Join Us for Crafty Secret Santa 2015!

Edit: Registration has now been closed.


This year I've decided to organize a Secret Santa with a special twist: please join us in a holiday gift exchange of crafty proportions, where all you need to spare is four hours of your time to surprise another artful individual with an original creation this holiday season!  Individuals of all skill levels are welcome to join and take part in the festivities!

What is Crafty Secret Santa?

By filling out the Crafty Secret Santa registration form, you agree to take part in a fun holiday experience where you and other creative individuals will be randomly matched in a Crafty Secret Santa experience! Participants should not purchase premade gifts for their Secret Santa, but rather, you should put on your crafty holiday hats and spend a minimum of four hours making your Secret Santa something special using the answers in their match's form.

How to Register

I’ve put together a Google Form for the Crafty Secret Santa 2015 project. If you’re interested in joining us for some festive holiday gift-making, please swing on by and register!  

In order to deter bots, you will need to create or log in with a Google account in order to view the form, which also allows you to edit your answers later if you like.  Below are images of the short, two-page form so you can check it out and see if you're interested in joining us prior to logging in!

I've kept the questions very short and simple so that everyone should be able to fill in the details with the imagination and that the information will be helpful to you, regardless of if you crochet, sculpt, draw, bead, sew, make ornaments, paint, or anything else!  I'll be participating as well, of course! :)

If you notice any issues when using the form or have any feedback, please don’t hesitate to let me know! -> Register Here

What the Registration Form Looks Like

 

Important Dates and Deadlines

• Registration runs through November 22nd, 2015. 
• You will receive your match on or before November 25th, 2015. The sooner you register, the sooner you get your match! Registration may end early if capacity is reached before November 25th, 2015.
• Please complete your project and mail it out to your recipient by December 15th, 2015.

If for any reason you need to back out from the exchange, please let the organizer know so that they can make alternative arrangements. 

Individuals who do not complete their end of the exchange will be barred from future exchanges. 

Costs and Expectations

Since you are not expected to buy your Crafty Secret Santa a premade gift, the only financial cost to participate will be to cover shipping and handling to mail your gift to your Secret Santa. You can create your gift using any creative materials you already own if you like! You just need to spend four or more hours on whatever you're creating. The sky's the limit beyond that!

When you receive your gift from your Crafty Secret Santa, we ask that you please take the time to take a photo and a thank you message if you have one so that we can share it with your Crafty Secret Santa and other participants.  Please email your photos and messages to kimberly.lecrone@gmail.com

Your personal email address will not be shared with your Crafty Secret Santa nor posted publicly. Your mailing address will only be shared with your Crafty Secret Santa for mailing purposes.

Questions? Feedback?

If you have any questions, please email me at kimberly.lecrone@gmail.com.

I hope you'll join us for this fun holiday activity!

#WIPWednesday and Revised Personal Goals and Upcoming Milestones:

#WIPWednesday

For this #WIP Wednesday, I've been trying not to start any new art projects lately (with the intent that it will enable me to help finish up outstanding personal art projects), but while watching a zBrush demo, this... dragon humanoid thing... started to take shape and I just went with it. He/she isn't done, but I'll likely try and finish sculpting her in the coming week or two so I can mark him/her off as "complete" as well. I'll likely stick to a bust. You can watch me work on him/her during a recent Livestream here.

Revised Personal Goals and Upcoming Milestones

Over the last few weeks I've been working hard behind the scenes on carving out time for my art and writing. On the whole, it's been an incredibly successful exercise, and one that I intend to keep up in the coming months.

I've been tracking my daily and weekly progress in spreadsheet form. This is my current week's progress so far!

I've been working on my writing regularly (which feels utterly awesome). Having a spreadsheet to help me along and regular routines has really helped me make a lot of headway on projects and given me an unexpected peace of mind.

But along with the solidarity of feeling that I'm moving towards a goal of releasing a short story on October 1st also came the unexpected realization that the story I was in the process of writing had grown quite a bit larger in scope and anticipated word count. Where initially I saw it coming in at around 15k words (which seemed quite reasonable to complete in two months on the side while working a demanding full-time job), it has grown significantly in scope, and is now looking like it will land closer to 40-50k words, and that's just an estimate. At present, the outline for it is complete, and I feel like I'm about a quarter of a way through its first draft.

