365/2013 - Day 289

rainy day stuff

I LOVE dark, overcast mornings that drift into light showers all day.  A lovely fall day like this reminds me of a certain cherished memory from childhood.  A day like this fills me with energy to make things, get things sorted and organized, and it starts my brain going with jillions of ideas...so many that I often have to sit quietly and really listen for a little bit of guidance so that I can jot some of them down.

It also makes me want to concoct a soup or chili for dinner.  When I came back from a quick run to Hiller's for ingredients I noticed -- once again -- that the squirrels had moved the yarn bombing snake off of my back landing (outside of my studio).  I wasn't sure what was moving the snake until yesterday morning when I caught one (of the 2 or 3) gigantic fox squirrels dragging it down the steps.  I sure surprised him -- ha!

Anyway, I moved the snake to the back porch (where the squirrels are actually eating my house) and gave him an adorable pose.  I know it won't keep the squirrels away, but it might give them something else to focus on for a while.

Here are just a couple of the first jottings of ideas for a new hand sewn guy:

My evening was taken up with organizing, sorting, sweeping, etc. in the wet studio.  I can actually walk around in there again!  I still want to do a table clean up before I get back to the wet plaster cloth.  Man this feels good!

before -- the "save-them-for-later" projects area

before - the area with the closet where the crocodile and tiger wait

before - looking out of the room from the table

Wow -- all of those wads of paper that came as packing material folded up into just this much space!

whew -- after!

after

after

after

Day Sixty-Six

It was a dark and rainy day.

Actually, it was. The kind of day when I get a whole lot of stuff done.

I brought a cabinet up from the basement by myself...it is heavy! It has 11 drawers and was sold in Rubberstampmadness in the 90's as a rubber stamp cabinet. The drawers are about 20 inches wide and 14 inches deep...this is as close as I will ever get to having a flat file. I am using it for art papers in my studio. (I had one of those "DUH!" moments...it is perfect for papers & scraps that are too small for hanging on the floor rack) (Thankfully I had a burst of energy, too!) YAY!

I went to the grocery store, did laundry, ran the dishwasher. I made this cat girl in the pixel-y dress (hard to see the pattern in the scan) for my Animal People series for Art-o-mat®.

As you may imagine, I have a large Art-o-mat® art collection. Today I also went to the hardware store and bought the right size screws and wall anchors for the metal strips I got at Ikea so that I can put magnets on the backs of a lot of the blocks in my Arto-collection and display them on the wall in my studio -- and if it works out like I hope it will, I will do the same in other parts of the house. Cooly cool!

And in a little while -- after I feed the cats -- I am going to roast some turnips, onions, garlic, portobella mushrooms, butternut squash and Italian eggplants to go along with my lovely Delmonico steak. Mmmmm...leftover vegetables tomorrow!

And later on I think I will start breaking down the cardboard and bundling it up for Monday's recycling. And sort magazine cuttings into their correct trays while I watch one of the movies that arrived today from Netflix.

Ahhhh...nice day! I love dark and rainy days!