Tag: acrylic

Mister Carrot

Posted on by Jennifer At Your Toy Portrait


9″x12″ acrylic, 2013. I adore a generations-old, threadbare toy, but imagine my delight at getting to paint something this quirky and colorful! This large, puffy carrot was purchased at Ikea by Amy for her adorable youngest son Ike as a desperate measure to entertain and calm him while the family shopped. At the time, Ike and the carrot were roughly the same size! These days, Ike really prefers all things Elmo in terms of toys, but the carrot has evolved into an indispensable nighttime pillow companion. This portrait marks Ike’s very recent second birthday. Here he is, having just run to get his carrot after recognizing it in the portrait…


Because we lack an Ikea in our immediate area, I was not familiar with this recent line of toys, but here’s a painting of an ill-fated bear I bought on an Ikea excursion about ten years ago. Also, if you are not one of the gazillion devoted readers of Amy’s fabulous blog, you are missing some of the funniest writing on the internet about life with small children!

Cassie’s BearBear

Posted on by Jennifer At Your Toy Portrait

8″x10″ acrylic, 2013. One of my daughter’s very closest friends in her pre-k class is Cassie, an adorable girl with dark ringlets, dimples, and fabulous Lisa Loeb glasses. Cassie is often accompanied at drop-off by this well-worn bear. A gift from Cassie’s great-aunt, the bear originally known as “Fuzzy Was He” came to be called “BearBear” as he grew more and more beloved and less and less fuzzy. When Cassie was a baby, she would idly twirl BearBear’s fur in her finger while sucking her thumb. The fur plucking and twirling continues, so Cassie’s mom Catherine decided to commission a portrait to preserve BearBear’s present appearance before he becomes even more fur-less and floppy… in order to pose him I had to employ some strategically-placed tape to hold him upright in the chair!

Puppy Love

Posted on by Jennifer At Your Toy Portrait

8″x10″ acrylic, 2013. Becky was the lucky winner in a custom portrait giveaway hosted by Casey of the wonderful blog Moosh In Indy and Babble a couple of months ago. This 1970’s Knickerbocker Toys pup was purchased with Becky’s own money in a department store when she was in first grade, and has been her “security blanket” and confidant ever since. He looks quite Snoopy-esque, but was probably not a licensed Peanuts product. As a child, Becky dried her tears on his ears, and he later proved to be a sympathetic listener to her tales of teen angst. After her mother taught her to sew, Becky made him a little night shirt. She considered having him wear for the painting, but wanted to showcase the red and yellow shirt that drew her to him originally. After patiently enduring sporadic periods of storage, Puppy Love now holds a place of honor upon the bed in Becky’s guest room.
I posted a photo of this portrait on FaceBook earlier today, and immediately heard from a friend that she had had the same exact stuffed dog growing up and felt equally as passionate about it. She regaled me at length with stories of desperate searches for him whenever he was lost and of pushing him in a little stroller alongside her friends and their babydolls. It’s fascinating to hear about such a cheerfully innocuous stuffed toy inspiring so much devotion!

Monchhichi Family

Posted on by Jennifer At Your Toy Portrait

8″x10″ acrylic, 2013. So first of all, did you know that Monchhichi is spelled that way, with the two consecutive h’s? I didn’t until I began researching this project. Seems like an odd marketing choice, but there you go! This is the second family portrait commissioned by Dominic for his wife as Mother’s Day gifts. In last year’s version there were only Dominic, Cassandra, and Isaac, each represented by classic Fisher-Price Little People. With the addition of their new baby girl, Noa, this past August, Dominic decided to have a new portrait made of the family of four. I look forward to more of Dominic’s clever projects in the future as his family continues to grow!

Watch this video at your own risk — it will be stuck in your head FOREVER.

Little People Wedding Portrait

Posted on by Jennifer At Your Toy Portrait

9″x12″ acrylic, 2013. This assignment combines two of my favorite portrait categories: The couple’s toy portrait and the Fisher-Price Little People family portrait! What could be a more romantic gift for a couple who both love classic ’70’s and ’80’s toys? Kerry tells me that Kate played with her Little People village constantly when she was a child, and that Kate’s fiancé Pete is a connoisseur of vintage toys. Kerry commissioned this painting as a gift for her sister Kate for her upcoming May wedding. I modified classic Fisher-Price figures to show Pete’s goatee, Kate’s hair color and recently-acquired glasses, and Kelly’s choice of clothing color for the two of them. Here’s to a long, happy life together for this fun-loving couple!

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Mia’s Teddy

Posted on by Jennifer At Your Toy Portrait

8″x10″ acrylic, 2013. In the photo I was given to work from for this painting, this serenely smiling bear dwarfs tiny infant Mia as she rests against his side and bawls robustly. My daughter, who is five, exclaimed “Oh no, the baby doesn’t like that bear!” But in fact nothing could be further from the truth. Maureen’s 17-year-old niece Mia was given this big stuffed bear by her dad before she came home from the hospital as a new baby, and has slept with it every night since. Concerned that “Teddy” will not be in any condition to travel with Mia to college next fall, Maureen commissioned this portrait as a gift to go along with her in its place. Maureen hopes that someday the painting might hang in the nursery of Mia’s own baby!

Little People Portrait: Amy’s Family

Posted on by Jennifer At Your Toy Portrait

8″x10″ acrylic, 2013. Amy first contacted me via etsy nearly a year ago, and we built up to the making of this Fisher-Price Little People family portrait via a slow-motion conversation. I’m actually glad it took us this long to get it going, because, by the time Amy sent me a current photo of her family, her little boy had grown from babyhood into a fully-formed toddler complete with lovely strawberry-blonde hair! This made it easy to choose the classic orange-bodied boy with wispy red hair and a sweet smile to stand for Amy’s son. I modified the standard yellow haired/blue bodied “mom” figure to have brown hair to match Amy’s, but her husband is well represented by the green-clad “dad” just as he is!

Grumpy Sheep

Posted on by Jennifer At Your Toy Portrait

8×10 acrylic, 2013. This grouchy stuffed sheep lifted the mood of my entire household during the process of making his portrait. There’s something about his of-kilter lean and comically stunned expression that just made anyone passing by my easel snort with laughter or at least smile! This toy was the childhood favorite of Tara, who is expecting her first baby this May. The painting will hang in the baby’s nursery alongside my portrait of Tara’s husband’s own stuffed bunny. incorporating paintings of parents’ beloved toys is a super charming idea for nursery décor!

Beans

Posted on by Jennifer At Your Toy Portrait

8″x10″ acrylic, 2012. Thirty-six years ago, Sami’s mother’s company had a Christmas party which featured a visit from “Santa.” On that occasion, this doll was Santa’s gift to Sami’s then-two-year-old sister. With her soft, bean-bag body, a sweet-faced, plastic head, and a fabulous floppy hat, “Beans” was a cherished toy throughout childhood. Eventually the doll went into safe-keeping in their mother’s cabinet — until it was spotted by Sami’s neice, Ramsie! Beans now enjoys the adoration of three-year-old Ramsie and sleeps with her every night. I love to hear about toys that are beloved by multiple generations of a family!

Pet Portrait: Olive Grown Up

Posted on by Jennifer At Your Toy Portrait

5″x7″ acrylic, 2013. As an incredibly thoughtful and clever Valentine’s Day gift for his wife, Tim commissioned a pair of portraits of the couple’s beloved boxer Olive. The first painting depicts Olive as a puppy, and this one shows her as she is today, a loveable “smush” usually found sprawled upon the couch.