewhat nicely dressed man of means, regaling his companions with his tales of conquests in the marketplace.  As he spoke, I glanced at his hands, those revealing appendages which told many things about their owners.  His were stained perceptibly black at the tips, suggesting labors at the presses rather than as the top publisher he claimed to be.

Also at his table, seated next to another braggart, was a woman clothed in finery, sparklingly bejeweled.  Something about this Kensington courtesan did not ring true, and it took me but a moment to discover the clue.  The reflected beams of sunlight captured by her earrings did not display the correct levels of radiance expected from true diamonds.  I had written a monograph on this very subject and therefore knew that these baubles were not genuine.  Further investigation revealed that her gown was rather crudely stitched across the shoulders, indicative of manufacture by the new lock-stitch machines, rather than the fine stitches produced by a seamstress of quality and experience. Finally, I noted that her chatelaine was of very poor quality and was at the point of failing, thus to release her trinkets upon the floor.

Across the room was another gathering of men, surrounding a man who was holding forth on the marvels of manufacture that could be seen at the Great Exhibition at Hyde Park.  And, although he had been exposed to many miracles of the Industrial Age, his attempts at explanation of these marvels bordered on the laughable.  Unfortunately, his voice carried well across the public house and I could hear all of it, much more than I desired.  According to him, some of these new mechanisms employed principles never mentioned in any physics textbook.  It was all I could do to keep from rising to my feet and take him down from his pedestal by use of pure logic.  And yet I restrained myself.

“Holmes, are you well?  You seem quite distracted,” said Watson, arriving at last.  I rose to shake his hand, delighted to welcome him to my table.

“Dr. Watson, you have delivered me from boredom once again!  How wonderful to see you!  Any news of further investigations to be made, new mysteries to solve?”

We sat down together to plumb the depths of human foibles.

Keywords to include in the story: gumball   accubation   ubiquitous

I lounged, almost in a pose of accubation, in the Elephant and Castle, awaiting the arrival of my dear companion, Doctor Watson.  I entertained myself by browsing the Daily Telegraph, seeking the unusual, the arcane.  This daily rag of the bourgeoisie seemed bulging with adverts for things common, as well as things apparently found only in the homes of carnival denizens.  What the devil was a gumball machine, anyway?

Ubiquitous among these adverts were the brazen claims made by the purveyors of patent medications, purported to cure all the ailments of gullible, frail, hypochondriacally crippled people with loose monies to spend on panaceas. Oh, the folly!

Half-past, and still no Watson. Deucedly irritating!  Perhaps he had been detained by one of those hypochondriacs, himself.  This was not the first time he had been late due to the demands of a woman who was distressed by the changing appearance of her aging body, or perhaps by the entreaties of a gentleman hoping to achieve those levels of performance remembered from years past.  Gad, what fools we mortals be!

As I gazed upon the patrons of the Elephant I practiced my powers of deduction, seeking only the smallest of details which would lead invariably to the revelation of their backgrounds or fields of employ.  Here was a somewhat nicely dressed man of means, regaling his companions with his tales of conquests in the marketplace.  As he spoke, I glanced at his hands, those revealing appendages which told many things about their owners.  His were stained perceptibly black at the tips, suggesting labors at the presses rather than as the top publisher he claimed to be.

Also at his table, seated next to another braggart, was a woman clothed in finery, sparklingly bejeweled.  Something about this Kensington courtesan did not ring true, and it took me but a moment to discover the clue.  The reflected beams of sunlight captured by her earrings did not display the correct levels of radiance expected from true diamonds.  I had written a monograph on this very subject and therefore knew that these baubles were not genuine.  Further investigation revealed that her gown was rather crudely stitched across the shoulders, indicative of manufacture by the new lock-stitch machines, rather than the fine stitches produced by a seamstress of quality and experience. Finally, I noted that her chatelaine was of very poor quality and was at the point of failing, thus to release her trinkets upon the floor.

Across the room was another gathering of men, surrounding a man who was holding forth on the marvels of manufacure that could be seen at the Great Exhibition at Hyde Park.  And, although he had been exposed to many miracles of the Industrial Age, his attempts at explanation of these marvels bordered on the laughable.  Unfortunately, his voice carried well across the public house and I could hear all of it, much more than I desired.  According to him, some of these new mechanisms employed principles never mentioned in any physics textbook.  It was all I could do to keep from rising to my feet and take him down from his pedestal by use of pure logic.  And yet I restrained myself.

“Holmes, are you well?  You seem quite distracted,” said, Watson, arriving at last.  I rose to shake his hand, delighted to welcome him to my table.

“Dr. Watson, you have delivered me from boredom once again!  How wonderful to see you!  Any news of further investigations to be made, new mysteries to solve?”

We sat down together to plumb the depths of human foibles.

Purchase here

Candy Birthday Invitations by LittlebeaneBoutique

FULLY CUSTOMIZABLE FOR ANY PURPOSE! This is an adorable invitation for any child that loves Candy… is having a Sweet Shoppe Party or the game “Candy Land” Party! It has Cupcakes, Rock Candy, hard candies, gumballs and polka dots all around in fun vibrant colors.  There also matching stickers the designer’s shop! Check them out!

Video review of a random “gumball machine” prize – an Amazing Spiderman bobblehead keyring.

まりめっこ Drawr