Overextracted Things

So Long Blogger!

2007-12-20T12:32:00.001-06:00

Well, I just wanted to let all you kids to know that I'm moving my blog! Hooray! You can check out the new blog here.

And if you are an rss feeder (haha, that makes me think of bird feeders), make sure to add http://kristinroach.wordpress.com/ to your feed!

See you all on the new site!

A minor without knowing it

2007-11-26T21:55:00.000-06:00

So over the last couple of years I have been pretty obsessed with art history. I have two empty spots next semester and was thinking that if it wasn't too much more, I could take enough classes to get my minor. Well, as I was looking at the requirements and the classes that I have taken it turns out that I might just have one and I just need to declare it! I'm going to talk to my advisor tomorrow to make sure everything is all set to go for graduating and declare what I have already done as far as a minor goes.

I feel on the brink of accomplishment and like I have been able to learn and grow so much through and around my studies. It has been a truly rewarding experience.

Did I really just type that? Crazy.

In other news, i'm not sure if I posted it here, but I had an interview with Jennifer of Craft Sanity awhile ago and it was published last weekend. If you want to hear me yammer on forever and a day about what I'm doing with craft leftovers and life in general, you should check it out. If anything, check out the show notes and the comments. I was deeply touched by how people responded to the interview. It positively made my day! That is the hugest reward, although I like it when I sell stuff too, that pays the bills. Nice comments pay into my emotional wellness fund.

Well, lots to do, talk to you later!

++ Kristin Roach ++

Breaking the Golden Rule

2007-11-16T19:21:00.000-06:00

So for me, the golden rule for a long time has been to not drink caffeine after 5pm. I can get away with 4:59, but 5pm and I'm up all night. It's about to come to it. Give me that coffee. Bring it on. I have a long weekend and follow weeks ahead and I need to squeeze out every last bit of creativity and production that I can manage. That. This is where the title Over extracted comes from. It's taking it to the edge and then some until the coffee is over spent. Or I am over spent. In the case of coffee... not so good. In the case of myself.. well there is something satisfying about know that I have pushed myself to my capacity. The only thing that sucks. Well, my messy apartment. I could do with a clean up.

I participated in a rocking group show last night at the Pleasant Street Gallery, I'm going to be full of myself and only show shots of my stuff:

general peoples enjoying the show. Actually it is Katie on the left and Joanna as the pink blur I believe and Staci on the right in the other room in the red. All artist folks showing their amazing work last night.

This is the weaving project I have been working on and have shown you pictures of time to time. This is the first time I have shown it anywhere though.

Endangered Plant Species Panel Series

Part of the Larger Junk Mail Project (One Year of Junk Mail), This is "One Day of Junk Mail"

Detail of the Mobile and Cast Shadows

Here is a shot of how my "room" was arranged.

We had to take down today, and as it turns out I had to go to St Charles to participate in the Strategic Planning Task Force of the NIU College of Visual and Preforming Arts. I was the undergraduate representative. It was realllllly interesting. I don't want to say too much though. Anyway, point being that I had to take down last night, brush up on the material for today, then get up at 6:30, which turned into 7:20 because I stayed up even later looking for Sloane. So the cage was still open and she popped up on the bed and woke me up by snuggling my head. It was cute. It was a really long day.

It was really interesting though.

I did get about 2 inches on a large knitting project that is in the Christmas category, so it will stay nameless.

I have to work in the morning at Encore, which will help me make up the loss of pay from not working today.

Let's see:
Stretch hogs gut for drying
Clean
Give ferrets bath
Give myself a shower
Clean more
Finish pattern for tomorrow
Finish CLM December for Monday
Work on Sketches
Work on other patterns
Work on animations
Work work work.

So.... more coffee for me tonight foooor sure!

I'll see you all later, if I don't get too over extracted that is.

Good Times

2007-11-08T16:32:00.001-06:00

Well this week has been pretty darn good. Busy. But still good. Mainly because I actually got everything done that I set out to do. An amazing feat if I do say so myself. Tomorrow I'm heading out of town so there was pressure to get all the school type stuff done now instead of on oh say, sunday night. Geeze. So I have. Amazing!

I think what really helped was instead of continuing to freak out like I was on Monday (just really overwhelmed), I stopped, went to Panera, got some coffee, good food and planned out my week. I planned it out in a realistic way too. Not just "oh my gosh this is how much I have to get done by the end of the semester! aahhhhh!" I made a list of short and long term goals. I actually just took it out to the end of the semester. I lined up goals for each week and than within each week, each day. And at the end of each day I've been re-evaluating what I need to do, what I was able to get done, and go from there. It's worked really well. I think I'm going to have to keep it up.

I finished and documented my weaving project.
Posted new stuff to the shop.
As of tonight I will have my mold finished for the creepy beeswax fruit.
Got my second sock cast on and started.
Finished the overstuffed chair for the animation.
Talked to audio visual people about shooting the animation.
Started on the next Craft Leftovers pattern.
Cleaned.
Cleaned some more.

Lots of other stuff too in there that I can't even remember. All I know is that I have routinely checked everything off my to-do list for each day. That makes me pretty dang happy.

Oh and I sold some more craft leftovers monthly. And some of the yarn I just dyed sold. And I just today sold the first Honey Bunny kit! I love that kit so much and I'm so happy it has finally sold!

Well, I'll talk to you later. Sorry no pictures this time. I thought it would be better just post without than not at all.

Have a good evening!

Lovin' the Crochet

2007-11-01T17:09:00.000-05:00

So I just started this bag last night, worked on it about an hour. Then just for 2 and a half hours today, if that. I had to get up and run around after Sloane trying to get her to go in the litter box, get off the table, then she got angry and jump/ran/leaped onto my chair and into my tea. Woo wee. That little girl is crazy. But I love her, and she is just oh so cute.

Here is the tea she tried her best to spill, but I saved it. Oh and here is the little red work chick linen tea cloth that I picked up at the Craft Sale I was in this past weekend. Aren't those little chicks just so great!

And seeing this picture I realize I have, from front to back, embroidery, crochet, knitting, and spinning all represented in this one shot. That makes me pretty happy.

Oh and just for the record. I love my sun tea spot coasters for my hot tea too, not just the iced.

So my market bag. I just realized that the photo is bad. So I'll take another shot when I get back from class. I followed the pattern and only made one slight alteration (added another row of sc on the strap and border so it would be a bit thicker). It's from the book Simple Crochet, the first craft book I every bought before I even knew how to make a proper sc stitch. It was actually from this book that I learned how to do all other basic stitch. Best crochet book every award... I'll call it the "I'm Hooked on You Book award" That's a long title, but I like it!

I think I would also give it to Loop d' Loop Crochet as well because that book is also just amazing. I can't wait to make the little jacket for my friend's daughter as well as the lace stockings for myself. I also want to make that big comfy looking orange jacket and the smart spike stitch cardigan is on the list too.

Oh and way long ago back in the era that was September 2007, I started my first ever toe up sock to see how much I can get from one skein of my hand dyed yarn. The knitting commenced and here I am! Just about ready to BO! That is one long-o knee sock. It actually goes to the top of my knee. That is so exciting. Now to make the second. I'm casting on tonight, right after I finish this one. I really want to get these finished before I start my Christmas knitting, countdown has begun. 2 weeks. Can I finish another knee sock in two weeks? We will find out I suppose.

Oh, that's a bit blurry, yuck. I'll pick up my tripod from my studio and re-shoot for sure now, promise.

Wow, so two posts in one day! I think I'm trying to make up for my absence these past 2 months.

See you all later!

ps - I listed 10 of the November clm in the shop yesterday, so if you missed it before you have until Monday morning to pick one up, then they are going off on their way to the Sampler.

Stringy things... mmmm... delicious

2007-11-01T10:01:00.000-05:00

So I'm starting this new project dealing with issues surrounding genetically engineered fruits and veggies, and how it's done with animal genes, and most offered at your local super market are, and it isn't required info, I understand why it's done. I'm not saying that people are playing evil scientists, but all the same, it's kind of creepy. So I'm going to make some creepy fruits and veggies. One part of that is this:

And while doing research on hog's gut I saw this:
by artist Fran Reed on this site. And it got me thinking about creepy little fish fruits an veggies with scales and fins sticking out.... yuck yes. Creepy yes. Perfect. I'm kicking myself because I just bought and ate some fish fillets and pitched the skin. I'm not sure how I would go about preserving/working with it so it doesn't stink to high heaven... or at least so my apartment doesn't. There aren't the proper facilities to work with it at my studio. I also don't want to make anyone else suffer because of my smelly work. So at the apartment it will be.

I'm also going to be making a piece mold and casting fruits and veggies with beeswax. I'm pretty excited about that. I'll shoot some pictures tonight while I'm working on it.

I have a group show coming up on the 15th (thursday) at the Pleasant Street Gallery. I really want to show this work, but I don't think I'll have enough time to build my fruit display as well as all the fruit to fill it. So I'm making a crocheted market bag that I will place some in and hang that on the wall, or maybe on a little side table so it will look like you are just coming up on a market bag and then it will be filled with all these creepy produce.

I'm also, finally, all set up to weave the second part of the identity deconstruction project. So I'll be working on that this afternoon and hopefully burning it out monday night for the group crit. What fun right? That along with the first piece in the series will be in the group show too. I'm going to have flip books so you can see the burning of it without any fancy technology stuff.

Oh and how appropreate for Halloween. My friend and I both dyed last night. Hahaha, what a bad pun. No seriously though, we dyed a crap load of yarn and it was super fun working on it with another person. I think at first I was a little tentitive but then I got into it. I might have to redyed that first batch because it's not up to snuff:

I just feel like it needs something more. Maybe I'm just being neurotic about color and going over kill. I'm going to let it dry, skien it, then see what it looks like.

I did like this one though:

It's kind of interesting how this one looks kind of weirdo right now, but I can tell it will be beautiful once I get it skeined.

So there will be a big gpf update this Saturday as well as a big Craft leftovers update. How exciting right?

Well, I need to get stuff together for class. See you all later.

Tuesday is Tuesday

2007-10-23T10:00:00.000-05:00

I've been feeling in a funk the last couple of days, not sure why. Could seriously just be the weather. Or this professor I don't much care for who I'm letting make me miserable... that's my own fault though.

So instead of working on things this morning like I should, I browsed through my etsy fav list. What am I realllly wanting to buy at this very second?

A super cute library bag from Emily:

I haven't decided which one I want yet, it seriously might come to me buying both and giving one to a close friend who just had a birthday not too long ago.... hmm... that seems like a good idea. She loves the library as much as I do. I think I've been thinking about it because my books are over due, hehe, so that fine's sleeve is perfect for the perpetually late with my books me.

Emily makes everything so cute and so well crafted. It seems like most of the materials she uses are vintage and vintage inspired and I really like that. I know she's sold quite a few bags (saw it on her blog) and the people who got them love them. And even though she doesn't have feedback, I can vouch that you will get what you order in a timely fashion. So you should all get a library bag too. Then we can show them off in our respective public libraries with pride. I think they are great for kids of all ages, including myself.

In the same vain, I really like these here book card/pockets from Phobe:

I got a few from her before and really want to get some more. They are just so stinking cute. I put them in all the books I loan out so I can keep track of who has what, simply because I will forget who I gave books to. She ships out really fast and is a really creative maker. She has a lot of neat pins/broaches and such. Another one I highly recommend.

Oh one last thing. The November issue of Craft Leftovers Monthly is up in my shop and will be on sale until Sunday midnight, then will be shipped out on the 29th.

They haven't been selling super fast, but fairly steadily, so I think/hope they will sell out again. If you want one, I would get it sooner rather than later to be on the safe side.

Well, I need to head to class, blah.

See you all later!

Handmade Chicago and Updates!

2007-10-17T16:20:00.001-05:00

Hey folks! It's been too long.

I just wanted to check in and post some about things and such.

First off the Handmade Market was really fun, I broke just about even for the day, and I met a whole lot of great people! I don't think I'll be doing it again though because they allowed smoking, and well, I sell yarn and no one really wants smokey yarn so I'm going to have to air it out now. Not to mention my throat is still on fire. No thanks.

I did learn a whole lot of stuff though and I want to share it with you.

Oh and before I get into a long list, I want to let you know that I'm going to have a booth at the Sycamore Pumpkin Festival's High School Craft Show. It's on the 27th and 28th (Saturday and Sunday) from 9am - 5pm. I just got verified today and scooted in on it at the last minute (apps closed like Sept 1st, but they thankfully had a couple of booths left, they have like over 100 vendors I think). Thankfully I was able to get work off so I'm all set... kind of... I need someone to give me a bathroom brake, any takers?

And here is a picture of my table (it was dark in there):

So "what I learn at my first craft sale ever":
-Make sure the venue is non-smoking if it's in a bar/restaurant type of place

-If it's inside and darker, bring extra light bulbs in case the one in the lamp brakes in transit

-Test not just setting up your display, but collapsing it to make sure it fits nicely under the table.

-If your space is limited and you just have one table, use an extra empty container as a "table" for your cash box/credit card swiper so it's not in your lap.

-If selling kits, have items made up from them as displays with the kit (even if you have nice pictures, people will be more likely to buy it, if they can see it and hold it)

-Hand out business cards with every purchase, make up little cards (like no bigger than 3 x 4 ish) with info about you and your business and contact info, especially if you do custom work (I do custom dyeing and Craft Leftovers is more than just making stuff, it's about bringing purpose to materials that at first glance are valueless).

-If a vendor likes your stuff/you like theirs, ask about swapping! Swapping is fab! (Another vendor bought some yarn and I really wanted some of her earrings but didn't make it back up to her both and she probably thinks I blew her off, I wish I would have asked about swapping with her.... I learned my lesson).

-If you are being friendly and chatty (which you should be) with your fellow vendors, make sure to ask what shows they like and if they think you would be a good fit, write it don't, you won't remember (I didn't and wish I would have).

-Pack a lunch

-Have all your admin stuff in one box (pens, pencils, tape, scissors, project to work on while your sitting there, cash box, swipper, recipe book, etc).

-Have all your display stuff in one box (if it will fit) including extension cords and table cloth and signs.

-Make your signs when you set up your display (I totally forgot to make signs.. lame)

-If you have a 6 foot space, use a 5 foot or less table so you can get around the sides.

-Have a banner (ran out of time to make mine, but will have it finished for this next one)

-Bring chairs (I had mine by the door, but neglected to take them).

Stuff that I did right? There were some things:
-Collapsable display stuff is great (all of my shelves and such fold into themselves)
-mailing list and business cards on the table in a prominate spot where people can see it
-If you have multiples, just put one out and store the rest under the table
-Freebees because people like those (I gave out free vintage buttons and print outs of the patterns)
-There were other things too, just your standard stuff, like change, having prices at 50 cent intervals so all I had to worry about was quarters for change.

Listen to the feedback the customers as well as people who pass you by give you (even if it's a snide comment, which thankfully I didn't this time) on everything from prices, product, to display/set up.

On to other things.....

I finished my first mobile for the Junk Mail Project that I'm working on. Basically I have been collecting junk mail for the past 6 months+ and am re-purposing it into objects of aesthetic and commercial value. In it's end product it will be a site specific installation with one year's worth of junk mail from just one person, me. I'm constructing mobiles, paper pulp forms with press molds, sheets of handmade paper, and sheets of quilling.

Here is a picture of the mobile (please ignore the background, i'm hoping to get professional shots of it soon), it's about 7-8' x 5-6' (i need to measure it):

And a detail:

The whole thing is less than 2 days worth of junk mail. Crazy right? The only thing I didn't like about it was the supports, the river reeds look a little, well wrong.... so in crit we worked on how I could make rods out of junkmail too. I'm going to work on replacing the supports in it. It might honestly be easier to take it apart and restring it completely. I'm not going to worry about that right now, I'm just going to try to get the new rods worked out.

I'm also working on a series of animations that will take place in a doll house that my dad built for me when I was growing up. I'm working on refinishing it (it's been in the basement for too long). I'm also working on making the figure and various props and clothing articles. I forgot to take a picture, but I have a little cardigan that I knit for the figure on size 000 dpns and a little tee shirt that has strawberries on it. I'm making little pants too, so when I get those finished up I'm make sure to post a picture of it.

Here is the doll house:

I'm working on also getting my apartment cleaned up and doing about a month's worth of laundry (I need to get rid of some clothing so I can't go that long without doing laundry).

Have a good week, hopefully I'll start posting more regularly soon, it's just been so crazy!

Oh Geeze!

2007-10-07T22:52:00.000-05:00

In all my excitement I totally forgot to mention:

Handmade Market
Noon - 4:30pm
Saturday October 13th
@The Empty Bottle
1035 N. Western
Chicago, Illinois

Thanks Deb for reminding me about that important info!
Hope to see some of you there!

(My mom and I had a great time today picking pumpkins and gourds and squash, lots of apple cider was purchased as well, hooray!)

Wowzers

2007-10-05T23:22:00.000-05:00

I just wanted to post a update for you all. I know it's been awhile since I posted. Partly because my camera battery has been dead and I've been lazy about charging it. Partly because school has kept me crazy busy.

So I'm in full swing of trying to get everything ready for Handmade Chicago which is in just one week! Ah! I'm making tons of kits and handmade goodies that will be great presents. You should come check it out.

Here is a flier:

It's Saturday, October 13th from noon to 4:30pm. It's going to be a smash. On the vendor end, all the tables have sold out and I know for a fact that super neat of people will be there. It's kind of interesting because some of them I will be meeting for the first time, and yet, I've been reading their blogs for quite some time. The Internet is amazing.

This will be my second public event for Craft Leftovers (the first being BlogHer) and I'm really excited/nervous/hoping things sell/scared they won't/what if I get lost/what if I can't find a parking spot/what if/what if/ what if/ oh heck. I'm sure it will be fine. My mom is coming up this weekend to help me cut and fold and prep. My friend Carolyn is kicking some butt and folding patterns and braiding draw strings and putting together zines. My other friend Jess is coming over on Sunday to lend her hand. And my friend and studio mate, Joanna, will be going with me to help set up, run the table, take down, fabulousness. She's really neat and does some amazing things herself. She also likes bringing purpose to cast off forgotten treasures. That's what most of her work is about, that and her personal habit of collecting and how her personality is hidden amongst and contained within those collections. She also listens to some amazing music (which is good because I swear if it weren't for my friends I would listen to the same ten bands over and over again... except recently because Jason showed me this).

Anyway, other art stuff. I'm getting close to having the first section of my mobile finished up. I was planning on it being the mock up, but I think it will actually be either the 1st of many smaller ones or the 1st part of one large one. Heck. I might even make several smaller (about 8' length x 4' circumference) and then one huge one. Honestly just doing the one took only a small fraction of my junk mail.

I have also started some other projects. One includes these drawing that I seem to do whenever I am really upset. I'll tell more about that later though. It's shaping up to be pretty neat.

I'm also working with a doll house that my dad made for me. It's the setting for some stop motion films that I'm doing. Also very neat.

Then some paintings. More paintings... and some drawings of the gulf of mexico sea shore creatures. Not really sure why. I guess they just remind me of my childhood, trips to florida, visits to my grandma... okay, so I guess I do know why they interest me.

Oh and on a side note. I have consistently done my dishes for the past week and let me tell you, I think I could get used to this clean thing. I kind of like it a whole lot. My apartment is slowly starting to go that way (Carolyn, you totally saw the disaster before the deep clean today). I've been pitching tons of stuff, moving things into my studio space (I have pictures of that on my dead camera, but they will come soon because the battery is charging), selling things so that's always a plus, and organizing! woot!

