.....i make rust on purpose

anatomy

2012-01-21T21:51:00.000-08:00

the third assignment from the first (yes, the FIRST) day of class (she gave us like 8 that day, ok?! ;) it was way harder than i expected. i think mostly the ribcage, because a) i was drawing from a preserved skeleton, but the cartilage had all turned black, so it was hard to interpret where the ribs were, and b) the background was black (mine was white, you may have noticed ;) and there were almost ZERO shadows on this guy (in my human anatomy book from freshman year in college), so i kind of felt like i was making it up. that was a way longer apology explanation than this 10-minute drawing deserved.

looking at the anatomy book, though, inspired me to think about incorporating more anatomical drawings into my work. this has been something i've considered before, since i'm a nurse, and so have a little bit of an inside look to the human body.

also, i LOVE the opening credits on the show, House - have you seen them? anatomical drawings, text, MRI's, textures...LOVE. side note: i also love all the drawing in the sherlock holmes movies (especially the credits ... i just start smiling when they come on :).

this week...

2012-01-21T17:03:00.000-08:00

don't worry - i've still been making art and being creative this week... just haven't also had time to post about it (i've had a cold, and joey hasn't been napping much, so i'm pretty exhausted, among other things ;)... so here was basically my week (i've taken sundays off thus far):

Monday: finished painting this lady... i'm still not happy with it, but it's way better than it was! she went through phases of being pasty-white-sickly-looking, little-miss-sunburned-pinky, and fake-tan-orange girl before finally ending up like this :)

as i went through the stages of making her, my two-year-old kept eyeing my progress with his usual running commentary: "mommy, is that your playdough? what you making?" and then, "you made a person, mommy? i like it. :)" and the best "what's she doing, mommy? praying?" yep, buddy, that's exactly what she's doing: praying.

tuesday: ok, this was the craft at MOPS, but i'm counting it as being creative... i did come home and paint the frame white ;) it's dry-erase - cute, right?

wednesday: pencil drawing of an animal (leopard? ocelot? cheetah? my son assures me it's a cheetah) my husband photographed on our trip to israel a few years ago... i chose it because i identified with the pose ;)

thursday: got out and made some "art in nature". i had picked all these hollowed-out, almost petrified pomegranates off my sister's tree last weekend before i even saw the assignment this week, and i was like "perfect! i actually have a use for them, besides just enjoying them myself!" :) took joey to run around at the park while i arranged and rearranged dried pomegranates ("you touching the ew, mommy?"). it was great. now i want to draw some of these combinations :D

friday: a journal page assignment. wrote a bunch of stuff down and then painted over it :) it was supposed to be about the "season" we're in (eg, winter)... since we don't exactly have distinguishable seasons around here, i thought about what DOES happen only at certain times of year... the migration of the monarch butterflies ends with them wintering in southern california - perfect! in pismo beach, near where i grew up, there's this grove of eucalyptus trees by the beach that is currently (probably - i'm not there right now to check) covered in these orange beauties!

and today, saturday... we shall see!

2012-01-14T21:29:00.000-08:00

day 5 of the class: journaling. i think this is basically "putting it all together".
for this assignment, we journaled about what we've learned so far, and then drew, colored, and painted over it. this was the first portrait i've done without using a person or photo for reference. just made it up {intuitive, they call it}. i thought it was done when i took this first photo, but then it seemed garishly bright when i looked at it on the computer screen. so i added some white, and it turned into the piece below. i think this one looks more like me (or, at least, like a person in general), but i miss the colors of the first draft, especially in the neck area... all part of the process...!

sculpted

2012-01-14T21:21:00.000-08:00

i've never sculpted before yesterday (besides the occasional playdough veggietales character for my son ;)... watched a couple of videos from my class, and it looked super-easy...

yeah, not so much... especially faces.

i do love this simple little worshiper-woman...

especially the little crown of rosetted bedecking her crown...

but this is what she looks like today - somehow her lips disappeared, and her entire bottom half is cracked. guess i have some things to learn ;) i was hoping she'd dry by today so i could paint her... but i guess i'll be filling in cracks and letting those dry first! and making some lips?

expressive

2012-01-13T14:44:00.000-08:00

this was a very quickly done "expressive" portrait (meaning it's not meant to be representational - not meant to look exactly like the subject in real life - it's supposed to express an emotion by the use of different marks and colors...) - i love it :)

i started with a ten-minute sketch (with shading) using vine charcoal, and then i added color using water-soluble artist crayons. instead of wetting them with water afterwards, i just went straight over it with a layer of creamy white paint. i'll definitely be trying this set of techniques again! :)

what emotion do you see? just curious :)

and today i drew him ;)

2012-01-11T22:40:00.000-08:00

this class i'm taking is awesome. and insane ;) at least if you were actually expecting to complete it in the allotted 5 weeks - but she leaves it all up for a year, so there's not a huge time crunch! good thing, since the first DAY had like 8 assignments and this is the second one (draw someone you feel deeply connected to - my two-year-old, joey!)! and, yes, this is all instagram-filtered up ;)

today i drew me...

2012-01-10T19:51:00.000-08:00

it was during joey's nap, and my only two mirrors in the house are in wake-him-up-if-you-walk-by-on-the-squeaky-hardwood-floor territory. so i grabbed a vintage handheld mirror that was decorating my desk, and drew what i could see! :) not so sure about the yellow oil pastels... i've never really worked with them before, and am not really sure how to move them successfully... so three self-portraits in 24 hours, and my nose still looks deformed, and it doesn't quite look like me (although, this is the most attractive one of the three, so you can think i look like this if you want ;) but i am so inspired to keep drawing and practicing! the self-portrait was only ONE of the assignments for the first day, so i'll definitely be continuing to work in drawing in the days & weeks to come! :)
however, mondays are for drawing. tuesdays are writing! so i'm about to start the lesson for today (i have been looking forward to this all day! :) and do a little creative writing, sipping vanilla rooibos tea at starbucks :)

class has begun!

2012-01-10T00:20:00.000-08:00

first assignment is a self-portrait... i only watched a third of the videos misty posted for today, and after the first one on portrait drawing, i knew i had to stop and play with that technique before moving onto another (and hopefully finding a "favorite" way of expressing :)

this was my first attempt (my first graphite portrait ever, i think! i did draw my face one other time a few years ago, but it was with charcoal - these are pencil). i was having a hard time seeing lights & darks so i turned off all the lights save one spotlight. this ended up complicating things, but i was glad to have the core shadows to highlights to practice with. this turned out looking NOTHING like me. i felt like it was because i started with the wrong proportions (eyes too big, too far apart, too low). so instead of using like a "universal" grid to shape my self-portrait, i made my own of my actual face (below) by placing a transparency on the bathroom mirror and drawing the grid (plus a few features) with a sharpie.

so this second attempt at a portrait definitely turned out looking more like me. but they are both pretty angular, and the proportions still aren't quite right. but i'm going to bed, and i plan to try a more "expressive" one tomorrow (read: not a sour expression like these ones. guess i need more practice to get my emotions into the expressiveness of the portrait - cause i was super-happy when i was drawing both of these... can't you tell??? ;)

i made: a journal!

2012-01-08T20:39:00.000-08:00

i've always wanted to try bookbinding, but it always looked so intimidating as i tried to read two-dimensional words to describe the process of coptic binding... not what i ended up doing here.
my 5-week online art class with misty mawn starts tomorrow! and we're supposed to have a journal to work in. so, along with most of the other participants, i made one! she showed us this easy way to sew your pages directly into the cover to make a spine. i used watercolor paper so i can paint in it! the cover is a piece of a dropcloth i had used for practice when i was brainstorming for this project. it's part of the word "beauty". i love that it's abstract ;) and i can't wait to use it :) good thing class starts tomorrow!

ps. i made this journal over the last two days. not today. i didn't do anything creative today. literally. i laid around on the couch and tried to get up - all. day. at least i'm finally blogging!
pps. i also forgot to journal one day this week. other than that, i have kept all my resolutions so far this year! uh, maybe i forgot to floss last night. ;) how are yours going?

i am my beloved's

2012-01-05T20:00:00.000-08:00

i've been wanting to get a tattoo for over a year. one that says "i am my beloved's and he is mine" on my foot (picture it running in a v shape just inside where flip flops sit). jason and i keep going back and forth about its permanence. still haven't come to a decision, so today, i decided to paint some shoes with that same phrase (a lot less permanent ;).

i started with these shoes that i never really wore, and painted all the fabric with fabric paint! after removing the ribbon, of course :) sanded them, and wrote the script with a sharpie :) they might get another makeover tomorrow... i can't tell until i see them in the daylight ;)

the meaning behind this is twofold: it is sort of a "remembrance marker" for both my relationship with jason and with God. we came out of a super-hard time together with a renewed commitment to our relationship (and while some people might just renew their vows, i want a tattoo - more permanent ;) also, i had just come out of a really long time of darkness, doubt, and despair, and feel like this would be sort of an ebenezer to God's faithfulness... i once was lost, but now am found.

so, we'll see about the tattoo, but for now i still have some memorial shoes :)

2012-01-05T01:24:00.000-08:00

so my creative project the last 2 days (i said make art/be creative every day, not finish a project every day ;) has been turning this old t-shirt dress into a studio apron! inspired by watching misty mawn creating in her studio with an apron safely protecting her clothes underneath, i've always wanted to have one specifically to use in art-making... one that doesn't matter if it gets paint all over it because that's its intended use! so here's mine... and i took shots along the way to give you sort of a DIY... :)

i started with this dress, which had been cleaned out of my closet to get rid of. i love the crochet details of it, but it has just never fit right (that i can remember) so i was freeing my closet from it... but what a great way to salvage it! here's how:

step one, CUTTING: i first cut directly down the center of the back of the dress. then, i cut off the sleeves and continued the curve down and back until it was at the same height as the string that would tie around the waist. third, i trimmed a few inches off either edge, making it the right width to wrap around my hips. out of that excess, i cut two long strips for the top straps (mine were about 3 1/2" x 20").

step two, SEWING: i have told you before that i am no seamstress (and if you look close at these, it will prove it.) i left it as simple as possible... you don't get a lot of extra time when you have a two-year-old! first, i sewed the straps, turned them into long tubes, and turned right sides out. then, i made a seam along the unfinished edges. i (lucky for me :) had a tie already attached to this dress, so i just sewed it in a straight line to the edge. last, i sewed on the straps to the top, to be tied behind the neck.

then, my favorite part: i added a row of little rosettes along the seams of the ties

as you can see, i made good use of all the scraps that got cut off in the reconstruction process :)

here's a video tutorial on how i make the rosettes - i'm sure there are lots of ways, and i think i made this one up myself, so if you have more sophisticated knowledge, please ignore my movie ;)

and, voila! a finished apron, ready to get splattered with paint, dotted with beeswax, and otherwise stained with evidence of art-making! (this was the best shot i could get of me wearing it, home alone, and not knowing how to use the timer function on jason's Canon 50D - sorry!

yesterday's art: he has my eyes

2012-01-03T12:18:00.000-08:00

this piece started out as a drawing of joey. i actually first tried to do a real-life drawing of him while he watched a movie, but he didn't even stay still enough THEN! this two-year-old is an active kid! ;) so i grabbed an old photo of him and drew from that. i hated it by the time i was done. i need lots of practice drawing faces (guess that's one thing that might come out of the class i'm starting with Misty Mawn next week! so excited!). even though the eyes turned out a little funky, i like them. i think i recognize a little bit of myself in them... i asked joey this morning "who is this?" and he said "it's joey!" so i guess he sees a little of himself in them, too ;) i sort gave the piece a "grid" feel by touching corners of these found objects - two of them were found on our family walk down the railroad tracks on new year's ( and the square nut was from my collection... :)

so far, so good with making art, journaling, and flossing every day -

how are your resolutions going?

the beginning

2012-01-01T23:44:00.000-08:00

before i posted this, i had exactly 67 posts on each of my blogs (which is a little crazy, considering that i started this one 2 1/2 years ago now, and the other one, only this summer!). for a lot of reasons, my art (and therefore, this blog) has been somewhat neglected the last couple of months.

but, as you may have noticed, it's new year's. january first, 2012 (the last year of our world ;). and i have resolved, among other things, to make art every day. i know, you say, i've made that decision before, and even posted about it) twice: here and here. but it never lasted past a couple of weeks. first of all, i'm going into it with a healthier attitude this time. usually if i miss a day in something like that, it's all over. i've failed at my resolution. but now, for me, although i do plan to make art/do something creative every day, and post about my adventures in creativity, i know (now) that i'm human. and life happens. if i miss a day or week here or there, it's ok. but it has just proven (along with eating well, exercising, resting, etc, also on my list) to help me thrive and live and love better, so i'm choosing life here!

second of all, they say it takes 21 days to make (or break) a habit. in the past, i haven't even lasted that long... but this year, i only need to get through the first EIGHT DAYS on my own - then, i'll be forced to make art every day for 5 weeks, thanks to misty mawn and her open studio workshop jason bought me for christmas! :) i can't wait!!! and so, by the end of february, i will have made art every day for two months, and i'll be good to go! (right?? ;)

so, to start it off, i did a "blind contour drawing" (you draw just the outlines of something, looking only at the object/person and not at your paper) of jason, and then turned it into a mixed media piece by attaching it to a canvas board, painting, and texturing, attaching a piece of wood that we found on a family walk down the railroad tracks today, and journaling in some song lyrics... the beginning of a david crowder band song:

Lord, i'm tired
so tired of walking
and Lord, i'm so alone
and Lord, the dark
is creeping in
creeping up to swallow me
i think i'll stop
rest here awhile

like i said, it's the beginning of the song. it gets more hopeful as it goes along, and i trust that's how this story will go, too.

i forgot!!!

