All posts filed under: Life

Snow on a Monday

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We have had a snowy day today here in the mid-west as the temperatures plummeted from the sunny sixties yesterday straight down into the frosty twenties by mid morning today. I braved the snow and wind to walk down to the YMCA to pilates class, I arrived looking like a snowman and with a slightly damp mat!  I enjoyed the work out though, so worth the wintery walk, and I got to stomp through the snowy woods and discover that one of my winter boots has a hole in the back heel…..ewwww wet cold sock… Apart from the trip out to pilates I have mainly been drinking tea, eating home made gooey butter cookies and doing a little bit of art journaling.  Oh, and I vacuumed the floor!! Hope you have had a good start to the week. Happy Monday x  

Marvelous Monday

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What is marvelous this Monday?  These things are! The Joy of Watercolor by Emma Block is a beautiful book from cover to cover, I even love the size and shape of it.  I love a square chunky book! She shares lots of specific watercolor projects but they are not just step by steps, they are full of ideas and information which you can use in your own work. The most gorgeous jewelry from British designer Layla Amber.  Delicate woodcut necklaces, pendants, rings and earrings galore for all seasons. I am reading the new Joanna Cannon book ‘Three Things about Elsie’ and really enjoying it, I am only about 50 pages in and already it is full of intrigue and characters. Tinkersketch  August challenge is one I came late to, but I still jumped in even though I started about two weeks into the month!  Rachelle of Tinkerlab (the host of Tinkersketch) suggested on her Instagram to combine prompts and used ‘building’ as an example.  This got me thinking I could do the whole prompt list …

Estate sale finds.

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A couple of weeks ago I went to an estate sale in St Louis and found some great stuff.  When I go to a sale I am usually looking for papers of all kinds to use in my art journaling, these can include old books, postcards, flash cards or recipe cards to name a few.  I also look for books I can use to make a sketchbook from, so a cool cover might catch my eye. This book definitely caught my eye at this sale, it is pretty ancient and delicate but not to the extent that I can’t use it.  What I love most about this book is that I can use it as it is and I don’t have to take any pages out or sew any new in. It used to house vinyl records and is basically a book of pockets made from fabulous brown paper with lots of character. There are only 12 ‘pages’ but so many options.  Each pocket page is intact and secure and the hole through the book …

Happy New (school) Year!

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The beginning of the school year feels to me more like a new year than January 1st.  Without the resolutions and goal setting and navel gazing which is tradition in my January world! My August new year is more about getting on with stuff, more starting, less thinking. Even though I am now working part time at the library which is new from last year, I still make my plans. So far they have included – read my magazine stack, paint the gladioli I just bought from Trader Joes (especially to paint and draw!), go to the Art Museum to gather inspiration, watch classes at Creative Bug and Skillshare as well as all of the art journaling. So far I can report that the boys have been back at school for two days and my magazines are still in a stack and the gladioli are beautiful and full of flowers but unpainted, I have been nowhere and watched nothing! However I have had a very nice couple of days getting back into the routine and …

Weekly Photos 2017. 22/52

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The end of the Sandwich boardwalk in Sandwich MA. Parnassus Book shop on Route 6A, Yarmouth, MA. This shop is amazing, books from floor to ceiling and nooks and crannies galore. Bass Hole boardwalk at Grays beach, Yarmouth MA. Fishing lure hanging out at Chatham Light beach. Nauset Beach, one of our favourite beaches on the Cape. My art desk on the deck! Gelli printing seaweed into my art journal and onto old atlas paper. Boats at Fort Hill in Eastham MA. This is how all general store windows should look! Wellfleet MA. I hope you had a great weekend, happy Monday x

What do I want to do when I grow up…

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My teen has a field trip to a career fair this month and it is not the first he has been to, they are very keen on careers and knowing what you want to do when you grow up in this country. Blimey, I am not sure I know what I want to do when I grow up even now, maybe I need to go to a career fair! I do remember talking to the career advisor at school and getting a print out (on green striped paper with holes down either side) of possible vocations. Milliner was top of my list along with lots of other options I can’t remember. Pretty specific, milliner.  I am not a hat maker, but I am fully submerged in the art, making and creative aspect of my world. What about a money making choice though? I would like to follow a path into the world of art and illustrating, maybe stationary, postcards and colouring sheets.  I like to write about all kinds of creativity, doing it, finding it …

I am socially awkward. Things I have learnt.

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I didn’t learn that I am socially awkward, I already am acutely aware of that. I am no good in a social situation, I either hide in the corner, talk too much or both which is a strange combination but one I managed just this past week. I was asked, in fact, no, I volunteered to take some photos for a friend’s event to launch their non profit organization. I thought I would be great, I like taking photos, I take ok photos.  I’ve got this. I’ve not got this. I knew there were other people taking photos, so none of us were the sole recorders of the event.  When I arrived the first person I saw was a huge man with a huge beard and a huge camera and a huge flash, working the room like he was there to take pictures and only there to take pictures.  Like I was supposed to be. Except I didn’t, I just froze, the room was pretty small, the turn out was amazing and all I could …

Persimmon predictions

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  I learnt two new things this week, that there is a persimmon tree in the woods (I am sure there are many, but I only know of the one) and the seeds from the ripe persimmon fruit can predict the future. Only the immediate winter future, the weather to be specific.  Sorry, it is not a request service, open a persimmon seed and see what you will be having for dinner type thing. I must admit that I thought persimmons were a tropical fruit, so that shows what I know. Ain’t nothing tropical about our local woods! I read about it here and decided to have a go at checking for myself. So I gathered a few persimmon fruits from the woodland floor and brought them home for dissection. The seed are small and slimey little buggers as to be expected I suppose from a plum like fruit which got so ripe it hurled itself from the tree to the ground. I managed to wash some  seeds off and cut them in half and …

Mishaps come in Threes (or Fours)!

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Blimey, today started as a drag and a chore and a moan. I intended to have a little lie in and go to the gym to run for an hour while listening to one of my favorite podcasts, most likely This American Life or Radio Lab.  Not a bad start to the day. I have decided that running inside is ok when it is humid and super hot outside. I am not a hot weather runner, no matter how much water I drink and how many hats I wear (usually one), I still end up with a head ache all day from being too hot whilst running first thing in the morning. So the treadmill it is then. Yes treadmills are boring, but to be honest I find running so boring anyway it really doesn’t matter to me, the inside of the YMCA is no less interesting than local sidewalks, roads and houses.  If I have something to listen to, I am usually ok, music for shorter jaunts and podcast or a book for longer running …

Ideas and how best to tame them.

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  Where on earth do all of the ideas in the world come from?  Books? Brains? Computers? Instagram? Do you have lots of ideas or do your struggle with the blank page? I think the blank page stares us all down on a regular basis, especially when there is no brief or stated requirement in place. We all need a starter idea, so what can we use as that beginning? We could add some of these things – Colour- wash, splash, pattern, dot, dots, cover the page or a corner. Word-Single, quote, lyric, random, at the top left, in the middle, upside down. A stripe of washi tape – small, across the page, tiny rips. A magazine cutting – torn up, cut out carefully, words, pictures, colour. Any of these should add enough to the most stubborn page to get started. How come sometimes ideas seem to spout out of the top of my head and I have to spread out my sketchbook net to catch them all before they fly off and yet sometimes, …