And it is so late and I'm not feeling like going to bed still, but I should, so I will, and I'm sure I will conk out in 1 min or less. It's been a busy day. I've made 6 crocheted items in the last 48 hours alone! Plus cleaning. Plus the Craft Leftovers Pattern. Plus working 9 hours today and 4 yesterday. Plus. Plus. Plus. I totally cleaned my bathroom tonight too. I do need to step it up though as far as making things goes. I'm itching to get back to my own project as is. I bought crap yarn from walmart for an afghan tonight because my fingers were just so itching to make something different. After the 6 dish cloth lets just say I get a little tired.

Hope this finds you all well, have a good week!

ps - here is a picture of all the skeins I wound for kits for the subscription this month, wow:

Toe Up Fantastic!

2007-09-16T10:09:00.001-05:00

I dyed up some fab yarn on Wednesday and loved it so much that I decided I should make another batch for myself. I cast on this Friday and blah. I don't know that it was, I just didn't want to do another top down, lots of ribbing, blah blah blah sock. Plus, this yarn is so gorgeous the idea of wasting even one quarter of an ounce killed me. So toe up it is. Love it. Well, hate that I can't find a pattern that I like. At all. Anywhere. I've heard rumors of good patterns, but I didn't like any that I found. Not even a starting cast on. So I made up my own (which later I found out has been done for years, but whatever, I didn't see it anywhere and figured it out so that makes me think I learn knitting through osmosis or something, "internet knitting blogs show me your secrets *woooooooooooo* while waving the arms usually does it).

Anyway, I'm have this particular heel in mind, you know, the depression heel. It's the one that you add in separately so you can redo it if it wears out. By my thinking, instead of busting out a heel being bad, it might just be fun, I can change the color of the sock and it will be like a whole new pair! Exciting!

I'm totally sick right now, so some toe up knitting in bed while watching Sunday movies sounds good.

I do need to work on the CL Monthly today as well. I have it all laid out in my sketch book and need to transfer it all to digital media. I have some super fun stuff in mind.

Oh I posted a pattern for these little guys last night:

I really like them. I think I'm going to make more of the non-bias tape version (the bias tape one took about 5 hours to hand sew around the edge) for the handmade market. Which reminds me, I have a sidekick again for Craft Leftovers. She is really rocking and she's going to help me out in my studio with making kits and sewing and art stuff. It should be really good. I'm thinking if I get help, then I can offer more subscriptions. Oh yeah, 20 will be going on sale tomorrow (Monday) at 3pm in the Etsy shop. I'm also going to put more kits in the shop on Wednesday night. There is going to be lots of new kits, like this little guy:

I'm going to take some pictures of my new studio space soon and show you around those projects later this week. I'm going to go start that lazy thing that's good for today. I wish you all the lazing about you need too!

CraftyPod Goodness

2007-09-09T15:19:00.001-05:00

Sister Diane of the CraftyPod contacted via email about a month or so ago with some questions on craft overload. We did a follow up interview just 2 Sundays ago and now the show is up, wow she is fast! She interviewed quite a few crafty ladies for the show and it's packed with great insights on how to deal with and avoid becoming overwhelmed with all the craft goodness out there.

To listen to the show and for more details click here.

Thanks so much to Sister D, it was such a pleasure to chat with her and I am so honored that I was asked to participate.

And super thanks to all of you for inspiring me to keep at it, you totally rock.

In other news, I'm up to my knees in fabric working on the subscriptions that are due to go out tomorrow. I'm about to head into my studio to really get things knocked out (less distractions = more productiveness).

This is the box all packed up with vintage goodness to take to the studio. I'm so proud of how fast I was able to cut out 40 fat quarters of fabric. It's great that everyone gets something a little different, but man, I really wish everyone could get some duck fabric, that's right, I found this fabric with ducks on it! And duck ribbon to match! I love mallards, maybe a kick back to the times feeding them down by the river... ah, stale bread.

I'm thinking that given how fast things went (knock on wood), I'm going to take on 10 more subscriptions next month! We will see how that goes.

Anyway, back to work!

Oh the Dog Days of School

2007-08-28T10:12:00.000-05:00

I'm going to be heading to my second day of class in about 15 mins here. I think I need to wake up earlier. I got up about an hour ago and have been packing up orders and letters and answering email.

I love making that personal connection to the Craft Leftovers readers, but I've been spending about 3-4 hours on average answering emails... too much.... I want to make stuff. So I'm going to try to be a bit more concise which is so hard for me. Because as all of you know, I love to ramble.

Anyway, other things:
My prof is trying to get me a residency for the Junk Mail Project. We were looking at ThreeWalls, but the deadline was in May (I just really started looking into it). I'm going to chat some more with her and another prof to see if they know of an appropriate space. I've also thought about pitching the proposal to Mess Hall. I would have talked to them first, but I think they have already had a project there dealing with recycling paper into art, which is too close to what I'm doing. I might just try to find a vacant store front and see if they will let me use the space for a month or two. A residency would be best/super fun.

I'm getting a huge sweet studio space that will be in the corner so I have two walls. I think it's about 12 x 12, maybe a little smaller, but if it gives you an idea, the one I have now is only 8 x 8. Also, it locks. Mine is just marked off by tape in the main open studio space, lame. I get a key to the building and the room. It's a lot more private.

We are doing a studio clean up tonight because the people last year left everything trashed. Hopefully some free stuff will come my way. That's the best thing about clean up. Everything from the previous year is up for grabs.

Oh one last thing, I almost forgot!

I started a Craft Leftovers subscription. It's on sale in the shop starting yesterday until Monday (the 3rd) or it sells out, ha! like that's going to happen! edited in: okay so it's almost sold out, that is so awesome/amazing. I'm shocked, flattered, can't believe it. You can get all the details on Craft Leftovers.

My favorite part is that you get a little Craft Leftovers Monthly zine! Woot! It's got a little project, tips for stress free crafting and living, little handmade and reclaimed goodies. The whole subscription is for a kit, the zine, reclaimed goodies, and a little handmade fun.

Oh and just getting back from school now, i had to cut it off before posting....

There is only one subscription left! Wowwy!

I feel falsely rich... I'm going to keep it all in my paypal account for now and use it to make purchases for the Handmade Market and of course shipping and handling. What great timing, I was just about to go to the thrift shop/antique shop looking for stuff for displays.

Anyway, I have to head back to class again. See you all later!

Stuff I want

2007-08-25T21:33:00.000-05:00

I've been going through a fashion crisis lately. I'm at a point where I don't really enjoy many of my clothes and never really feel swanky anymore. So I've been drooling over so many cute things that have been coming out lately. I feel like the clothes that have been coming out are the things that I would actually make, things I've made in the past. But I can't make all my clothes.... well, I suppose I could, but then I wouldn't have time to write 2+ patterns a week and go to school and work and cook all my meals so I don't waste money on eating out... oh yeah... and sleep!

Like this from Urban Outfitters:
I would so wear it as a dress and a shirt.
Or this:

I've been in an I want mode in general it seems.... like I want this:

I was thinking it would be really nice to put my yarn into for shows and such... but too expensive. I found it on ebay, but still too much.

This may not look so great, but imagine it filled with these:

And other reclaimed little goodies.

I have a couple things for display, mainly cardboard, which can be shaped and then covered in fabric. I have a neat-o Take and Read rack that I will use... and my red dish drain. I'm going to go to Lavish Thrift tomorrow and see if I can find something for the yarn and some of the hand made stuff. I only have a 6 foot spot, so I want some "shelves" so to speak that I can put towards the back of the table and then stuff in the front of that....

I'm obsessing... but that's what I do...

Good random news. I just heard from the head of the fiber arts department that I can continue work on my weaving... even though I am not enrolled in any fiber arts classes... and am not in the department because "The work is strong and I'd like to see you finish the series w/o rushing." She actually said that I could continue working on the loom until the end of the school year because she is not teaching beginning weaving again until next spring... woot.

I think I'm going to incorporate it into my sculpture class. I'm thinking... more wire.... large.... hmm.... crochet... wire crocheted forms................ okay I need to go get my sketch book, see you all later!

Woot WIP's

2007-08-24T19:41:00.000-05:00

This is little guy will be tomorrow morning's pattern, go check it out over at Craft Leftovers to see the finished version and get your hands on the pattern.

Now I'm not going to tell you what this one will be, but this is pretty much the last, and least favorite part. It's going to be super awesome!

Oh and cool thing happened last night, I received an order over at Green Prairie Fibers! Woot to that too! I have this feeling that if people only knew the yarn was there they would buy it up like there is no tomorrow, but alas, I have a feeling I get lost in all the hand dyed yarn, even though mine is the best, hehe, well, maybe not the best, but really good.

This is what she bought:

I really like the tags because they go around the hank, and then when I wind it, it slides right over the little center pull cake. Oh and she also got a little free handmade stitch holder. It's just a little fancier than the ones I made for Craft Leftovers.

Oh I can't remember if I mentioned it or not, but Sandi (the owner of the yarn shop I work at) has agreed to sell my stitch holders on a trial basis. We are going to see how well they sell and then she will/or will not order more... here is to hoping they sell well!

Anyway, I'm beat, long day, just finished up the pattern for tomorrow morning and I still need to do the dishes, so I will bid you goodnight!

MacBook Loving

2007-08-22T19:52:00.001-05:00

I posted about it on Craft Leftovers, but neglected, I'm going to say out of grief, to post about it here. My little ferret baby Sloane decided it would be a good idea to figure out how to climb up onto my bed, where I happened to have left my ibook and tea while I got up to go grab something or other, and play in my tea, on my keyboard, shorting the logic board, killing all ports. Sigh. I naively thought it may have a chance of being fixed. I was right.. but for around 750... another sigh.... another big purchase... and now! volia!

I am the proud owner of a new macbook and it has a fancy little remote. Which I'm not really sure that I need as I am always within hand reach of my computer.

It was an hour and a half trek to the closest apple store... an hour wait to see a "genius"... 5 mins of him looking at it to tell me I am f-ed... 20 mins in line because the lady in front of me was annnnoying.... 10 mins checking out because the guy was nice and went through everything with me and asked me questions and told me about this:

So now I am a proud owner of one of these babies:

For Free!

I got the green one, to which the guy checking me out said: "oh, good choice, green is nice." So I guess I made good choices. It was fun because I without knowing it really stroked my ibook which was in my tote and he said "it will be okay, let it go, your macbook will be good to you" hehe... I am grieving big time for my lost ibook. Not just all the data, but also just the physical item. I have become attached to it. The macbook seems so large in comparison. I just had the 12 inch, which was actually 11.5 inches.... this one is 13 inches. It's nice though and I'm sure it will work well for, well, work!

In other news, I'm am officially going to be at the Saturday, October 13th Handmade Market in Chicago from noon to 4:30. I will have a table there for Craft Leftovers and a basket for Green Prairie Fibers.

Oh! I also just did an interview with Jennifer of the Craft Sanity Podcast last Sunday and Sister Diane of the CraftyPod emailed me on Monday oddly enough to set up an interview for her podcasts! Things have been nuts around here since the conference. It's like everything has started to really take off.

In other Craft Leftovers news, I'm going to do a huge revamping to the etsy shop, mainly to the kits. As of the Sept 1stish update they will include alllllll needed supplies including needles and hooks and and and, well, you know, whatever they may need, except a sewing machine, because that would be rediculous-o. So the prices will be going up a bit. The handmade stuff, other than the catnip and lavender pillows and the reusable tea bags, will either go up in price or out of the shop. I haven't decided yet.

I'm hoping to also have some new kits when the shop reopens, but we will see how that goes.

Anyway, that's all for now. I'll try to get some shots of some works in progress tomorrow. Oh and I start school on Monday..... blark!

Have a good week everyone!

Update time!

2007-08-07T17:08:00.000-05:00

Hey kiddos! How's it hanging? I'm pretty good over here in the big DK... haha, yeah, big if you count all the corn as citizens! We are gearing up for Corn Fest at the consignment shop, marking tons of stuff to a dollar and thank goodness. We are running out of space and it's getting cramped in here. The dollar sale always cleans the place out!

Kind of a hectic rush before school starts again. I've been trying to get my apartment in order and unload tons of stuff to the Salvation Army. I have 4 bags packed up and ready to go, but I'm thinking that everyone else has the same idea or something because when I went to drop them off, the bins were packed, there was stuff piled around them, and it was rainin... well, no thanks. I'll wait instead of letting everything get rained on so they are chilling in my car until they can be dropped.

I'm also working hard to get Craft Leftovers 2 months ahead in the pattern cycle before school starts. I wrote 4 patterns this weekend so I'm getting closer. Only three more to go! My pattern testers are great and are working hard to proof everything for me. I send them kits in return so it's not completely a one sided thing. With the last pattern I sent them some little fancy soaps too, so they get more than just yarn and fabric.

BlogHer was great, I did a full write up over on Craft Leftovers sense that was the reason I was invited. It's been great! I've had several orders from the shop since I've been back... am I using since and sense right? what's the difference in the spelling, someone totally needs to fill me in, I've never been able to get it straight, anyway... and a huge increase in visitors and comments on Craft Leftovers. It was so much fun, it is so much fun. I did exceed my bandwidth, again, which is kind of neat because that means people have been downloading the patterns.

I got a second opinion on Beuler and he does have a mass and only has maybe a month or so to live, maybe less, maybe more, it's hard to tell without knowing what it is. Even the doctor said that it was a pretty hopeless case because of how big and where it was. Sigh... $500 in vet bills only to be told he's dying. It is a relief to know one way or the other.

I know I've been really absent lately, which is unfortunate because I think writing about my day to day helps to keep track of things, think about stuff in different ways, get feedback, and chart progress. So. I'm going to try to post a bit more often about stuff that's going on with pictures and stories and whatnot. Let's see if that happens.

Best wishes everyone!

Weekend fun

2007-07-22T22:50:00.001-05:00

Well after doing all that dyeing, getting it into the shop, and finishing the pattern for Craft Leftovers this week I neglected to name the different yarn color ways.

So now I have renamed them, done drawings for them, and all but two are up and ready.

I picked the color names from Field Book of American Wildflowers by F. Schuyler Mathews. It's a book I have had for a long time and have always enjoyed imagining what the flowers would look like just by reading the passages. I have spent many hours day dreaming about colors and floral types. It seemed appropriate to name the color ways after what has inspired my own color sense: flowers. More specifically wild flowers.

This time around, because it was an after thought about naming them, I picked selections that matched the colors. From now on I'm going to do it the other way. I will pick a plant and interpret the colors that the discription brings into my mind's eye. Then look up the plant in color to see what it really looks like after I dye it. All of the dye lots will have illustrations of the images on the tag as well as an excerpt of the passage.

For example, this is the passage that I found for Monarda Didyma:
"A brilliant and showy wild flower whose scarlet-red color is strongly relieved by its usual background of shady woodland. Commonly found beside streams on the border of woods." - Field Book of American Wild Flowers by F. Schuyler Mathews

Here are one of the drawings I did today:

This is the yarn:

And this is what the flower looks like in color:

Now about natural dyeing and why I have decided to slow down on it and start dyeing with acid dyes. Basically what it comes down to is that handling heavy metals in my kitchen isn't something I feel comfortable doing on a regular basis. And unfortunately heavy metals are something required for natural dyeing. So less often, smaller batches, more control, less danger of breathing it in or spilling it. Also, it's a long processes, and while I'm still in school, I don't have many full days off to spend dyeing. Acid dyeing is easier to fit into my schedule. Next year though, Jason and I, are planning on building a dye shed outside for me with really great ventilation and not around my cooking surfaces.

So for now, more acid dyeing, less natural dyeing. More safety in my home.

I've also been thinking about some other things to make for the shop to round it out a little. I've been thinking about making some stitch holders and maybe some needle clutches (like the pattern over at Craft Leftovers for this week). We will see. We will see.

I'm also playing at spinning more and want to get my hands on a wheel.... sigh. Where would I put it though? I would have to toss some more furniture. I mean seriously, who needs that stuff anyway?

Jason came up this weekend and it was oh so nice. It had been awhile and we mostly just lazed around all day.

Well I'm going to play at spinning a bit, so I'll see you all later.

Get Your Yarn On!

2007-07-20T17:36:00.000-05:00

Go check out all the really sweet yarn now in the shop!

Good stuff, good news, good day, long post

2007-07-17T10:58:00.000-05:00

Lots of stuff to report today.... no surprise there considering how long it's been since I posted last.

I was in a funk and feeling down... and no, as jason asked, I was not feeling funky or ready to "get down get down get down.... funky town" or however that goes... although him saying so did make me smile and laugh. I sure do love that guy.

Anyway, enough of that, I was feeling down and low and sad and it must have been that time of the month because I sure feel a-okay now.

I'll start with the most recent and work my way back.
This morning I exceeded my bandwidth for the month over at Craft Leftovers and had to up it. I have had too many downloads for the month! Exciting right? I was pretty surprised and happy about it. I am going to have to start paying more for bandwidth though... so people need to start buying more from the shop or using the donate button to help make this happen. There have been over 300 pattern downloads this month and it's only the 17th! And I haven't even converted all the patterns to pdfs yet so most likely more than that!

It's kind of interesting to think that a year ago when I started this is was shocked/excited when I got 50 hits a week, now Craft Leftovers is consistently getting around 1300+! My average per a day went from 7 to 160! and it a good day was 20 now it's 400! Anyway, I'm excited to say the least.

I know it will take time, but I am a little bummed that the shop doesn't sell more because I really enjoy making kits and finding new "leftover" materials from thrift shops and donated stashes and etc. Oh well, that will come too, it will just take time.

Okay so next thing:
More yarn! I dyed with lettuce yesterday and instead of coming out "blah murk" it came out "lettuce green." It's so pretty.

And I also tried my hand at acid dyeing for the first time too! It looks so great and now I'm hooked! I did two, then another skien, then another, and another! I'm saving one for myself, but the rest I'm going to add into the shop. The official update time is Friday at 5pm! So check it out. I'll save my reasons for not sticking to naturally dyed yarns in the next post, it will give me something to talk about for sure.

Oh and I can't remember if I told you or not, but I finally found a wholesaler for natural yarns. I'm going to keep offering the natural dyed in the superwash merino, but the acid dyed is a superwash merino with 15% nylon. Perfect for socks! I'm also playing with wool roving and bulky yarn for felting. I'm going to try out some hand painting tonight with blues, yellows and greens. I think on my first shot I accidently felted the roving... woops. Try again. Too much agitation. I think I'm going to have to hand paint that and then steam it.

And yesterday I felted, that's right, after two years of knitting I finally made not just one, but two felted projects. I'll show them later once I take a picture, hopefully of the ferrets playing in the one.

Speaking of the kiddos, Mr B is frisking as ever and is eating more more often, but is still not eating on his own. I don't mind getting quality time with him 4 times a day though. Sloane is still all sneezy and I think she is allergic to wool! go figure right? I've been cleaning like mad so hopefully she will show improvement soon.

I do have some bad news. I didn't get into Renegade.. blah. That's okay though, it has helped me to work harder at getting Craft Leftovers more professional looking. My friend is doing packaging design for me, along with some promos, and I'm working on being a better photographer. Renegade wasn't really the right venue anyway, I think they are more alternative art than alternative craft. Whatever. I'm looking into some small little "crafty" shows that are like $25 a table and are all about everyone is welcome to sell their stuff. I like the idea of craft shows with crafty old ladies, those were always so fun to go to growing up. Kind of like a craft garage sale feel. My friend jill says that Craft Leftovers is more suited to a "grass roots" kind of movement than trendy indie movement. I think she's right. Sometimes I do dream of being a trendy ass hole i must admit. Sigh. To fit in somewhere. I suppose I never have so why would I now.