2011-12-28T22:29:00.000-08:00

in the craziness of the holiday blur, i totally forgot to tell anyone (not even my family!) that two of my pieces were featured in the Jan/Feb 2012 Cloth Paper Scissors, since i was a finalist in two categories of their "Artisan Search"! here's my two little bios, one for art journaling, and one for my jewelry, with one of my pieces next to each :)

also, i have the cutest ~~two-year-old~~ kid in the world.

o come, immanuel

2011-12-07T14:59:00.000-08:00

christmas tree and chai smells intermingle
and both are bettered,
if that were even possible
pungent fresh spicy sweet aromas
greet me as i come to this moment
of longing,
heart wide open,
hoping for a supernatural acquaintance
with him for whom i yearn every moment.
him who i push away in my moments
of deepest need
for him.
my senses of smell and taste, exuberant
as i tell him how much i love
what he made for me!

now i gently cup a little dead leaf
in my touch-sensing palm.
all browns, and a crack breaks
through the leathery loveliness
of life-veins now dry.
its top gathered as a stage-curtain
waiting to reveal the glory
and beauty of One
so deeply desiring of my own affection.
my gaze turns from the created to the One.
i adore him.
o come.

that was a couple of days ago. today, our advent calendar revealed the task to "read a Christmas book." i immediately went searching through joey's too-full shelves in search of one. i know he must have one or two, at least, right? i found one little dumb foam book called jingle, jingle, and then read him the nativity chapter in a bible stories book, hoping to unpack more as i get through the "christmas boxes". but as i sensed God inviting me to rest and read the next chapter of Beautiful Outlaw, to become better-acquainted with this Jesus, i was not expecting a Christmas story! but, on the second page, here is what i read:

No king has ever taken such a humble path. His first step was a staggering descent - the Son of God becomes a son of man:
Let the same mind be in you that was also in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not regard equality with God something to be exploited, but emptied himself, taking the form of a slave, being born in human likeness. And being found in human form, he humbled himself and became obedient. (Philippians 2:5-8 NRSV)
"Humbled himself?"
"Humility" hardly begins to describe the incarnation.
That's like saying it would be a humble thing for you to become a goldfish, to live in the bowl, in a fishy world, trying to help those other fishies become something more like Phoenixes. It boggles the mind. The eternal Son of God, "Light of very Light, Very God of Very God...one substance with the Father," spent nine months developing in Mary's uterus. Jesus passed through her birth canal. He had to learn to walk. The Word of God had to learn to talk. He who calls the stars by name had to learn the names of everything, just as you did. "This is a cup. Can you say cup? Cuuup."
Or did you think baby Jesus came into the world with the vocabulary of Dictionary.com?
For ages upon ages, his generous hand fed every creature on earth; now it is he that has to be fed, spoon-fed, drooling most of it down his chin like every other toddler. The Son of God doesn't even know how to tie his shoes. Someone had to teach him how to tie those sandals John the Baptist said none of us were worthy to untie. "The rabbit goes around the tree and down through the hole...like that. Now you try it." Picture seven-year-old Jesus in the shop out back, learning from Joseph how to use a hammer and a saw. He who hung galaxies in such perfect poise, like a hundred billion mobiles, has to be shown how to nail two boards together.
I take my shoes off. The humility of this is beyond words.
John Eldredge, Beautiful Outlaw

i hope this speaks of christmas to you as it did to me. o come let us adore him, emmanuel, God with us, Jesus.

lately...

2011-10-25T18:22:00.000-07:00

i've been making jewelry! despite the fact that i didn't win the cloth paper scissors artisan 2012 contest, i've been prolific in my jewelry-making! mostly motivated because of the boutique i'll be a vendor at in a couple of weeks (the Light of Christmas)! so here are the ones i spotlighted on my other blog last week: 1) green valve necklace, 2) buttons and lace ring, 3) found wood necklace, 4) yellow pendant necklace, 5) drill gauge/riveted flowers statement necklace, and 6) found melted chrome statement necklace

a bit of mystery...

2011-10-06T21:20:00.000-07:00

before a couple of years ago, mystery drove me crazy. i wanted everything to fit into neat little black and white categories (that i understood). these last three years or so have been a journey (as if they rest of life hadn't been). of stopping. quitting my expectations of how life and God should work. of opening my heart to beauty and mystery. God has met me here so deeply. but i can promise that were i to tell the stories of these meetings to someone still in black-and-white world, i'd at LEAST get a raised eyebrow, if not a "where is that found in the Bible?" lecture.

part of this process has been realizing how uniquely God designed me (and you). that sounds obvious, but i'm pretty sure before, i understood my place to be as a part of a giant, undifferentiated blob. maybe each section with different "gifts", but not different in the way we relate to our Creator, to each other. how wrong i was! God's plan has been to take me down a path i would have never traveled if he had not hedged my way with thorns (hosea 2:6, speaking of how God gets israel to turn from other lovers back to himself, to his heart). toward creativity, toward knowing who i am, toward his deep mysterious heart of love.

my world suddenly stopped fitting neatly in the boxes i had been given and so long cared for. life became messy. and i was finally able to be truthful down in my soul, about my searching, my longing, my desires. desire so fathomless it cannot be met, except for by the one who is also fathomless.

i have long been wanting to post these abstract shots that i absolutely adore! something about the structure of the grid, even though it's messy, and you can't quite tell what's going on besides it... and the color. so much beauty to my eye. and i'm sure not to everyone's! because God designed my creative soul to love rusty and torn and weathered. somehow that reflects him and how he loves us as we are, worn patina and all.

the tree of life

2011-09-19T22:09:00.000-07:00

come away with me...

be still, and delight in beauty...

my my grandpa passed away today. it was sort of sudden, and a shock, but really his health has been failing slowly as he's gotten older. i'm having a hard time processing it, with the suddenness of it, and how far away my dad's whole side of the family lives... joey got to meet him last year around this time, and that was our last trip up to northern california. i'm thankful that he (just in the last decade or so) chose to trust Christ. never too late until it is.

trying to process all this has reminded me of an amazing movie i saw recently that i've been wanting to recommend: The Tree of Life. it's an anomaly of a movie to me. super artistic, abstract, and spiritual, but has big (BIG) name actors in it, like Brad Pitt, Sean Penn, and my current favorite actress, Jessica Chastain. as a friend described it, this movie is deeply Christian, as long as your idea of a "christian movie" doesn't stop at "fireproof". it's basically about grieving, learning to process with God all of life, seeing the bigger picture. as i said, it's really abstract, with lengthy sequences of creation imagery, and lots of whispers. dialogue between a woman and her God, a man and his brother. if you get annoyed by lack of plot, or feeling lost as to what exactly is going on in a linear way, be forewarned: this movie does not fit into any neat and tidy categories. but is a.mazing.

all these shots are from a day i spent alone (rapture!) at descanso gardens. a time to rest, be alone with my God, enjoy his created glorious beauty. he met me there and i danced with him. more glory in just these flowers and trees and SPACE than a soul can take in (in a day or ever!)... hope you can get a little taste of it here... and then go. - drive to pasadena (la canada flintridge, really), and take a breather for yourself. $8 for a day is so worth it...

"my spot"

handmade gifts

2011-09-17T02:19:00.000-07:00

the three little headbands i made for my sister for her birthday (i took pictures of me wearing them for the sole purpose of submitting as a possibility of something i could make for the upcoming Light of Christmas boutique... but someone else is already making flower hair accessories. so i'm gonna have to be more creative ;) i realized that i love making things for people as gifts! but not really just "crafty" things, where i can like, find a pattern and copy step-by-step instructions... i like to take things my own direction so that they end up not just being a labor of love & time, but truly an expression of me! so, as i have a couple of different "projects" in the works, i'm having a hard time figuring out ways to really involve others like i would love to... cause they're not me... but whatever "we" make will be an expression of us (and me)... sounds like a control issue ;)

first of all is the ever-present "project" of the uptown aesthetics team... i have a bunch of ideas swirling around in my head (this being one of those sleepless nights), but i'm not sure how to implement them while still maintaining my (& my family's) sanity... i have GOT to learn to delegate, let go! ;)

the second thing that i currently have on my plate is that i'm in charge of the gift bags & nametags for our november women's retreat... and i have a hard time not choosing to make something handmade to go in every single of the 120 bags... pretty sure that, not only will the nametags & bags be embellished, but there'll be something designed my yours truly in there... but again, how not to let that completely overwhelm my life involves a team working together... which means i need to come up with something easily reproducible (a "craft" project of my own design, i suppose?)... and a team ;)

and there are more... and i can't wait ;) to see what pours out of my heart in the form of creativity to serve others. so my heart's desire and a passion that is always resting in my soul, waiting for expression! wanna join me? ;)

"happy pretty!" as joey says, in his attempt to say "happy birthday, kristi" ;)

couple of things to share

2011-09-07T20:45:00.000-07:00

it was a good day for an estate sale... found some sweet vintage stuff, and some actual useful things that i'd had on my mental list of things to buy - but in way cooler form! like these awesome ramekin things (at least i assume that's what they are lol - couldn't resist the set for $4.50!) , and the turquoise vase :)

something i made this summer that somehow never ended up on here, so i needed to share it with you now... this piece i made for jason for father's day! i took a shot of jason and joey and used that for the imagery, and a poem i wrote about fatherhood. turned out fun, and he loves it, and it's hanging above his computer :) note: the last 2 pictures are more true to color - it's not as vibrant as it looks in this first one.

can you read that? if not, i can post the text...

oh, and i love my family....

some news (not pregnant)...!

2011-09-07T20:30:00.000-07:00

omg!!

i am a semifinalist in the Cloth Paper Scissors Artisan Search 2012!

(my all-time favorite art magazine)

i entered this last year in three of the five categories, fully expecting to be chosen... and was a little crushed when i wasn't. i didn't make a lot of art for a while after that, and didn't blog for over 5 months! blogged about it a bit here. i guess i need to learn how to deal with disappointment a little better... ;) but anyways, THIS year, i knew not to get my hopes up - a lot of great artists enter, and a lot of them have been creating much longer than me... but i'm in!! i entered 3 categories again this year: mixed media jewelry, art journal and bookmaking, and collage and assemblage.

they posted the 5 semifinalists in each of the 5 categories today, and i'm in TWO!! WHAT?! so cool.

you've already seen the art journal pages, since i posted them here earlier this year (the last two with the model girls, and the "known" one were my entry :) i'll keep you posted - i have to send all my six pieces (the other 3 are my flower jewelry - i need to do a quick photo shoot with them to post on my other blog before i send them off to massachusetts!) in by the first week of october! exciting times! :)

2011-08-28T22:48:00.000-07:00

why does lying in bed awake at night inspire me so much?! it’s then that so many ideas for creating and writing start pouring out! it’s not JUST the time of day, cause if i was UP during those hours, i would not feel the same… probably because i would still be trying to fit as many things as possible into my day – all the organizing, reading, sorting, cleaning, learning that’s been on my to do list all day. but once i’m in bed, i’m not doing my “to-do”s anymore. i’m lying still, resting… and i guess my inspiration has a chance to catch up with me (on those rare nights that i don’t hit the bed already asleep from the exhaustion of the day).

like tonight, my mind was just going wherever, and i remembered the fact that the only 2 doctors who have ever put a scalpel to me were both born in Colombia ON THE SAME DAY. weird. somehow they ended up here in the same practice. one did my c-section, and one released my gallbladder… so then stream of consciousness, i thought, “and my father-in-law’s Colombian”… and tonight when we were deciding what to do, we talked about the movie theater, and the movie Colombiana that’s playing right now, and i immediately remembered the “colombiana” soda we were drinking this afternoon! such a strange assortment of events to all come together in one night in one mind. after this, i also realized that this means my son is a fourth Colombian (my husband being half), a fourth Argentinian, and the other half (my half) EuroAmerican mutt… oh, my stream of consciousness (and, yes, even at this late hour, i do realize that this is probably not exciting to anyone but me ;)

and on that note, here's some shots of "the little details" of another time that i got to stop and relax and allow the present to catch up with me, take in life, enjoy beauty... our anniversary trip to catalina (if you want to see my outfits from that trip, and my handsome husband, go here)

don't you love the little details? a kiss, a silhouette, a reflection, an amazing compilation of color and shape and rust and sky in that last shot...
ps. i just discovered how to update to the new version of blogger, so post should be better formatted in the future :) it wouldn't let me fix this one though...

2011-08-26T14:13:00.000-07:00

first of all, i just HAD to post this picture. my sister took it (& instagrammed) last night during joey's bath. and i just think it proves hoe irresistibly cute my son is! so i had to share ;)

i also wanted to share this piece that i made at least a year ago, but has now been strategically placed in our house where people can actually see it, and there have been endless comments (and many requests to help them make their own!) so i thought i'd do a DIY on here. i'm pretty sure i got this technique from a book (maybe Image Transfer Workshop by McElroy & Wilson? - yep, i just looked - page 20 :) - it's called making a "gel skin". they used it to include in a mixed-media art piece, as the top layer to show the rest of the layers underneath, while still showcasing the image. of course, i did my own "take" on it (as usual), and just used the gel skin itself as a work of art! you choose - here's how:

1. print out a laserjet copy of the picture you want to use (you could even do color if you had color laserjet capabilities). you're gonna want to increase the contrast some, to get a more striking image.

2. paint on a layer of gel medium (of course, most mixed-media artists will tell you, use Golden brand, but really any that they sell in the art aisle at michael's have worked fine for me! and since i'm not a "real artist", i can tell you that, and shop there ;). let dry.

3. repeat 3-4 times. let dry overnight.

4. soak the back with a spray bottle, let it soak in, then begin rolling off the paper with your fingers (gently, so you don't tear the image! but it does take some pressure - you'll get it with practice :) until all the paper backing has been removed, and you are left with your "gel skin"!

5. if you want the look i created here, take the backing out of a stand-alone frame, and simply "stick" your gel skin to the back of the inside glass! it should adhere like one of those "window cling" thingys.

or, do something totally different with it! and tell me about it! :)

this is actually the back of the piece - that's why everyone loves it so much! with where we placed it (see below) strategically between two rooms, you can see it from both, and with very different effects - here, the afternoon light is shining through it, which just makes it luminescent (yeah, that's pretty much the definition of luminescent, but whatever ;).

please ignore all the smudges and scratches on the sliding glass door here (i have a toddler! and i am home alone, and just had my gallbladder surgically removed 3 days ago, or else i might've cleaned it! ok, probably not. but here, i did the next best thing - edit in photoshop so they're much less visible ;)

ah, finally, a shot of the twice-before-noted strategic placement of the piece that engendered all the comments

(this is also one of my new favorite "comfy" spots in the house after we did a little rearranging last week :)

How he loves...

