Artist Trading Card class demos

Two ATCs I'll be teaching how to make: one with an Asian theme, one with a photo I took of a statue in St. Mary's Cemetery in Minneapolis.

more class demos of ATCs

Two more ATCs I'll be teaching: one with paper weaving and the other with a doggie theme (of course I have to do a doggie one!!) We'll be making something close to these.

A Sharp Stick in the Eye

Just to mix things up a little, I accidentally poked myself in the eye today. I just got home from the eye doctor and he says it's not a serious injury, but I do have to put ointment in my eye for a week 3 times a day, and it makes my vision blurry (think Vaseline in your eye) for 20 minutes after each application. FUN! Jeez. I blame this on the headache, because I probably wasn't being careful and was distracted by that pain, which has now resulted in...more pain. My eye feels bruised. The way the doc explained it to me, I scraped the skin off my cornea and white of my eye. Ack! I know it sounds nasty, but you can't really see anything. Heh, heh, little joke there. Corneal abrasion is the official name for it. Poke in the eye. Not a good Monday.

A Few Things Bright and Beautiful - Altered Book gift

Cover of AB I made for my aunt L. First book I've done all by myself, and I think it turned out really nice. Just sent it off to her, hope she likes it!

What Can You Do With A Headache?

Well, I can't write. Not much, obviously. I was supposed to do a book review over the weekend and it hurts to think. I can make some art, I still have to just rest a lot. This headache has lasted almost a week now. Saturday I had a repreive for a few hours, that was nice. And I'm managing to still get in a few fun things, I just can't do a lot. I need to go lie down now.

The little white poodle who lives across the street is named Snowball (or is it Snowflake? I can't remember, my head hurts. But anyway, they call him Snowy) and he got a really close haircut for the summer. He looks like a big rat now, how unfortunate. John is calling him Shaved Ice.

The other day I saw a guy on a motorcycle carrying crutches across the back. Does that seem like a good idea?

The weather is really nice lately, very cool. In fact it was so cool I got up this morning and found the heat on! Ack, turn it off!

Okay, really, going to lie down now. Just had to get a few random thoughts off.

Marbles Champion AB layout

For this altered book, i had to use a vintage photo and make up something about the boy's life. I chose to create his identity as a marbles champ, and did research on the U.S National Marble Championship, which started in the 1920's. The words stamped on the right side are all marbles terms, and the tags pull out and explain the terms and give some other info about the marbles championship, like the fact that it was integrated 25 years before Jackie Robinson played for the Dodgers. I love doing research like this.

Post Office Table

This was a $5 ugly off-white nightstand I got from a garage sale last year, and I've painted it in color blocks using 5 different blues, then glued stamps atop the paint. The stamps are from all over the world. It's not done yet but it's finally starting to look the way I envisioned it.

Yoga Skiing

Holy Vinassanas, Batman! I started a yoga class Tuesday, and although I could tell right away it was quite a workout, I was not quite prepared for how sore I was going to be the day after (and the day after and...). Yesterday I could hardly get out a chair without help. I haven't been this sore since I went downhill skiing, which was quite a while ago...and here I was wondering if I shouldn't be trying some of the poses at home during the week, but I think we'll be waiting on that, as it may take me a whole week to recover from the class.

Minneapolis Mystery ATC

torn pages from an Agatha Christie mystery, used train ticket for the time stamp, other ticket bits, and the cherry (a Minneapolis icon, from the Spoonbridge and Cherry sculpture) is from a candy box wrapper.

The White Album

A recent Altered Book layout for an all-white book. This was hard!! At first I couldn't think of anything to do, but I think it turned out nice. The spirally things are called spirellas. The left page is a paper weaving I made with a wedding-y paper, just cut strips and wove them together. The white circles are brads of different sizes. The white hook on the right page is a sock hanger!

Camping with Cocoa

At our campsite with Cocoa in St. Croix State Park. Cocoa did well sleeping in the tent. She especially liked being able to see out the windows in the morning.

Pillow Snoozer

Cocoa liked having her pillow along on the camping trip.

Camp Cook

Blueberry pancakes camping. It doesn't get much better.

Campfire

isn't it hypnotic?

Headaches and Rude Squirrels

Headaches. Blah blah blah, ow, neverending, boring boring boring. There, now I don't have to talk about my headaches. You get the picture.

Have you ever had a squirrel run right at you? Two of them almost ran right up my leg the other day. I was out walking, and they were chasing each other and I didn't even see them coming. Just saw this blur of fur coming at my legs, and heard that scratchy sound their little claws make on the sidewalk, ick. So I made this funny girly sound, you know, a little scream--it just sort of escaped from my lips, I usually don't do that--and I jumped up in the air just long enough for them to run under my feet instead of taking me for a tree and making me a prop in their little amusement. Yikes!

Siren Song

It's that time again, the first Wednesday of the month when the air raid sirens go off, and I'm sitting at my desk all peaceful-like when suddenly there's this horrible wailing... They're tornado warning sirens but they're so creepy-sounding, they always make me think of bomb shelters and the Blitz and nuclear war. I know, how pleasant.

National Night Out was last night and although I had a headache most of the day, I managed to get out and celebrate in the evening for the party on our block. Which is good, since I'm a block leader. I put out library info, including library card applications, but nobody filled out any. Oh well, probably the library geeks like me already have cards, and the other folk who don't read...well, I don't understand people who "don't read." "Oh, I don't read much," I've heard people say, and it makes my head spin. Does not compute. How can you not read much? To me reading is a necessary part of every day. It's like someone saying "Oh, I don't eat much." What, you mean today?

We took Cocoa camping last weekend for the first time and she did great. It was so nice to bring her with us instead of leaving her home at the doggie hotel. We hope to bring her up to the Boundary Waters soon, maybe in the next couple of years. It was a little hard seeing so many families camping with their kids, and us not having one...yet. But it was a bit easier having our whole family there, that is, our doggie, our fur-kid. We went to St. Croix State Park, which is a really nice park, and also rather huge. It's right on a river so we went swimming both days, with Cocoa, which felt so great. Growing up I always had a swimming pool and I really miss that here, not having a pool. I know, there's lakes. Can you say slime? I thought you could. Bleah. The Boundary Waters lakes were amazing to swim in, but the city lakes are icky. Call me a whiner.