The other thing that I have been thinking about is being a vendor at a fiber festival, like the midwest folk and fiber festival. I think it would be easier for me to get into with Green Prairie Fibers. I could sell my hand dyed yarn and then the kits from Craft Leftovers. There are quite a few good ones in this area. Eventually stitches midwest would be awesome to go to, but that's like a 5 year goal because it's so pricey for a booth.

I might do a small fair in the fall, but mostly it will have to wait until next year because all the deadlines have passed.

Oh so another cool thing. CRAFTzine is going to feature some of my patterns in their pattern podcast! Horray!

So I think this is long enough. I'll see you all later this week!

ps - more stuff:
I just finally got my act together in starting to prep for the conference. I made Craft Leftover Patches. And Deb I haven't forgotten you, your's is on it's way now that I actually made some!.... now where did I put your address.... hmm...

Does anybody else want a patch? I'll be putting some into the shop after Aug 1st or you can find me at the conference and get one from the grab bag.

Oh so long...

2007-07-11T23:42:00.000-05:00

Okay, lots of stuff going on, but I'm not going to post about it now, I'm just too tired. I've been working hard (5-6 days a week at the job) and then on Craft Leftovers and yarn stuff.

I just wanted to pop in and let you know I'm having a:
buy one get one half price sale in both my shops:
Craft Leftovers - kits and handmade goods

Green Prairie Fibers - naturally hand dyed sock yarn

So that's it for tonight, I'll update later this week, Saturday pm sounds good. I have some pictures and projects to share. Honestly CL has been taking up a lot of time... but that's good right? My friend and I are working on redesigning all the packaging, logos, banners, business cards, promos, etc. I'm also putting together another Sampler to go out in just 4 days! Yipes! Back to work!

Ferret Update

2007-07-03T23:33:00.000-05:00

So Mr B started to get really sick soon after (about 3 days) after I got Sloane. And then she got sick too...

She got better, Mr B got worse and stopped eating.

I took them both to the vet tonight and found out that Sloane has allergies it seems... to dogs!

Mr B...well... he's not doing so great. He has a mass that has pushed his heart down about an inch. And the mass is larger than his heart.

I'm not sure what to do outside of spending a crap load of money on tests that may just tell me what's wrong, but not fix it or try to make him as comfortable as possible. Maybe it will be a mixture of both. I think I'm going to get an ultrasound done to rule a lot of stuff out or maybe know what it is. But more than that I'm not sure what I can afford.

He seems to be taking it a whole lot better than me, that's for sure. He just kind of mosies around and then heads to bed. I'm mostly worried about the not eating on his own thing. I don't like force feeding him. The doctor said that if he stops drinking I'm going to have to put him down.... which I don't really want to do either... sigh. He's like my baby. He's my best friend too. I guess I'll just do whatever I can and knowing that I did my best to help him and keep him comfortable will just have to be enough.

Anyway, I'm pretty exhausted, I'm going to bed. Hopefully some good fun stuff soon.

New Stuff!

2007-06-28T22:18:00.000-05:00

A new ferret!

Mr Beuller has been wanting a girlfriend for a long time now, and I finally got up the guts to ask my landlords if I could have another ferret..... And they said yes! I had a hard time not hugging her to death. They are most likely the best landlords I have ever had.... well i've only had one other, but they are the best I have heard of as well as had. I really lucked out.

I took Mr B to the store and he met 3 lovely ladies, just like a dating show, sniffed all their butts, not so much like a dating show, but I suppose it could be. And seemed to like this little lady the best. Oh here's another picture:

That's them sleeping together. They aren't totally married yet or anything, but seem to be getting along fairly well. He started to get cranky though because he was tired and she wasn't. He's 3 years old and she is about 3 months old, if that. So she has way more energy than he does. Plus he was a bit over stimulated from all the ferret fun and then showing her all over the house. He followed her around and then she followed him.

They both got a bath, which they both hated, then they spent about a half hour rolling round in towels and licking themselves dry. So cute.

So I got another ferret because mr b really did need a girlfriend. Even when I'm home I'm working on stuff and I've read that unless I want to adopt him out, I better get him a buddy or he will get depressed and self destructive (like biting his tail so he looses fur) or just get lethargic and sad. He's been doing the later a whole lot and I have been pretty worried about him. Then when Jason came to visit, he even commented on how he didn't look so great and seemed depressed. And then he offered to help pay. So I asked my landlords today and they were just like "sure, what's one more going to do?" Sweet!

Oh yeah! her name is Sloane, like ferris beuller's girls name in the movie.

So I went ahead and tried my hand at silk screening by masking it off with glue. I just used an embroidery hoop to stretch it.

This was the first one:

I like the logo for the first one, the "crochet+knit+sew=craftleftovers" but it was too detailed, so I cut it back to just the craft leftovers and the ball of yarn and spool of thread.

So yep, anyone want a hand printed craft leftovers patch?

Long time no post

2007-06-25T21:07:00.000-05:00

Sorry about the absence in posting lately. I can't even really remember where I left off. I guess when class ended and the junk mail project.

Lately Craft Leftovers has really been consuming my life. I've also been working 6 days a week! yuck! Well it has been fun though. Nothing too bad happening at work, just normal, which is nice.

I cat sat for two different people this past weekend and Jason came into town too. It was so nice.

I also just loaded up the etsy shop with kits and a couple new items, like heatable lavender pillows!

I also redid the banner for Craft Leftovers.

I had a stressful situation today ordering yarn for Craft Leftover kits. The lady was a little, well, not so good with the social interaction.

I don't really have too much more to talk about. But hopefully neat-o stuff soon. I'll be back later this week with a couple of works in progress.

Oh so I'm going to have to frog the shawl because I don't have enough yarn. Blah.

Talk to you soon.

Schoooool OUT for the SUMMER!

2007-06-16T22:20:00.000-05:00

Oh yes, I am totally singing the title right now. I'm so glad I'm not starting those two classes this Friday after all!

So final project for this class, well it's actually just a start, but that's what my prof wanted, something to keep us all going over the summer.

Junk Mail.... A Year of Junk Mail, to be exact.

Well, that's what it's going to be. I've been collecting it since March and will continue until next March, so a year total. All the while I will be transforming this annoying useless junk mail into decorative and utilitarian works. At the end of it all I'm planning on an instillation, maybe with related workshops.

What is shown is (top left working clockwise) origami mobile (the first attempt), handmade paper, quilling, close up of the quilling. I will also be using sculptural elements and anything else I can think of.

The crit went well I think and after the visiting artist said that I need studio assistance to help "refine" these materials under my guidance, I had a couple of volunteers, so that's cool. Help in the studio is always welcome. My prof said she thought this would be a great senior show/project and I like that idea too. A year of junk mail lands nicely 1 month before I would have that show, so that worked out after all.

In other news the new Craft Leftover project is up:
Nice little picnic napkins. They are double sided too. My friend Andrea gave me this idea. She's a pretty creative lady.

Also pertaining to Craft Leftovers: I've decided to start posting about other diy projects/artists/ideas that carry the Craft Leftovers aesthetic during the week. There is just so much out there, I can't possibly write all the patterns I want to, nor should I have to.

And even more exciting, for me anyway, I've decided to add another element to the Craft Leftovers Store, Reclaimed Leftovers! Okay, so this was kind of a break through for me, and I've thought about it long and hard and it's kind of like the posting about the other diy projects. There are so many materials out there, and in my apartment for that matter, that I feel like I should offer those up too. Kind of helping leftover materials find a good home. It will start out with things like buttons, zippers, trim, small stuff, but I'm hoping to move it into vintage fabrics and yarn as well. Things will be pretty cheap by nature and most of the time less than current prices. The first bits of reclaimed materials will go into the shop this week! I will also be adding kits and other items too. I'll post here to let you all know when it actually happens.

And with that I'm going to go. I'm getting tired and I still need to clean a bit. My out of town friend from Chicago is coming in on the train tomorrow morning and I don't want it to be immediately apparent that I live in filth most of the time!

Have a good week!

WIP Wednesday!

2007-06-12T20:49:00.000-05:00

Wow, thanks for all the super nice comments to my last post, it totally helped to make me feel better last week. I think I'll be out of the woods when this class is over.

Okay, I think it was in the air, hormones or something.... I started, not just one new project, but two!

I did an exhaust dye with a new type of yarn I'm pretty excited about. It's from Hemp4Knitting and it's the HempWol. 50%wool and 50% hemp. It was cream and turned a really pretty tanish grey.... hemp color! Go figure! I do love it. It's kind of heathered too. Anyway, I'm trying out a pattern from the Knitted Vintage Socks book Jason picked me up for... oh was it Chirstmas? And I'm just now starting a pattern from it? Shame on me. Anyway, it's the lady's stockings pattern with the little color work up the side. I'm going to use the walnut dyed superwash merino (I have a little left over from the samples I made). I'm done with the cuff and about to the point where I work my first set of decreases! Oh so exciting, my first pair of knee highs!

The second project that has been eating up the time I would normally give to blogging and other things is a shawl. My very first shawl. I got the pattern here. And a friend of mine gave me her corrections and notes. Thank goodness too because that lady is as vague as I am when it comes to writing patterns. It's coming along fabulously. I'm already past the third set of increases. So it's all more of the same from here. I don't even have to carry the pattern with me. I'm making it with some yarn that I got at the Salvation Army about a year and a half ago. You really can't beat 50 cents a skein for "good quality afghan wool" I think it's Sears brand if that gives you an idea of how old it must be. It does seem of good quality though and I"m happy to not have to buy yarn from KnitPicks for it... and I am so tempted because they are having a huge sale right now until Friday!

This shawl is especially cool because of the shaping, it fits to your shoulders so it won't slide down. It just stays put. It's so neat! I can't wait to try it out in this fall!

I stopped by Micheal's today to pick up some clay for making little models to cast paper off of and found this:::::::::

Why all the sales! Don't they know I'm trying to save! I did only get three so I'm feeling okay. They were only $1 ea and there was 4 yds on each spool instead of 4 feet, which is the standard length for Micheal's dollar bin ribbon.

I'm also working on a junk mail project for my final project for this class I'm in. I did a ton of research last night and this morning and am finally ready to start making stuff. Tonight is my play night. Literally. I'm just going to play with cutting paper, doing some papier maché, sculpting with paper pulp, etc. Then tomorrow and the next I'm going to get down to making "art." Sometimes I hate that word. Sometimes I love it though. I think I'm just burnt out on having to think about what I'm making. I've had three pretty intense projects in a row and I need a break. I sure am glad I'm getting one.

I did a learn a lot of neat stuff doing research though. Like direct marketing pretty much didn't really exist until the movable type press was invented over in Europe and not in the us until the typewriter! And Sears and Montgomery Ward were the first to pioneer bulk mailing service through the postal service. I also learned about how many trees are ground up every year for unsolicited mail and how much of it goes straight into the landfill (about 34% of our landfills is just paper waste!) and how much money ea city wastes each year in hauling it to the landfill.

And speaking of all that I better hop to my play time, it's already 9:18!

Horray and Rah, all at the same time.

2007-06-06T20:54:00.000-05:00

Just to warn you... this is.a.realllly.long.post.

Things have been so up and down lately I'm going batty. I have good news, then bad, then good, then more bad, then a metal break down (literally). Now I'm better again, but still exhausted and kind of wound a little tight.

First issue of business. The yarn took super long to dry (I should have remember it takes like 3 days). It's dry tonight, but I can't take pictures until tomorrow morning when it's light out. Dang it. But doesn't it look beautiful? I sure think so.

The only issue is that the color is all off, not so great for selling, but it doesn't matter so much for blogging. The colors all have a reddish tint that isn't shown so well in the pictures with a flash.

So the good news that I received on Friday is:

:::::::: drum roll please :::::::::

BlogHer '07 I'm Speaking" title="BlogHer '07, July 27-29">

I've been invited to speak at the BlogHer Conference in Chicago! I'm going to be a panel member speaking on The Art of Craft. It will be a day two seminar. Exciting right! I get into the whole thing for free too! It would normally be way out of my price range. There are a whole bunch of really great seminars and such that I get to go to. Small business stuff, politics stuff, art stuff, craft stuff. Plus, there are cocktail parties just about every night with fancy little appetizers, sweet, i love fancy food.

Then I got the bad news. I can't get into the classes I need this summer, the class is closed and the prof won't allow any more students. And even worse, the only other time the class is offered is during all the hours I'm working (a schedule that has been locked in for over a month) and it would just be too much to try to work everyday and then go to class everyday too. I kind of flipped. You see, since I can't take these classes now, I have to take them later... like I have to take another semester of classes.... like I have to postpone being with my guy even longer. He's being great, totally supportive, taking it really well, giving me the whole "you know you need to graduate, it wouldn't be good to give up now, it's only one more semester, it will be fine, you will be okay." He's really wonderful like that. I'm starting to get a little bit more used to the idea of staying here longer and making a list of "Pros" instead of just seeing the "cons." Like I get to be close to Chicago for another year. And maybe I will rearrange my apartment because I will be here for another year after all. And you know what, he's right, I will be fine, and even better, I'm sure I'll be just great. Fabulous even.

Okay, so more good news. I went to this neat-o antique place today with my friend Susie and found: ta-dah! Buttons!

These are my favs (although I'm finding new ones that I didn't see before all the time):

I see some really great kits for pencil clutches in the near future.

And with all of my external stress gone, I've taken the time to clean, like realllllly clean my studio:

It's still cluttered, but I have a small place and that is unavoidable. Now everything does have a place and it's all thanks to my new shelving unit! I picked it up from lowes today. I got those two bins at the bottom too. One has felted sweaters and sweaters to be recycled for the yarn in it and the other is clothing to be recycled for the buttons, zippers, and fabric. (I do still have some in my other closet, but this gives me hope that I will get it down to one bin... eventually). The shelves are adjustable too, so I put the bottom taller for the bins and the next a little lower for bolts of fabric. Above that is separate little bins: one for loose buttons, one for buttons on their cards, one for pastels and charcoal, one for silk screening supplies, one from block printing supplies, etc... the list really does go on and on. I also now have a safe spot for my surger so it doesn't get banged around. The paper display is now full of paper and sketchbooks towards the bottom and fabric sorted by color at the top. The yarn to dye and yarn that has been dyed is on the top shelf (so mr b won't get at it) and on the very top, that crazy looking contraption is actually a table top loom! Yea! and I have a place in my studio for all of my resource books (I have another shelf for pattern and art books). I also have a clean work space for the first time in I don't know how long because everything has a place. It is so great feeling

I kind of like this little rack too: The little notebook was actually my grandma's sewing and knitting notes. I'm still kind of emotional (I seriously think it must be that time of the month) and I started crying. To she her tally marks for counting off row and here instructions for a "v-neck" sweater made me reminisce severely. Then there was a list of materials for a doll she made. She was amazing. She made these porcelain dolls, fired them and everything. Painted them too, little rosy cheeks. Then made all of their clothing. Like traditional Victorian wardrobes outfitted down to the details, even little pantaloons. I always loved to watch her sew and crochet. She was a crocheter too. My grandma always said she didn't know how to knit, but seriously, why did she have over 15 sets of knitting needles (pictured here as well)? Maybe she got them from my great grandma. I think it was actually my great grandma that knit the little pin cushion in there. She made my sister and me little plastic canvas sewing kits with those pin cushions and all the other little sewing notions that little girls need.

Ah, i miss that woman. It's kind of cool to think that there are 4 generations of crocheters. Maybe more.

So things really are looking up, but I'm still needing some r&r. It will be good to have two months off of school. I have taken classes in the off season for 3 years straight and I am getting burnt out. Hopefully I will return in the fall with a renewed spirit.

Plus, it will be good to have those two month off to prepare for the Renegade Craft Fair! I submitted my app yesterday morning. I hope I get in! I have some volunteers to help me prepare too. In exchange for dinner and knitting/crochet lessons of course. I'm trying to get the shops stocked up so I can focus on making items and kits for that. I will know on July 7th. Keep your fingers crossed for me. This could totally get Craft Leftovers up and really running. I'm making up some super special kits for the BlogHer thing too. I figure, you can throw away a business card, but would you really throw away a kit? I don't think so. You would give it to a friend instead. I'm going to spread the word about Craft Leftovers like a virus! Mwah hahahah.

And on that note, I'm done. Have a great week everyone!

Get your dye on! Naturally!

2007-06-03T18:59:00.000-05:00

I've spent most of the day dyeing and you know what that means? More yarn will be in the shop tomorrow night (if it's dry by then, which I think it will be). It will be up by midnight central time.

This is what the yarn looked like when I pitched it into the pot, neat-o.

I have been working on the endangered series again and I'm hoping to get another 1/3 done tonight (there are 33 panels all together in the one piece).

I almost have my quilt blocks finished for my partner, but I just realized that they are 12 x 12 instead of 12 1/2 by 12 1/2. That may not sound like much, but it is if you are piecing those blocks to other ones.

After I get that finished I think I'm going to make some more kits to put in the store, we will see how that actually goes though, it might not get done today.

Oh I have some really great news, but I want to wait until it is official and know all the details before I tell all.

Well, I need to get the late dinner into my belly and maybe go to the grocery store so I'll see all you cats later. Have a good week.

Stuff in the shop

2007-05-31T12:48:00.001-05:00

Just thought I would post "hello" to let you know there is new travel tissue holder available, 2 made ($5 ea) and 2 kits ($2 ea). I also dropped the price of the kits and added shipping separately so if you order multiple things your cost will be less! Now why didn't I think of that before! Better yet, why didn't any of you holler at me about it!

I've also made a bunch of new catnip pillows and I'll add as many as I can tonight.

Have a good one!

Taggeryific!

2007-05-30T20:32:00.000-05:00

Well, I've been tagged by Leathal Zine! I will list 7 random facts, but I'm not going to tag anyone because it seems like everyone I would has been! I love the way this is spreading like wildfire!

1. I have a ferret named Ferret Beuler, but I always call him Mr B or Mr Beuler, but never by he full name or just his last. He is the littlest little guy I have ever seen.
2. I write to-do lists everyday. They are always over ambitious, but the times that I do get everything done I feel really accomplished.
3. I love gardening, I love plants, I had a great huge garden that was abundant to say the least, but I have killed almost every house plant I have ever owned. So far, my cactus is the only one that has been able to put up with my lack of watering habits. I guess my green thumb needs a little help from the great outdoors.
4. My favorite snack, which is so bad, is tortias covered with chedder cheese, peppers, salsa, and sour cream.
5. I have a favorite chair, and it is the ugliest chair I have ever seen.
6. Even though most likely no one will see my sketch book, I get self conscious about what I write and draw in it. Something that I have been trying to overcome this year.
7. More so than finishing and wearing anything I make, I really enjoy the act of making.

If I were to tag people it would be:
Emily of Apron Wings
Amy of Angry Chicken
Sister D of The Crafty Pod
Wendy of Knit and Tonic
Keri of Knitty Gritty Thoughts
Lisa of Lisa Congdon Art+Craft
Franklin of The Panopticon
There are so many more, but really need to get back to it.

I don't know what it is about this week, but I am having a complete lack of motivation issue. If it were up to me I would sit around all day doing nothing, not even reading a book. I think, maybe, I'm just exhausted.

Oh well. I have more to do before the day is done.

I did tie off all of my hanks of sock yarn... so maybe, just maybe I will get the yarn dyed by Friday night and have it in the shop on monday.

Have a good night folks, I'll post again soon, thanks for all of the nice comments and emails too, it helped brighten up this lack of luster day!

New in the shop!