2011-08-12T23:58:00.000-07:00

I just had one of those moments - you know when people talk about seeing their kid and realizing how God sees them? With so much grace and love? I always feel guilty when I hear people say that. Of course I love my son, and he often delights me with just being himself. But he also frequently drains me. Demands and I feel I dont have enough to give. I think instead how much I am NOT like God as a parent - how infinitely greater a father he is than I could ever be as a mother.
But tonight...
It's just after 11 now, and I haven't been able to fall asleep (a combination of having too much sweet tea to make it through the worn hours of the evening, and the beckoning prospect of reading The Help - trying to finish it by Sunday when some friends are going to see the movie :). So I was much less annoyed and weary this time when Joey woke up three hours into his night's sleep. Just beginning to whimper and cry out intermittently, I could tell he was feeling agitated. I had the deep and sudden desire to run in there and catch him up in my arms of pure mother's love. But he's had issues sleeping lately, and I've been trying to get him back to being able to sleep through the night without extra doses of warm milk and eighteen lullabies.
So I waited to see if he'd drop back off to sleep, ignoring my urge to run in there.
But I started to really feel a push to go in, snatch him up, and just love on him. Like it was God's spirit within my own. So once I realized that, all caution thrown to the wind, I rushed in. Picked him up to hold him against my chest. But he was so in between sleeping and waking, and so agitated, he fought me! Well, THAT was unexpected. He usually melts into my arms once I come to rescue him in the middle of the night. He kept crying out as though I wasnt even holding him, and began yelling out that he wanted milk. I told him okay, I'd get him some. Headed to the kitchen to warm it up to his perfect taste, he was yelling and fighting the whole time. I scooped him up again, and he was just arching and crying. Saying "milk" but refusing it when I offered it. Like he was oblivious to the fact that I was giving him exactly what he needed - mom's cuddles and comfort and deep love - AND what he'd asked for - milk. He finally stopped thrashing long enough to get the cup in his mouth, and he succumbed.
I let him drink for minute before starting my soft humming "oh how he loves us" - a song I sing with his lullabies pretty much every night - had just sung (along with my husband, at joey's request ;) three hours earlier in the same rocking chair. He told me no. Didn't want my song. But I kept humming and holding and loving and feeding and nurturing. And soon he'd relaxed into my embrace, contentedly sucking his midnight snack, and asking for more singing when there was a lull. No longer fighting. When he had had enough, he turned to me and said sweetly " all done" as only a toddler can, and then "nunnight".

I finished my song with tears in my eyes as I began to see the similarities between these moments with my son, and how we (I) so often treat God. He comes to our cry, longing and delighting to meet our needs, to connect with us in our desires. And we fight him. Treat him like the enemy. Like we know better how it is our needs should be met. Joey seemed so angry tonight. How often we arch against His sweet embrace, bent on OUR way. When what we really need and so deeply yearn for is right there. He is so willing. Loves to look past our immaturity and delight in the real person. Thank you God, for another reminder that you never give up on me, and are always waiting for me to turn and run back into your arms again.

He is jealous for me
Loves like a hurricane - I am a tree
Bending beneath the weight of his wind and mercy
And all of a sudden, I am unaware of these afflictions, eclipsed by glory
And I realized just how beautiful you are
And how great your affections are for me
Oh, how he loves us
Oh, how he loves us
How he loves us, oh

Yeah, he loves us
Oh, how he loves us
Oh how he loves us
Oh how he loves...
And we are his portion, and he is our prize
Drawn to redemption by the grace in his eyes
If his grace is an ocean, we're all sinking
And heaven meets earth like an unforeseen kiss
And my heart turns violently inside of my chest
I don't have time to maintain these regrets
When I think about the way that
He loves us
Oh, how he loves us
Oh how he loves us
Oh how he loves...
(how he loves by John Mark McMillan)

accidental art

2011-08-10T03:11:00.000-07:00

it seems that the best blogging time for me is when i can't sleep at night. i thought tonight was going to be such a night - had coffee late in the afternoon, had an impromptu hip-hop dance party, was getting stuff cleaned and organized... when jason was ready for bed. and i fell right to sleep! ...only to be awakened an hour later by joey, who i discovered had a fever. 102.9 by my thermometer (which i don't trust - it usually says my body temperature is like 97, much lower than it actually is). so i took care of him, but then lay WIDE awake in bed for a while... before deciding to make good use of this time of having energy...! so i already posted on my other blog, and then i remembered i promised a post here about "accidental art" a few weeks ago. i've had all these pictures just waiting to share with you! so i guess now's the time!a little about "accidental art": i started keeping my eyes open when i was reading "How to be an explorer of the world" by Keri Smith. her basic premise is one of being more aware of the world, and as i have been on a quest to become ever more fully "present", i took on some of her assignments... this was "exploration #27", and the goal was to find accidental art - things that were not created on purpose (eg paint spills, things that have rusted or cracked from their original state, etc). i was amazed when i opened my eyes, how much more i saw than i would have walking the same route any other day. i hope you find some of these as delightful as i do!

oh, the colors and the textures! couldn't have done it better if they'd tried! my favorite ones were the painted jungle gym (below) that have gone through layer after layer every year, only to get worn off and redone once again... beautiful!

a much-needed mini vacation...

2011-07-30T06:13:00.000-07:00

our 8th anniversary (!) was this week, and my whole family is in town from all parts of the western hemisphere, so they watched the kiddo while my love and i took off for catalina island alone! (and bought this cute wooden horse for joey - at a thrift store for a dollar, haha - i think i want to use it as one of those travel-icon-things, like the gnome in Amelie - take it with us on all our travels, and document our adventures - and its!)

our sweet little victorianesque pink hotel :)

we have lots more photos from the trip, but we haven't gotten to sort through them yet, so i thought i'd at least share the couple i had on my iphone! :)

my favorite part of these little jaunts (ok, this is only our second time ;) is the boat ride... wind whipping my hair (and dress) in all directions, salty ocean spray, so much sparkling blue... here's the sharks we bought at the candy store on the island (i know - they really look like they're swimming out there, right? ;) - in addition to some awesome childhood-memory-inducing jawbreakers :)

art for joey's room!

2011-07-22T20:31:00.000-07:00

i had some inspiration a while back to make more playful art. i had brainstormed about toys i loved as a kid, and wanted to turn those into little artworks... so i did! as i created them, i noticed that the color schemes went perfectly with Joey's room! perfect! art about my childhood in my one-year-old's room - feels like i'm passing something on... plus, this bear that i drew actually does sit on joey's shelf (his name is peter... except for a couple months in grade school, when i decided i wanted "him" to be a female bear - then it was petrina ;), so it all works!
i'm not really sure what this toy was exactly... i think it was a little plastic coin bank. but it stands out in my memory as a "favorite", so i drew it :)
a tiny double-decker bus that i rediscovered recently and had included as some of my decor in my art room - knew i needed to include it with this project, as i have very fond feelings associated with it (along with the mailbox) from my childhood bedroom that i lived in (with 3 younger sisters!) until age 8.
peter: isn't he so friendly? he used to have a knit nightcap and sweater when i was a kid, but those got lost somewhere along the way to 2011...
you can see it best in these last couple of pictures, but i wanted to make sure i said that what i drew this bear on was an actual first-grade composition i wrote ABOUT peter. i wished afterwards that i'd made copies first. i think i still have the rough draft somewhere, complete with Mrs. Birlew's red markings... but i think it makes the piece even more authentic-feeling, using actual personal ephemera. and the porous composition paper took to the beeswax nicely in this encaustic piece! the other two pieces were drawn on a theology book page and a children's book page, respectively, before being adhered with the beeswax to the boxes.

can you see my name there? "Jamie Miller" (well, that USED to be my name, before i attached myself to this wonderful guy with whom i will be celebrating our 8th wedding anniversary next week!) - a little difficult to read because the pencil from the back of the page shows through once the paper has been saturated with the beeswax - i love seeing how beeswax/encaustic medium transforms a given piece of paper (or fabric, or plant, or... my experiments have taken many forms ;).

new blog: transformed by design

2011-07-19T22:53:00.000-07:00

oh! i forgot to tell you! i started posting on my other blog! and it's (dun dun dun)

transformedbydesign.blogspot.com

after i chose the name, i couldn't sleep for two hours because of second guessing it. it seems too boring or stuffy to me, like it'd be a section header in a master's thesis or something. i wanted to make it something more fun and fresh and colorful... but, alas, once you choose it, you're stuck with it! and it really does encompass a lot of what i want that blog to be about: the process of transformation, and it being "by design" meaning 1)on purpose, and 2)created to be this way by God's design... and ALSO, the fact that i plan to include lots of little things i've altered (transformed): clothes, accessories, etc. AND that i PERSONALLY have been transformed already by the design process - by discovering my creativity, and the ways that i personally and uniquely reflect God to the world! so, although it's a little stuffy (and the fact that i realized afterwards also, that there's a fashion blog called "alteredbydesign" already, which is very similar), i'm sticking with it/stuck with it :) so check it out if you haven't already! tomorrow's post will be a food one...see you there...!

p.s. can you tell i've been obsessed with instagram lately? along with the rest of the iphone world, i guess :)

renegade!

2011-07-18T00:47:00.000-07:00

it is so very therapeutic for me to go places like this. i come away bursting with inspiration, but most of all, i feel like i'm not alone - there are other people out there like me! and there's proof! :)

i am absolutely in love with this shop - everything about it. here's a couple shots of what she had displayed (and how she displayed it, i love almost as much as the jewelry itself!)...

and in other news...

i'm starting a new blog! this one is not going away (oh, no it's not!) - just a new one with a different focus. this one will remain my art and poetry and life and thoughts blog. my new one is specifically about becoming healthy. about the transformation i foresee taking place as i embark on a new journey (starting soon, details to come!) toward wholeness, body and soul. beginning the journey toward eating healthy, enjoying exercising my body, and - get this - fashion! (what?? i'm a fashion blogger??? how did THIS happen? i never thought i'd see the day!) it all just came to me as an idea at once, to sort of document the process of transformation via "fashion". i have only recently begun to be interested in developing a sense of personal fashion and beauty (i have a hard time even calling it "fashion" - more just "an expression of me in what i wear" :) but over time i have become more and more interested in letting my own creations become a part of what i put on, personalizing my wardrobe, changing and growing over time. and i have really been in a process of transformation that God has been taking me through, in relation to my having "a beauty to unveil", and i think this is part of it. so, expect great things!

beauty. creativity. delicious. colorful. me.

my goal is to post every day on one or the other of these two blogs (but we all know how that can go with a toddler in tow, so it's at least something to shoot for!), so if you haven't heard from me for a while over here, check the other one! i'll tell you the address in the next post, once i have something posted on my new blog!

ps. i'm sorry to those of you whose lives this complicates, as you have this blog set as your homepage, and now will never know when to be jumping between them (this includes a very large readership of my sister and April - i'm sorry ;) - just think of it as "spicing things up a bit" ;)

finding beauty every day...

2011-06-15T14:23:00.000-07:00

on lambert road...

on the walk between michael's and starbucks...

in the little things i notice

in "accidental art" (more on that later)

in my amazing family...

(also, can you tell i've been obsessed with yellow lately? i think it started with that tree ;)

it's been a while...

2011-06-02T20:51:00.000-07:00

almost 2 months...! life got really crazy there for a while (okay, it's not really all that much less full now, as i keep being reminded), especially around easter. hadn't been making much art & really just lost my rhythm in life... organization who?

so, although i don't really feel like starting again, i think sometimes it's taking the first step that puts us back on a healthy path to living the life we want and were intended to live...

i had been saying i hadn't made any art since that lovely snowy mountain retreat, but then i realized OF COURSE I DID! all the artwork & decor for the church! our big "launch" was on easter, so although we'd been meeting for a couple months before that, and had completed lots of projects here and there, i had a lot more big ideas in my head (and heart) to finish... ended up getting LOTS of help from people willing to paint-by-number and make random things designed by me... but there were a few things that i needed to do myself, and ended up staying up to the wee hours working on... mainly these four art pieces, which now hang proudly along a wall they were not intended for ("what?? a huge industrial light stand with spotlights and stuff is blocking half the back wall?? that's where these pieces were designed to hang... plan B - the blue fabric folding wall!"

the idea for these pieces started with some of the vision statement of Whittier Hills Baptist Church (both the parent "russell" campus, and the new "uptown" campus) which has been fleshed out in the past into some graphic design-y color-coded rectangles and an alliteration of words creating the mission statement: red = Reborn (ie salvation), green = Reshaped (ie sanctification), orange = Retooled (for ministry), and blue = Released (on a mission with God)

so here they are (my version :)

and some of the rest of the decor...

it's so weird to see my ideas actually made, and "out there" in the real world. feels like my heart is on display - which is a good thing, unveiling the beauty God has uniquely given me and all that - but also so vulnerable and risky! i pretty much feel naked every sunday, especially when people talk about my work, ESPECIALLY when the person preaching for some reason continually points it out to be an example of how God is working, and asks for people's responses "isn't this amazing? how this place has been transformed?" it IS amazing. amazing how God has worked in my heart to bring me to this place. i could never have imagined a year ago THIS. and truly (not just in like an "i made a touchdown, but i'm pointing to God to be humble" kind of way) it has been his work. his ideas even... there have been moments that i have really felt like it was HIM stirring my mind in one direction or another - waking me up at odd hours with tons of inspiration flowing, not letting me get back to sleep until i get up and write them down, stuff like that. and to just be able to share pieces of my journey and what i have learned and am learning about the heart of God has been so good. sometimes i forget. glad i finally buckled down and wrote this so i could remember...

it's also very weird for me to have sketched my vision out and then see it "come to be" (like a "real artist"! ;) - these sketches were done before we started working on stuff and look at the next picture how (eerily ;) similar it ended up!

handmade

2011-04-10T16:33:00.000-07:00

i had been brainstorming for a photo series, and also writing that self portrait poem, referring to myself as "tactile and colorful but still sensellita (a word jason's family used to describe me when we first started dating... means like simple one - not too "done up" or fancy... down to earth)" so i decided to document a week's worth of my little accessories - afterwards looking back and realizing i have an affinity for all things handmade (who knew? ;)

<---- a super-colorful frayed flower pin i bought on etsy
one of my favorite pieces i've made - can't bear to post it in my shop to sell cause i love it & wear it so often :)

*closeup below - it's a paper flower in a found metal gaskety thing :)

<--- lovin' the red & purple for some reason right now; earrings made by a friend

<---HUGE flower in my hair - it was on one of my Christmas presents this year (thanks Joanne :)

below: i had to be the "marshal" at heather's birthday murder mystery dinner, so i made a makeshift cowboy hat & badge :)

a pendant i made (found object, moss, beeswax)

kristi got me this ring on etsy for christmas

and this necklace was bought on etsy by ashley for my birthday! they know me so well :)

my "beauty" fabric cuff i made when i was making cuffs for gifts for christmas - had to make one for myself too!!! ;) this one has gone through the wash 'cause joey puked on it when he got carsick on the way up the mountain last month (ew.)

i guess i'm less "sensellita" than used to be... but i really feel like it's truly ME as i make and wear these little pieces of beauty

a day in the life

2011-04-06T14:07:00.000-07:00

Wednesday, March 23, 2011

4:54am jason's alarm goes off...snooze & cuddle

5:48 get up, make jason's breakfast, pack his lunch, and brew some coffee

6:05 joey wakes up (because of all the noise). i give him a sippy cup of warm milk in hopes that he'll go back to sleep for a while (today, it works :)

6:20 read, journal, time with God (and cereal & coffee)

7:00 exercise... ope, never mind - joey's up!

