When life gets crazy, I collage

The past nine months have been kinda crazy for my extended family medically speaking. Biopsies, cancer diagnosis, myasthenia gravis, feeding tubes, hospice care, heart transplant, infection, DNR, DNR repeal, DNR again, more biopsies, no cancer but abnormal cells, autoimmune responses, vitreous detachment, and on and on.

This week my grandfather-in-law finally passed away. He was a dearly loved man and left behind an amazing legacy of love and family. We are all taking comfort in the fact that he is no longer in pain and was fully ready for things to end. That being said, is is just hard and sad right now.

As we run around trying to get ready for the 10 hour drive that awaits us, I stepped away to have a little time in my studio to collage. It is what I do when I need to work with my hands and engage color but am a little bit of a mess inside.

What do these textures look like next to each other? How does this color relate to that one? This is my favorite kind of therapy. 

Prints of these and others are available here in my shop. 

What are your favorite creative coping mechanisms? Would love to hear your stories!

Friday night foraging finds

My husband has an upcoming bike race at Platte River State Park and was needing to head out there for a few practice laps before the big day. Being in desperate need of some solitude and fresh air, I quickly volunteered to go with him.

I really love how you can still see some of the original art on the coins even after the train flattened them. Also, they remind me of some of the forms that I like to experiment with.

I'll keep changing up this arrangement until it feels a little more right. If I don't get this glued down by 4pm today my daughter will probably take a few of these items for her own collections so I had better get to work!

In my studio: Playing with my new gelli plate

Last week I finally got myself a Gelli plate!!!

There are so many tutorials of how to make different kinds of prints with them online that it can be sort of overwhelming just where to start.

I really liked the simplicity of Linda Germain's Yoga Printmaking that I thought I would began with that. I cutout several organic-shaped stencils out of a manila folder and collected several other items that would go well with this method. 

My supplies: newsprint, hand-made stencils, string and various paints I had on hand

  

It was a really fun, relaxing process, and I'm anxious to use these prints in an upcoming collage!

In my studio: Staying close to home

 I always feel a tinge of jealous for my artist friends who live by the ocean. They always seem to collect amazing things on their beach-combing trips.

Having just entered the third trimester of my third pregnancy, I am in no condition for long excursions but walks around the block with my two little ones in tow is completely do-able! This led me to make a collage of goodies that I found within a one-block radius of my house.

Week in review...

So here is what I've been up to this week:

painted some Jenga blocks from the thrift store to make a wall hanging

tried my hand at digital collage for the first time

doodled a little in my sketchbook

and discovered someone else's checkout list in a library book! Think I'm going to add some of these titles to my reading list. :-)

Hope you've all had a creative week, too!

in my studio: making lemonade out of lemons!

So, something good did come out of my most recent DIY fail. I liked how my sketches translated onto Christmas ornaments so I thought that I would try and see how they looked on sculpy.

Now I just have to seal them and turn them into pendants!!

Mother-daughter fun: scribbling!!

AJ's scribbles inspired me to do some scribbling of my own!

(hers are color and mine are black and white)

Hello sketchbook.... it has been awhile

After two weeks of not sketching, I thought that it was time to pull out my marker and watercolors.

The reason that I haven't been sketching so much lately is because I'm trying to work on my sewing skills before baby #2 makes his appearance. Here is a pic of my first ever double-needle hem (I'm sure that is not the right term for it, but you get the gist). 

Print practice

I wanted to practice my printing skills on the cheap and figured that making artwork for my daughter's room would provide the perfect opportunity. 

With my tendency of tensing up on projects when I'm using "nice" supplies, I pulled out some leftover charcoal paper from some school projects and slapped on a pretty thick coat of gesso.

I was also able to find another use for the craft foam sticks by carving a chevron pattern using a paperclip of all things!

And voila! I'm going to take my daughter's "oohs" as a sign that she likes it, too. :-)

in my studio...

I've always said that once I became a mother that I would start to sew for my kiddos. Now that my firstborn is over a year old (and won't need a new wardrobe every three months!), I've started to work on that resolution. 

  

Hope to continue to blog more "in process" posts and not just things I've completed as I start to take on new creative endeavors!