2007-05-29T09:32:00.000-05:00

Okay, so while I was away, I spent a lot of time making stuff. And I am in the process of putting it all into the shop. So far I've added some more reusable tea bags, crocheted head wraps (one is a kiddo size, it fits me, but i have a pretty small head), and some Sun Tea Spot Coasters in sets of 4! I'm going to add some kits today for the sun tea spot coaster set too, maybe some other things as well, I'm not sure what the day will hold quite yet. Well, other than paying bills and that sort of thing. Oh! I am going to send out the package of samples to the sampler today! It has to be post marked by the 1st and I would rather not cut it any closer than I am. The last thing is finished and the tags just need to be tied on. I'm also going to prep yarn today for dyeing tomorrow, so if everything works out and I don't botch another batch, there will be more yarn in that shop next week! (lettuce dyeing didn't go so well the second time around)

I'm going to hop to it, so I'll see you cats later, I'll post more pictures and updates later this week.

Sampler Samples

2007-05-24T18:54:00.000-05:00

Okay so they are all ready to go and I'm dropping the box off at the post tomorrow. How exciting right. This might lead to some good things, I'm not sure what exactly, but some free publicity can't hurt. Here is a picture of everything:
And I've also been working on some little painting collages, what do you think:
I found this nice little frame at Salvation Army the other day and then I bought some paints from the clearance bin at walmart. I was just having fun playing with it. Sometimes it's nice just to play with paints and not worry if it has some kind of higher meaning. That's kind of been the goal of my vacation, just relaxing, having fun, no worries, no stressful activities. It's been a good break. And I still have a couple days left of it.

I'm also going to work more on the second in the endangered species series tonight, this is the start I got on it last week, I'm hoping to have it finished by next friday, we will see how it goes:
There's about 30+ pieces so getting done in a week plus dyeing yarn is going to be a whole lot of work. But... good news, I think I might have help. Some classmates of mine said that in exchange for dinner and fiber arts lessons they will give me hard labor. So I might get some help preping the yarn at least. They are going to help me put together kits and pick out and cut fabric combos for the different items I'll be selling. So woot to that. Maybe once I graduate and move to Iowa I will be able to get a supply of interns from the art department at the local university. That would be pretty sweet. I didn't think that I might have something to offer workers other than money. But now that I think about it, I would totally work in someone's studio to learn how to say: throw pots, work with metals, book arts, etc.

Here is a little preview of this week's Craft Leftovers pattern:

Hopefully the pattern makes some kind of sense. I'm really worried that even with my best intentions I have a whole lot of errors. It's inevitable when you are just one person making, writing, and testing all of the patterns. I know that I assume things. So if you notice any, if you've made something from Craft Leftovers, send me an email or leave a comment. It's important to me. I really want to put quality patterns out there. I know how frustrating it is to be mislead by poor pattern writing. I don't want to be a poor pattern writer.

Well, that's all for now, I better get on that pattern I just previewed. I have it written up to the last step and just need to finish it and then type it up.

Have a good night!

New stuff

2007-05-16T14:17:00.000-05:00

First off, I really want to say thanks to everyone who commented and sent emails. Another "wow" for all of the sweetness and encouragement. It was really great to hear.

I wanted to post a quick update. Mainly there are now more reusable tea bags in both sizes in the shop and I added this:

It's a variety pack! You get one of each size, for the tea pot or sun tea pitcher and the tea cup!

Also, things are well underway for getting the Sampler together. It's my first one, so i'm a little anxious that everything goes well. I'm sending in 20 kits and 30 items from the Craft Leftover front and 50 yarn samples for Green Prairie Fibers.

Which bring me to another new thing. Samples are now available for Green Prairie Fibers, just send me an etsy message or email me and i will send one to you.

Once I'm all finished (I just have the tissue holders to make and then kits for the pencil clutch and tissue holders to put together and I will be finished) I'll post some pictures.

I also just started planning for the Renegade Craft Fair... and holy moly! I have so much to make. I'm going to get started this week. Try to get as much as I can cut so that way I can work on sewing it up while at Jason's. The list is ridiculous. Really. Like 720+ items and kits. If I can pull it off, it would be really great. I'm going to make 4 times as much as I need to break even, so that way, with that much variety, I will have a better chance of breaking even.

I guess, for me, this is the make or break kind of thing. I really want to make the Craft Leftover project my full time job and how well this goes off at the Renegade will be a good indicator as to if I should continue to try to pursue it full or part time. So go buy some tea bags and such because all that money will go towards application fees and getting me an ez tent, which are the two largest outright costs (except the kits which are still for the first print of the book).

Oh and on the front of full time, I just received a repeat wholesale order for the catnip pillows!

Well that short update turned into a long rant, so I'll go now and post pictures of the finished Sampler before I send it off. Have a good day!

Wow....

2007-05-13T10:54:00.000-05:00

Okay, so that's where to start today's post, seriously, just wow. I'm still pretty stunned after Friday and Saturday. First. Chicago... wow... um.. it was bizarre and abstract to say the least. Looptopia started out pretty good. You know, crowds of people mulling around, looking at things, enjoying themselves, ooooing and aaaahing and saying art is bizarre, but kind of enjoying the bizarreness at the same time. I planted myself in an overstuffed border's chair at borders on the second floor on Lake and Clark and did a good amount of people watching from afar, which was way more exciting than anything Chicago had to offer. Interesting.

Then I went uptown a bit to I think the Lincoln park area... i don't know, it was the wellington stop on the brown line if that tells you anything... to where Brett W. was having a solo show. That was great. I got a coat, with a ridiculously large collar (i might have to alter it a bit, but I haven't decided yet). It has great buttons and really deep pockets! Perfect! And to boot...wow.

... There was this great scarf as I was checking out. Everything was 50% off during the opening so it was $11 for both! Good thing too because I neglected to bring a coat and it was freezing!

I came back to the loop and saw some stuff up close and a lot of it just looked like over funded extravagance, but that's okay. it's all good.

Then to my shift at the third shift worker celebration. (excuse the blurry pics, i didn't have a tripod with me).

Everything was fine, groups of people milling by, asking polite questions like "what are you doing and why?" and were content to be pointed to the signage that explained things, then nods of approval and smile... then midnight hit. Unknown to us, Chicago had failed us. From 12am - 5am.... valid hours of looptopia... there were no events planned, little food available, and definitely no place warm to sit and relax and maybe fall asleep until the trains ran again at 6:30.... so there were a few others, but we were one of the few to have an ongoing active exhibit until 5:30.... and holy crap. wow... bad planning.
Like I said, starting at midnight... until about 2 or so... people started getting aggressive... not bad, more like the air was charged with annoyance. It was colder than people thought it would be, most everything was shut down, and they were wandering around til the last train came (about 1:30) or the cta started running again at 4:30ish I think. We were protested by an angry misguided youth who thought we were trying to bring awareness to sweat shop conditions.... which we weren't... it was interesting, he gathered a crowd with his yelling and protesting, all of which was spurred because we wouldn't let him come in... we wouldn't let anyone come in. wow.

It was interesting the reactions we got... a lot of negative "your stupid" and later in the night "holy sh**, their f***ing sewing at 4!" which was responded by her friend "oh, it's an art space, their artists".. "oh... art-ists" ... like that excuses anything... oh the dada's final cop out... "it's just art"...

Anyway, a lot of window tapping, window banging, pulling at the door, yelling, trying to get us to respond. we finally, around 1am, decided not to respond to potentially aggressive individuals, which helped them to move on faster because they thought we couldn't hear them, which was in itself interesting. We all felt like gerbils in an aquarium. Or as I put it, pandas in the zoo... like any movement we made that resembled acknowledgment of what was going on outside brought camera flashes and more flailing of limbs to get another reaction. wow.

The best was the two reallllly drunk guys around 4 or so. They were saying stupid things about I don't even know what, but I remember it being crude for some reason or another. We were doing our normal, ignore them and maybe they will go away routine, when one of the girls looks back at us and says... "haha, his fly is totally down" and the other girl goes "he's not wearing any underwear!" and so Carole looks at him and goes "your fly's down" and does a zipper motion.. and we all start laughing in a way only sleep deprived people can.. and he was like "what?" and so she repeats herself a few more times and then points to his crotch and then does the zipper motion... we were all laughing so hard... he was trying so hard to be smooth and really he was just exposing himself in a way only a drunk 20 year old can at 4 am in downtown chicago... wow... thank goodness that door was locked. But wait no, at around 2 or 3 it stopped working... that was a little worrisome to say the least. But things calmed down and we figured after being sleep deprived, surrounded by scissors, we could defend ourselves with a blind stupor. Thankfully it never came to that point. Although one sad woman did come in and we had to make her leave.

oh and we got tagged too. hehe, that was more in the spirit of random art making in the street than aggressive.

So 5:30 came and I went on my way to the train station.

Then class... that's right I had class and a 20 min intro speech to give at 9:30... I was planning on sleeping in the car from 8:00-9, but there were all these business people mulling around and I was honestly a little worried they would call the cops on the girl sleeping in the back of the only car that was older than 2007 in the parking lot, so I knit in the car and then went in around 8:45 and then went inside to knit in a chair in the lounge but couldn't help but slumping into sleep... for 15 mins... I made my way to the main lounge and my prof was there and then up to the class.

She wanted me to go first, I thought because I was so out of it and she knew i would only get worse. But then she told the class she wanted me to go first because I had a significant body of work and she wanted to give me the time I needed to talk about it all and that she wanted to show everyone an example of how an artist should be working... I'm glad I was so tired or I would have been a lot more self conscious. In my state though it was more like, blushing and meh and moving on.

I talked about the weaving piece first: (I've decided to show them all here pretty much how they were shown to the class)

I showed them a couple of details and then for the next 40 mins there was a q&a about it's meaning and about my own spirituality and then testimonials from them and reactions to and identifying with the piece... So at 40 mins I said that it was interesting how much discussion was being generated, but that there were other people to show work and I felt that it was time to move on to other people.

Then my prof said, normally that would be true, but I really want people to see your full body of work... and proceed to have me talk and answer questions about my other work for the next hour and 10 mins..... it was exhausting. I talked about the blog and the Craft Leftover project, and the "Freedom of Movement, Freedom of Thought" piece I did for the Pleasant street reception, and the color studies that came out of the smaller bits being created from Craft Leftovers which gets rid of the larger bits, and the endangered species pieces and how they are about the importance of diversity in the ecosystem.

We didn't even get to the newest collaboration with brett or the sewing rebellion, or the junk mail project. It was really great really, it made me feel really good about giving artist talks in the future, I'm excited about my work and it's hard not to talk about it because I love it so much... there is a but in there, but i'm not going to put it in such a public place.

And I somehow managed to get though it with only stepping out and falling asleep in the hall once. I got home and tried to stay up until 8... but fell asleep at 6 until 9, tried to stay up until10, fell asleep at 9:15, then woke back up around 10 and went to sleep in bed until 10 am! I think I needed it.

I'm still groggy after so much sleep, but am feeling no worse for the wear kind of deal.

I'm going to be working on the next in the weaving series and stuff for the Craft Leftovers shop and the sampler this week. I'll post some pictures in a couple of days.

If you have read all of that, to this point... another wow for you, precious reader. Thank you for your time.

The Day is Upon Me

2007-05-11T09:02:00.000-05:00

Seriously time is just going too fast. It's May, soon it will be June, before I know it December!

I got really sick on Saturday, like bad.... like it wasn't good in anyway. But I'm better now, and I'm totally behind schedule. I had everything planned out. Like if I do such and such every day, than everything will get done on time. Well I didn't get such and such done on Saturday, so now i'm getting such and such done today and not this and that. So it goes.

Bad news is: No craft leftover project this week
+++I'm not going to be able to use the 16 harness loom over the summer because it is not assembled. It makes me sad, but is understandable.

Good news: there will be two next week
+++I still get to use the 4 harness and am going to do another wire/paper/fire piece. A reconstruction of my identity now that I have purged it so to speak.
+++I have a commission to finish for a friend... anniversary present kind of thing. I guess her husband is really into endangered spiecies of plants and things so she wants one of my panel pieces.
+++I am going to collaborate with the artist Brett W. (mentioned in the last post when I knew how to spell his name). I sent him a picture of the liner I was working on and he really loved it. So now we are going to start collaborating on those. He will do the outsides and I will do the liners. We are hoping to get into a show with them later on. He's going to drop off a few (I think he mentioned before like 12! eagads! where will I put those!) so I can start working on them.

+++I'm going to participate in a performance piece tonight for the looptopia event that's happening in Chicago. Here is the blurb:

"As part of Looptopia, the Open Studio Program presents Carole Frances
Lung's overnight performance commemorating Chicago's history of
garment production and recognizing the sleepless night shift worker.
In the Page Brothers storefront at 179 N. State Street, two laborers
will create uniforms while another supervises in two-hour shifts
beginning at 5 pm and working until dawn. They will perform all the
steps of creating a garment, from cutting out the pieces to
merchandising the garments modeled from real people in the store front
windows. The laborers are participants from the Synchronized Sewing
Squad, a volunteer community from Chicago of unskilled and skilled
textile workers who perform garment production in public space."

+++Oh and I start class tomorrow in Naperville which should be really good, if I don't fall asleep!
+++I'm about to finish my first sweater vest!
+++I contacted the Sampler about my two stores (Green Prairie Fibers and the Craft Leftover Shop (kristin roach originals currently)) and they gave me the thumbs up so I'm going to start cracking on that. It needs to be sent in by June 1st! Which is just around the corner! I want to get post cards printed up for Green Prairie Fibers because it will just be yarn swatches, so I was thinking about attaching them to the post card and having an image of the dyestuff (walnut leaves or something) faded as the background with text over that and then images of the yarn on the front.... so anyone know where I could get that done cheap and quick? like 50 - 100? under $50?

Well, I'm off to work, then Chicago, then Naperville, and maybe home. I need to pack sack lunches for like 2 days worth of meals!

Finished!... Almost!

2007-05-08T23:19:00.000-05:00

Okay, well, two things. One is finished, the other is almost.

First up is the weaving project. I finished, in time, and everything was perfect, and than it was not... for whatever reason at some point between Sunday night and this morning I switched times and thought that our final critique started at 11 (normal class time) instead of 10. I'm just hoping that my project kicked so much butt that it won't affect (or is it effect?) my grade too much and I will still get an A. I got 100% on my first project, so i'm hoping for the same on this one. So here are a few pictures:

You can see more of it before being burnt and while being burnt here.

And then there is the other project, you might remember when I started cleaning out that suitcase inside I got back in March. Well, it's clean now, and I starting making the lining for it:

The liner is actually an old vintage skirt that my friend in Indiana gave to me last time I visited. Thanks Deb! You rock to a super neat beat!

Here is the front image again that the artist Brett Whitacre painted:

I think I was stressing out too much about making the liner perfect, so now I'm just jumping in feet first and it's actually working out really well! Yea!

I think I am going to get some quilting batting so I can quilt the bottom and top sections of the suitcase. I'm also going to make some pockets with the elastic tops like they usually have in vintage suitcases. Oh to have a quilting machine, I could do some super cool things.

Oh and an update:
Here is the information on the performance piece I will be participating in Friday night/Saturday morning:

"Sleepless Labor
Installation/performance
177 North State Street, Corner of State and Lake
8-12 labor practitioners will participate
Performance is 14 hours – the duration of Looptopia event

Commemorating Chicago's history of garment production and recognizing
the sleepless night shift worker, I propose a 14-hour performance that
will occupy a display or storefront window. Becoming a garment
production facility for three laborers, working a rotating three-hour
shift for 14 hours. The laborers are participants from the
Synchronized Sewing Squad, a volunteer community from Chicago of
unskilled and skilled textile workers who perform garment production
in public space. During the 14 hours of production the squad will
construct uniforms symbolic of the night shift worker. As each
garment is completed it will be displayed in the empty windows."

My shift will be from 11pm - 2am... then some sleep in the back room until the trains start running, then class at 9:30 in naperville... there will be some train sleeping going on that morning. I'm going to be getting around the area at 8pmish to check out everything that is going on before my shift. The whole looptopia chicago event is going to be really great. Lots of art, lots of shops, lots of food, all open for 24 hours! Woo! Hopefully my body will be able to handle all of the over stimulation. Art Chicago about did me in.

Oh I am making progress on my knit/crochet tank, but I will show you pictures once I hit the 8 inch mark, it's coming up soon though!

A Good Day

2007-05-03T20:13:00.000-05:00

Well, I swear it really was. For several reasons actually.

I woke up this morning and drearily checked my email only half awake.... wow there are a lot of emails this morning, maybe an order..... most likely not.... Inbox 11... click! 2 Orders! One from each store! Which means I had my very first yarn order! I really hope she likes it. And another kit sold too, which always makes me happy. It's like not only do people like what I make, but they actually want to make it themselves! I get so few comments on Craft Leftovers that sometimes it gets a little discouraging, but when kits sell, I know that I'm on the right track!

So good thing number one.

Then off to the post office, I really like the guy who works there, he so freaking nice and tell me all these great hints about sending packages and how to get the best rates and what forms to fill out for customs and thing.

Then to weaving.... finally, warps on and ready and time to start weaving.... my prof couldn't get over, she loves what I'm making and that I'm using wire warps. Here is an in progress shot:

What a mess right? It has taken well over 16 hours just to get it set up! 480 warp end of wire! eek! Thankfully the actual weaving will go faster than that. I think I may be able to finish tonight. I'll post more in progress shots of the actual weaving tomorrow.

For the weavers out there:
I'm using wire warps and wefts and inlaying every other row with shredded paper. 480 warp ends and an epi of 16 (8 for each side of the double weave). I'm doing a double woven tube to form a shirt. The sleeves will be added later towards the top at about the 12 inch mark. I'm using toilet paper as fillers around the shirt that will be pulled out later. I will snip the wire around the shirt and twist it so it stays put.

Then Monday night at 9:30 in the lagoon fire pit, I will ceremonially set fire to this self portrait (it is made to my dimensions and of shredded paper from my mom (my dna so to speak)). Then we will un-ceremonially cook smores over it if campus security hasn't kicked off the site.

Okay so good things 2 and 3.

Then while at work, I got a bug... a design a sweater vest with crochet and knitting bug.

Here is the swatch, the sketch, and the start:

I really think it's going to work nicely.

I'm starting with 2 inches of 2x2 rib, the alternating 1 inch of stockinette stitch and 1 inch of crochet. The decreases and increases will be worked every 4 rows of knit and every other crochet. It will be topped off with 2x2 rib, then knit straps that have a sc edging.

I'm trying to take detailed notes and will write the pattern up to share on Craft Leftovers. I'm not sure when it will get finished, but I'm hoping it will be a June pattern. We will see how it goes.

Oh and the pattern was a good excuse to get my hands on some inox size 1 us cir needles and a size d crochet hook... I figure it's a tank top and I'm not too crazy... right? right?! okay so maybe a bit, but it's going to be so cute it will be worth it!

I am also almost finished with my sweater vest and I will write up that patt as well, but I'm think that might be published more towards the fall... I love sweater vests!

so good things all over the place!

More weaving for me, you kiddos have a good night!

I'm back, kind of

2007-04-30T21:49:00.000-05:00

I just thought I'd pop in to say that I haven't died yet, but I swear, finals need to get here and get over. I'm on sleep deprivation to the nth degree.

so fun stuff. I finished my first panel piece and placed it in the context of the color study collages. There will be about ten times as many color studies and at least 9 more panel pieces.
Also I would like the band of color to be at least 5 feet wide and wrap all the way around whatever place I install it in.

Here's some details:

And then there was Art Chicago this past weekend, which was awesome.

I'll post more pictures on that subject later.

Right now, I'm really close to the semester being over. I had my painting portfolio review today, and I don't want to brag or sound like an ass, but hell, I did really good.

I'm also plugging away at my weaving project and more color studies. There is also the Fashion and Labor Trade show on Sunday that I'm trying to get ready for. Knitting about 3 socks in one week is a doozy on top of everything else.