7:15 baby einstein & a banana while i do dishes & clean up (movies don't usually happen this early in the day, but we have people coming over ;)

7:45 shower

8:15 joey's second breakfast (oatmeal & applesauce) while i try to make a dent in my coffee...

8:42 jessica & max arrive! moms discuss plans for decor at church (as part of the "aesthetics team") while the boys play together (sort of :)

10:40 garcias leave, and joey & i have clementines & an egg sandwich (he eats a lot, this boy)

11:00 blockbuster (see us reflected in their ceiling mirrors? :)

11:25 home again, play outside for a while (joey's favorite part of the day - balls & dogs - not so much mine ;)

12:15 yogurt & graham crackers

12:30 naptime! time for mom to get organized!

12:55 work on free-motion stitching Isaiah 61:1-3 onto the canvas dropcloths we're using as wall "textiles" at the new church, work on a piece for etsy, clean up some, rest

3:15 joey's up (he took a LONG nap!! nice... :)

3:45 jason's home (i stopped keeping track of everything we ate - it's just too often ;) jason works out; meanwhile, it starts raining! :) i love rain :)

4:45 jason takes joey with him to cameron's house to "wrench" (work on their jeeps) while i continue working on stitching those canvases...!

6:15 chick-fil-a (RAINCHECK! heck yeah!) for dinner

6:45 bath

7:20 joey is in bed, jason is working on grading, and i continue to (fight with my sewing machine and) sew those canvases

9:00 bedtime! :)

...and there you have it! a typical (ok super-cooperative) day with joey! :)

i am...

2011-03-31T21:56:00.000-07:00

tactile and

colorful, but

still sencillita

worshiper and

lover, but

often distracted

dreamer, longing,

slowly becoming

beauty discoverer

in flip-flops

rainy day delight

fighting for truth

and freedom and rest

sapphire mystery

self-portrait photographs and poem

by jamie bonilla

circular

2011-03-31T13:29:00.000-07:00

i was challenged to look for a certain shape or color throughout the course of a day. i picked circles (and you may notice a green theme running through the photos).

this one made me think about "holes" and i ended up making this piece, called

"holey"

<------

then i tried to make a self-expressive piece of art based on them (not so green ;) which was a different vein than i'd been working in the rest of the retreat - i just felt like i was playing :) it was fun & restful (somehow a break from the "ultimately important" is good sometimes... except that it really is important, since it's an expression of my creative soul God has given me... it just doesn't FEEL important so it's more restful ;)

this is the view out one of the windows of the upstairs room where i worked the rest of the retreat - AMAZING.

i wrote a poem about it:

winter, cold dawn

snow falling, a thing of beauty

silent, unknown until

the shades are pulled

lying in bed, waiting to hear it

like the rain

but it is a beauty that must be

sought out to be known

like the soul

so glorious

but shrouded, unheard until

it is revealed

by intention to one trusted

a noble pursuer

will be greeted by a sight

at once lovely and messy

true, vulnerable, real

breathless in the mist

march

2011-03-30T15:24:00.000-07:00

this month has been a WHIRLWIND. a lot of months feel that way, but this month especially... in the midst of getting decor stuff ready for church, captivating group, and the rest of life (that was already full-time before adding those in) with jason & joey... we've really felt the lack of time to ourselves, the lack of REST. but in the midst, i've been able to use joey's naptimes (fueled up on coffee ;) and jason has been AMAZING about giving me time to work on art & time with God & rest. i started a series in my art about worship - mostly based on lyrics to Kari Jobe songs. this one is my second (and jason's favorite) piece. i'm really excited about this series. exploring art with worship as the subject matter, as well as art AS worship and worshiping DURING art-making. i would love to get a strong sense of God's intention in making us creative (specifically ME creative), and how that can bring him glory (and maybe write an article about it... or a book - hey, why not? ;)
i love this picture - haha - he is such a techie already ;)

now for the REAL fun... :) for Christmas, jason gave me a coupon for a retreat in the mountains. so i could be alone with God, work on art, and rest... and it was last weekend!

all set up & ready!

we planned it for as early in the year as we could, hoping that there would still be snow on the ground (but had given up all hope of that after being in the southern california warm weather for so many weeks before going). not only was there enough snow on the ground for our 4WD jeep to get stuck going up the driveway, it SNOWED like 18" while we were there! it. was. amazing. so beautiful. and felt truly like a gift from God to me, for that weekend.
jason and joey on their way out for a hike (this was just before all the snow started coming down - look how clear that driveway is compared to that other picture that was the following day... when we were trying to leave! we were truly "snowed in" - it took lots of shoveling, a snow plow, and finally a tow to get us out of the driveway! not to mention the rest of the way down the snowy mountain road...)

i got to read, journal, write poetry, just enjoy the beauty, and make art! for 2 1/2 days!! i set up all my art stuff upstairs while the boys stayed downstairs (or wandered around outside) the whole time - just came down for coffee refills & meals :) it wasn't as restful as i'd hoped... i had a hard time being truly "present" and engaging in the moment. but i still got a chance to process a lot, and make some truly heart-worship-art. so thankful for that time.

february...

2011-03-24T13:05:00.000-07:00

...was when life turned upside down! we had been praying about joining the new Whittier Hills Uptown Campus that was going to begin having services at the YMCA on February 13th. we had actually both felt a pull toward it, and toward the uptown area in general, for over a year. but being where we were spiritually, not sure we had a place there, we didn't really think THAT much about it. then the week before the first service, we were praying for them, and decided that we would join! and then decided that there was a need for me to fill already - they had been trying to work on "decor" for the Y - getting to look more like a worship center and less like a zumba room - but didn't have anyone "in charge" of that area... i knew this because i had been helping a little bit with ideas, without really being a part of it (because i'm friends with Jessica and it had sort of unofficially fallen to her to "decor"ate for the first "preview service"). so that same day that we decided to join the new church plant (i mean, "campus plant" - one church - 2 locations ;) i also volunteered to take over on decor!! huge leaps for both of us! and an answer to prayer, according to the director of the new plant :) we have now spent a TON of time up at the Y, trying to figure out ways to cover up 46-foot walls of mirrors, or multiple mauve accordion carpeted folding walls... jason has been a huge contributor, getting things in place, transporting - and a good sport about all the changes this has made for our life. not the comfortable little family-centered existence we had developed the last 7+ years of being married... a lot more "external" focus going on... and it's awesome... and overwhelming...! i am so excited about the possibilities of what my role could look like, and i wake up in the middle of the night with ideas rushing through my head! lots of little logistical details that are taking precedence of the artsy design stuff i'd prefer to be doing... but the background stuff (& lighting & electrical stuff) has to happen first... but truly, deeply, this is something my soul delights in. i totally have a desire to incorporate worship and my creativity into one. to worship God as i create, bearing His image as creator, and even connecting with him during those times of creating & processing. AND i am so hopeful that in all this, i'll be able to create a space that facilitates others' worship. a space that is beautiful, but not distracting. words and nature and artistic focus that reflect God and draw hearts to Him. totally my passion in life right now.

me & my "aesthetics team" troubleshooting a big yellow ladder in the middle of the room :)

...and I thought the way i was going to be "stepping out" was in another area that i had been praying about: starting a Captivating group! this book had impacted me so much that i longed to share that healing with others... so i decided to start with some close friends, inviting them to join me in a 10-part DVD series & discussion time... i have never facilitated something like this before, and it was a gi-normous step for me to even invite people to this! but we're doing it! started the friday before the first Uptown service (2 days after we'd decided to join ;) - what was i thinking??! it has been such a crazy whirlwind ever since. still trying to get our feet back on the ground. so excited. :)

just a pretty flower from one of our walks around the neighborhood - an attempt at trying to "be present" and record daily life, to truly experience each of its moments :)

little tragedies

2011-03-16T14:33:00.000-07:00

i had to put this picture in and say something because it was seriously a tragic day for me... i had sold these four pendants on etsy, and got them all packaged up, all pretty & safe for sending to the east coast. i planned to take them to the post office after thursday morning Bible study, but alas, i left them on top of the car. and didn't know it till i turned onto a main street and the box went flying out into lanes of traffic...! i couldn't pull over right there, so i went around the block, and saw cars avoiding my package - a huge truck went around it right as i was getting out of my car to pick it up. then, the unthinkable... this little sedan comes roaring through and crushes my box to bits right before my eyes. (this is the tragic part ;) ...i recovered all i could of my pendants (technically not MINE anymore, someone had already bought them!), broken pieces of buttons, twisted wire, intact hardware... and went to Bible study, a bit distressed and distracted... came home and let my customer know... she insisted that it was not a "tragedy", and waited for me to "remake" them, as close as possible to the originals. the pic is actually of the reworked ones, ready to send off (again)! i got them fixed pretty well, and pretty quickly (although she was in no rush - she is planning to use them as Christmas ornaments - she said "you only have eleven months!" - haha) and all was well... so glad there are nice and understanding people in the world. she even loved that i left one of the broken buttons in one of them - said it gave them a "backstory", making them more interesting! :) i wish i had a picture on here of how they looked destroyed, for full effect, but i can't find them... alas, another "tragedy" ;)

ope! found it! tragedy averted (i know. huge earthquakes and tsunamis and nuclear crises are tragedies. not this. but to my heart on that day it was ;)

january

2011-03-16T14:07:00.000-07:00

the new year... i had made all these lovely "resolutions", which really, this year, were more of "hey, here's an idea" seeing how consistently i follow through on those resolutions... the general idea is to live a more creative life DAILY and document my daily life through art & journaling & photos & blogging... i hereby renew this vision (hear, hear)...! here's a little sampling of some of my photos and art & experimenting...

moldy grapefruits at a friend's house

i love how this piece became a self-potrait because of the little reflection when i took the picture :)

a spread in my art journal, the beginnings of a series exploring art as worship,

using lyrics from Kari Jobe worship songs as the subject matter

so i made a few pieces and i wrote another "poem"; which was really more like journaling, but i was doing a specific exercise where i created a list of words by flipping through a book and just writing down like 20 words from different pages, and then using them as the starting point for the poem (thank you, Liz Lamoreaux for this idea):

untitled poem #2 (using "found words" from Love & War by John & Stasi Eldredge)

i want brokenness, i do

but it can be so tiring

feel so needy

like the struggle is too much

at least too much for others to

walk with me through it

the search for healing

has to start with knowing there is a wound

and safety in one who has also hurt

who has bled to take my pain

and trust that there is more

on the other side

keep reaching, keep opening, keep desiring

and life becomes more than drudgery

the biggest adventures, lived every day

beyond beautiful

expeditions in love

the terrain of the heart

true, there is an enemy of my soul

the accuser

who tries to steal me away

but he can never truly win

for i have been won

and he must remain outside

barred from the doors of my spirit

so that i am free to believe

to hear what is true

from my lover

that he has never left me

will never leave me

lives within me

with me, always in me

so i am never alone

and loved to the depths

my absence, part 4

2011-03-14T13:20:00.000-07:00

December:

heart: just continuing with God in the life of my heart, discovering things i still need to learn from Him, and getting glimpses of his heart of love for me...

art: mostly worked on Christmas gifts (like my free-motion-stitched fabric cuffs i made for my mom & sisters... and myself ;)... got a couple of awesome art books for Christmas that inspired me to start writing poetry (me??!) and making art more frequently.

family: Christmas! my entire family was together for once! mom & dad flew in from hawai'i and sister jenna and her boyfriend izzy flew in from honduras (via el salvador) on Christmas Day! and then on new year's eve, they got engaged! yep, another 11.11.11 wedding comin' up!

joey brushed his little teeth for the first time ;)

and we got to take another trip to Yosemite - our first time seeing it in the snow!

and it. was. amazing. indescribable. joey loved the snow, and we loved seeing the beauty.

here's a "poem" i wrote when we got back (pretty much my first attempt at writing poetry, ever. so don't judge. ;)

untitled stream of consciousness/word toolbox poem:

i begin heavy

my soul altering its own expression

unnerved, uncomfortable with my attempt

to tell of my heart of concrete

sinking, disappointed, overboard

the soil of my soul furrowed

in weariness and readiness

unnerved by the unpredictability of life

and jesus and my own self

longing for brilliant light to be shed

but feeling it blocked by my own jungle canopy

wishing for a perfect world

where i am desired and not demanded, startled

often by deep pursuit, a whirlwind of desire

expressed and met in a storybook affair

dangerous in an odd sort of way

but instead i pass my days harmlessly, in monotony

with the scope of a merely human view

meanwhile the heavens are popping with static

as a war wages over the souls of men

a struggle unseen

only even sensed by those really tuned in

i've had glimpses

of his love and his abundant life

but as soon as they've come, i've blinked

and they've gone

the forest on monday, one such moment

the bare branches with their layers of snow

lacy and pristine

something only a God of beauty would create

moments where i have sensed his heart touch mine

seeing my heart soften and enlarge

from the moment my son became

a part of my life

now some of my deepest joys

being with him

a kiss, a tickle, a hug

such delight

brought by the same one that saps me

of my energy

so beautiful

my babylove

i end buoyant, thankful

for the blessings of a child

a strong lover

a beautiful God

a healthy body

this time to myself

the absence from "my absence"

2011-03-10T12:27:00.000-08:00

wow. so much. this last month or so has been a whirlwind! so much busyness, but mostly so much GOOD STUFF. the main thing being joining the new church plant of Whittier Hills Uptown, and joining the leadership team as "aesthetics coordinator"! how crazy is that? when you look back at my last few months, and where God has been taking me, and the passions he's begun to develop in me... i can't think of any better way to be in ministry right now! creating a space where people's hearts can be drawn to worship through nature and beauty and truth... so excited...! for now it's been a lot more "big picture" stuff - getting the zumba wall full of mirrors (and the ugly mauve carpet accordion walls) covered with canvas & fabric, figuring out the lighting situation - that one still needs help... putting together a team of both aesthetically-minded people, and the "muscles" of the setup of it :) so exciting. and so risky for me, because it truly is my HEART i'm putting out there for everyone to see, to like or not like, to notice or just pass by... but God's the one who's brought me here, and HE sees the beauty & desire in my heart to glorify him by putting myself out there... so here we go, adventure!!!

my absence, part 3

2011-02-09T14:13:00.000-08:00

November:

heart: started off with my 30th birthday, which we celebrated up in the mountains, in the lovely fall beauty. ahhhhh... jason gave me time to sit & rest & read & process out on the front porch of a cabin in the woods. lovely. and as a continuation of my "dreaming" from the october section... i have this desire to be a part of people's healing, making a safe place for them, being present with them, maybe incorporating art somehow... especially women... so the "big dream" is to somehow open a retreat center that can be a place of healing. so while we were in the mountains, we wandered around looking at possible properties to buy (which we canNOT ;) - but it was just good to nurture that dream (so facilitated by jason).

art: also on my birthday, i decided to stop actively promoting trying to sell my art, and just make it - to take a "break" for a year. my intention was to work in my art journal every day of that year... yeah, that lasted like a week.

