It had been too long since I’d checked in on Amanda Blake — one of my all-time favorite artists, she is responsible for the image of the Girl in a Party Hat — and look what she’s got for sale on her etsy store.

The image is lovely, as always. But the title of the piece blew me away.

The other day, I was perusing the Etsy shop of one of my all-time favorite artists, she of Girl in a Party Hat “fame,” Amanda Blake, and realized I didn’t have any of her boys.

Now I do. Oliver arrived just the other day, wrapped thusly (how freakin’ cute is that?!) and as it’s a Gocco print rather than the pricier paintings I truly crave, he was an insanely affordable $10.

Run, don’t walk. I see more Olivers in Amanda’s shop, along with the breathtaking painting “caroline carefully arranges all she holds dear”.

And now for a commercial announcement.

The Scottsdale Arts Festival is sweatily underway (my car thermometer insists it’s over 90 degrees this afternoon) in — you guessed it — Scottsdale.

Years ago, I found one of my now-favorite artists at the festival: Amanda Blake, creator of the beautiful artwork that graces this blog and inspired its name.

She’ll be in Scottsdale again this weekend — today, tomorrow and Sunday. For details, go to www.scottsdaleartsfestival.org. Or to see more of Amanda’s art and buy it online, go to www.amandablakeart.com

The Scottsdale festival’s one of the largest around, and while you will see a lot of the stuff that makes these festivals bad (ceramic Kleenex box holder, anyone?) it’s got some of the best art I’ve seen in such a venue. Also, there is always a super craft area for the kids.

We now return you to your regularly scheduled Web surfing and wish you a happy, air conditioned weekend.

Not in stock. In merch. Something that will remind you of a positive writing experience, every time you look at it. When I sold a piece to salon.com years ago about how it’s hard to name your kids when you’ve used up all the good names on the pets, I bought myself a red leather Kate Spade organizer, which I only recently gave up for Google’s calendar.

(You can read the piece at http://archive.salon.com/mwt/feature/2002/03/08/pet_names/index.html — and no, I still haven’t learned the link thing.)

Sometimes the purchases are not as auspicious. Ditto for the assignments. Earlier this year, I used the money from a Travel & Leisure assignment (which I will NOT link to here) to pay my Visa bill.

But when I got the check from “This American Life” last week, I knew what I was going to buy, and it’s something very special.

Now, I need to say here that I felt incredibly guilty, taking money from public radio. True confession: For years, I’d time my contributions during the pledge drives to TAL, so I could call in to donate in answer to Ira’s plea. I figured it wouldn’t hurt to beckon a little karma.

And it worked!

I do have bills to pay with much of my TAL check, but I intend to use part of it for this year’s donation. I used another small hunk to buy a piece from Amanda Blake, who so graciously agreed to let me use the image of “Beth” for Girl in a Party Hat. (And big thanks to Deborah, who suggested the name.)

Nancy will be arriving any day now, but I’m so psyched I had to show her off immediately (I also don’t know how to size photos — still — but here’s a bit of an idea), and give Amanda a plug: She’s got more little girls on wood for sale, on etsy.com. You can check her out at amandablakeart.com