With multiple conventions and travel on the horizon, its forced me to realize that I would do well to adjust my milestones so that I can better complete "Secrets of an Accord" and not feel like I"m trying to meet an artificial deadline I've set for myself based on an story with a significantly smaller word count. In addition, in an ideal world I'd love to come up with a little art to go along with the story when I post it, because this story is a pretty big milestone for me.

Why These Milestones Mean So Much to Me

It's not that I think this writing is perfect (it's not), or that the story is utterly polished to a shine (I could spend years on it and it still wouldn't be "finished" to me). I do not count myself among the sincerely great writers or artists out there, but unlike my art, I've held so much of my writing close to my heart for so long now that it feels bottled-up inside and threatening to burst. This story is one of my first big steps in a public setting, and the prospect of sharing it and my other stories it is at once terrifying and exhilarating for me, and I want to ensure that I'm putting my (reasonably) best foot forward. While I have numerous other stories available that I've completed in past years, it somehow feels more genuine to me to test myself and my current writing chops with new content rather than simply editing older writing I've done previously.

Like I said in this blog post, thorough this plan of attack I'm hoping to accomplish two main things:

1. Get my work “out there” and improve it. Writing in a vacuum only goes so far, and the more eyes that see my work and can give me honest feedback, the better I can make it.
2. Share my work with a wider audience. I have had these stories to tell for a over a dozen years now, and I’m eager to share the characters and their world with more people.

Revised Personal Goals and Upcoming Milestones:

• I will have a full rough draft of my next short story, "Secrets of an Accord" complete by October 1st, 2014
• I will publish my next short story, "Secrets of an Accord" online on November 1st, 2014.

In addition I will:

• Complete at least one unfinished art piece by September 1st, 2014.
• I worked on and completed a bunch of new art, but I still have to try to finish up a piece that's been lying around prior to the start of this month.

DONE! - Complete reading at least one unfinished book by September 1st 2014.

• 2k to 10k: Writing Faster, Writing Better, and Writing More of What You Love
• Pop Sculpture: How to Create Action Figures and Collectible Statues
• I was a Beta Reader for Alex Roque's "Wings of the Fallen"
• I was a Beta Reader for Cynthia Reep's "Ruuk and Cambir"

I hope your own personal projects are going well!

My 5-Year Blizzard Sword

I don’t usually post much about work, but just recently, at last, I received my Blizzard Sword! Thanks for five awesome years, and here’s to many more! :D

You can read more about Blizzard Entertainment’s snazzy Service Awards here.

If you're curious what working at Blizzard is all about, make sure to check out our new Career Site! There's also a neat video that just went up this week that shows a great look behind the scenes and glimpses into the many faces behind our games as well as our core values and culture. You can check it out below!

If you have any general questions about what life is like at Blizzard, don't hesitate to let me know!

The First Steps of the Journey!

So at the moment I'm pretty swamped for time, but I was trying to figure out how exactly I could get the ball rolling on this blog and start opening up a bit more about my characters, their stories, and their world.

Like the first page of a fresh sketchbook, I want so much to create the perfect image to set the mood of what's to come. I'd love to work on a trove of new art for the occasion! Perhaps make a video to share the excitement, or pass along songs relating to their world, and the stories that have lived in my heart for over a dozen years now.

But the reality is: there's no need to wait or delay longer simply to try to capture the "perfect" moment for those first encountering my work. I have a personal journey to undertake to share and further refine my writing, and it's exciting and terrifying both at once. But the more steps forward I take, the more I can grow as a storyteller.

So, to get the ball rolling, here is a scene I illustrated twice over. Once in 2006, and then again in 2012.  The scene was originally scripted for Book 3, so a hefty amount of story and adventures had taken place before these four characters ended up on the side of a mountain at dawn overlooking an expansive view below, but you'll have to trust me on that one. There's just so much more ahead for everyone involved, and myself as well!

"Homeland" - by K. LeCrone - Completed on January 15, 2012

So to anyone first encountering my work: welcome!

To friends and family that have encouraged me over the years: thank you for your incredible support, and thank you for joining me in the next evolution. It's due to be a fun ride. :)

And welcome, everyone, to a first glimpse of the Kingdom of the Twin Lions!