April tells me that if i post a commitment like that on my blog, it keeps me accountable to do it, plus i can get feedback on my work, etc... so i'll let you know if i do ;) i do still have my items listed on etsy, and did sell some bangle bracelets this month... AND super-exciting... dun-dun-dunnn... i got one of my pendants featured in Cloth Paper Scissors! (the same magazine that i wasn't a finalist in that contest) i had no idea - just flipped it open, and there it was, on the table of contents! and then it was the biggest photo in the actual article (it was about a Christmas Art Swap :)

family: Jason got a bunch more photo gigs this month!

WHBC date night: the Eason family: the Marriotts:
and joey had his first birthday!!!! all growed up. ;)

my absence (part2)

2011-02-01T16:07:00.000-08:00

October:

heart: started the month off on a 4-day/3-night retreat in Colorado - the Captivating Woment's Retreat. jason stayed home with joey, letting me take off for so long! which was amazing. i got to take days and days of just focusing on God and his heart and my heart. lots of little healings and baby steps towards him and toward the abundant life he has for me... heard him speak again there and just really enjoyed being in the beauty of the colorado rockies. began to have a growing desire to dream... to really think big in what God could do with my life if i lived surrendered to Him, just with the specific passions & gifts unique to me... more on that next month ;) oh! and really began to discover the power of worship music for my soul. fell in love with Kari Jobe music on the retreat, and haven't stopped listening to it every day since ;)

lost my journal :( this is also very sad for my art soul because i used it to write down all my ideas for things to try... jason got me a new one, so i'm starting over!

art: sold a piece on etsy :)

family: jason continued his photo class got some awesome shots of joey :)

took a vacation to Hawai'i! to visit my parents who live on the Big Island, and for a marriage conference they were hosting (but mostly so they could see joey ;)

hiking to pololu beach

got to go to my absolute favorite place in the world. it doesn't really have a name... but my parents have named it Upolu Point, so that's what i call it, too. such crazy untamed wild beauty there in the sandstone and black lava cliffs, windswept gorgeous blue ocean below. but MY favorite part is all the rusty stuff! the entire area of the bluffs is covered in old milling equipment, car parts, etc. actually, it would be more accurate to say they are PART of the bluffs. it's all been there for so long that the rusty things have been buried, and look more like texture than recognizable objects. you might be able to guess that I of all people would love that! and paired with that wild ocean... amazing.

jason gets his first photo "gig" (at least recently), being the official photographer at a school, shooting "harvest" shots at Halloween time. oh, and i made joey's "joey" costume, and my "mama kangaroo" one just in time for the chick-fil-a contest http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=462250538813&set=a.462250043813.252600.131184493813

my absence...

2011-02-01T13:59:00.000-08:00

"wait", you say! what about the last 5 months? what's been going on with your art and heart and family during that time?? okay, okay, i'll try to recap :)

rest of august:

art: came back from those art workshops totally inspired and made a bunch of mixed-media, encaustic art & jewelry

family: jason's birthday drive down the coast, joey turned 9 months, jason starts taking a photo class at Biola that took up 6 hours/week of class time plus the projects (maybe this was part of why i felt like i had less time for things like blogging last semester ;)

heart: i had been reading the book Captivating all year, little by little, and came to a part about spiritual warfare, and it made me want to stand up and FIGHT! the last seven years have been so doubt-filled and hopeless... but the idea that there is an ENEMY of my soul trying to derail me, my marriage, my journey to really get to the depths... inspired me to stand up to him! we went to Biola & met with Dr. Arnold who prayed for us & against spiritual forces in our lives... and for the first time in years (maybe ever) i sensed God's presence with me, within me. suddenly, the ever-lingering doubt was gone - the fog of confusion dissipated. wow. major turning point in my spiritual life.

September:

heart: as i continued to work through the Captivating book & accompanying journal, i began to sense God speaking to me. telling me i was his, his bride, his beauty... things i so long doubted. at this point, i feel like there can never really be turning back to the doubt from before - i really KNOW he spoke to me. so he HAS to be real. and he loves me. really. not because he "has to" 'cause he's God. not "tolerates" me. delights in me! he still has to remind me daily, but it's truth... that i can hold onto. amazing.

art: this was a hard time for my art & soul... my favorite magazine had a contest for "artisan of the year 2011", which i thought i had a chance for... submitted some of my favorite pieces in a couple different categories, and waited...

hmm this one is sideways and i couldn't figure out how to rotate it...

and was not one of the finalists :( i was a little crushed. i put a few creative things on hold then because of my sorrow... but never completely. jason kept encouraging me that i had to be brave and keep making art - that it was a part of my soul that had to be nourished (he's so great ;) so i chose to be brave and keep going... after a bit... i even stopped hosting artsycrafty club for a couple months because of it (and busyness)! back on now, though ;)

family: we had quite a busy month with lots of trips and camping! we went camping with our sunday school class at San Clemente, and then did a whirlwind tour of northern california, where joey got to meet his great-grandparents (my dad's parents) for the first time, and finally ending up in Yosemite for another camping trip! jason lost his wedding ring there :( joey learned to pull up & "cruise" which he was quite happy about, and turned 10 months!

sentinel dome

you'll have to wait for the next installment... joey's nap is over! :)

getting organized...

2011-01-24T13:17:00.000-08:00

on my Christmas wishlist, i asked for "moleskines". no one in my family knew what those were (or most of the other things i had on the list:Yudu, ICE resin,claybords (ampersand),little rusty or colorful bits of things as always, "digital ground" for printing on fabric, organza, stitchwitchery, metal alphabet stamping set, metal "blanks", alcohol inks, liver of sulfur, mica...Which they made fun of me profusely for, haha ;)

however, they obliged me, and i now have 7 of them PLUS a monthly color-coded day planner (jason counts that as 12 more when he makes fun of me). in case you don't know, moleskines are AMAZING little books. they have journals/lined notebooks, sketchbooks, calendars, etc. and i have some of each! and i am DETERMINED to get organized! i feel so often like my days slip away without knowing really what i did or whether i was really experiencing the moments of the day or not. i get so discouraged when things pile up and i'm not getting ANYthing done - not keeping up with the housework, art, reading, time with God, and just spending all my time trying to "keep up" (especially with joey, my main time-and-energy-consumer).

i shall be frustrated no more, i say!

so, i dedicated each of my new moleskines to something that i need to write or create or plan and i am so excited about it! i had looked up last year "how to organize recipes" because my system wasn't working out for me; and the first one i read said they put all their tried-and-true recipes in a moleskine with tabs for dividers. ooh! so exciting! i've started transferring them into the awesome orange book, and throwing away all those little slips of paper i've hastily written them down on from over the phone or whatever.

and i'm recording my thoughts about art, ideas i want to try, and yes, even some POETRY in one (thanks, kimmy for the art books you gave me - they're showing me how :).

then there's the one i'm collaging & painting stuff in - my "visual art journal" - also have a mini one of these that goes everywhere with me in my purse.

also in my purse come my little moustache one that is dedicated to observations about jason (trying to "be a student of my spouse" as i've heard so many times :), and the little tiny blue one (jason got me both of these on etsy :) that i'm recording the moments i don't want to forget - "what joey's doing right now"

and... last but not least... the most organizationally exciting one... the monthly planner(s)!! so pretty :) and so helpful... i'm always jealous when everyone pulls out their dayplanner, and i'm like "i only have like one thing scheduled every other week - why do i need one... wish i had one" ;) but i do need to write lists and plans down, even if it's not an "official" event, just to stay on top of things! and i am lovin' it. (today "blog" is on my list - hence the reason i'm finally doing it for the first time since august!)

aren't they pretty?

first few pages in my visual art journal...

so, look forward to more blog entries this year, and i'll look forward to a more organized life! :)

2, 8, 9

2010-08-12T17:05:00.000-07:00

the 3 of us have driven from 7pm-1am 4 out of the last 5 days... 6 hour trips to and from phoenix and king's canyon (i feel like i need to find a way to include the numbers 2, 8, 9 in that sentence, too, since the rest of the digits were used somewhere - lol).

first of all, we took the same drive through the desert that i'd taken midweek to go back to "art unraveled" for another art workshop... this one was taught by Patricia Baldwin Seggebruch, the premiere expert in encaustic techniques (to me - in all my playing with this medium, i've had only her book "encaustic art workshop" to go from)... it was great. i got to ask her a bunch of troubleshooting questions about things that have come up in my pieces as i've worked with encaustics, and i mostly just got to play! new techniques i'd never been able to get a good grasp on, like painting with pigmented encaustic paint and image transfers onto the wax, and then just making stuff! very therapeutic... i made more than a dozen "pieces" ranging from a 12x12" piece (the one of jason's face) to 3-dimensional baby food jars and lids... here's some of them!

meanwhile, during my restful and fun day, jason and joey were off having their own adventure - they went off-roading on the Apache Trail, and picnicked by one of the lakes out there.

then we all drove back together into the night again... here's an excerpt from my journal from that drive west on the 10 (and a shot of those amazing towers i talked about before):

"inky blackness broken only by the snaking yellow and red lights along the highway, and the milky way! have never seen so many stars. so little "light pollution" out here. but it's amazing how even the dim glow that headlights emit can darken the dazzling sky. light obscured by light. [insert profound metaphorical insight here.] heading back into the los angeles basin where youre lucky to see the big dipper or orion's belt, i just have to say: if God intended for us to see this many stars all the time... he wouldn't have invented the sun. [note: i think it was getting a little late when i was writing this part... lol]

the sterile coolness of the air conditioning versus the wildness of the wind...

dreaming of ways to turn my "drillbit measuring template" into an actual belt buckle [a byproduct of that found object jewelry class from earlier in the week]; i am suddenly snapped from my reverie by a huge falling star. it is green! and looks as though it must have crashed on the road directly ahead...

the wind becomes twice as brutal, attempting to dislodge my brooch-turned-makeshift-hair-flower, and i realize i'm in that magical place of the wind turbines... harness that energy! so strong and unruly! [the end of my random musings-while-driving :]"

so we drove there saturday night, back sunday night, and then monday night we took off for a camping adventure! we met some friends up in king's canyon (near hume lake/yosemite), and spent two full days hanging out in the forest and by the river, before driving back down wednesday night! we all feel amazingly rested after all that driving and all those escapades!

stream (in the desert) of consciousness

2010-08-06T14:17:00.000-07:00

written during the 6-hour drive home from phoenix yesterday (no i was not looking at what i was writing - see picture ;) word-for-word and completely unedited (read: long) --

even the desert can be beautiful at the right time of day. when the shadows are long... when the scorching heat of midday has faded to the gentle arid warmth of evening... the scrubby little bushes dotting the landscape stand taller, highlighted by that last glow of evening sun even as it silhouettes the jagged distant shadowy purple mountains. even 18-wheelers carrying their loads look elegant in this late august sunset.

with coldplay filling the atmosphere inside my car, and blinded as i drive directly west with a grimy windshield, i begin to process the events of my day in phoenix.

i have never been a desert-lover (or even tolerater). so hot and utterly boring. couldn't fathom why anyone would choose to live there, or even think it beautiful. but these faint hues of amber and aubergine have just stirred my soul. or maybe it was the last day and a half of art i've been doing and contemplating.

huh. just had a thought: could it be that art is something i do, rather than make? "make" seems to imply that the goal is the finished piece, or at least some example of a new technique mastered... but doing art - that means that the process is the important part. the focus is on the artist's journey... from beginning to end, or somewhere in between. i often have to pause my artmaking (artdoing henceforth) with all the daily demands of life (and a studio space coexisting in the same room with my husband's office, and my 8-month-old's play area - affectionately referred to as "joey's cage" :) but when you "do art", it really tends to spill over into all sections of life. i become more creative in my cooking, or decorating, or letter-writing (haha when was the last time i sent a handwritten letter?? actually, tuesday :)

i wonder if the desert seems so peaceful to me because of its vast wide openness... in addition to the way all the lights and shadows are playing off each other - silhouetted bridges; all the trucks are orange as they reflect the already-set glow of the sun. the crest of the mountain range - or are those low clouds? mountains. this is the desert - radiant, as though there has been a layer of lava painted across its profile. windows down, the air is still too hot to leave the a/c off; but i can't help it - i love the wind.

i have always been much more drawn to the visual arts in my creative pursuits, and never been much of a wordsmith. but i feel right now that this prose flowing from my soul is a thing of beauty. not contrived. just natural expression through language. new for me! usually i feel that when i journal, it's simply an exercise in forcing my pen to complete thoughts that maybe aren't even important to my heart. or i start trying to process something my heart feels urgently needs to be dealt with, and instead all that comes out are stale words that could not possibly have any connection to the current state of my soul.

a quick note about - what are they called? those noble towers that stand elegant and intricate against the sky, stringing power lines across the barren land... whatever their name, they intrigue me and take my breath away when the last of the daylight steals away the remaining details of the desertscape surrounding me and all that is left are these industrial steel towers, stark and beautiful against the dusky sky. ah...

wonder if it's the spaciousness of the desert that makes it so peaceful (did i already say that?) - just a huge amount of extra soul-space. my heart can expand to fill not only my chest, but all the barely visible boundaries of this wilderness. roam wild and free. ahh.

ha. another love of mine is that barely light sky reflected in a body of water - i just passed some kind of aqueduct, and my breath caught. why is that so beautiful?

soon it will be night, and it will still be hot. the wind will ravage my hair as i open all the windows and just let its power blow over me and my soul... i will still have four hours of driving on into darkness, but this flood of inspiration cannot last. (can it?) so i reflect once more on the past 36 hours or so and revel in the beauty i have seen and been a part of. i never knew there were others so like-minded until yesterday. in a "found object jewelry" class with Keith LoBue, he had us take out a bit of our "stash" so we could start the juices flowing, then had us come to the front of the room for an exercise. and as i walked past other peoples' piles of rusty "stuff" and other junk (treasures), my heart leapt, and i couldn't help but exclaim aloud "there are other people like me in this world!" how very reassuring. there was an almost palpable camaraderie as people began peering at each other's things and proclaiming "junk envy" (while secretly knowing that their stash was really the best, having accumulated it personally over time).

someone ELSE'S pile! i know - you didn't think there were other people like me either!

we spent the whole first evening "making stuff" and i was unstoppable! the juices were definitely flowing. today was more of a learning day, with lots of invaluable lecture and demos (i texted jason at lunchtime that Keith was saving me months of trial and error in things i would have most certainly attempted in the near future). he gave away all his secrets (save one)!

i felt totally overloaded this afternoonm and couldn't really make anything. but now, with all this soul space, i want to get into the studio immediately, and create! use the new skills i learned today (before i go back and look at my notes and wonder "what does 'make a DAP donut' mean??" but first i have to drive home, sleep, take care of my boys, and go to the doctor (followup for that pinched nerve in my back that is MUCH better, thank you...) but we're all coming back to arizona on saturday for an encaustic workshop with patricia seggebruch - can't wait.

to be continued...

well that was a bust.

