so many earrings

i recently rediscovered my stash of jewelry making supplies. the whim to create jewelry strikes me every few years, but i had some newer beads left over from projects used as gifts last year, and a donation of five pairs of earrings into an auction this spring reminded me how fun it is to make earrings.

dangle earrings are my favorite kind of jewelry to assemble. the beads, findings and tools are extremely portable (so much more than paint!), and the process goes so quickly that the feeling of accomplishment is sudden. i love all of the textures and colors and combinations of the beads. i like rearranging beads until they look right. also, i can work on earrings and still focus on other things (the emmy awards were a three hour long earring making session, and i still feel like i got to see everything).

these will be a great addition to my craft booths this year.

so far, there are over 120 pairs. they don't photograph well on the cork tray i use to corral this crafty mess, but here are some of the finished pieces:

Enjoy this week!

a post for the end of August

Hello and goodbye, August.   I couldn't let the month pass without writing something!

This summer, I put most of my energy into the school where I spend most of my time. Changes needed to be made. It was the perfect time for big transitions so I planned (and paid attention to many lightbulb moments) and worked really hard to put everything into place for my students. It's work that I love, but it consumed most of my creative energy. It has already started paying off, though. The first month of school has been great!

So my painting table wasn't really used, except for last weekend, when I created the painting above. I think this happens every summer. I have to practice to get back into the creative process. This painting started out as an experimentation of something new to me - but it *wasn't* me or my style. So I kept going until it looked like something that might look like mine. SO MANY LAYERS. And then it just felt finished-ish, and I don't know how I feel about it, and I'm not going to think about it too much. I like it more than I dislike it, and most of what I dislike is how long it took me to get to the end. And there were lessons learned in all the experimentation.

Similar experimentation is what got me to the end of this painting, which became the most pinned thing I've ever put on Pinterest:

So it's all good. And tomorrow, this girl who has lost her keys too many times this month and can't remember words is going back on vacation.

Have a lovely weekend!

monogram painting 2014

This summer has been full, and it feels like it's almost over. School starts in less than three weeks! Many districts in Indianapolis have switched to a "balanced calendar" - typically nine weeks on, two weeks off, with an extended Thanksgiving break. That means school starts at the end of July or beginning of August, and lasts until June. I like the two week breaks, and I don't work a typical teachers' calendar. If I did, I might love the two week breaks!

Anyway, this has been a fairly cool summer temperature-wise, which is awesome. I just spent the past weekend in Cincinnati and the first week of July in northern Michigan. There is so much to tell! Today I just want to post this photo of a painting I made for my niece, Gretchen. It's 11x14. It's cemented my inkling that my next painted projects will be strictly painting - no additional media. I love creating with mixed media - but I love just painting, too.

Gretchen's painting is a follow up to the monogram painting I made last summer. I've worked on my flowers a bit, and I like these shapes more. Gretchen, once again, was the color advisor. She has a keen eye.

Have a wonderful week!

tinkering

It's been a few months since I first posted about my recent adventures in art journaling.  I still don't like the phrase "art journaling", and I'm trying to come up with a term I'm more comfortable with.



I am liking this more and more all the time.

The first game changer was the day I added washi tape.

The next game changer was the day I added handmade stamps.  When I carved these tiny houses, I could barely keep from stamping them on every page.

I'm still working on the entire book all at once.  About half of the pages have backgrounds so far.  I usually take one tool or pen or type of paint, and add that to several pages at a time.  I just keep updating everything.  There are spaces to add words later, if I choose.  

This process has led me to be more self aware about my own style and creative habits.   Right now my goal is to be freer with color schemes.  It started out that when I would paint a background, I would tend to choose keep the color scheme of the background as I added patterns and designs.  Lately, I'm more intentional about mixing warm and cool elements.  

I'm also aware now that my canvas creations are more fairly rigid and calculated than I realized. Here, I have no expectations, and nothing is a mistake.  There is not a picture in my head about what the final product might look like.  I mix inks and paints and paint markers and delight in whatever the result turns out to be.  Words are from my stream of consciousness.  

Today I made some stamps out of bottle caps, and I like how the white pigment ink was just a little bit smeary, and how the edge of the bottle cap made an unintentional speckled semi-border.

And I wrote something for myself because I had a bit of a worry that looking at so many journals would make mine feel derivative.  And then I realized that the important part of it is to get into the mental space where I'm just creating - and within that space, "where I am not planning anything at all", there is no room for anything but authenticity.  It's probably similar to meditiation.  It definitely calms me, and that could be why I seek opportunities to keep at it - to keep adding new colors and shapes and layers - to keep tinkering with different media - to keep creating.

downtown franklin goodness

Pictured below - just a sampling of the vintage/antique/artsy goodness of a Saturday trip through the shops on Jefferson Street in downtown Franklin, Indiana*.  I'd been through a few before, but taking in all of them on one day (with Heather K.) was fun and creatively inspiring.  I think this needs to become a seasonal visit!

*All of the shops were awesome in their own way, but the link only mentions a few. If you go, I can't stress enough the coolness of Bird on a Wire and Vintage Whimsy - they skew toward midcentury quirkiness. We stayed in those shops the longest, for good reason!

easter bunny gets depressed after easter

This week at school, we said goodbye to our guitar teacher after five years. He used the phrase "Easter Bunny Gets Depressed After Easter" to teach the order of the guitar strings...E,B,G,D,A,E. He often told the students he wanted a picture of a depressed Easter bunny to go along with that reminder. So now, finally, he has one. Painting this was fun!

Cale was a phenomenal teacher with our students. He will be teaching lessons in the South Jersey/Philadelphia area soon - so if you are in the area and are seeking guitar lessons, trust me on this recommendation, and find him here.

new and somewhat new

last weekend, i got back to painting for a little while.   as happy as i was to be painting something, i was kind of bummed at the end of the day - nothing was turning out well enough for me to feel like i had reached my potential for the day.  i'm sure this happens to everyone...off days are opportunities to figure out what not to do next time.  my favorite piece is the "you are" flower, above...which completed changed at least three times.  it started out as a pink canvas with no flower at all!  it's only 3x5 - and though i really love the idea for this flower...3x5 is too small for the message, and all of the words - even though i used my tiniest paintbrush. i think i will try this idea again sometime - using a larger canvas!

i also tried a new blog banner, but in the end, the proportions didn't look right to me when i posted it.  i still like it, though...so i'm posting it below:



i was determined to update my blog banner, though...so tonight i created this new image, which feels right:



(the way i painted the circle reminds me of a pair of keds i had in high school, and even though i can't find a photo of that keds style online, trust me that they were really cool shoes!!!)

i'm headed back to the painting table now.  enjoy your evening!