A little weekend walk in the woods…

I am an obsessive compulsive furniture rearranger.  This old potting bench used to be down in my studio/office but wasn’t really being used…now,it’s my living room work station.  I’d like to put this chair there, but right now I am using one of our dining chairs.  It remains to be seen if this will stay or go back to where it came from in the basement…

see, J is wavering on the painted floors.  So excuse me for a moment while I stare dreamily at this photo….

via emmas designblogg

card catalog generator here found via hide & seek

This weekend I was able to make a lot of progress on a series of paintings I’ve been working on and I’m very happy with them!  Here are a few.

Are you sick of the horse pictures yet?  Friday is officially horse day here.  I drive down (it’s quite a ways from where we live) during the day and ride, come home for a bit, pick up the kids and drive back down for my daughters lesson.  I hope I don’t sound like I am complaining because if you’d told me a few years ago I would be spending any amount of time around horses again, I would have been beyond thrilled.

I have been letting myself play around, experiment and explore.  Here are some outakes of my day.  Maybe they will end up somewhere, maybe not….

update, a few hours later…

My daughter’s best friend has been raising money for Haiti by making and selling these heart branches.  So sweet don’t you think?  They are fitting on many levels, not the least of which is how open kids hearts are to help others.

The family that wears matching shoes together…

Poppytalk is holding their first poppies awards, I guess sort of the peoples choice for the handmade world.  Here’s the part where I ask, quite shamelessly, to pretty please with sprinkles and a cherry on top, to vote for me!  I am nominated in the affordable art category, along with a long list of other talented folks.  So even if you don’t vote for me, please stop by and vote for your favorite.

I picked up my monthly lot of the dying breed known as magazines today and oh my.  I found my dream home in the latest issue of Inside Out.  The house is the perfect mix of old and new, kind of a barn meets loft feel, in a gorgeous setting.  Oh and they have horses.  Apart from the fact that I am torn whether I could actually live in the country, I would move there in a second.

As I jump into new paintings and projects for the new year, I wanted to share what was probably the one that was the most fun of 2009.  I was contacted to see if I would lend some of my paintings to a movie that was being made here in Portland, and while that alone was exciting, it is a film being directed by Gus Van Sant.  That’s all I needed to know.  In addition to the paintings that were used as set dressing, I was asked to create the main characters sketch book.  The currently untitled film stars Mia Wasikowska (aka Alice in the upcoming Alice in Wonderland) as a dying girl preoccupied with mortality.   The images and quotes deal with death and are influenced by the fact that the characters father had been a naturalist.  Some images were specifically mentioned in the script so that helped as a starting point.  Here are a few pages.  Now I’ll have to wait another year to see if any of it actually makes it into the film!

So, I received a couple moleskine sketch books for Christmas (love), that I am hoping to fill with ideas, rough sketches etc.  In addition, I gifted my self with a color a month planners.  One page a day, one book for each month and they all come nicely boxed.  I am not a diary keeper, but I think these will be a fun challenge for myself, to write/sketch/whatever every single day for a year.  When the year is up, it will be a fun time capsule of sorts to look back on, don’t you think?

As we head into the weekend I thought I’d share some links!

There is no end to amazing blogs out there, here are a few of my new (to me) favorites:

Portland Places

Sunday Suppers

The City Sage

Hashai

Hide and Seek

The Jealous Curator

Lake Jane

You Are My Fave

I’ve been trying to work on some paintings at least a bit each day, all in various states of completion.  I am realizing I usually have been working a good hour or so before I become inspired and ‘ready’ to really go at it.  I’ve never really done a warm up because I only have so many hours to work before the little ones come home, at which point I become very jealous of those who have an entire day to paint.  This is the main reason I put start and keep sketch book on my resolution/goal list.  Maybe if I put more effort into that part of thinking/trying/experimenting stage, I will be more ready when the paint comes out.  Thoughts?  Do you start your day of making with a warm up?

I just purchased this great drawing from Lauren Nassef.  I have been slowly buying pieces to fill a wall I have in our dining room.  I can’t wait to see it in person and get it framed and hung up!

My print ‘Girl in the Yellow Suit’ is part of Art Wall’s January room.  Art Wall is a virtual display space created to exhibit the artwork of independent artists.  It’s approach to showing art is fun and a great inspiration for creating your own art wall.

these are still very much in progress…

Resolutions and goals for 2010.

1.  photograph my dad painting (he’ll hate this, but he is an AMAZINGLY gifted painter, and even though he was always   working on something, I don’t think I’ve ever actually seen him paint.

2.  work on getting more shows, I think I do my best work with the motivation of a looming show

3.  have my work used as an album cover (music is a huge point of inspiration for me, so just throwin that out there, you never know, right?)

4.  eat healthier (you reading this mom?!)

5.  spend more time listening

6.  keep a sketch book

7.  paint, paint, paint some more….

8.  keep receipts and other ‘business stuff’ more organized (hubby made me add this one)

9.  organize and clean studio/office, and keep it that way

10.  yell less at other drivers

11.  go to more music shows at small venues/go to more art shows as well

12. take more mini vacations this summer (at least one to the mountains and one to the coast)

13.  finish all my house projects (repaint entry way/upstairs hall/powder room, paint floors, bench in mudroom, reupholster antique sofa I bought on craigs list) not that I’m looking forward to the floor painting mess but I know it will be amazing, unfortunately hubby is wavering, maybe i should suggest it could be an early b-day gift…

14.  figure out what I am currently most afraid/intimidated by and do it

15.  go on a special ‘date’ with each of my kids individually

16.  try to get back in the jogging/yoga habit

17.  curse less (people are always surprised to find out I curse like a sailor)

I’m sure I’ll come up with more, once you get going it’s hard to stop.  Hoping you have a wonderful new years eve and new year!  Cheers!

We got surprise snow, just enough to turn our world a lovely white.  The kids are still enjoying it this morning but it will likely be gone by afternoon.  That is how I like snow.  Enough to enjoy out the window, to indulge the kids in a snow ball fight, then no more.  Life returns to its normal pace (melting puddles of snow on my floor not included).  My favorite part is how even that hose over there on the side of the house that I never got around to putting away, even that looks pretty.