But then things will calm down a bit. There will still be a lot to do, but it will be calmer. Then there is the 6 day vacation to Ames to look forward to at the end of May, that will be nice.

Well, I'm going to turn in early tonight, have a good week, hopefully I'll be able to post again soon!

Math is good!

2007-04-26T10:14:00.000-05:00

Okay, so I'm really glad no one bought any yarn yet because I have decided to drop the price to 18.50 a bundle (two skeins). During the experimental stage I'm just trying to cover costs of the yarn and dyeing process so I rechecked my math and figured out that I could cut my margin a little and make it cheaper for you to buy. So go get your hands on some super nice super wash naturally hand dyed yarn.

Have a good week!

Green Prairie Fibers

2007-04-24T19:50:00.000-05:00

It's up in the shop, go check it out.

I'm finally getting to it. I'm going to put some of my naturally dyed yarn up for sale in the Green Prairie Fibers etsy shop by 10 a.m. tomorrow (April 25, 2007). There will be 4 bundles of sock yarn, one reddish brown (in the background of the image) and 3 dark brown (foreground). Each bundle is actually 2 skeins at 276 yards each. It is enough to make long knee socks or large men's sized socks. I have size 7 1/2 feet and I can actually make exactly one pair with one skein. They even have a cuff the length of my hand and a 2 1/2 inch heel flap. Pretty sweet right? They are $18.50 a bundle during this trial time (about the next year or so I am thinking). I'm not sure if I posted about Green Prairie Fibers or not, so I might be repeating myself here, just to warn you.

I've been scheming for awhile now about starting my own brand of yarn called Green Prairie Fibers. It will be/is, all natural hand dyed yarn. I'm starting out with just sock yarn. I was going to just jump on the scene and dye a ton of yarn, but I've decided, for now, I better start small. Plus I want to nail down dyeing processes and figure out what works well and what doesn't and what types of colors I can get. You know, really become an expert at natural dyeing.

One of the other main reasons why I'm holding off is that I'm not done experimenting with fiber content either. My ideal would be an organic wool blended with hemp, cotton, flax, or soy silk.... something of that kind. Getting a supplier when I'm not really sure what I want is pretty difficult.

I use only collected dye stuff at this point, things like: cuttings from my mom's garden that normally get bagged up and taken away from the city, walnuts collected over a wide variety of places so as not to mess up ecosystems, lettuce and leafy veggies that start to go bad in my frig, etc. I use a minimum amount of mordants because they in themselves are pretty harsh stuff.

So all the boon for you guys out there! While I am in this experimental stage I am going to dyeing more yarn than I can reasonably knit, so I'm going to put it up for sale as I dye it and you will always be the first to know. I'm setting up a mailing list just for green prairie fibers and I'll let you know when that is ready. I will always post notices in the shop and on here when yarn is on the way.

Speaking of, I just recieved what to me looks like a huge order of sock yarn, so I will hopefully have some more browns up in the next couple of weeks.

Well, back to cleaning, prepping yarn, and working on my c.v. (yuck). I think that all calls for a pot of tea! Have a good week!

Windy in the Windy City

2007-04-18T11:23:00.000-05:00

Here are some pictures from this past weekend at the Sewing Rebellion at Mess Hall. It was a super fun time. It was really great to see everyone crocheting and sewing and making great stuff from patterns they were creating themselves. The pictures are not so great, but they aren't so bad either, really dark, maybe kind of blurry, don't look too close okay.

Also, while in the windy city I picked up a drop spindle ($6!) and some green wool roving ($8 for a whole bag full!) and tried my hand spinning... It kind of looks like yarn... hehe.... So I went and picked up a book at the local library called something like "Spindle Spinning: Beginner to Expert," which sounded pretty good. I haven't had time to have another go at it, but this weekend Jason and I are going to get our whorl on! (I bought him a bottom whorl spindle for his birthday and then got a top whorl for myself). I'll let you know how it goes.

Okay, so this was the best picture I could get, but the story is more interesting anyway. Basically I knit that sweater for Catalina Yarn and they (the owner) decided that it should be a display for the yarn shop I work at! ah... I don't know, it just made me feel a little weird. Anyway, after being up for a couple months it disappeared and a green one replaced it (one I didn't knit) and so I wasn't sure if they just didn't like it and I didn't want to ask about it.... Then, when I was working last Saturday, I saw this:

It's the sweater I knit, in print, on a model... I was pretty happy about that and I was confident in my sweater knitting skills once more. (granted I still think the pattern needs some shaping to help it out, but I was instructed to knit it "according to the pattern").

I also just received an order from the UK! my very first out of the country order, how exciting!

And just so you are the first to know, I'm going to put some new items in the store. I have some Crocheted Head Wraps and some tea pot sized reusable tea bags that I'm going to take pictures of and put up for sale. I would say by midnight it will all be up. You should go check it out.

Have a good week!

MIA

2007-04-14T01:07:00.000-05:00

Or at least that is what has been said. Sorry about the lack of, well, anything, I've been way off the radar this past week. I haven't even really been reading blogs, let alone writing on my own. So I thought I would let you all know that I'm still around, and give you a few quick updates.
1. The multi panel piece for the endangered species series is almost finished. Actually more so than these pictures imply because I have worked my way to the right and only have 5 smallish panels left.I'm going to cut more wood on monday to start the second in the series. Oh and I've also been doing more color study collages, I'll post a picture of those after I hang them to take slides from... that's right, i'm putting together my c.v./portfolio and sending it out to galleries and residencies. One of the many things taking up time right now.
2. The performance went really well, but I haven't received the images from it yet. It went so good though, afterwards we ended up talking about textile labor and the american consumer mentality, but I will speak more to that when I get the pictures.
3. There is a new craft leftover pattern up. It was so hard to figure out how to write it up, let me know if it doesn't make sense. I really do like the project though. It's tote for bike baskets to go grocery shopping with! And it's reversible!And on another Craft Leftover note, I'm now posting on Saturday by 2pm.
5. there is another performance, more of the same and some new stuff, coming up at mess hall in chicago on Sunday May 7... or is it the 6th.. it's sunday and it's listed in the sidebar. If you are in the area you should come check it out.
6. I just got an email today saying that the sock yarn finally came in and she (my supplier, Jennifer of Stick Chic Designs on etsy) is going to ship it out asap so there is more dyeing in the near future and hopefully, some will finally go up for sale in the etsy shop.
7. I'm tired and working tomorrow so I'm going to bed, have a good night!

Boo hoo!

2007-04-02T23:47:00.000-05:00

So the sale is off, I just got an email about it today. I'm so disappointed. There was just a lack of vendor response, I understand, we can't just have an Ars Nova Art and Craft Sale with just 3 people... the president, the vice president, and one member. It's so annoying too because we had such a good response last semester... it's okay though... there will be more sales. And on top of that, I now have 34 catnip pillows made, 12 crocheted head wraps, fabric cut for 15 pencil clutches and 15 travel tissue holders, 10 dish cloths finished, and it's all going to go into the store once I get pictures taken. I'm still a little sad though, I was really looking forward to having a physical craft leftovers presence. Ahh... so it goes.

In other news, I have pictures up (finally) of the finished craft leftovers pattern for this past week. There are more pictures on the blog.
Oh, there won't be any pattern this week because of the Chicago performance I'm helping out with at Links Hall, I'll post pictures of the performance though on Saturday if I'm able to get any.

Have a good night!

Running at Full Throttle!

2007-03-28T10:21:00.000-05:00

Gearing up for the Ars Nova Art and Craft Sale is in full swing! I have all of the small/child sized head wraps done and will start working on the med and larges today. I have also sew 34 cat nip pillows and am going to start filling them tonight. Right now it doesn't look like much, but it will when they are packed full of rice and catnip. I'm also going to cut the fabric for the pencil clutches today and if I have time some travel tissue holders too. I'm still trying to figure out display ideas. I want to try to make a step display made out of paper pulp from junk mail and paper scraps, but I have to make the form first which will be tricky for me.

I also have an old create that I'm going to fill with fabric and put the pencil clutches and tissue holders in. And then there is this swanky "take and Read" display I got a long time ago. I'm going to put kits for the pencil clutches and travel tissue holders along the bottom, pattern print out (they will be $1 ea) along the center, and then business cards and "about craft leftovers" pamphlets in the top. Perfect right. I love this little rack so much, I'm so glad I finally get to use it. Oh and then, I'm going to put the crocheted dishcloths in my dishdrain (which is bright red) and prop that up. I thought that would be kind of neat. I have a Styrofoam head that I will put one of the head wraps on, but I'm honestly not sure what to do with the rest of them. I'm sure I will get it figured out... Maybe that is what will go on the paper pulp stair form! Ha! Thanks for letting me chat this up with you all, because I think now I do know what I'm going to do for my display!

Now you may be wondering... how is she doing all this sewing if her machine is broke? Well, because of the generosity of others that's how. Thank you to everyone who donated, you have really made this little crafty lady happy! This is my new machine, isn't she beautiful?
It's a brother CE-4000 computer... she sews like a dream. If I would have known that sewing was so easy with a fulling working, not having to hold the foot control in your hand to make it go and only having one hand to guide things, no button hole function, bad tension, out of alignment, gets smelling like burning rubber when I use it machine, I would have bought one a long time ago.

And with that I'm going to head into the studio. Even though I have today completely off class, I have a lot to do... I'll show you what I've been up to in my studio at school in my next post.

Have a good day!

Foggy Groggy

2007-03-24T14:31:00.000-05:00

Well, they day(s) have been really foggy. It is positively reminding me of England... I am really getting the traveling itch lately. It's going to be another year before I can really get some time to run around to other countries. I can't wait to whip out my passport again... ah... le sigh.

Anyway. Lots of stuff to show you out there in webdom. I recieved my order of concave buttons after picking up these at the local vintage everything shop (Lavish Thrift).

These are the ones that I ordered:

I'm going to do something really super cool (hopefully) with them and will show you when I'm finished.

Also, I'm going to be collaborating with this Rockford artist that was showing his work at the group salon show at the leger gallery. We had a good chat, I bought this from him,

and then realized "crap, I should have gotten his info." After I took it home I realized that I was going to have to reline the inside before I used it.... then it hit me, what a great collaboration that would be, he could do the outside and i could do the inside. My friend saw him at the reopening, got his info, and i shot him an email asking if he would like to give it a try. He really liked the idea. It's something he had wanted to do, but didn't want to... if you know what I mean. It's just not his idea of fun... but it is for me because maybe I'm just a bit neroidic... but that's okay. So we are going to do a trial run. Like 2-10ish after I redo the one I have and see how it goes.

So far I'm in the process of ripping out the liner and scrubbing down the inside... this is what it looks like right now:

Gross right?

I'll show more pictures of it as it's in process, then finally done... hopefully by next weekend.

Okay so other news:
I just added more craftleftover kits to the etsy shop, you should go get your hands on one. Remeber 50 cents of each kit (the rest of the price is s&h and materials) goes towards the publishing of the book. The kits are all made from stuff from my stash (for the most part) and a lot of the materials in them are vintage and neat-o. So check it out. There are kits for the Pencil Clutch, the reversable travel tissue holders, the perfect dish cloth, and the newest pattern the Springy Crocheted Head Wrap.

It's pretty swanky... I got a ton of compliments and "ohhhh! where did you buy that?" comments, which are the best because then I can say "I didn't buy it, I made it, you can get the pattern for free on craft leftovers!" what great promotion right?

And even more fun Craft Leftover news, I'm going to be in the Ars Nova Art and Craft Sale that is happening April 11th and 12th at the NIU Glass Gallery in the Holmes Student Center. It's going to be all Craft Leftover stuff too. I'm working on my display and inventory right now. I'll be selling Craft Leftover Kits, have the patterns printed out that will be 50 cents each, and then all the different craft leftover projects made up for sale. Mainly the catnip pillows, crochet head wraps, reusable tea bags, reversable travel tissue holders, and pencil clutches.

I'm also going to apply for the Renagade Craft Fair this summer so hopefully that will be coming up in the fall. It will be way easy once I get my inventory/display all ramped up! Woot.

My goal is that by next summer I will be in the Bazaar Bizarre out in the bay area... here's to hoping!

Okay so I do have some bad news in all this.... my sewing machine has totally, finally, completely... bit the freaking dust. I'm so sad. I haven't been able to sew in over a week. It's driving me nuts. I have plans on getting a new one, after a few pay checks and a painting sells, but honestly it will not be nice, it will be one of those on sale walmart ones. Plus, my credit card number got stolen last week so I can't even go out and emergancy charge the thing.

I'm not one to ask for help, but if you feel my pain and feel inclined to help, there is a donate button in the sidebar of craft leftovers, that would go towards helping me to get a new sewing machine. Anything would be an big help.

Well, now that I'm done groveling, I'm going to get on that art history paper, have a good weekend!

Ahhhh......

2007-03-19T22:47:00.000-05:00

That was quite the breather! I love vacation, especially when I don't have anything in particular to do. Although I'm sure I could have spent my time more wisely, I sure did enjoy myself... and my visitors. Both my friend Jill and Jason made it here to visit with me. It was great! Jill came the first half of the break. We used the time to shop and craft and mainly I taught her how to crochet and she taught me how to make jewelry! We also walked around and had some good times in general. Here are the earrings she helped me to whip up.

It brightened up just enough to take two bike rides! So I put my new clip peddles on my bike and road off to no where in particular. It was wonderful! I even stopped in the park to sketch some geese. I haven't tipped yet either so I'm happy. I did come close today though. Oh yeah, for those of you out there who aren't acquainted with these peddles I'm talking about, basically you have these shoes with a clip on them and they lock into the peddles. It is a common occurrence to forget to up clip them and literally just fall over on your bike. More embarrassing then painful. It happens in theory several times until you get used to it, but hopefully it will be one cycling experience I will never have to endure.

Anyway, then Jason came and we just hung out a whole lot, it was super fun. You know, I honestly don't know what we did in particular, just kind of hung out. We did get out and about quite a bit, but mainly just running around together. It was great. I can't wait to finish school so I can see him more than once a month or so.

Some pretty cool stuff has been happening, like Craft Leftovers was just featured again on the CRAFTzine blog! I am excited to say the least that it wasn't just a one time freak thing. Also there are more kits of a new kind up in the store. All the proceeds from those go towards the book that I will hopefully come out in the fall. I scored some sweet buttons while my friend Jill was here and some more when Jason came to visit, I have a secret project that I am working on with those. I will post pictures when it's finished.

Oh I made a new reversible tissue holder for myself just to make sure I had the kinks worked out of the pattern, I am really loving it. Here are some pictures of it in and out.

I got some coffee and tea in the mail today which is always so nice. I tried out the cherry green tea immediately and it was delicious!

I am also whipping up some ideas for my senior show.... or my three senior shows... geeze. I'm maybe going to have twoish in chicago and one in dekalb. I'm not sure what the one in DeKalb will be, but I'm sure it will get worked out. I will think of something, I always do.

Oh there has been a really long delay/back order on the sock yarn so I think I'm going to just dye up what I have left and it should be ready by this weekend. I'm shooting for some brown and green variegated in the sock, some green in the hemp sock yarn for me, and some green for the worsted that I'm going to make into a sweater vest. I'm on a sweater vest kick lately, I'm not really sure why, I am just loving them.

Ah yes, the list. So what did I get done on it?
Clean, clean, clean
Sleep, sleep, sleep

That was seriously all there was time for... I did throw away a lot of stuff, and consigned about half my closest, but I have a long way to go as far as getting rid of all the undesirables in my apartment. Not to mention more cleaning! It never ends, but you all know that well I'm sure.

Have a good day!

Ah, the spring... well break anyway.

2007-03-09T16:33:00.000-06:00

I'm officially on Spring break, and it's actually going to be a break too! I'm not going anywhere, don't really have any homework, and I don't have any major projects due when I get back. It's going to be so nice. My friend Jill is coming to visit during the first half of break and then Jason is going to visit the second half! I'm spending this weekend cleaning like mad trying to make up for the lack of cleaning that has been going on around here since last semester! I just sorted the laundry and I have something like 10 loads worth. I've only been doing necessary loads this semester, so it will be nice to have everything clean and put away.

I've been knitting like a fiend again and finished another pair of socks this past week.
I also finished and turned in my tapestry for my weaving class on Thursday. It's inspired by the Anatolian weaving tradition. It's a "tree of life" motif.
It hasn't been blocked so its a little wonky. I'll fix it when I get it back.

Oh yeah, so the socks pictured above, they are this week's craft leftover pattern, you should go check it out. They knit up pretty quick and just about any fingering weight yarn can be used.

So goals for this break:
1. Clean clean clean
2. Learn how to silk screen
3. Dye more yarn (as soon as I get it, I honestly thought it would have been here by today)
4. Sleep sleep sleep
5. Finish some commissions I haven't had time for.
6. Read read read
7. Get rid of everything that I'm not crazy about that is taking up space in my apartment

I'll check back with you at the end of break and let you know how it's gone. In fact, I think I'm going to take a week off blogging, I'll post lots of pictures next weekend. If I do get that yarn, and it does get dyed before then, I will post an update to let you know that it's going in the shop.

Have a great week!

Miss match, moch poge

2007-03-06T21:18:00.000-06:00

The sewing rebellion was well underway in the picture above. It was great. I will post more about it later.

Okay so for whatever reason I can't move or delete any photos, so they are kind of mixed up. Above is one of the Craft Leftover Kits that is going out with the mail tomorrow. The picture of the other side is below.

These are shots of the gallery opening at Pleasant Street. It was a pretty good time. A lot of good stuff there. The central figure facing everyone is reciting some really amazing poetry. I think is was titled "it's like..."

Here is my piece. I really loved the shadows, but couldn't get them with the flash, so it's a little blurry. I don't have a tripod.

Okay, so this is Oak Park from the train platform.

This is the storefront window of a shop in Oak Park. I really wish they would have been open!

This is Elbern from the train, it was kind of an interesting sunrise, the windows tinted everything green.

On the way back I finished my second sock! Now where did I put that first one? Oh and look how close I was to not making it, that's all the yarn I had left! I did get a pair out of one skein.
So I would have deleted, then turned, and re-uploaded this one, but blogger won't let me. Oh well. It was a really interesting performance piece. All the little bags were filled with milk, and people were invited to prick the pins and let the milk drain out.
This is the other image of the kit I mentioned above.
And here is me next to the piece I had in the show.
And now I need to go finish my tapestry. Hopefully it will be all done by tomorrow. Have a good week!

Field trip!

2007-03-03T21:53:00.000-06:00

I always love going into Chicago, but it's even better when I get to learn stuff and meet/hang out with new people. While doing research for my Modernist Groups art history class I came across this artist run group in Chicago called Mess Hall. They sound pretty great and really on the same page as I'm feeling right now. The Mess Hall hosts free workshops, exhibits, music, has a small library to browse and a give and take kind of feel to it. In their words "Mess Hall runs on the generosity of those who use it. This allows us to provide everything for free - from food and drinks to workshops and events. Please bring things to share with others."So tomorrow I'm heading up there to check it out in person with my friend Deanna. There's a brunch kind of deal so I made some cookies to share. I figured if I made them vegan than everyone would be able to eat them.
These people sound really super nice. I'm very excited.

In other news:
1. Craft Leftover kits are up in the store and there is a new pattern posted.
2. I love yarn on the spool, it makes me really super happy.
3. Sister D mentioned the Craft Leftover book fundraiser on CraftyPod Blog and made the whole thing sound really great! Thank you so much! She is one super crafty lady and to have her moral support is so, well, supportive!
4. I've been dyeing way more sock yarn than I can reasonably knit up, so I'm going to start selling it in my etsy shop. I'll let you know the day and time it will be going up. It will be soon though. I'm hoping by this time next week.
And on that note I'm going to go clean my craft room a bit! Have a good week!

