When Plan A fails, go to Plan B. Below is Plan B for an ATCs with text swap on ATCs for All.
ephemera, ink, ink, and more ink.
Most happy passion: Summer. It’s finally here.
Recipe of the Week: Bulgar with strawberries and soy milk. Breakfast doesn’t know what hit it.
Song of the Week: “Eet” by Regina Spektor. Here’s the video:
Library Checkouts: Diet for a Dead Planet: How the Food Industry is Killing Us by Christopher Cook, Food Matter by Mark Bittmann, Sock and Glove by Miyako Kanamori, and Happy Gloves by Miyako Kanamori
On the Worktable: Piles of stuff that need to be put away.
Actually reading: The Ministry of Special Cases by Nathan Englander. I’m savouring this because I’m terrified that I’ll have to wait until 2015 for his next book.
Other Projects: Let’s not get into what I should be doing.
Watching: The thunderheads rolling in from the West
Notable Purchases: New curtains for the bedroom
Lusting after: A new job, a new iPod, a Macbook
Hoping for: A new job in a new city
Looking forward to: Nothing, really. I’m enjoying being at the moment.
Good thing: Running water
Bad thing: Two clogged sinks
Political mini-rant: I don’t even know where to begin these days.
Health: I should contemplate running some more.
Where I Wish I Were Instead of Here: Vancouver
Goals: Finish cleaning the living and finish up my immigration paperwork
Living in Winnipeg has taught me to appreciate small beauties. A couple of Thursdays ago, as I walked to work, Beirut was on my iPod and I smelled the tree blossoms on a few sad trees in a patch of what qualifies for green space here. All was right in the world.
All is still right in the world.
The card is original, even if the title isn’t.
acrylics, pastels, ephemera
quote of an indeterminate length of time
Published 5 March 2009 quote of an indeterminate amount of time Leave a CommentAfter that, we were all envious of butterflies. How wonderful. To fly about the world, dressed up as if for a party, stopping off at flowers like taverns with barrels full of service.
-Manuel Rivas, “Butterfly’s Tongue”
I work close to the main branch of the library in Winnipeg, so I roam the stacks (and ride the glass elevator — whee!) a couple of times a weeks. A while ago I came across Danny Gregory’s The Creative License, which I will buy one day, and checked it out for the gazillionth time. I flipped through it several times, stopping when a drawing caught my eye, before I pulled out my journal and started drawing in it again.
Here are two pages from last month focusing on food, with which I had some issues.
I’ve since made friends with food again. It took vegan chorizo (which tastes nothing like real chorizo) to get my taste buds going again. Hopefully, though, those twenty-five pounds will stay off and maybe take some of their friends with them.
I have been itching to do some guerrilla art since I bought Keri Smith’s Guerrilla Art Kit last summer. I decided to start small with some little pieces scattered throughout the library. Here’s the first one.
So many things make me smile at the moment, I hope that discovering this makes someone else smile.
the old ‘hood
Published 24 February 2009 art , photography , winnipeg 2 CommentsTags: atcs for all, circle journal, mixed media
After four sets of pages for the collaborative book project in which I’m participating, I finally used a Holga photo — a square Holga photo too!
I still remember taking this picture. I was stressed out by Winnipeg’s tight rental market and dreading winter.
And here was this gorgeous shock of goldenrod that demanded admiration. In the cheesiest, most obvious way possible, I felt like I’d found a metaphor for what was/is going on. And then I took this picture, which some of you may recognize from the banner of this blog.
And I turned it into this:
ephemera, acrylics, pastels, embroidery floss
Most Happy Passion: Sunlight. It’s lighter out later and my will to live and chipper-arse self are returning.
Recipe of the Week: I’ve been using up a litre of soy milk so there are many recipes of the week, all of them from the cookie section of Vegan with a Vengeance.
Song of the Week: A-ha’s “Take on Me” coverd by A.C. Newman. It’s a perfect little curd of cheese and I love it.
Library Checkouts: The Irony Tower: Soviet Artists in a Time of Glasnost by Andrew Solomon (I know), Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg, On Writing Well by William Zinsser, When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chodron, Get Down by Asali Solomon, The Seine was Red by Leila Sebbar, Vermeer’s Milkmaid and Other Stories by Manuel Rivas, The Silkscreen Paintings; 1962-64 by Robert Rauschenberg, Run by Ann Patchett
Actually Reading: Run by Ann Patchett
On the Worktable: My big sketchbook. It’s time to restock the Etsy store, kids.
Other Projects: A ‘zine, another ‘zine, my final set of circle journal pages, some guerilla art.
Watching: Slumdog Millionaire Two thumbs up, by the way.
Notable Purchases: Vital wheat gluten (seitan) and textured vegetable protein. I’m trying out meat substitutes because I can.
Lusting after: This bag on Etsy
Hoping for: Continued good luck, don’t worry, I’m praying and moving my feet.
Looking forward to: 9 March because that’s when I leave peonhood behind. Unfortunately, I’m not leaving Winnipeg behind but that will come.
Good Thing: The wrist warmers my mom knit for me. I wear them every day at work.
Bad Thing: Ummmm….I’m drawing a blank at the moment.
Political Mini-Rant: The free market is a myth.
Health: I may not be able to run quickly, but I can run pretty far.
Where I Wish I Were Instead of Here: Seattle
Wondering: How long it takes for Immigration Canada to process citizenship applications.
Goals: Keep the apartment clean for a second straight week, finish something on my worktable, survive my penultimate week of peonhood, and start researching summer softball leagues (it’s time to admit that I’m sporty with a dash of artsy-fartsy and not the other way around).
acrylics, India ink
This is a spread from my journal (top is the left page and bottom is the right page). Since I normally use printed text for my backgrounds (insta-depth), I thought that I’d try writing out the background text with a brush and India ink. The text is this Rumi poem that I had posted earlier. Everyone sad needs a Rumi poem, yes? This one is mine.
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