2010-07-12T15:48:00.000-07:00

we had "done" that brentwood village summer festival (set up & sold art) a few weeks ago, and sold half a dozen items... which meant i took in double what i'd spent to be there, so even though it was slow, i had fun and it felt "sucessful" to me. i justified the few sales saying that it wasn't really the right venue for my stuff - lots of kids running around, wanting free pony rides and cotton candy; and not much traffic directed towards our booth isolated from the rest of the festival in the "artist" section... so i signed up for the Rose Bowl Flea Market - it said that 20,000 people come through every time they have it, and i was in the "arts and crafts" section, so it was perfect! i'd get lots of traffic, of people coming through looking for art, weird old and hip young people that my art would appeal to... and i had some lookers, but only TWO SALES in the entire 10-hour period i was there. makes me think it is more the product than the venue... maybe all this making art & selling it isn't gonna happen for me... i feel like all my dreams and aspirations have been... crushed. no excuses this time for why people weren't buying (although a lot of the other sellers said it was a super-slow sales day for them, too). a bunch of people who just "loved" the look of my stuff took business cards, promising to look me up on etsy later... so that's good, i guess - get my name out there. i just have felt super-depressed ever since it got over yesterday. i know it is still in my heart to make art - i need to be creative to thrive! but should i try to figure out what's "me" AND will sell? or just make stuff for my own personal use, and give up on trying to make money from it? i know this is not a very uplifting or inspirational post... but it's where i'm at, and i could use some feedback, too...!

something i've been thinking about this past week (and even today, despite my discouragement) is what my "style" is. in my art, home decorating, dress, etc... i've described it to jason before as "boho" (though i only have a rudimentary idea of what that even means)... today on the drive to starbucks i was thinking that i just love the "juxtaposition of the feminine and the industrial" (see pic of what i'm wearing today - super-girly, lacy, ruffle-y pink shirt and one of my recycled hardware STACK pendants - love it! lace and nuts - hey that's a good name for it all ;)

one lousy flea market day (most people seemed like they were there for the tommy bahama shirts and knockoff leather bags anyway) can't stop me! still need to process a bit more whether i'm gonna try to give so much of myself (and jason) to trying to sell it still, or just "play" and make art for my own soul's good... but i feel kind of excited to get my studion back in working order (we used all its furniture for my booth setup, and it has not returned to its place yet) and back to the "work (play)" of making art!! :)

the good, the bad, and the oh-so-cute...

2010-06-09T14:22:00.000-07:00

it's been a rough couple of weeks... a lot of stress, relational drama, baby, etc... but we have so many people willing to give us a little help so we can rest and work through stuff. amazing. ashley came over on saturday for a couple hours while jason and i did some separate fun and restful things... then that night, kristi babysat so we could go on a date! and we were still desperate for some time to talk sunday night, so kimmy & julie & kristi all came and hung out with joey while jason and i greabbed some food and talked for half an hour (amazing how much talk and connection time you can fit into that short span when it's all you've got!). then yesterday all day i was just in need of some time, and no one was able to come, but then kristi just showed up in the afternoon, and i handed joey off to her immediately... then when jason got home, she took joey with her to the horses while we got some more talk time - amazing! and now dana is at our house right now so i can finally get a little ALONE time (none of that was, and it has been desperately needed)! wow - it looks like even more once i write it out! we are so thankful for these dear friends and sisters who just give of their time for us (under the pretense that they're just glad for some "joey time" :)

anyone else want some joey time? (see picture ;)

joey at Maurice & Joanne's wedding rehearsal (practicing to be the ring bearer)

but... this saturday i'm gonna be showing and selling my art in a festival! the Brentwood Village Summer Festival this saturday from 11-3 (come visit me!) so we've been getting all ready for that! here's a few art pieces i've been making to have ready by then:

titled "math is abstract 1-4"

and here's my business card that jason went and had made after i designed them, ready to hand out to all my (potential and actual) buyers:

recent developments...

2010-05-18T22:20:00.000-07:00

i can't believe it's been so long since i posted (or since jenna or kelsey did ;)! so much has happened during that time, too! when i posted last, the most exciting stuff was happening and i wanted to post about it, but decided i needed to post about that artsycrafty club night first, and then catch up with the exciting stuff the next day... and then never did! so... drumroll......

i opened shop on etsy!! it's been open 2 weeks now! so fun and exciting!! especially the first couple of days - i got all this traffic, and people were contacting me asking for custom pieces (both the pendants and the beeswax pieces) and asking me to be in art festivals...! things have slowed down since then - i need to post more items for sale soon!

also in the last couple of weeks:
*artsycrafty club #3 - cardmaking (half of us worked on jessica's bridal shower invitations the whole time :)
*jason went off-roading for a couple of days, and joey and i had fun being just the 2 of us :) we joined a mom's group that meets on friday mornings, and it was SO therapeutic to just talk about what it's like to have kids, and realize i'm normal and joey's normal! we also went yard-saling while he was gone, and found a few treasures... then we went when he got back, too, and hit the jackpot at a yard sale in uptown that was full of old rusty tools and hardware!

*shipped my first custom pendant order to North Carolina! and she loves it!

*my first mother's day - AMAZING! jason gave me the "day off" from taking care of joey... i mean i still hung out with him and fed him, but jason took charge of any and all problem-solving for the day (is he fussing 'cause he's hungry? or tired? dirty diaper? it was a wonderful and much-needed break for me! poor jason got so tired partway through the day (which was kind of validating for me - this motherhood job feels so hard and exhausting, and i sometimes wonder if it's just me... it's not!) but he was a champ and lasted the whole day! and he bought me a travel mug on etsy which was fun :)
*i made my first etsy purchases: some patinaed headpins (still not quite sure what they are or what they're for, but they're gorgeous and i've been using them in some of my newer STACK pendants!) and a burlap coffee sack (i have big plans for this one ;)
*started cleaning my own house again (for the past year, my sister has been coming once a week to clean the bathroom and kitchen - my mother's day present from last year! sad to see that one be over... her new gift for this year, though, was free babysitting once a week for a year! heck yeah! we already went on a date to BJ's!)
*getting ready for jason's brother maurice's wedding this week! joey tried on his little white tux (he's gonna be the ring bearer!! pulled in a wagon by the flower girl! how cute is that???)... i've been painting and distressing old antique books for the centerpieces... and we leave today for a 3-day wedding extravaganza in murrieta, starting with the rehearsal tonight!
*today is joey's half birthday!!! he's 6 MONTHS OLD now! crazy.

artsycrafty club

2010-05-03T17:33:00.000-07:00

we had our second "artsycrafty club" meeting last week - so fun! this time we went less "crafty" and more "artsy", which was a little out of people's comfort zones... but they still had fun & learned something new, and stretched their creativity a bit! we hand-altered photos that mostly had been rejected from our albums and scrapbooks, and made them into little works of art and inspiration! i'm sure i had more fun than anyone... :)
here's an overview shot of all the ones i did that day:

and some closeups of some of my favorites (i forgot to take pictures that night, so i didn't get pix of anyone else's - oops!)

everyone wanted to know what we were going to "do" with them... my idea had been just to have this as a little creative exercise, but i had a couple of ideas of what the final resting places of these little artworks could be... here's what i ended up doing: putting them, along with an index card opposite each photo, all into a little flip photo album that i carry around in my purse with me, and when i have a little down time (pumping gas, waiting for whatever), i pull it out and journal in response each piece. i've only done a few s far, but each time, i've learned something about myself that i didn't know! i am one of those "external processors", where i don't think/process much alone, but once i start talking, i figure out what i'm feeling or wanting, etc. so journaling does that, too, and it's especially revealing when i journal about art that includes shots of me or a little piece of me in some way...

the first club meeting, each person went home with a tiny pink box full of unknown "treasures" and the (unrequired) homework was to open it up and make something out of what was inside... kristi & i were the only ones who brought something back this time (i've decided this will be the official "initiation" into the club - once each person completes their piece, they'll get like a membership something-or-other)... and, again, i forgot to take pictures of kristi's pencil holder, but here's mine:

heather said it looked like "christmas frosting"... not sure what that is, but it sounds delightful!

more walks, more beauty

2010-04-30T23:08:00.000-07:00

amazing the things you notice when you stop and look. i run and walk past things every day that, when i take time to look, are amazing... i have been longing more and more lately to live somewhere beautiful. montana, colorado, the beach, the mountains, hawai'i. i want it to all be just outside my door or window. so tired of the asphalt and concrete. but there are these moments... when the little details are just so beautiful and intricate... when i can show the world to my son, and my son to the world... when the wind blows so powerfully that it stirs my soul... that i am awed. thankful for the bits of beauty in MY world.

how did i get such a beautiful baby boy?

joey & his daddy go on walks too! they are so cute!!

oops

2010-04-19T20:07:00.000-07:00

so we got this amazing package from jason's aunt a couple days ago... it had a children's bible and "i'll love you forever" both with awesome sweet notes from his aunt (and grandma posthumously), a couple of handmade blankets, including this one with an airplane just like the one i painted on the wall in his nursery, and his name... except it's not his name... joey's name is josiah! and this same aunt made a blanket in the same style for jason's mom that said "josiah", but all the little notes in the package, and the blanket WE got all say "joshua"... LOL (she'll laugh about it too someday ;)

soul project

2010-04-13T16:15:00.000-07:00

my spiritual director and i were talking about joey and his wonder as he explores the world around him... and how "sensing" he is, and that i'm just like that - take everything in as i see, hear, taste, smell, feel it... how i love textures and find so much beauty around me... so she gave me a "soul project". she sent me out to take a walk with joey and talk with him about all the beauty we saw. then later, i'm supposed to process that walk and the beauty as though it was God showing ME the beautiful things (he's made many of them just because he knows how much we'll delight in their beauty) and talk to him about it... haven't done that part yet, but the walk with joey was awesome! i showed him all the things i found beautiful, even taking him out of his stroller if he couldn't see it from where he was.

and i got to see some things from his perspective that i would never have noticed otherwise.

joey, what are you looking at? ...oh!

something that has always kind of bothered me is how beautiful i find rusty objects. i mean, they're like decomposing! and it's always man-made stuff that is rusty and i find so fascinating - shouldn't i be so much more inspired by "nature"? flowers and animals and stuff? but i was thinking on this walk that God made rust, too... he made iron and he made it with the property that it begins to rust when exposed to weathering forces... now, there is probably some practical purpose in that, but couldn't it be, too, that he made it work that way because he knew it would delight people like me? that the history and texture something like rust adds to an object would just be a joy to some people he loves? just pondering...

my community

2010-04-12T19:51:00.000-07:00

i have been thinking that i need people in my life. people besides my husband and my baby. i need "community" with like-minded people... so... i invited a bunch of my facebook friends to join an ArtsyCrafty Club, hosted by me, and come play! we had our first meeting thursday night and it was SO fun :) everyone who came has also come to my birthday parties in the past, and they love me... and i was so rejuvenated at the end of the night! i don't know if it was that or the iced tea, but i couldn't fall asleep that night 'cause i felt so happy - happy to have spent time with people that care about me (and vice versa), happy to be creating... we did a "mixed - media recipe card swap" for our first evening together. here are some of the results!

meanwhile, jason took joey to the doctor and came home with antibiotics :( he has an ear infection and some "chest congestion" left over from his cold a couple weeks ago. he was acting weird for a few days after this, so we stopped giving him the cough medicine... and i think he's back to himself now...

(i think most of the people actually came to see joey, so they were glad when he showed up before they left ;) here, he's attacking lynda's face and pulling up his shirt at the same time - check out that chub! ha!

on a ROLL!

2010-04-09T15:23:00.001-07:00

"there sure are a lot of pictures in this post," you say. and you are right - because everything on this post i made in two days time (and jason wasn't even on spring break anymore!!)! and i have so many more ideas rumbling around...! i only stopped because i ran out of wood blocks... time for a trip to home depot!

i'm making art!

2010-04-05T20:28:00.000-07:00

jason being on spring break was awesome - he gave me all these little "breaks" - little chunks of time i don't normally get during my day, and i made a bunch of art! you saw the first 2 in the last post... here's 2 more, and i have 2 more that are almost done! it's amazing what you can do when you have that little extra bit of time! i'm thinkin' jason should just stay home with me and joey ALL the time - any ideas how we could be Independently Wealthy? maybe i'll actually be able to sell my art and be a "professional" artist! ha we'll see...

token easter pic of joey: he LOVES this jumper (and completely ignores the chocolate ;)

jason looked at me yesterday and said "are you tired, baby?" and i realized that i can't remember the last time i wasn't tired... sometime before joey i guess... having a baby has been by far the hardest thing i have ever done in my life. and the most amazing... i'm tired :)

making art!

2010-04-01T19:29:00.000-07:00

so yesterday, jason took joey with him to have bagels with duane, thereby giving me an hour break in the morning to work on art! apparently morning is more my "prime time" than afternoon or evening... i made 2 brand-new pieces!! planning to keep working on pieces along this line and posting them to my etsy site soon! ha! awesome!

today, jason went off-roading and i NEEDED a break. i spent 3 hours trying to post this and the last blog post... the combination of dead and dying batteries, low internet signal strength, and fussy babies just made it take FOREVER and i STILL didn't get the pictures posted! drama! soon and very soon though! cable people are coming tomorrow to install a router, so i don't have to go to panera to go on the internet :) all shall be well.

"dad, can i come with you in the jeep? i'm wearing my jeep onesie..."

a week in the life...

2010-04-01T16:02:00.000-07:00

Monday
joey has his first cold... and took his first self-portrait (i was holding him and the camera & he grabbed my hands and pushed my shutter finger!) in all his drooly glory...

Tuesday
i'm sick now too... but i made a pendant!

Wednesday
my parents have been here a week and a half now from Hawai'i! it's been so fun being all together as a family! joey gets to spend a bunch of time with his Mima & Papa Johnny...

Thursday
i went to the doctor and got some antibiotics... my parents babysat... they've enjoyed watching joey and helping me out while i'm sick (and i have very much enjoyed the break!)

Friday
SO sick. but we drove out to my sister's house in Temecula... joey & i got to get taken care of by my parents and family. my mom made me gargle hot salt water and drink lots of tea with lemon and honey....