Show shmoe

2007-02-28T23:27:00.000-06:00

Okay so it's official, my work is going to be included in the Pleasant Street Gallery "Conception" show, it's addressing woman's issues. The image above is the flyer for it. The opening is this Tuesday 7-10pm.

The image below is approximately what I will be showing. It's going to be hung on hooks from the ceiling, i'm not exactly sure in what configuration.
I will get more photos once it's hung. I will also post my artist statement once i whip it up later this week.

Anyway, I need to get some weaving and tea time in before bed. I'll post pictures of that project later this week. Have a good one!

Leger Opening

2007-02-25T21:27:00.000-06:00

Haha, it's offical, I'm cursed when it comes to showing my work. I did at least get to the qc and hang my work in the gallery. But it snowed.. oh it snowed and sleated and snowed and rained and thundered and sleated some more and froze. Everything is frozen. The power went out in about 50% of the town. So needless to say the only people who showed up were the artists and their significent others, including mine! He was really great. He took a ton of pictures of the set up and was really supportive. Ah I like that guy so much. Anyway, my parents and my sister showed up. In fact my sister bought a painting which is really great. So I bought a small piece from one of the other artists. It's a little vintage suitcase with a painted picture on the front. Unfortunately, the liner in it is crappy and smells really bad, so I'm going to reline it with some swanky vintage fabric. I will post a picture when it's swankdified.

Here are the pictures that Jason took while I was setting up:

The guy in this photo is the gallery owner, he's Charles or Chuck.

Generic set up photos:

A lot of these are of me standing there thinking "is this level?" And here it is all set up:

Overall it went really well and because of the crudy weather and the power outage we are having a re-opening on March 10th, 6-9pm. I will get there around 8:30 though because I have to work. Anyway, my battery is about to go so I will end this post here. Have a great night!

Another one!

2007-02-21T10:49:00.000-06:00

Okay so this is a quick post, but I just got some great news! I'm going to be in another group show coming up on the 6th! The show will be held at the Pleasant Street Gallery and Studios in DeKalb. The opening is March 6th, from 7-10pm. I decided to add a section of "upcoming exhibitions" in the side bar because I'm hoping that this is the begin of many more shows to come! I'm also going to shoot for the Women's center March Women's History month exhibit, I will know if I'm in by Sunday. So that might get added to the list too! 3 shows in 2 weeks, crazy, but really great!

I will post the official announcement for the Leger Gallery once it is emailed around. This week has been nuts, but I will be sipping wine and eating cheese and crackers before I know it.

I'll show you the results of this picture next week.

Have a good one, hopefully I will see some of you this weekend!

In the Studio

2007-02-18T20:06:00.000-06:00

Finally those pictures I have been promising you!

Here's my current studio:

Here's the color study collages that I've been working on this semester:
I'm guessing that most of you out there won't be able to go to the show at the leger gallery, so here is an extra special preview of the paintings I'll be showing:
Since they are technically "for class" I'm going to have a full crit tomorrow before I send them on their way. I figure that I will make final adjustments tomorrow night. I'll show final pictures after the show.

Here's a close up of the panels that I've been working on for the other part of the endangered species project.

And with that, I'm off, I need to finish reading some art history books and work on my artist statements. I'm not sure how much I will be able to post this week so if it is, well, not at all, then so be it, but hopefully I will be able to.

Have a good week!

Friday!

2007-02-16T22:09:00.000-06:00

Ah, it is nice that it's Friday. I think I will have some tea after I finish this post.

A new pattern is up on Craft Leftovers. It's the Tin Pin Canny and and and there are 2 Craft Leftover Kits for the Pencil Clutch now in the Etsy shop.
I'm going into the studio tomorrow night so I will get some pictures of my works in progress.

And speaking of my works in progress it looks like the show at the Leger gallery in davenport is finally going to work out! Saturday, Feb 24th, I'm going to be showing some current paintings there. I'm not sure what time the opening is, but I will let you all know when I find out. Most likely somewhere around 7-9ish. There will be wine and food and some fancy fine art. It should be a good time. It's a group show, so only 10 feet of wall space, so only 3 paintings, but that's enough for me. It's a series of 3 so it works out well. It should be hanging for about 2 weeks, maybe more... maybe less. The gallery director wasn't too specific.

I'm going to print up some business cards on my print gocco on sunday afternoon to hand out at the show. Cards would be good to just have around anyway, nothing too descriptive, just name, email, title, nothing fancy. Oh i do love run on sentences with comma splices!

I'm also going to need to come up with an artist statement... hmm... that will be tough, it's really hard to talk about work that I have just made. And by just made I mean I'm going to go into the studio tomorrow and finish the last two paintings for the series so they will be dry by Saturday. I don't want to hang wet canvases! I think I'm going to do the under painting in acrylic and use some Japanese drier too. You know... a week notice is tough to throw stuff together for a show. I think I can manage and if not I will just show some of the collages I've been working on.

Anyway, I'm going to go get that tea and snuggle up with a nice art history book.... only 300 pages to go by Monday! Have a good night!

Happy Valentine's Day!

2007-02-15T10:30:00.000-06:00

Hehe, okay so i know i'm a little late on this, but no big deal right. I was actually caught up all of yesterday staffing the Ars Nova "make your own valentine's day card, $1" table. We had a ton of stuff set out and although we didn't make any money, we did break even and cheered up a whole lot of people.

This is the valentine that I made for Jason:

Well, I'm brilliant I just ruined my cup of coffee with some soured half and half, that will teach me that I should just go with the soy milk... I actually drank about half a cup to before realizing "something doesn't taste right" and now I think some good ol' nasty stomach attitude is setting in... it's saying something like "you are giving me dairy and it's spoiled?! You JERK!" My stomach and I have a real love hate relationship, especially when I forget to check if something is spoiled.

As far as the store updates that I promised, well I was hit with the Ars Nova thing at the last minute and I was planning on working on that stuff on Wednesday during the day... so I'm not going to say when the next update will be simply because I'm not sure.

Oh I also was hit with a "you should have a critique with the visiting artist" so that was yesterday morning too. It went really well. It makes me feel pretty fabulous to have nationally known, living in new york, and making money off of his work artist tell me that my stuff kicks ass and that of course I'm going to be successful with my art work and that my ideas are great and it's okay that I work on 3 ideas at once because they support each other and if I didn't do all three I most likely won't finish any of them... which is true... If I just had one thing to work on, I would get bored with it and just not finish it. He gave me a lot of good tips on looking at the spacial relationships that my work has with the place I am installing it and stuff like that. I keep forgetting to take my camera to the studio, but I will try to this week so you can see what this "work" is that I'm talking about.

What I really need to work on is finding a gallery that will sponcer me for my fall show. I really need to work on having more shows. If I could even just have two major shows a year cushioned by group and salon shows the rest of the time I would feel pretty good about things.

There will be a Craft Leftover pattern up tomorrow night so be watching for that around 6pmish.

Have a good week!

Socked Foot 1

2007-02-09T09:04:00.000-06:00

Well I did it, the first sock is offically finished... now about that pesky second sock. I did cast on and do about and inch so that is a good sign. I really enjoy this one sock on my foot and would like to be able to wear them so hopefully that will be enough prompting to get over my second sock syndrom.
Oh there will be a new Craft Leftover pattern up later today. Hopefully by 5.

I don't think there will be any new items up in the store this weekend because I'm going out of town again. I'm hoping to finish those needle wraps I've been working on and a few other secret things by next Wednesday.

I better push off to work, have a good day!

birds of a feather flock together

2007-02-06T12:17:00.000-06:00

...or something like that. Point is, I made another little bird! I thought the boys needed a lady friend. She does have a little catnip in her belly and will go play with Molly later next week. I changed my mind about selling them as cat toys.... the idea of it kind of cracks me up now. Before I was a little horrified to have the little birdies in a cat's vicious claws. I guess after making two I got over it and realized that although they have their own personalities, they won't come back to haunt me if they split a seam.

Here is some shots of just her:

Okay so something pretty fricking cool happened yesterday! My other blog Craft Leftovers was mentioned on the Craftzine blog! I've had something like 500 hits in the last day! That's more than I usually get in a whole month. I know it's not going to last more than a couple of days, but for the time being it makes me feel pretty neat. The same post, the reusable tea bag along with the needle wrap, was also mentioned on the CraftyPod blog too! Thanks sister D! What the heck am I going to make this week that will make people want to come back.... too much pressure! I guess, just what I was planning on making, no reason to change it really. I just hope you all like it!

Oh yeah, another neat thing that I've been doing, related to school, is a woven tapestry based on an ancient culture. I chose the Anatolians for as my research topic and developed this pattern for my kilim tapestry. We had to do something based on their weaving tradition.
There won't be any grid lines in the finished product, they are just there to help me know what I'm supposed to be weaving. It's going to be about 4" x 6." I am going to use naturally dyed wool for the weft to better reflect on the culture's traditions. I have some walnuts left over from the sock yarn, so I figured I would use that. I'll show you pictures when it's finished.

Another school related: I've been cranking out about 12 little color studies every week since the first week of school and now have 50! It's not nearly enough.... I've decided that there needs to be enough to cover all the walls of a gallery and I think it will be my senior show... or a show this fall, which ever comes first. I'll take a picture when I go into the studio tonight. I'm also making a lot of progress on the endangered species project and have made some headway with the printing technique I'm using. I almost have the results that I want. I'll take pictures of that too. I'm shooting for a show for those works at the end of the summer... maybe at the botanical center in Chicago. Maybe I could donate them and they could auction them off to help with their conservation program... hmm... that might be good to look into.

Well, I need to get some rest before I head to work, I feel so fricking sick right now. Have a good day!

Edward- A little bird of plush goodness

2007-02-04T11:45:00.000-06:00

Okay so I made a buddy for my little birdy that I made last night. His name is Edward and he likes to read, sleep in houseplants, and hang out with his friends. He would like to be your friend too and he is awaiting adventurous travels over in my etsy shop.

Oh in other news, I came across Library Thing and fell in love. Like the huge nerd that I am, I promptly started adding my library to it. You can check it out here.

That is all for today, I need to go get to doing school stuff.

Have a good week!

Double Post!

2007-02-02T23:50:00.000-06:00

Okay so first a little update. I decided, at the prompting of Keri's enthusiasm, to offer the re-usable tea bags for sale in my etsy shop. They are sold in pairs for $1.95 + $.75 s&h. You can check them out here. Right now there are just tea cup sized ones, but I will make some tea pot sized ones soon. Those will be just a little bit more expensive, but not too much more.

And then there is this little guy:

Isn't he goofy looking! It was my first try at making a stuffed toy. I really like this little bird even if he is all wonky, maybe because he is all wonky. Here is another shot of him.

And here is his belly!

I used felted sweater scraps from making the needle holder (which has totally ran into some hang ups by the way, I will post about that later) and actually, some of the scraps of a shirt from another needle holder I was working on. The button eyes also came from a shirt that I made into that first needle holder.... jeeze a whole lot of scraps from the needle holder adventure. You will see them eventually, promise.

I think I'm going to keep him for myself, but I will make him some friends that will hopefully travel to distant places. I'm thinking that I like them too much to feed them to kitties, so they will just be straight up plushy birds. Unfortunately they will be kind of pricey until I learn how to make them on the sewing machine, because right now hand sewing is the only way that I can see them being made. Too many funky turns and curves on such a small surface. He's only about 5 or so inches long.

Anyway, I was just really excited about the little bird and about the Pinch of Tea tea bags.... goodnight!

2007-02-02T18:39:00.000-06:00

Well the new pattern is up over at Craft Leftovers. It's a little reusable tea bag. You should go check it out.

Also, the sock yarn is dry, isn't it beautiful! I still need to over dyed the variegated yarn, but that will happen this Sunday and I will post pictures again when that is dry. I can't wait to see how it turns out, hopefully well.

Well, I'm off to try to make some little stuffed birds! Have a good weekend!

I've been dyeing to tell you!

2007-02-01T18:37:00.000-06:00

Okay, so I realize that is a really bad pun, but I just couldn't resist. I've been dyeing yarn, a whole lot in fact. I'm trying out variegated sock yarn this time. I had two pots going at the same time. One was a walnut dye bath that I bloomed with tin (the lighter brown) and the other was a walnut dye bath saddened with iron (the darker brown). I'm going to over dye with tomato vines and hopefully get some bright greens in the areas that are still cream. I'm so excited.

When I got home from work today I found a little package at my door and look what it was!

Another etsy shop owner (Ex Libris Cuteness) and I decided to do a swap and this is what she sent me! The little drawings are actually felt pins that are printed on with a print gocco. The little cat reading on the card is actually a set of library cards to keep track of my personal library books! I love these. I have another set, but not nearly as cute as these. I can't wait to use them... but which books.

Anyway, that is all for today. Lots of stuff to do... like go to the library actually.

New Items up!

2007-01-30T00:44:00.000-06:00

I just wanted to let you all know really quick like that I put another drawing and 3 new catnip pillows in the etsy shop. You should check them out. I picked up some cute kitty fabric in the Ames quilting connection.

I don't really have any new pictures other than project shots, so here is a little something out of my sketch book.

Sorry to be so short for tonight, but that was all I had time to do. I'm tired and am going to bed. Have a good night!

D is for draw, P is for paint

2007-01-28T18:48:00.000-06:00

I started work on my new painting series about the endangered/threatened Illinois plant species this last month and found the best resource ever called VPlant. It is a virtual herbarium that the Chicago Botanical Gardens helps to run/host or something like that. They have plant species that have been collect as far back as the 1840's. It's amazing to me to see all of these plants, which are now endangered and/or threatened, have been collected for more than one hundred years. It is kind of depressing to see the lack of collections in recent years because they are becoming more rare and when they are spotted they are just recorded and no longer collected.

Here are a few of the species that will be included in the series... there will be more though, I have yet to work my way through the listings of rare species in the Illinois region.

In traditional botanical illustration, lithoprints were first done, then color was added after each print was dry. At least this is the way that some were done. I wanted to reflect on this method in my work. I am going to start with pen and ink drawings, then print them, and then I will touch them up with color. I'm thinking either acrylic ink, watercolors, or oil paints. I am going to layer the printing process, drawing, and inking/painting with gesso to blur it. I'll post some pictures of the whole process once I get some finished. I've started the preliminary pen and ink drawings this weekend and hope to get some prints done on Monday or Tuesday night.

On another note I put another dishcloth for sale in my etsy shop today. Unfortunately I forgot my needle and thread this weekend and will not be able to finish the knitting needle holder until Monday.

Anyway, that's it for tonight, I'm needing to pack up and head back to my home town.

Editted in: I added a new section to my etsy shop "Fine art" and put a drawing up for sale. I will be adding more small drawings and paintings in the near future. Also you can get any drawing or small painting matted for a small fee of $4. Have a good night!

Fiber Stuff

2007-01-25T22:12:00.000-06:00

Well I've finally started weaving in my weaving class. It took us the first 2 weeks to make our lap looms, but now we are off to a running start... doing plain weave. Which is okay, good practice, but I really can't wait until next week when we start doing tapestry stitches.

Here is my little loom, isn't it swell? I think so. I have done the first inch of weaving on it with 4 rows of twining to get things off to a good start. It's actually a two harness loom which is really nice, makes things go a lot faster than they did this summer. If only I had known, but I suppose now I do!

Also, that sock that I started knitting around the time of the last post is also making some headway. The cuff is actually about half way done! I'm very excited, I hope I actually finish the pair. I think I will though, there is a bit more motivation because it is yarn I dyed myself and I want to be able to wear them around and say "look what I made! Isn't this neat!?"

I was feeling a bit down and then realized that it was January and I was most likely feeling the winter blues. So I bought myself a pretty plant! Pink pedals and everything, she brightens up my apartment.

And good news all the more! I recieved another order this morning! So the first one wasn't just a freak acciedent after all! That is exciting. I'm working on a new type of catnip toy, hopefully by next weekend there will be a few for sale. This weekend I'm going to put up some more items for sale, I will post an update on the blog if I do.

Oh on a sad note, I'm going out of town tomorrow afternoon so there will be now Craft Leftover pattern this week. I'm very sad about this, I really like doing them every week. I think I'm just going to have to work on those submission guidelines to help fill in the weekends I can't write one. Or I might just have a once a month scheduled off weekend for out of town purposes.

Anyway, I'm super tired and still need to pack so I better head out. Have a good night!

Sketchity Sketch Sketch

2007-01-22T09:34:00.000-06:00

I've been doing a whole lot of sketching lately... which is usually followed by a fury of making new things... so hopefully that will come soon. In the meantime I thought I would show you what I have been brainstorming about.
Here are some quick little doodles about the Craft Leftover Pattern layouts.... but I'm starting to think that maybe I will put 5 patterns into each book so that way I can actually make some money on printing them. It's about $4.50 to print a 4 pager, but only about $5.50 to do more around 12, so I figure I will just do more patterns in the one mini book. They are what will be included in the kits. So it will be good for both the people who buy the pattern/kit and for myself, because I will not have to order say 5 mini books of 5 different patterns up front.

Guess what I'm going to be making more of? This is the general sketch... I will be working out the details in later pages ++like size, material lists, cost vs price++ that kind thing. I am hoping to have a few ++or at least one++ finished by the weekend to put up for sale in the etsy shop. You guys/ladies gave me such a positive response that it seemed like something that would be good to make a bunch of. Not to mention that I really enjoyed making it ++ I'm sure after the tenth one it will not be sooo exciting, but hopefully I will keep up the interest. Oh that reminds me. I'm also working on a set of more affordable sewing kits to put up for sale, I think those will be done in 2 weeks, maybe less.

I went a little nutty with the ocean life books and have been doing quite a few sketches of those as well... here are three of them.

I think I'm going to cast on a sock today to take to class with me... I'm starting to get that yansy feeling in my fingers. I'm finally going to knit up that yarn that I dyed with walnuts before Christmas.... I will post pictures, I'm really excited. I'm going to try a variegated walnut/lettuce sock yarn next, I need to get some lettuce and some wax linen thread first. I'm shooting for next week for that. I'm thinking about 8 skiens worth. Two for a friend, two for me, and maybe just maybe four to sell. We will see how it goes, I will keep you posted.

That is all for today, I need to finish my reading for that said class that I will be taking the sock too. Have a good one!

Hi there

2007-01-19T23:03:00.000-06:00

Well well well.... so I tried to add a list of the patterns into the sidebar of craft leftovers tonight and did something or other to the template and now it looks really screwy and I may end up having to redo the whole thing, not too hard, but still annoying. So I'm really sorry about the mess I left over there but I am experiencing some technical difficulties (aka I only have very basic html skills and have no idea what to look for).

The good news is that I did post a new pattern tonight and you can go check it out here... just scroll down and you can get to the pattern, just nevermind all the text garble at the top.

Here is a little preview shot, it's a needle wrap.
I will also be adding some new felted dishcloths to the shop tomorrow so you should go check that out as well.

Now that the first week of school is over I have some things to report. I love my classes, but they will be nuts. And my last day at the Village Commons Bookstore will be this Thursday.... and that is the only day I have left to work too. I'm so relieved, it's been really stressing me out. It will be nice to only have one job for once. And this semester I won't be required to get up earlier than 8:30! That's a first in I don't know how long. It's a good thing that things will be more open for me because I am going to need a ton of studio time. I'm taking two painting classes, weaving, and an advanced art history class. It will be fun though. I will post some pictures of what I am working on in the studio as it comes up... I'm supposed to get 2 paintings done a week, so it will come up a lot.

