swallowfield

mayday

i've been feeling kind of quiet this week. i've been enjoying all of the buds on the trees and dreaming up all kinds of things i want to draw and create, but have been feeling spare on words.
(this new gocco print came from of paper and thread - isn't it lovely? i rearranged some of my favorite things around it because i like it so much.)

my house is getting a new roof this week. while this is a very exciting and much needed happening + i am happy to see the old one go, trying to get any artwork done at home has been a bit of a challenge - it feels a bit like being a hamster inside a cage with lots of men peering in on you through the windows. ((oh hi! you're looking in on me in my bathroom, which has lovely shades but crap for privacy! i was thinking of -oh i don't know - peeing, but now i think i...won't. okay.))  this morning i woke up and felt a lot like i was a tennis ball inside a giant dryer, with cyclical thumping on all parts of the house. oh, and there's the excellent music that they've been playing all week ive gotten to enjoy: i've heard barracuda at least four times already. at a nice loud volume. i love some heart here and there, but at 7am? the persistant beat of barracuda is a lot like the thumping on the roof.

i've been drawing a bunch, because it's portable and i can do it anywhere. like coffee shops, with bathrooms. :)

furniture putter-together-er

say what now?  ikea directions make me laugh.

the kids are on vacation this week and i'm in spring putter mode, so we made a trip down to ikea last weekend for a few things we needed. i felt like i really knew what i wanted there, but it still took over three hours to figure it all out and by the time we ate lunch/dinner there we all had that wacky glazed-over look in our eyes. does that happen to you?  it was a long day, but i left feeling convinced i'd be a more organized, better person going forward. ha.

i've been putting stuff together over the past few days in between applying bandaids, serving snacky meals on the fly, and enjoying time with the kids and their friends. (i forgot how filthy my kids tend to get at this time of year, when they're outside until its dark and i'm begging them to come in.)

in other news, i have some cool art-related stuff going on:

- i now have a shop on supermarket - i really love the site's spare look and design, and there's some excellent stuff to be found that i hadn't seen before - super fun browsing.
- i'll be participating in the old school show at uppercase gallery this fall.
- i'm looking into a way to have my art available for vinyl cling enlargements to order - a lot of people have emailed and asked me for this option; i'll keep you posted!

it is sunny and gorgeous here - how about where you are? enjoy your day.

spring cleaning

i've begun a major spring cleaning/purge around here. it feels so good! i feel like i can see things again, you know? it is inspiring me to want to paint and rearrange things here and there. it's so much nicer  than the way i was feeling all winter - a kind of 'i hate it here. i hate snow, i hate everything' feeling.  well, maybe hate is strong word, but a good summary for what i think was a decent case of seasonal affective depression. the older i get, the more important the seasonal stuff seems to my overall well-being. even my pandora stations seem to know it's spring; they're not playing the depressing stuff today. it's all good.

after i put away all of the mittens, hats and snow boots yesterday (and did a little happy dance, which probably sealed the fact that we will get a blizzard in the next few days) i snapped this picture because i suddenly remembered that i like this little corner. the green is cheerful and i am digging pussywillows right now.

this is a new collage/papercutting piece. i love the colors in it.

i just found out that aprill and i will be sharing a booth in june at renegade craft fair in brooklyn. last year she came as meg's and my helper, and i am so excited that she'll be showing off her gorgeous yarn and wares this time around. i had a great time last year and am looking forward to it - though i seriously need to get my act in gear.  we're going to miss you there this year, meg!

finally, i have a very serious question for my gardening friends out there:  what do you recommend for a black-thumbed gal with a pretty large amount of shade in her yard who wants to overcome her fears and plant some things that won't die this year? i would love some suggestions. thanks so much in advance!

cheap + easy + satisfying wall art

you might remember this piece, which was a commission earlier this year for an extremely nice person. my eight year old was pretty sad to see it go, since she'd supervised much of its creation and kept me company for some of the many hours i fussed over it. she has asked many times time since then for a big piece of art for her room, 'like that one you sent to pennsylvania, mom.'

mrs. bossy can be very persistent.  and persuasive.

so on a whim and in secret last week i ordered a vinyl cling in size super huge (4x3 feet) by uploading a high resolution digital file here. it was simple and cheap and i got to approve a proof within 24 hours of the order. it arrived yesterday, and we unrolled it to let it settle a bit. it was wild to see my art in a large format like this - but the quality was really nice and crisp. the instructions recommended a two person installation, but this morning i did it myself with a satisfying and painless outcome. she loves it and i think it suits her room, which is a mix of old quilts and random mismatched sheets.  she loves a lot of color and pattern, like her mom.   
now i am wondering what other art i can turn into vinyl clings. :)

sunlight and pattern

it's feeling a teensy bit springy around here, if you can look past the big snowbanks still hanging around in the shady parts of town, ie my tree-filled front and back yards. i see green grass here and there, a few crocuses, and the morning sun streams into the living room and makes me happy. the kids have been scootering and biking a bit without me worrying that they'll have a terrible accident on some big patch of glare ice, so everyone's happy.