Saturday
joey helped his dad mow the lawn at Aunt Kimmy's house and hung out with Aunt Kristi and the rest of the fam... while mom painted an Eiffel Tower on the wall in the guest bedroom upstairs (feeling a little better, but had to take frequent breaks due to uncontrollable coughing fits)!

Sunday
finished the Eiffel Tower, went to church, and sent the grandparents off to the airport! joey and i are feeling 100% better, but mima and papa johnny took my sore throat with them :(

we are SET!

2010-03-30T15:10:00.000-07:00

i finally got my laptop! all $100 worth of it! here's a pic of my new dynamic duo: beauty (aqua-colored canon powershot elph) and the beast (used and lovingly abused first by Biola and then another owner for a few years, before finally making it to my lap - so far it appears to be worth all hundred bucks :)

i'm just so excited to be able to take a picture, and post it from my very own laptop that WORKS! i'm at panera drinking a cup of hot chocolate right now for my first blog post of my new era... and now i can just post a picture of that! amazing. it's a whole new world (every turn a surprise; every moment gets better... ahhh, aladdin, the last great disney cartoon)
and here's a completely unrelated picture of joey in the awesome green snuggly sleeper my mom made for him (just because i can... i have a feeling you're gonna be seeing a lot more pix of joey on here because i have way more pictures of him than anything else... he's just so dang cute! ;)

come and gone

2010-03-23T14:04:00.000-07:00

joey's fourth month birthday was friday. i didn't come anywhere close to my goal of creating and /or blogging every day... but it was better than it's ever been! i blogged 8 times in that month, and i'd only EVER blogged 9 times before that (the whole year of 2009+). so it's an improvement! and i made stuff maybe an average of every other day...? i discovered how hard it is to really buckle down and do it when there's this all-time-consuming little person with me 24/7! maybe the older he gets, the more he'll entertain himself and i can play when he plays? he came down with his first cold yesterday, AND got his 4 month shots! pobrecito.

but in happier news... i got a new camera and it's aqua-colored! and i'm getting a new (to me) laptop, too! so my blogging career may be just beginning to take off (i dream of no more frustrations with uploading photos, converting them from RAW, etc. ;) watch out, world, here i come! ;D

the opening

2010-03-11T11:16:00.000-08:00

last night, i went to my first art exhibit opening that had my art in it! so fun! not quite as exciting as i had first thought - when the e-mail came out saying we'd been accepted to the show, there were only 8 names on the poster... so i didn't know if that was all that had submitted, or if mine was one of "the chosen", but i was 1/8 of the show! then on the facebook event page, there were like 13 names listed... and all in all, there ended up being 26 artists with work up! over 50 pieces! which is exciting - there was a lot of great work represented there (my favorites were megan gonzalez, danielle camorlinga, and julis barbee) - but less "special" for me... still fun though! when we got to my pieces, they didn't have a label on the wall next to them with my name, e-mail, explanation of the piece like everyone else's did... i was a little disappointed (there goes my "exposure"! no one even knows who did it!) - and that's when we took this picture... little bit of fake smiling going on ;)

jason and i were debating whether to go ask Shannon, the curator, about it, but thought it'd be a little awkward/weird... while we were standing there talking about it, a girl came up to the director of the event, and asked if she knew whose pieces those were "cause i love them...!" i talked to her for a minute (turns out she is the wife of a friend of mine from high school! AND she had her own awesome piece in the show!), and then the curator runs over to us and says "jamie! (hi, i'm shannon) we don't have your label up there! hello?! this is the SHOW! i'm so sorry! i'm gonna go get it from my car right now!" we talked for a while, and when i told her it was the first time i'd been in a show, she asked how it felt... my response was "exciting... VULNERABLE" and she was saying how even more vulnerable it would be because i have my own image up there and my own journaling. so true. i'm "out there" for all to see! ...so take me or leave me but this is who i am! :)

i love watching kids on playgrounds!

2010-03-09T15:58:00.000-08:00

that sounds creepy... ha. but oh, isn't it so delightful watching little ones enjoy themselves? my morning run used to take me past a school that always seemed to be at recess when i'd be running by (since we moved, the school i run past always seems to NOT be at recess - guess i'm too early... but i keep hoping!). such a joy to see elementary students playing like they don't have a care in the world! ...or like they do - watching 5th grade girls and their bff/cattiness with each other just reminds me of the good old days! watching 10 year old boys play soccer like they're trying out for the pros. they just have so much heart! such an ability to PLAY that adults somehow lose. like we're not allowed to play. we have to be "responsible" and work hard and make a living and blah blah blah. i think it is SO important to the human soul, young or old, to take time out to just PLAY. making art has been that playtime for me. i have to ALLOW myself time to have fun and do things that maybe don't seem productive or to have any lasting value... but oh, how they rejuvenate my soul!

YOU need to give yourself permission to do creative things, too. not as a means to an end, being "productive", but as PLAY. i mean, it can be refreshing for me even if i'm simultaneously doing something productive, like making a card for a friend... but sometimes i just have to play with color and texture and transparency just because. and a lot of times, i end up putting my heart onto whatever i'm making, and i end up being able to see it as almost a journaling time - time to process life and emotions... but sometimes, it's just the delight of putting aqua, lime green, and bright red together to see what happens!

i wish i could post pictures of the little projects i've been working on this week: baby shower cards, scrapbook art, making a "gel skin" image transfer... but alas, our camera and our computer are still not speaking to each other. i know a blog is much more fun to read when there are photos, so i'm gonna keep trying!

i'm gonna be in my first ever art show!

2010-03-05T07:43:00.000-08:00

i love technology...

2010-03-03T10:09:00.000-08:00

when it works... and i HATE technology when it doesn't work. the only reason i haven't been blogging is that we haven't been able to upload any pictures from our computer for the last week and a half. i finished that one piece and posted about it a WEEK ago. and we've been trying every day to "fix" our Mac so it'll post a picture of it! granted, we don't have much time to work on stuff like that, but we keep trying with the few minutes we can snag! i'm hopeful that today's the day, so i'm writing a blog post for the pictures to be added to WHEN we figure it out today ;)

I did it! i made two art pieces and submitted them friday to biola for the show commemorating "women's history month"! they were supposed to be about the theme "process" - i think more referring to the process of art-making itself than the subject matter, but i took it both ways :) these pieces are about the emotions that came with finding out we were pregnant all the way through the process of pregnancy to actually having a baby. they are entitled "fear" and "wonder" which i guess can still pretty much sum up how i feel about the whole "motherhood" thing. from the time 1 year ago when we found out i was pregnant, till now with a 3 month old, i'd say the progression has gone from FEAR & wonder to fear & WONDER. amazingness. so the first piece has me pregnant, and the altered photo actually shows the different stages of the growing belly and joey inside (hard to see in the final product 'cause of the layers of beeswax). the second one is about MY wonder, but i love that i found a picture of him as a newborn with such a look of wonder on HIS face! the rest of the pieces are collage elements such as my journal pages about what i was feeling about being pregnant, dress pattern tissue (i use some of that in pretty much every piece i make), beeswax, ink, and oil paint stick. a bunch of transparent layers that reveal the "process" of art-making.

they were supposed to e-mail us yesterday to let us know if our pieces were accepted to the show or not... i'm waiting!

got the pictures posted finally! here they are!

"fear" 5"x7" encaustic collage on claybord

"wonder" 5"x7" encaustic collage on claybord

what a joy

2010-02-24T20:16:00.000-08:00

i've decided that i'm only gonna blog if i actually have something to say - but actually DO it when the inspiration strikes... i don't like the idea of forcing myself to say something every day even if i'm supertired uninspired "just to say something". i'm just more of a "talk if you actually have something to SAY" kind of a person... so let my blog reflect that...

jason was just telling me that the one thing he prayed for in anticipation of joey's arrival was for a baby that would just bring joy to people (good disposition, etc.). and if joey has one defining characteristic, it's that he completely endears himself to people pretty much every time he sees them... from the moment he started smiling at 5 weeks, and then laughing at 7-8 weeks, it's been "all over". people can't get enough! he is such a flirt! :) and it brings us so much joy as his parents, both because we get to be on the receiving end of those smiles and giggles, and also because we get to see how happy he makes other peope just being around him! i mean, he's no angel - he still has his evening "fussy times" like most babies, and as far as eating and sleeping... let's just say he doesn't go by the book... but those big blue eyes wrinkling up into a toothless grin that seems to take up half his face just make it worth it! we don't really have any good pictures of this yet, but i'll post some soon! (we don't have any because we haven't really taken pictures of him - besides on our phones to text to people - in like a month - we gotta get on that!)

ps. i "finished" what i was working on yesterday (the sewing machine wouldn't cooperate with my buttonholes) so i'll try to post a pic of that soon... and here it is...!

can you see the rusty bottlecaps for buttons? it used to have a frilly white flowery edging, but jason never liked it that way, so i thought maybe it'd be better this way... ;)

now i have a deadline of friday for a piece to submit for the Biola women & art show... let's see what i can come up with tomorrow!!

missed!

2010-02-23T17:38:00.000-08:00

so i already missed a day of blogging... on the THIRD day of my month! pathetic. but life just catches up with you, and when you have a full day of laundry, cleaning, taking care of baby, going on a date with hubby, ETC... it's not that i forgot about it, or even that i didn't feel "up to it" - i just never had time! crazy. i did get to work on a little creative project yesterday, that i was hoping to finish today... but right now it's stuck in my sewing machine (really - i can't get it out!) so it'll have to wait i guess...

speaking of "missing"... i was just thinking how much i miss having close friends nearby. it takes me so much Oomph to get out there and make a friend, and then for some reason, they all seem to move away... FAR away. my best friend since childhood now lives in Papua New Guinea... my 2 friends that i stayed in touch with from college both live in Africa now, and the 2 close friends i've had since then have also moved away in the last couple of years - one to Atlanta, and one to Greece!! i keep telling myself that i need to "try again"... but it's hard! although i have noticed that it gets a little easier with a baby! people wanna hang out with you just so they can get a piece of that cuteness (AND because they like you, but the baby just makes it actually happen :) and there's a lot fewer lulls in conversation - always something to talk about, or a little guy to coo to! i have actually felt more connected to people since the baby than the past few years... and somehow more confident, too. like somehow it makes me a better person worth knowing now that i have him... or maybe it's just that i know if i can handle being a mother i can handle anything? having a baby has been WAY harder than i expected. i mean, i knew it was gonna be hard in like a "this will change our lives forever" way, but i wasn't so much expecting it to be hard like "i don't know if i can survive this!' kind of way! i guess i never really had any close friends or family that i got to see in the throes of raising a baby...

but (see last post) it has gotten MUCH better the past few weeks. he is amazing and i love spending time with him! we've got a lot of adventure ahead of us, i can tell!

a random shot of me and joey falling knee-deep in snow... having an adventure!

fullheart 2-21-2010

2010-02-22T17:19:00.000-08:00

my heart is so full right now! i feel it like a physical sensation, bubbling up and over inside my chest. about to burst, impatient for the laptop to finally boot up so i can express just how joyful i am in this moment. i have so much wonder in my soul… an amazing, strong husband who loves me… a son who brings me delight a hundred times a day… the beauty of golden wheat, green hills after a good rain, silent snow-laden trees – oh, so much beauty, and so much joy in my life!

i write this in bed in the dark since i finally realized i couldn’t fall asleep with all this welling up inside me! this is the third day of jason’s off-road expedition trip, so my bed is half-empty, but joey lies just a couple of feet away in his bassinet, and i can hear him breathing and stirring as i write this. there is nothing more peaceful than a baby sleeping. i could watch him forever (if there weren’t other things that REALLY needed to be done in those precious few moments). and nothing i can think of brings me so much joy as his little smiles! the eye contact, where you know that 3-month-old is really looking at you, learning about his world and his mother, and the huge grin that will light up his face… the shrieks he lets out when he’s on his changing table or when he gets so excited that the bears on his mobile are MOVING (the fan comes in a close second)! even his little drunk smiles after he’s just finished eating – no, maybe especially those – just so sweet and blissful and thankful. they thrill my heart and i can’t help grinning back, or getting teary, or wrapping him in an almost-too-tight hug. the first few surreal weeks of his life, i wasn’t so sure that this was a good idea – “what did we get ourselves into???” was the question i often asked myself… and “why do people have kids? and why do they think it’s so great?” but now that i can see that little person inside, and he’s not just this crying, demanding little stranger… i have so much love for him. i must tell him a couple of dozen times a day – it probably comprises half our conversation (we’ll have to start branching out soon ;) “oh, I just love you so much, bug”!

i was a little worried that jason leaving for 4 days would lead to me having a meltdown with joey… i tend to need a little break every other day or so – just for an hour or two – where i don’t have to be the one responsible for meeting his every need. being a “single parent” for a few days was not something i was completely looking forward to. but I knew this trip would be so refreshing and good for jason’s soul, so i sent him off! and my time with joey has been just wonderful! so sweet. just “mommy and me”. i can’t wait for jason to come back, though! i’ve been doing things i wouldn’t normally do with him around, like watch chick flicks… i’ve been reading Captivating by John and Stasi Eldredge, and they encourage their reader to go back and watch movies that touch your soul (with romance, beauty, adventure). so last night, my sister and i watched Ever After; and tonight, i watched two of the movies with Katherine Heigl based on the books by Janette Oke Love Comes Softly and Love’s Enduring Promise. movies i would NEVER make jason sit down and watch, but knew my heart would enjoy… and i think that’s what has stirred up this sense of wonder and gratitude in me. i used to watch romantic movies, hoping for the day MY prince would come and sweep ME off my feet. Now when i watch them, they serve as reminder of how good i have it! my husband is amazing. He takes such good care of his family. i am so loved, and so is our son. he is strong for us, fights for us, plays with us. i can’t imagine this journey of life with anyone else. he works so hard to provide a safe place for us, and for my heart – he never gives up… though there have been plenty of moments these past 6 ½ years where i’m sure he’s wanted to… we’ve come through a lot together, and we are more in love now than ever! AND he’s good-looking ;) my prince.

my boys... aren't they handsome?

joey just stirred again, which reminds me that i should be sleeping while he is, since it’s my only chance! he’ll be up and ready to start our day again in just a few short hours (and i’m NOT quite yet ;)… here’s hopin’ that I’ve said all I needed to and can fall asleep this time!

what i made today... i used my Dremel tool for the first time today, and drilled a hole in this old bottle cap to make a lovely rusty pendant - i'm gonna wear it on our date tonight!

fourthmonth 2-20-2010

2010-02-21T15:12:00.000-08:00

joey turned 3 months old yesterday! and i decided that since (some of) the fog has lifted, and I am looking longingly at my “art area” every day, but never really getting in there… for joey’s fourth month of life I will create and/or blog every day. i always read about people challenging themselves to do months or years like this, and think “yeah, that’d be nice”… but never seems doable, with work, baby, taking care of home and husband… (and I can never find a good “starting point” like the new year or a birthday – but what better than the 4th month of your baby’s life?? ;) but this month, i’m gonna do it! even if it’s little. like today, i made a little paper quilt that was more of a study in color than anything else, but it was SOMETHING! i created and i learned from it, and i was refreshed in the process! my soul needs to create – i feel so alive when i do! i even feel rejuvenated just from brainstorming about being creative, but so many times it just doesn’t get put into action. not this month! we’re doin’ it, baby! and by baby, I mean joey, because i AM toting him around most of the day (he was in the jeep front carrier while I was making that paper quilt today), so he’s gonna have to be my little (mini) partner in crime. this is gonna be awesome! …but not easy… i can barely find the time and energy to update my facebook status once a week, much less blog every day… and so much other household “stuff” tends to take precedence over “fun” stuff like art and being creative. but this month… here goes!

i LOVE being off work

2009-09-27T15:40:00.000-07:00

i have talked to so many friends and coworkers who say "I could never stay home - i'd get so bored! need some time outside of the house..." well, it's been almost 3 weeks that i've been on disability leave now, and i still can't fathom WANTING to go back to work. i just feel like i get to be so "normal" now! I cook, keep the house clean, hang out with friends, read, and be creative as much as i want! yesterday i made 22 scrapbook pages!! workin' hard on getting caught up! and the 2 days before that, i made, wrote, and sent off 35-40 thank-you notes from my shower! SO MUCH FUN... i hope joey comes on his due date 'cause then that gives me 6 weeks still to get all caught up and ready for him! we shall see... babies come when they want to come, but i'm doing everything i can to keep him inside a few more weeks! (lots of resting and staying hydrated) plus then my mom can see me pregnant before she meets the new little one (living in hawai'i, she hasn't been able to see my growing belly - much to her dismay)... yes, this is the first grandchild (on both sides of the family) so EVERYONE is so excited!

well, i'm not going to post pictures of my creative endeavors of the last couple of days, 'cause there are too many pages, and i already sent out the thank-yous! but i have a shot of a piece i made a while back that needs a home on my blog - it's made up of a bunch of pics of things around our house - turned out kinda fun...