I better get off to bed, lots of stuff to do tomorrow, it's my first day off work since new year's!

Sewing Kit Upcycling!

2007-01-14T23:23:00.000-06:00

Okay so I just wanted to let you know that I put the sewing kit up for sale tonight. It's a little pricey I've been told by a few people, but it took quite a long time to make because of all the little french knots and satin stitching on the lid. And the box is completely made from scratch, it's not a generic Micheal's one and that took some time too.

This will be the next sewing kit that will hopefully go up for sale tomorrow night... no promises though.

I'm off to bed, have a good night!

Friday Fantastic

2007-01-12T23:30:00.000-06:00

I'm not sure why it's friday fantastic, but I'm sure it is for some reason or another. I do have some fun stuff to show you. This is the sewing kit that I mentioned in my last post. I wanted to show you how it came about... well that did start with jill late at night at vi, but i mean the actually composition.

I started with this:

Which turned into this:

Which then became this (rotated a bit):

I haven't quite finished the stitching around the edge of the lid seam, but I couldn't wait to show and tell.

I also have some general announcements:
There is a new pattern up over at Craft Leftovers for a crocheted felted dishcloth... the perfect dishcloth. And also, if you don't feel like making them yourself, I am putting some up for sale over in my etsy shop tonight, check back in the am for those.

Hey Y'all

2007-01-10T21:07:00.000-06:00

So guess what guess what guess what!? I received my very first order through etsy today!
And a friend of mine bought two catnip pillows from me today as well. It's so exciting. I've sold 4 things in as many days.

I also received a thank you/care package from one of the quilt block swap members. It had coffee, hot chocolate, and sock yarn in it! How sweet is that. She even told me I was a good quilt block swap mom. It totally made my day. I was kind of feeling down about the qbs too because of how rough it was getting things together for the January swap. Not to mention that 5 different people haven't gotten blocks even though they sent theirs out. It's just frustrating. But now I can sip hot chocolate or coffee and knit a bit to relax. It totally perked me up about the whole thing. I still can't believe I've been hosting it for 7 months now, 8 including the December month that we took off. So thank you Tammy, you are a serious sweetie.

Another thing about the quilt block swap is that we have had odd number members just about every month so I have been sitting out, which I think is effecting my moral because I am just admin now instead of an active member. So hopefully, in Feb we will have an even number and i can make and receive some blocks and work a bit on my own quilt.

Another neat thing that is going on and that I'm going to enter into the Upcycling contest at etsy. Only a couple days to do some upcycling.... which is actually kind of funny because that is pretty much what I am all about anyway. I really just had to choose which item I wanted to submit. Upcycling is the whole premise of Craft Leftovers. I decided on the little sewing kits I make out of scrap fabric, yarn, and mat board. All things that would normally get thrown out, but instead I make them into something to use. That is what upcycling is. I guess the term was coined in the book From Cradle to Cradle, which I actually read last summer... or maybe it was the fall. Anyway, it's a good book, you should read it.

I'm going to let you all go and stop blabbing on and get to work on those sewing kits. They will most likely go up on the 13th. I will post an update.

Oh yeah. Also, I will be putting some dishcloths up for sale around the 13th too. Be looking for it. And I put some more bookmarks and catnip pillows into the store tonight.

Have a good night!

Mark those Pages

2007-01-08T19:33:00.000-06:00

Mentioning nativities again, here is one I made for my grandma when I was.... oh i think 10. Also Deb, I totally should have known that you got it from a garage sale, what was I thinking.

Here is a picture of the catnip pillows in progress. I just picked up some more catnip today to make some more and decided to go the organic route. I think that better, kitties don't need to be freaking out over chemicaled up catnip.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do with these, maybe some more tin pin cannies, we will see.

I posted some bookmarks for sale in my esty shop tonight. 2 for only $1.50, what a steal! They are made from recycled library card catalogs and printed on with a hand cut linoleum block. Plus they are laminated so even if you spill your coffee all over your book, your book mark will be A-okay!

Etsy Store Update!

2007-01-07T17:19:00.001-06:00

Amazing, two posts in one day!
I got a little too about the prospect of updating my store and made a bunch of stuff and updated it tonight.

I made some of these:
And some of these:

Go check it out!

I'm going to start adding items on a regular basis... just about every other day, maybe more. So, check back frequently to see the new stuff. Or subscribe to my mailing list to hear about the store update first by e-mailing me at kristinroachoriginals@gmail.com with Mailing List in the subject field.

Have a great night!

Yummy!

2007-01-07T11:07:00.000-06:00

Okay, so for the last week I have been working.... a whole lot. And being sick and all I have been trying to eat well, but breakfast has really been lacking... I'm just so worn out that I struggle to get out of bed and end up not having enough time to make something other than toast. So this morning, late morning, I made some Banana fritters with pecans, honey, and mini chocolate chips... and then I made quite a few extra to freeze and then toast up during the week. Most likely without the chocolate chips, that was a special treat just for today.

The other cool that I'm doing today is making a ton of needle holders. They start out like this:And then end up like this:
Here is the production line:

All the yarn for me to dye up came in this past week. Doesn't it look delicious! I can't wait!

Here are some little crewel works that I stitched up over Christmas time. They will soon be little sewing kits, I just need to make up the boxes and glue it all together.

Anyway, I'm going to get on those tin can pin holders, I'll post pictures when I'm finished. I think I'm going to follow my ferret's lead and take a nap first. I'm starting to lose the cold, but now I'm coughing a whole lot and I'm having a hard time breathing, so I'm getting tired super fast. Nap time!

Stuff and Junk

2007-01-05T20:49:00.000-06:00

Exiting news! There is a new pattern up on Craft Leftovers! Here is a picture of it, live long a prosper! I will be posting new patterns every Friday from here on out. How cool is that.I cut all the pieces for my mock up of the pants I'm going to make really soon out of the denim and corduroy.
I found this really neat hat out in the yard. I thought it might belong to someone, so I left it all day... and then I came home from work the next day and it was raining and so I took it home. I don't think I will wear it though because I don't know where it was. But it will be awesome in still lives and other prop type things. Although on the off chance of someone knowing: Does anyone know a good way to clean it... just in case I would like to wear it sometime... maybe.
This is what the little circular strip of fabric turned into, cool huh? I wore it over a blouse and it was trÃ¨s chique!
And here is my pink panther in Chartre! Bon soir!

Disaster Everted...

2007-01-03T22:40:00.000-06:00

Okay, so first a funny little story. Opening shipment boxes and unpacking art supplies is what I do... just about everyday.... but today was different. I'm not sure if I was just tired... maybe a little too much caffine... whatever it was I messed up. I meant to slash the tape and I ended up gouging my own thumb instead. My boss took one look at it and said "yep, that's what my thumb looked like when I need stitches, we better send you to the clinic to get that checked out." It was pretty great, they paid for everything... including the 3 hours I spent waiting at the clinic. It was a close call though, it turned out I missed my nerve by about... well the doctor said that he wasn't sure exactly how it missed my nerve, but that in case it goes tingly, I have some numbers to call. Nice.

Anyway, better stuff. Here is an apron that Deb gave me along with the stash of fabric... somehow wearing an apron makes me feel super... well... just super.
In fact so super that I organized and cataloged my fabric stash, this is just the first bit.
Then I tried my hand at this:
It's weird how this:
Turns into something swanky.

Well, I'm off to bed, have a good night!

JoAnn Rocks my Socks and my new pants!

2006-12-30T23:31:00.000-06:00

Okay so I finished up the sewing that I started yesterday and have really caught the bug (I have yet to take pictures though so you will have to wait on that). I went to JoAnn's today to get you know, just a few things.... some eyelettes, ribbon, and cording.... and lo and behold they were having a 60% off sale on all "bottom" fall fabric! There was some lushious dark blue denim and chocolate brown corderoy on sale for under $2 a yard! I mean, that just doesn't happen every day. And how convienent too. I was just saying to Jason before we left, "I would really like to try my hand at making pants, they can't be any harder than these 19th century corsets I've been making...." Also, I just junked up my last pair of jeans. So I bought enough denim to make a pair along with a skirt... Nice jean skirts are so hard to come by. I'm really hoping that between making my cloths and getting stuff off the donate pile at Encore (stuff that we don't accept because of missing buttons and things like that) that I will be able to supply my own clothing completely.... except maybe undergarments.... so I can Craft a Better Tomorrow.... Maybe that should be a website... in fact it may already be... hold on, I'm going to google that. Okay, so here is the status... there are no websites per say, but it is a phrase that has been used by 4 people. Hmmm.... anyone want to craft a better tomorrow with me?
::::::::::::
Okay so enough of that. I'm going to leave you with more pictures of Indiana because I'm really starting to ramble... but that's okay too, this is my blog and I can ramble all I want, but seriously, enough is enough. Goodnight.
::::::::::::

Sew U, Sew Me a new one!

2006-12-30T00:01:00.000-06:00

Well, tonight was full of sewing, but I will talk about that more tomorrow when I have the photos to prove it. So instead here are some more pictures from my trip to see my good friends the Cory's.

This one I think I'm going to make into a painting, I really enjoy this image a whole lot.

And that is just about it for now. I sat down... and got really tired... I took some night time cold meds and I think they are starting to make me sleepy. Goodnight!

Long time no post!

2006-12-28T20:57:00.001-06:00

Okay folks, I realize that I disappeared there for awhile, but with good reason I swear. Mainly no internet access for almost two weeks and then coming down with a really bad cold. I have been taking lots of pictures while on break and will start posting a few everyday while I'm continuing to settle back into my apartment and working on feeling better.

First I do have a couple updates and good news and whatnot:
1. I was able to graze by with straight A's this semester despite my nervous breakdown and having to withdrawl from a class.
2. Yarn is on the way for dyeing and I have walnuts soaking in a dye bath so the dyeing should be starting soon.
3. The Quilt Block Swap will be starting up again January 1st.
4. Crafty Leftovers will be starting up again the first Friday of January and I will start posting patterns every Friday instead of just every other.
5. I recieved a bunch of great stuff for Christmas: Fabric to books to cds to books to slow cookers to books to awesome knife sets. And my sister came through with a drying rack just in time for my dyeing too. Thank you to everyone and I hope you had a very merry christmas!
6. I have a few great New Year's Resolutions that I will announce after new years.

I'm sure there is something I'm missing, but it will have to wait, my mind is all cloudy and full of snot so on to the pictures!

These pictures were taken in Indiana right before the Christmas season. I just love the way Deb switches over to the holiday season. The window is up year round, as well as the flowers. I have a whole lot more pictures and will post some again tomorrow. I am not running spell check because I am just too tired and am going to crawl into bed with some tea post haste. Have a good night! Sorry for the long disappearance!

My Day Today

2006-12-12T20:19:00.000-06:00

Here is today's fun. I started out sewing a whole lot to finish my sculpture project....
Here it is at about half its size.... Total size: 12' by 8'

This is what I put it over.... the plaster cast I mentioned awhile back.
Here is the final painting that I turned in tonight, our assignment was to take a product and make it into a holiday using a limited pallet of 4 colors from nature and 4 from a movie still... so I chose parker brothers and they are having a Block Party.
And then I went and took some night photos by the lagoon:

And now I'm at home sitting in my chair posting this blog and sipping some tea.

My semester is offically over and I'm going to go christmas craft it up with my friend tomorrow who's in Oak Park... it should be fun! Goodnight!

Art and Sewing

2006-12-08T19:09:00.000-06:00

Oh boy, just my luck. I'm just about finished with all of my sculptures, and my sewing machine breaks. I have a wonderful Singer that I received when my Grandma passed away. I have much sentimental attachment to it. And it really is becoming like one of those old cars that you love... But that just keeps breaking down from one thing or another. I was able to fix it, kind of, and I'm starting to think the day to get a new one is fast approaching. Any ideas on what would be a good machine to get? At this point I don't think I need anything fancy. Just straight and zig-zag stitch, maybe a button hole capability. The thing that stinks is that it is not really the machine that is even breaking... it is all the little rubber parts. Mainly the foot paddle. And my machine is so old that I cannot find replacement parts for it. So it goes.

Anyway, back to the sculpture bit. This is one of the works that I did for my beginning sculpture class. The really neat thing it that you cannot hear is the audio. I took recordings of TV shows and overlapped all of them so it is kind of a jumbled mess. The audio was then slowed down so it is really kind of creepy and weird. Also, the speakers are inside the TV's and the sound is turned down low. There, but indistinguishable. I guess it's my commentary on the slowing down of our minds because of the negative use of TV's as bed time stories. The assignment was to create a paradox... Which for me was TV bookends holding up children's books.

The other piece that I am doing involves the plaster cast that I did of my crawling form. I am piecing a bunch of fabric that I have acquired from my grandma, mother, and myself. The pieced fabric will drape the crawling, weighed down form. (I really was weighed down too.... Plaster is heavy, especially when in a crawling dynamic pose for 2 hours). It is my reinterpretation of a sculpture by.... Shoot I can't remember her name, I need to look that up... Which was the assignment for this work. It really turned into a comment on domesticity in women's lives today. How they are expected to have a career and still be a full-time homemaker.... Thankfully for me, Jason has never pressured me like that... Responsibilities are pretty equally divided. It is still a common problem in our society... And that bothers me.

I'm also working on that sweater for Catalina yarns this week. I have all of the back finished and the rest is well underway. I'm on skein 3... So about 1/4 of the way done... Not too bad considering I just got the yarn on Tuesday night.

Oh I finished my fiber arts piece last night too... I'm not too fond of the documentation so I might set it up again and redo it.

Okay, so I realize that it looks a lot like an explosion of fabric all over my apartment... So I will explain the assignment a little bit.

We were instructed to create an instillation in a space we considered Home. The instillation had to deal with our own concept/feelings/idea of home.... So that is what I did... Home is a tangled mess of fabric for me... hehe... No that's not the point of this piece. I started out with the fabric from my grandmother and cut it into strips, sewed them together, then my mom's, and then my own. This one long strip I piled and spread all throughout my apartment... The implication is that my grandmother and my mom's influences have permeated all of my "home" and hence my fabric which the piece ends with. That is why there is fabric in the sewing machine being added on. That is where the work starts/ends depending on the way that you look at. I guess... A continuance of generational crafting, haha.

And with that I will leave you, I need to get back to knitting that sweater. Have a good night!

Stocking Stuffers!

2006-12-05T23:45:00.000-06:00

You should buy some handmade stocking stuffers... I know you want to!

So if you would like a catnip pillow, a travel tissue holder, or a crocheted dish cloth, just e-mail me at kristinroachoriginals@gmail.com. They are all priced at $5 each or 6 for $26.50 (mix and match). You can specify colors or I can surprise you. I accept paypal and personal check. All orders will be sent out in 2 business days by priority mail... Unless it is unusually large in which case I will let you know how fast I can get it done and sent out. Definitely in time for Christmas if you order now.

You can get the crocheted dish cloths in any of these colors:

And here is a picture of my kitty for good measure:

Have a good night!

Wish List Time!

2006-12-03T21:53:00.000-06:00

Okay, so all of those folks out there wondering "what would Kristin like for Christmas?" I have the perfect answer: My Wish List! Now, I know that you are thinking, well if I buy it off her wish list she will know what I bought... Not so. I have done my last additions to the list and I promise from this day to after Christmas I will not peek. Promise. Now if you are still inclined to buy something that I have listed, but not through my list, don't! Amazon is not fun to return items to, so just trust me that I won't peek and buy it off the wish list. Don't ruin my holiday cheer by making me do returns... Thank you!

Here are some other non-amazon things that would be cool Christmas presents:
1. A Swift (it's the thing that you put a hank of yarn on to wind it... i need one!)
2. A scale, digital, at least 5 lbs+ capacity, you can get it off www.usps.com for a decent price.
3. Coffee maker with a timer.
4. Coffee in general, decaf and regular are nice.
5. Any and all teas
6. Reusable cloth tea bags for loose leaf tea on the go
7. Socks, I need thick warm socks.
8. Scan Disk drive for my camera
9. Gift certificate to Lowe's, Dick Blick, The Yarn Exchange, Borders, the Quilting Corner in Ames (they have lots of neat fabric), the Bike Shop here in DeKalb that I can't remember the name of.
10. One of those fancy blenders that is also a smallish food processor, those are neat too.
11. House plants for shaded areas that are low maintenance.
12. More Socks!
13. More Sock yarn!

Okay so I know there is a lot on that list and the Amazon list so I just want you to know that I only expect to not get one of those things... Everything else I better get.... Okay so I'm being really sarcastic there. The truth is that I have no expectations about Christmas and I am just one of those people that would be happy just getting to see my family and friends and that is it. Anything else is a pleasant surprise. Have a happy Christmas crafting season by the way!

I finally finished the bath mat from Mason-Dixon Knitting... But I will post a photo of that tomorrow. I also made another crocheted wash cloth! My goal is one a day in a different stitch every time... That way I will learn new stitches and be a crochet wiz in no time at all.... Plus they make for great stocking stuffers!

That's all for tonight, have a great week and see you all tomorrow.

2006-12-02T19:13:00.000-06:00

I have quite a few things to report today. First off there is a new pattern up on Craft leftovers that you should check out.I finally received my yarn winder today and promptly wound the sock yarn that I dyed last week.
I also received a package from Sister Diane of the CraftyPod! The Christmas Digest! It's filled with a ton of great stuff including puzzles, stories, stickers, and crafty ideas for the Christmas season! Thank you Sister Diane!

I went nutty crocheting yesterday. I love the fact that I can start and finish multiple projects in one day in crochet. I made a dishcloth:

And a tea cozy, which I'm thinking about wripping out, but I thought I would show it to you all none the less. I still need to put buttons on it, but I'm not going to do that until I decide to whether or not to frog it. I'm not happy with the bulkiness of the white yarn.
So okay, I'm not a crocheting genious, but I do really enjoy it. The main reason why I have not crocheted more is that there is a complete lack of good quality/modern crochet patterns. They all look well... frumpy/from the 80's/for hippies only or a combo of the three. So I'm setting out on a quest... along with my friend Andrea who is helping with ideas and what nots... to create crochet patterns that are updated and modern. I have a stong inclination that crochet is best for household items, but I do have quite a few clothing items in mind as well. I've been told by quite a few people that this does need to be done. We really do need a revolution in crochet like there has been in knitting! I have looked around quite a bit and I found a site called CrochetMe that has more modern patterns, but they are just one site! We need one hundred sites! Where are the Crochet Lists?! Where are the crochet in's!? Where are the crochet books that make me happy and inspired!? So.... I'm not sure about the sites and the crochet in's, but I'm going to start focusing on crochet in my pattern writing and who knows, maybe I'll even write a crochet book! So there!

Also, in January I'm going to start posting patterns on Craft Leftovers every Friday instead of every other Friday. I am finding that I miss the challenge on Fridays when I don't write one, so, every Friday it will be.

All and all it's been a good day for me, despite the fact that I was not able to be in the Salon show and sell some paintings. I made a whole lot of stuff, cleaned my apartment a bit, and got my tire fixed. It just so happened that the place that I took my car to was a block and a half from the yarn exchange! So instead of waiting in a room at say farm and fleet for 2 1/2 hours, I got to sit around and knit and drink coffee! It is something that I used to do just about every Saturday (the knitting and drinking coffee at the yarn exchange, not the getting my car fixed), it was pretty nice.... Unfortunately I came down with a migraine today, so maybe not driving to the QC was a good thing, it's subsided now, but it's still just below the surface... I think I'm going to call it an early night.

I'm hoping to get another dishcloth crocheted up tonight before bed so I will end this here.

Have a good crafty weekend!

It's a Blizzard out there!

