Celebration!

The Eugene Celebration is this weekend and while I don't think I'll make it this weekend (we have a vet visit Saturday) I will be there in spirit! I have a book in the first annual MECCA Object Afterlife Challenge which will be on display at the old MECCA location for the Celebration this weekend, after that it will be at the spiffy new MECCA location and then in October it moves to Bring! The opening of the show will be at Bring on October 10th if anyone local wants to stop by and chat with me.


This book was really a challenge for me, I don't often thing of my self as an artist and almost never put content in a book. The materials also really threw me for a loop for a long time, I received a large plastic burlap like bag, some plastic packaging, and a bunch of the tear off ends of tractor feed paper. I ended up using all but the tractor feed pieces, I wanted to use them to decorate the covers with but it made the book way to busy so I went with a wonder scrap of green Bugra paper and earth tones for the confetti.


The inside pages are the bag cut up and then I glued scraps of torn paper on to the pages in hopes that someone will use the book for an altered art journal. I'll be honest that while I'm intrigued by the idea I just don't have the time right now to start. Hopefully in a year when Penny grows up a bit, right now she's very demanding of all most all of mom's free time :)

Jitters

I know I said it was time to slow down in my last post... and I did as far as blogging and binding were concerned but that doesn't mean I haven't been busy!
Last week was spent getting my husbands classroom ready for school. We built and installed new whiteboards and built him a new podium and worked on decorating his room a bit too. He was a roving teacher last year so the classroom is very exciting.

I've also been busy gearing up to start teaching! Eek! I start Tuesday and last week there were a sad 2 people signed up for my first class and no one signed up for my second. Last night was the First Friday Art Walk in downtown Eugene and where I will be teaching was right in the middle. We decided very last minute (Thursday afternoon) that to drum up some enrollment I should come down and show.
We might have been a bit too successful and are looking at having to schedule a second introduction class!

Fall has had quick entry in to town this year, the mornings are crisp and we have had a few mornings where the fog was settling gently on the hill around us. The leaves are just starting to turn color and it's a wonderful time of year. It's a hard time of year to be inside working as you know the last of the sunny days are limited and that the rain is not far off.

I have been doing just a little bit of work in the shop. I got a great new recycled leather journal listed and have been struggling with how to create a book strap with a cross strap. The long strap I have plently of ideas for, its the cross strap that's throwing me for a loop. Anyone have any experience making them?

Busy Busy Me

I haven't forgotten you all! I promise!

I've just been really, really busy. It's trade show season at work, and if you have ever worked in the wholesale industry you understand what I mean.
It's also summer craft show time and I've done two in the last two weeks. Which is CRAZY for me. While I don't see my Etsy shop as a hobby (it's more a fledgling business) I've never gotten heavy into the craft market here. I had the show I had posted about last time which was a good day with friends and other vendors despite the crazy wind and bugs. While there the opportunity came up for me to do a recycled craft fair the next weekend. I jumped at the chance as it was a new venue and more time with good friends.
I got home and realized my recycled item stock was lower then I remembered and had a week to get stocked up.
I finally got to working with the pieces of scrap upholstery leather to make some leather journals and sketch books. I also did some crazy silk screening and sewing to make some rockin' recycled tote bags (no pictures yet sorry!).
While all of this was a blast I was so tired by the time the show was over I was ready to fall over as I haven't had a day since we got home from vacation where I wasn't working all day. And that is why I've not said a word in over a week. I've been crafting like a crazy lady.

The good news is that as soon as my camera and laptop become friends again I'll have some great new items to post in the ol' shop.

In the madness of the last week I was also awarded the "Arte y pico" blog award by Rhonda!

Thanks Rhonda!

Here is how the award works:
1) You have to pick 5 blogs that you consider deserve this award for, creativity, design, interesting material, and also contributing to the blogger community, no matter what language.
2) Each award has to have the name of the author and also a link to his or her blog to be visited by everyone.
3) Each award-winner, has to show the award and put the name and link to the blog that has given her or him the award itself.
4) Award-winners and the one who has given the prize should to show the link to the Arte y pico blog, so everyone will know the origin of this award.
5) To show these rules.

Between getting this award, and finally getting around to posting about it I found out that it's not against the rules to give the award to someone who already has it! Which is great because I was starting to get stressed out!
My picks (in totally random order) for the award are:

Billie of Billie's Craft Room- Billie is a UK craft who does the most amazing things with ranger inks (don't worry I don't know what they are either!) and has recently joined the book arts forum and brings lots of great energy and ideas.

Chelsea of 88 Words- She's a very prolific blogger & her blog is always a good read and while I
don't comment as often as I should you can be sure I stop by everyday!

Bev of La Paperie & Cozy- Bev makes amazing leather journals filled with wonderful quotes and other things. My personal favorite of her shows my true inner geek, it had the Periodic table of elements in the front instead of a quote. It's sold, but I'm sure she would make you another one!

Aly of Bliss Monkey Studio- Aly's blog is a double dirty pleasure of mine- not only is her blog filled with fantastic stories of urban chickens and water ballon fights, but she has great stories about things in my own community I had no clue even existed!

Kevin of Library Preservation- Kevin probably doesn't know I read his blog on a regular basis. I've never left a comment but I love his blog. It's for the true geek in me, the one that longs to work on wet, damaged, well loved, or unloved books. I would love to have his day job "spends some of my time conserving rare and not so rare items. I also regularly teach book repair to Michigan library staff, and am a part-time faculty at Wayne State University, teaching introduction to preservation."
That is exactly what I aspire for some day.....

Ok not too bad, only one person that already has the award- but that's because I've been looking for a reason to share Billie's blog with you.

Hopefully I wont' be such a stranger between posts for the rest of the summer!

Earth Week

Eugene is an eco-minded town and there were all kinds of Earth Week festivities going on around town. Susan of Seh What! on my local street team works for Levi and they put out a call for handmade items from the team that were recycled. I admit that most of what I do isn't recycled but the cute little book earrings fit the bill perfectly! I sent the 4 pairs above and I hope they got warm welcomes!
I have had a busy week with school, work, and the like. I got my first project back from grading and am plugging away on my second. Silk screening is turning out to be much harder than I had expected it to be. Not sure why I though it was going to be easy, but I did. I'm WAY behind on my second project because I can't get my beaker to turn out... yes I'm a geek, I'm doing an art project involving chemistry. I promise to share a picture of one of the prints when I'm done.
Today is a nice day after a week of snow, rain, & hail so we are enjoying the fading sunshine and waiting for a few friends to arrive for the weekly Saturday dinner. We are setting up the ball game in the "back yard" which is really the grass we share in the back with the rest of the apartments that no one but us seems to use.
My prints are due Thursday so if I remember to pack my camera as I finish them this week I'll share by the weekend. If not I'm not sure when I'll get them back from grading.