3 months later...

2009-09-14T15:06:00.000-07:00

wow - it's been a while... i guess i took a break because of how sick i'd been feeling and the total lack of energy... but in july i found a "magic medicine" that made my morning sickness go away - just like that! amazing stuff! i just take one little sleeping pill (Unisom SleepTabs) with a B6 every other night, and abracadabra! no more nausea! discovered this stuff and stopped feeling sick about 3 days before going on a cruise to Alaska (a-mazing.) and ate everything in sight while i was there (because i could finally stomach more than fruit and gummy bears!)... and ended up with a gallstone. so ever since then, i've been having lots of little bouts of pain after almost every time i eat because of this gallstone (doc says i'll probably have to have the whole gallbladder removed after the baby's born - just what i wanted to be doing in those "bonding weeks" i get off from work)... but i seriously feel so much better and like a normal human being again, after finding my little magic blue pill :)

of course, as my pregnancy has progressed, i just feel more and more like my body is falling apart... everything hurts - feet, legs, back, pelvis, belly... and then a couple of weeks ago i started having contractions at work. i work 12-hour shifts as a nurse in the ER and don't get a lot of "down time". so at about 29 weeks, i started having fairly consistent contractions towards the end of each shift (like 8-9 hours into the shift, i'd start having consistently 6 contractions an hour), and i was also totally exhausted - like i was about to cry the last couple of hours of each shift. so after a few days of all these contractions, my doctor took me off on disability - 5 weeks early! yay! now for the last week or so that i've been off, i've been feeling so much more "normal" again! i mean, i still feel like my body is falling apart ;) but only 2-3 contractions a day, and i'm just getting to rest a lot more and do "normal" things like keep the house clean, and cook and bake and stuff... AND i've had more time to "be creative" finally! which is mostly taking the form of getting "caught up" on my scrapbooking from the last few years... i finally did our wedding (6 years ago now)!!! and i just want to get everything chronicled from pre-baby before he comes and all my scrapbooking will be about him... i really need to do some painting/collage and stuff, too. i miss it. i have this piece that has been in progress for a couple of months now (the 3rd piece in the Coldplay series - Cemeteries of London)...

here's the only 2 pieces i finished this summer (during my blog absence), both based on pictures from my baby sister's wedding in april... HUGE departure from my usual color schemes... but i think they turned out pretty good... i'm thinking about making prints and marketing them as like cards or something (bridal shower invitations?)

ok, fine, you can see it today...

2009-06-04T16:14:00.000-07:00

here is the piece i made today... it's the second piece in my "coldplay" series - this one is about the song "Clocks"

and this one below was the first in that series, based on - you guessed it - 'yellow'! i like how the silhouettes leave ambiguity about the emotion involved in the scene... in the clocks one, the person could be wistful, longing, or just glancing up on an evening walk to see the giant moon. the yellow silhouette could be jumping for joy, reaching for the stars, or just motioning to something (or i'm sure there could be a lot of other interpretations, depending on who's looking at it!)

these pieces came about because i really liked how my birthday party invitations i made this past year turned out, with the multicolored paper and paint backgrounds (a technique learned from kelly rae roberts' book Taking Flight) -- see them below! but with these 2 in the coldplay series, i purposely chose colors i normally wouldn't first pick - but i like how they turned out!!

i hand-delivered each of these invitations to the dozen or so invitees - it was so fun! and so was the party! most of the people that came had NO artistic background whatsoever, but a few did, and i just got to hang out and help people "play" - so fun. i need to have another one of those parties!

I threw up at the grocery store on Tuesday.

2009-06-04T14:33:00.001-07:00

I’m 4 months pregnant – the morning sickness is supposed to be OVER by now! It is so miserable just feeling nauseous all the time… but I think the reason I’m MOST disappointed that it hasn’t subsided is that the second trimester is supposed to be the time you feel the best (like, ever in your life), from stuff I’d read before being pregnant, at least. And I had all these big plans of things I was going to accomplish during these 3 months: get caught up with my scrapbooking , make lots of art, start an etsy site and start selling it… ‘cause once the baby comes, I know I’m going to have a very new focus in my life, and these things may have to take a backseat for a while. I mean I’ll still HAVE to create stuff… but won’t be able to dedicate large chunks of time to it – like I SHOULD be able to now. Pero, no. I’m already a month into the second trimester and all I do is lay around all the time. Ok, not completely, but by the time I do some laundry, grocery shopping, errands, cooking, cleaning (plus working full time) – all in between times of feeling so sick I just HAVE to lay down – there’s just not much time/energy left.

At least I have an amazing husband that supports me and loves me through all the whining, “I feel sick, but I HAVE to eat now. No that doesn’t sound good… no. no! blech! no. no. no. Ok we could try that…” and all my frustration with never getting anything done “all I did today was ONE load of laundry, and went to the grocery store and I threw up. :( ” He’ll say, “but did you do your ONE job for the day?? Taking care of the baby??” “yeah, I guess…” “then good job!! You accomplished everything you needed to today!” he’s sweet. And then there’s my sister Kristi… for mother’s day this year (my very first soon-to-be-mother’s day) she gave me a card that says she’ll clean my house once a week until next mother’s day, because she knows how tired I’ve been and that’s not gonna go away when the baby comes… omg. I am loved. I would NEVER do that for someone – such a huge sacrifice, with everything else going on in life. Thanks, sis!

The other part of what I was “supposed” to be doing during this time was getting ready for the baby! Such an incredibly gigantic life change is about to happen, and I feel like I haven’t even been able to think about it much/process/engage emotionally with the fact that a new little human is inside of me, forming… all that aside from physically preparing – nursery, picking names, shopping, etc – can’t even THINK about all that yet at this point! Guess I’ve been waiting till the morning sickness was over… but at this rate, I better start trying THROUGH it now! My mom was sick for 8 months with me, so hopefully this isn’t payback for that ;) and hopefully it’s not genetic… :) but I worked on some art today! My fingers and fingernails are all turquoise right now – have to show you when it’s done!

the baby at 10 weeks (7 weeks ago now! my little "joey" is much bigger now! and more human-looking ;)

up to speed

2009-05-26T14:29:00.001-07:00

So I wanted to give everyone a little background about me and my art journey before I started blogging about the everyday “stuff”, so I think you’re pretty well up to speed now! Oh! Except I took one more class at the community college – intro to painting – and got to play with paint and learn how it works! Here’s my two favs from that class:

Now, in other news, Jason (my wonderful husband) went off-roading with his jeep and some friends last weekend and look what he brought me back!! He said they were from some old mining camp from the 1800s (but could’ve been from campers in present day too ;) – still so cool! Can’t wait to figure out something to do with them!

first tries

2009-05-19T14:06:00.000-07:00

these were my first mixed-media art pieces. I had read an article on transferring images and absolutely HAD to try it! i used shots jason had just taken on our anniversary (for those of you who already saw this post yesterday, when jason got home i made him take new pictures for me, so these ones are better :)

Then I started taking my first art class – an intro to design class (with Barry Krammes – lol) – and I LOVED it! Just putting colors and textures and ideas together in visually appealing ways… felt so much like just playing! I was 26 and in a class with all these cute little college freshmen, many of whose skills with drawing or painting far exceeded mine… but I could hold my own with design! :) my 2 favorite pieces from that:

lovin' the silhouettes!

Barry introduced me to beeswax, and i fell in love! this piece got a little... melted, 'cause i originally hung it above the oven in my kitchen -- not such a good idea :)

Biola was too expensive even to audit, so after that I took a drawing class at the Community College, and loved that, too! I mean, I was REALLY unsure of myself at first “never” having drawn before. But my teacher, Alexandra Weisenfeld, was so encouraging! I felt like the star of the class – she not only praised my technical abilities in drawing, but also my playful, creative side – made me feel like a “real” artist with real potential. A couple of pieces from that class:

self-portrait

my "art area" (known to most artists as the studio? i guess because it's only part of a big room, we call it that...). picture got smudgy from being in my portfolio with charcoal drawings...

While I was taking that class, they had a contest at my work (Children’s Hospital of Los Angeles) for nurses to submit art pieces with a theme of “Family-centered care”, so I made a last minute piece and turned it in! that was so scary – putting myself out there like that… only about 7 nurses entered, but I WON! $500! It was crazy! And SO exciting! I took Jason out to dinner at the Yard House with that money to thank him for his support and celebrate with me, and then with the rest, every last penny went back into supplies and stuff for making more art! (if only every piece I made could be so profitable! I really could quit “work” and just “play” making art! :) think it’ll be a while before that happens…… ) Anyways, here’s that piece (I got paid $500 for it AND I got to keep it!)

it all started with scrapbooking (2 of 2)

2009-05-16T12:03:00.000-07:00

Then the transition to “art”. My husband and I love to go on “dates” to Borders. Sit in their café area and read together, drink yummy concoctions… so I would always grab a huge stack of all the scrapbooking magazines and thumb through them till I had so many new ideas floating around I had to go home and play (oh, and sometimes we buy books and magazines, too – we’re not JUST freeloaders ;)! Well, one day, somehow a Cloth Paper Scissors ended up in my stack and I started reading it, intrigued by the images and my very first introduction to mixed-media art – I think I read it cover-to-cover that day. But the article that drew me in the most was the one by Kelly Rae Roberts. I delighted in my first glimpses of her art, but even more than that, it was her story! So similar to mine. That she had been in the medical field, totally not using creative talents at all, and then eventually after she discovered the joy she had in creating, she took the daring step of leaving that stable career and dedicating herself to making art as a full-time endeavor! That has been my dream since that moment. I also had a friend at the same time who was an art teacher, who was working on developing her own portfolio, and we began to talk about her art and the altered books assignments she was giving her class… she started giving ME creative assignments, too! And it was all downhill from there for me! I couldn’t stop! I started taking art classes at local colleges, to try to develop some of those skills a little bit more, and I have fallen in love. My day no longer seems complete unless I’ve created something that day. I am obsessed with rust and all things distressed. I love texture and almost none of my pieces get away without some sewing pattern attached to it, making it all wrinkly…

it all started with scrapbooking (1 of 2)

2009-05-16T10:16:00.000-07:00

I know, I know. That statement is enough to make all the “real artists” out there shudder. But it’s true, and I can’t deny it! I had never considered myself “creative” IN ANY WAY. I grew up always being the smartie – good at stuff like math and science – guess that’s why I became a nurse! But anytime a project called for creativity, I was like “count me out!” Then I discovered scrapbooking. I mean, I had glued stuff in scrapbooks since I was like 15,

my first scrapbook ever

but never paid any attention to color or layout or anything, but when I was in college, some of my other nursing friends were scrapbookers and I saw a whole new world open up!

my first "cute" scrapbook

My skills kept developing in that area, but I still thought “I’m not creative – I just put together stuff that’s already there in my own way.” Then I had a conversation with a friend that helped me realize that that is exactly what creativity is! You don’t start from nowhere and create new worlds without a reference point in THIS world and the things and colors and textures you’ve experienced here! It really is just putting it all together in a new way that is “yours”. That opened up the doors of creativity to me – I suddenly had the freedom to do whatever I wanted with my supplies, and I loved it! I still stuck with paper pretty exclusively for a while, making cards and scrapbooking for myself and others.

People started calling me “their creative friend”! What a change! I hadn’t done anything creative like paint or draw or collage since I was a kid (part of the reason for the name “rusty artist” – the idea that everyone starts out as kids able to access their creative sides, but as many are encouraged in a different direction, they stop using those talents/that side of them, and it ends up “rusty”.) Now people were asking ME to create stuff for them and their families!

jason took pictures of a bunch of rusty stuff for me at Fisherman's Wharf in San Francisco (you can't really tell from this picture, but the letters "RUSTY" have actual rust on them - not sure if that's too archival, but i like it :)

Explanation of the name RustyArtist

2009-05-14T14:56:00.000-07:00

The reason for this name is twofold: first, I love rust. I cannot resist a rusty object. My sisters joke that for my birthday or Christmas, all they have to do is go look around on the street till they find something rusty, and I will be happy – lol – it’s true! I think I even put it on my Christmas wish list one year – “rusty stuff”. I buy objects from thrift stores and MAKE them rusty. Like this shield – it started out plastic with a shiny silver emblem – doesn’t it look way better now?? ;) The second reason for this name is the idea that most of us are “rusty artists”. We get to express our creativity boundlessly in childhood, but soon it becomes less accepted as we “grow up” and are encouraged in other, more practical directions. So my creativity was very “rusty” when I finally rediscovered it a few years ago, and I’m still getting all my creative parts in working order. Can you hear the tin man saying “oil can…”?