i was super impressed by this before and after bungalow makeover at design*sponge yesterday. hot damn, that took some serious vision, + i love the results. i found this hilarious video by clicking around some links on the homeowner's design business site (which is lovely) called finishing school design.  having been a major, major tetris lover in college, i thought it was especially excellent. i used to love tetris so much that i would fall asleep dreaming of level nine blocks falling down and how i would arrange them. {{and of course i was always totally sober and imagining this scenario from a purely studious angle. }}  it's all pattern love, right?

thinking of patterns reminds me to share this article by oliver sacks from the new york times, sent to me by my friend suzy.

did you know the heather smith jones just opened an etsy shop? i really love her stuff. 

i finished a drawing yesterday and i like it. i like to imagine little teeny people coming out of the house to tend these crazy ginormous flowers.

happy friday. happy spring. happy sunlight. :)

hanging around

i think i sort of disappeared this week - sorry about that. the kids have had school vacation and there were a lot of boggle games that needed to be played inside a giant blanket fort with flashlights. they both dared me to see how long i could go without checking the internet, and we were all pleased with the outcome of that bet. it was nice to have a simple, old fashioned vacation  - lots of reading + swimming + baking projects + wearing pajamas long into the day.  we saw the spiderwick chronicles and all loved it - not recommended if your kids do not like fairly scary stuff, but my kids are thrillseeker-ish so i don't think it phased them too much.
i've been working on some little patterny things over the past day too, and that has been fun. i love teaching myself new tricks on the computer + am eager to learn so much more.
i hope you have a terrific sunday, wherever you are.

quick + easy

in my busy little head i have declared that 2008 will be the year i get organized... which means i will need to involve some sort of system for organizing all of the magazines i've saved because they have articles about organizational systems. ahem.

along those lines there was a cool article in blueprint (sniff, i'll miss you) recently about organizing your jewelry into box frames (i also love the branch** idea, but for a variety of reasons consider it impractical in my own home.) grace at design*sponge made them look respectably easy + lovely to create in one sitting, which suited me fine because i am impatient. (and like grace, i didn't bother painting the frame.)
so one ikea 9x9" shadowbox frame + one piece of excellent vintage shelf paper given to me by meg + ten tiny cup hooks later, i made this:

it is cute and was satisfyingly low-tech and easy. i need a few more to organize all of my jewelry, but this is a start.

{{and once i organize all of those magazines, i'm sure i'll remember all of those other nifty ideas about organizing things, so all of the piles of crap in my house stop spilling everytime someone runs by with a cape on, brandishing a branch handmade weapon. **see above.}}

finding my happy place

all of the snow we got a few weeks ago has been melting into a messy, dirty, rainy puddle - which calls for flowers to remind me that i will, in fact, get through the dark times that are january in maine.

some real (dried, but still):
some drawn:

deep + meaningless thoughts, or the post where i use the word happy four times

things i've been pondering today, as i've puttered about cleaning and working:

why do all sorts of things other than fruit end up in our fruit bowl? the list of items discovered today was long, varied, and a little bit disturbing. is it really so hard to keep it a fruit-only zone? aye.
why do i care and feel so disappointed to have learned that my favorite feist song is actually called brandy alexander instead of bandy-eyed pretender? what the heck did i think 'bandy-eyed' even meant, anyway? google, you were totally unhelpful on this point.
these cheap thin black frames make me happy and i've decided i should always have some on hand. case in point: new artwork on the walls. it makes me happy.

i am ridiculously excited to see juno. give me a movie with an unplanned pregnancy, cutiepants teens and witty dialogue any day; i'll be a happy girl. saved and citizen ruth come immediately to mind as two other favorites.

it's been a good day. oh, + i also made this

and this (for the show at nahcotta.) happy saturday!

the fun that wasn't on my list

i had a pretty big list of to-dos for today, but when we woke up to the 3rd major december snow storm this morning, i quickly had to change gears. the kids, of course, were pretty thrilled to have a day off from school.
the revised list:
take a deep breath and try to remember that i will get it all done eventually, somehow.
admiring the mass quantities of snow we have outside {{me from my cozy + warm indoor vantage point , and the kids right out in the middle of it all}}

making my mom's christmas cookies
which were frosted with care by my kids (it makes my teeth hurt to look at them, how about you?)  i hope you have some fun stuff on your list, too.