2006-12-01T09:47:00.000-06:00

Okay, so first I want to show you a picture of the yarn I dyed up on Monday. I really just love it. It is kind of a short yardage, about 150 yards between the two skeins of bulky. I think some fingerless gloves or house booties might work, maybe another scarf or a hat... any ideas as to what I should knit out of this? The gauge is about 4.5 stitches/inch.

So now I'm going to share my adventure with you, and because I am snowed in it's going to be long winded, just to warn you.

Last night I was all packed up for class, walked out to my car, pulled out into the street and "thump thump thump" my tire was flat. Down to the rim. Well crap, what to do. So I call farm and fleet to see if they are taking any more work orders, I figured I could call a friend, get the tire off, and take it up there, or just get towed up there and wait while they fix it. It was no good though, they were all booked up for the night.... well them and everyone else in town. That first blast of cold always does that up here in northern IL. So I figure I will at least get the donut on there and get it fixed in the morning... I can't find the spare. I call my dad, he can't remember where it is either. After about a half hour of looking in the instruction manual, pulling random levers, and lots of swearing, I find it hidden in the left panel in the back (I have a station wagon). My dad tells me that our insurance has towing/changing tire in the cold coverage, so I call around to find someone who can come out. No one can, they are all booked up too.... finally at around my 3rd or 4th call someone agrees. To wrap up this part of the story: my tire gets in the back of my trunk and the donut on the front right.

My plan was to go to bed, get up early, and get it taken care of first thing in the morning before I head off to work. Well, I overslept, I have never slept though my alarm, and it seems like I remember hitting the snooze at some point, but I don't remember it going off again... but it was still on, so I guess I slept straight though it. I jump out of bed, look outside, and well crap, there is a foot of snow on the ground... There is no way I'm going to be able to drive my car in that, which is front wheel drive and my flat is on the front... I don't think that my little spare would do me much good in a foot of snow. So I called my boss and told him that I was going to be a half hour late because I would be walking (this was at 8 am and so I'm thinking an hour to walk to work)... no big deal, a nice walk in the morning snow would be refreshing... I bundle up, take a shot of espresso, put mr b back to bed and head out the door. As soon as I turn the corner a blast of cold air and sleet hits me in the face... now I suppose I should, in the honor of things that are hand knitted, point out that that I have bundled myself in three shirts, a sweater, long underwear, two pairs of socks, industrial boots, pants tucked in, my long handknit gloves, my biggest, thickest, scarf and a hat.... so only my eyes are really exposed... but still covered with glasses... which are instantly fogged and covered in ice... that is correct: ICE! So I can't see... I take my glasses off and my vision improves for a moment... only a moment though because the wind decides to carry the snow into my eyes. I could not keep them open... so glasses back on... I had to walk in the middle of the street because I could not trudge though the snow on the sidewalk, which had now drifted to past my knees. I am moving along as fast as I can, which gives me plenty of time to take in this winter scene... as much as I could anyway with my glasses covered in ice. I did take them off from time to time to make sure that I was still headed in the right direction... it sure is beautiful outside.

I get about 5 blocks from my house and there is a car stuck... well... I'm already late, why not help out... good deeds never hurt anyone... the guy across the street comes to help out too. We push while the guy rocks himself out. The driver asks me where I'm going. "Oh just the VCB," he offers me a lift (I'm still only about 1/4 of the way there at this point)... I accept and we head on our way. So I'm going to only be about 10 mins late, not too bad.... things are going good, what a nice morning... that was really a pleasent walk.... and then the irony hits... my boss calls: "so they didn't call me, but I guess they called everyone else, we are closed today." Well okay, I guess I will head back home... the guy I hitched a ride with (a security man at NIU actually) drops me off at the gas station and asks if I want a ride home... I decline and decide to pick up some milk and bread.... if I'm going to be stranded at home I might as well have some food to eat (I was going to go to the grocery store last night, but the flat tire made that not possible). I bought my food and headed back home. It was strange to see the shadowy figures emerging out of the distance, becoming clear, and fading into the snow and fog again. I got back home safe and sound and only a little damp. And now I'm sipping on some more coffee, I'm about to make some toast and eggs... all and all it really has been a good morning. I love the snow!

And that was my adventure... and unfortunately the only thing that I am not liking about the snow is that there is now no way I will be able to drive home tomorrow morning and I am going to have to drop out the show... I was so hoping to sell my paintings, but these things happen for a reason I'm sure.

And with that I'm going to wish you a happy snow day! Drink some hot choco and stay warm!

Happy Thursday!

2006-11-30T16:51:00.000-06:00

Woo! What a relief! I just turned in my last two papers and finished up most of the big stuff on my sculptures. One more week of school and it will be pretty tame, it's so nice to be close to finished. I'm actually looking forward to finals week because I don't actually have any exams, and I really only have two final crits that week so basically I just need to sew and paint a whole lot.... I like that. I do that anyway. I will be posting a new crafty leftovers pattern tomorrow night so be looking for it.

Sorry no pictures today, I moved them all to my external hard drive without even thinking about it... Nothing new anyway. Tomorrow though I will have some pictures of the yarn I dyed on Monday. It is finally dry.

Tonight: more painting, more sewing, typing up an artist statement, printing some business cards, and matting more paintings for the show this weekend... So much fun! Too much for just me... nah... Just the right amount.

Have a good night!

Hi a little early....

2006-11-28T15:50:00.000-06:00

Haha, not blog for a week, whatever.... I'm so excited about my yarn that I dyed last night I just had to tell you all about it! It is the most beautiful shade of pale sage green! I really had no idea what I was going to get with it because I had never used leaves for dyeing before... the book said avocado green, but honestly I like my result much better!

Also, I wanted to post today because I wanted to test out the paypal button feature... I just signed up for a merchant account... So I decided I would offer up the little travel tissue holder for sale. If you want it, it's your's. I will remove the button when it sells... or if it doesn't at all in a week then I will make someone I know buy it to test out the button.

And it is reversable, so here is the other side:
Tissue included with purchase $3.50 + $1.50 S&H

Hello there all

2006-11-27T17:14:00.000-06:00

And how was your Thanksgiving break? Mine was pretty good... as always too short and now I'm here back in DeKalb wondering how I am going to get everything I need to get done this week... and today I just realized that I need to get my portfolio together for my painting review next week! I have two short papers due this week, a painting to start and finish in a week and a half, a show to get ready for... that's right, I got in, woot... a sculpture to finish, stuff to dye (with lettuce), another sculpture to finish, a fiber art project to finish, presentations to give... ah! okay so I'm going to stop listing stuff because it is freaking me out.

The weekend was all and all really nice. My friend Jill was sick, which stinks, for her and me both... She is coming to the end of a semester too and that is always the worst time to get sick... Me... Well I just wanted to soak up her creative vibes she is always sending out. So it goes.

Also, here is the announcement that is being sent out for the show... Pass it around, come if you can, buy my paintings if you are willing.....

On December 2ND Leger Fine Art will be holding it's
second salon show. This one day event includes area
artist Terry Rathje, Leigh Funk, Eric Mart, Audrey Brown,
Stephen Calvert, Dennis Hall, Rick Lodmell, Brian
Spurgeon, Kristin Roach, Marylou Kean, Jill Hatzer, Kara
Fedje and several more. The media varies from metal
sculpture to pen/ink and has turned into a very
exiting exhibit of known and soon to be known artists
and their works. I hope that you'll be able to attend
this little event.

LEGER FINE ART
2ND SALON SHOW
DECEMBER 2ND, 2006
6:00pm to 9:00pm
refreshments to be served
a $2 donation will be requested at the door
donation to go to purchasing materials for
artists otherwise unable to afford them.

Thank you for your time and hope to see you at this
event.

Sincerely,
Charles

So you are going to come right?

Anyway, I need to get working on that "to-do" list... I think I need to take the rest of the week off blogging too... but I will post some nice photos of yarn and shows and my new work and stuff and more stuff, you'll love it, promise!

Happy Turkey Day!

2006-11-23T10:30:00.000-06:00

Or Tofurkey Day for some of us! Hehe. So sorry I didn't post yesterday, what was I thinking anyway? I worked all day and then left straight for my parents.... where did getting online and posting pictures fit into that?

Here is the yarn that I dyed on Monday. It's all dry and wonderful. I just love the way that it turned out! I can't wait to dye more. My Mom is letting me clean out the garden (she's glad for the help really). I'm going to grab the tomatoes, cut back the raspberry canes, collect all of the dead mum flower heads, and clear off the sidewalk of walnuts. I should be getting some more yarn on Saturday or Monday and will hopefully dye it Monday or Wednesday night. It's really addictive, I love it so much. Anyway. The sock yarn is still a mess, but as you can see by the little ball I have been making some progress untangling it. I will never again forget to tie it off!

Mr Beuler climbed into a bag of polyfill and brought it all out of the bag and then proceeded to roll and dig in it.... he was being so cute that I took pictures instead of scolding him like I should have... Oh well.... he sure is cute though!

I took a walk with my mom and Annie (my parent's little lady, she's a lab something mix... so cute too)... This picture is all blown out because I was adjusting the settings still but Annie was being so nutty... she's a real goof ball. My mom flings around the leash for the first block or so of the walk and then Annie get out all of her energy flailing around and biting at it and then walks just fine.
These are some other pictures that I took on the walk.Anyway, I'm off to help clean up the house and go collect some more dye stuff out in the yard. Have a happy thanksgiving! Stop eating if it starts to hurt!

Print Gocco! Go Coooooo!

2006-11-20T17:36:00.000-06:00

Alright, well sorry about the title, I got a little excited there... I'm not sure how long you readers out there have been reading... but this past summer I bought I print gocco... and it made me happy... but what to make.. what to print? I had no idea... well it dawned on me and here she be. Lots of printing! I was hem hawing around about business cards.. something I've been really indecisive about. I really just don't like the idea of going to office max or some such thing for my business cards that will be promoting my handmade/fine art/organic fibers business. That just seems like a huge contradiction. Anyway, I was thinking about silk screening on some recycled paper... And then it hit me! I have a print gocco, it's the perfect size, and I also have old card catalogs that I have been wanting to use for something but nothing in particular, which are also the perfect size. These are the pictures after an hour of printing.

I then proceeded to print on just about anything I could... Vellum for instance...

Craft Paper...

Muslin.... and I would say that I like this one the best outside of the library catalog cards... although I'm not exactly sure what I would use it for...

When I cut them I can fold them to make a little plate card or just unfolded as a single business card with space for a personal note/message...

And I can also print them again to get a whole lot of little tags for products...

And I can use the bottom half, when the catalog cards are cut in half, as another product tag, but folded to put information about fiber content/price/weight... that kind of thing. Because they were catalog cards they already have a whole punch.

I also took a picture of the yarn while it was drying... I was impatient... Anyway, it's all tangled up because I yet again forgot to tie it. The worsted isn't so bad, but the sock yarn is going to give me a headache. It will be worth it though. The colors turned out great. A beautiful brownish grey and a deep chocolate brown.... I can't wait to knit it. I do really need to get a drying rack... like one of those folding ones for cloths. That would be perfect.

I have been working extra this week so I decided to spend a little bit of this money I have been hoarding and get two skeins of organic bulky undyed yarn... I want to say it's alpaca. But what to dye it with? I have been tooling around with the idea of lettuce. I read in my book... which has kind of become my natural dyeing bible... that you can get a bright yellow-green with tin and an avocado green with iron... Which one? Well I suppose because I have contaminated my pot with iron I better go for the avocado green.

Well I need to head off to the studio and do some more little paintings. I will post more pictures of the new ones on Wednesday (I did 5 on Saturday). And hopefully the yarn will be dry by then and I can post pictures of it.

Have a good couple of days everyone!

Hi there, it's an off day for me...

2006-11-19T22:02:00.000-06:00

Well today has just been odd. I feel like I've been doing everything backwards... but I did dye some yarn with walnuts today and that finally went forward. I'm so excited, it's going to soak overnight... I want to see it right now, but I will have to wait. So, instead I have some pictures for you all of other random things.

This is the quilted pot holder that I made from the crafty leftovers pattern. My sewing mechine went on the fritz so I will have to hand stitch the rest.

I did a couple more paintings. Here they are. I have more in my studio that I did last night, but I'm waiting for them to dry.

And here is some fabric that I bought at the quilting corner in Ames. I'm going to make some more catnip pillows out of the blue mouse fabric and some travel tissue holders out of the other two fabrics. E-mail me if you would like to order one or the other. They are both $5 each. Shipping is free. Just let me know.

Well that is all for now. Have a good night!

I just can't stay away....

2006-11-16T23:13:00.000-06:00

But I might have to. I have a super busy day tomorrow! I'm working at the Bookstore in the morning until 130 and then at encore from 2-8 and then the pot luck from 8-? and then posting the crafty leftover pattern! Jeeze! Plus a friend is coming into town and I need to clean my apartment a bit before him and his cousin get here so they don't think I am living in a trash heap... which I'm not, it just might look that way from time to time (especailly when he only gave me a two day notice.... he had mentioned it about a month ago but wasn't sure about the date).

I have some good news and some annoying news too. So annoying news first. I rented out a studio space at the school and every time I go in there I'm cleaning out people's crap... I have collected quite a few pens, x-acto knifes, brushes, and other little things this way.... the studio spaces are partitianed off with tape on the floor so pretty much if I don't mark my teritory everyday my space starts to get sucked into the general "open" studio area where everyone and their mother can paint. And you know, I'm okay with this... as long as they don't get paint on my stuff or steal things or store their crap in my area I really don't mind that my stuff gets scooted around... but! and this is a big but... faculty should know better than to set up a still life on the desk in a studio area... I mean that is what we pay for every semester. Not just a space, but a desk, chair, easel, and a locker.... it's a package. And you know, I haven't been diligent about making my presence known (aka I clean up after myself), but faculty should know better! So me and one of the other guys who rents out a space moved the table into the "open" studio area and moved a new table into my area, which I promptly covered with my own drawings and things and put a sign on. This better not happen again....

On to the better news - I brought in all of my little paintings to class and my professor thought they were really great and that they stand on their own feet as far as art pieces go and he gave me some tips on how to frame/mat them and some advise in general. It was good to get positive feedback from him because I really feel like everything I have done so far has been kind of lacking. I think it was just lacking that spontinaity. I am kind of worried about the little paintings though because that is what I put on my desk to mark it. They are so small... I really hope they don't wander off. (get stolen). That is another reason why I am not posting tomorrow... I want to work on some more of those little guys. I'm going to do some more yellow ones and then move into green...

Well that is all I have for you tonight. Have a good day!

ps - for reading all that you get a prize! An unedited photo of my studio while preping for the art and craft sale. Mr B is under the table too! He says "hi."

Pish Posh and Paint

2006-11-15T22:05:00.000-06:00

Well, no images of the crawling plaster body yet, I'm going to snap some in class tomorrow. Instead, just 9 little mixed media paintings that I did tonight. I had a pretty harsh crit today. They didn't like my idea, so I have to re-evaluate what I am doing for it... something similar, but different. I need to make it more potent.... anyway, I decided instead of hem hawing it out tonight and worrying about whether or not it was good enough, I would just do some little paintings instead... well collaged paintings. I made 13 total tonight, 4 are still drying, i will post those Friday. I'm really excited, it's been awhile since I painted and enjoyed myself. I think I'm just going to keep making them until.... well... until I don't want to anymore.

Some details about them: They are all aprox 4"x 6", mixed media (acrylic, fabric, wood glue, string, other stuff laying around), all on illustration board.

The colors are a little off, but pretty close.

In other news my friend Jill, the most neat-o lady ever, called me up and she is going to be showing some of her photography Dec 2 in Davenport.... anyone around that area should totally come out for it. I'm going to be there. E-mail me for details. Also she said that I might be able to get in... so I might have a show too... which would be so nice. DeKalb is kind of a cess pool as far as show going is concerned. Okay, so not to rant too much... but there are only about 4 gallery spots in DeKalb worth showing at... and every grad student and BFA candidate is trying to get a spot in one of those four spots and everyone from faculty to BFA candidates send out huge guilt trips if someone tries to get a show who doesn't need it. So after being here for over a year I have been too much of a wuss to thumb my nose and say screw you to the art community here.... what kind of show would that be even if I did, without some kind of showing up of the art community, it wouldn't be much of show now would it.... anyway... that's my rant.

I figure that I will try to get some shows around my old town and then next summer when I move to the Chicago area I will show at some galleries there. I'm really wanting to work up a bit of a reputation before I head up there. So that way the curators won't laugh when I submit proposals... it's really competitive. Anyway, it's 11pm and my bedtime. Have a good night.... oh yeah, one last thing... A new Crafty Leftovers Pattern will be going up on Friday... Late.... look for it Saturday.

Where did Monday Go?

2006-11-14T23:06:00.000-06:00

Oh my, I totally missed out on Monday posting. I did have some great times this weekend, it was so great to see Jason and the little lady Molly cat.... I miss them both already, sigh... Anyway, I already mention and posted the light box try out..... but I didn't post about casting my whole body for my sculpture project now did I! I'm pretty excited about it. It looks really super nice. It took 4 people an hour to coat me in plaster (they were actually covering the sheet that was over me, I needed a hollow human form draped in fabric, so a sheet covered in plaster while I'm under it was the answer). Anyway, it took another hour for it to dry! It was tough, 2 hours in a really uncomfortable crawling position... but it was so worth it. It looks great... it's charged with motion. In fact so much so that while it was drying (after I was out) everyone thought it was shifting to the side, but really it was just that way. It's one of those great dynamics that most artists try to capture and I was able to... well me and a crew of 4. I was so worried it wasn't going to work out and it did! But I still need to add a head (suffocation reasons prevented me from casting my head while under a sheet... no way to breath, that is bad)... and I need to smooth it out and do all of that other ocd stuff that I do with my sculpture. I also need to make the quilt top...
I figured out the numbers for it at work the other day... I will give you the run down:
Large Squares 12 1/2" x 12 1/2" - 169
Rectangles 12 1/2" x 2 1/2" - 1095
Small Squares 2 1/2" x 2 1/2" - 1764

I started with the small squares and have close to 400.... only 2628 to go! And with all of that excitement I am off to bed. Good night everyone... I will try to get some pictures of the cast for tomorrow's post.

Today is a day.

2006-11-11T19:48:00.000-06:00

Well it is and there is no lying there. I do have some stuff to show you/tell you about, which is kind of exciting for me. Unfortunately not as much as I had hoped, my camera is out in the car, and well, it's realllly cold, so maybe tomorrow more pictures for everyone.

First off the art and craft sale was a smashing success and we are thinking that we will have another one next semester. Over $1000 worth of art and craft was sold in two days... and because we (Ars Nova) wasn't taking a cut of that, it all went to the art students who participate, which makes me feel really good about the whole thing. I personally sold 7 wallets total, I had to make some more and bring them in for the second day, which made me happy. Anyway, so I do have 6 left over, but they aren't that nice, hence they did not sell... so I think I'm just going to pitch them (I was having issues sewing them so the stitching is reallllly messy, I am not so proud of that). Here is the one that I kept for myself.

Jason built a light box for product shots and this is our first round of experimenting with it.

Now that I finally have the hang of sewing with vinyl I will be making more of these, but I will be using my own photography instead of from a magazine. I don't want to get hit up for copyright infringement.

Anyway, this is one of the things that I bought from one of the other vendors there, it's the little bag I wanted, it didn't sell by the beginning of the second day so it's mine now!
I also bought the little white dish with a red bug on it, that I also told myself, if this doesn't sell I will buy it... so it's mine too.

In other randomness, I have decided not to resubscribe to ArtNews... and am thinking about subscribing to Cabinet instead.
Well, that's all I've got right now, it looks like we might be heading out soon and dinner is needed before then. Have a good weekend!