I’m taking a drawing class right now and in an effort to try and find something new to draw so I could practice the basics of drawing curves and shading objects, I searched the web for images of white vases and pottery. I was hoping for some basic stock images of geometric shapes like the one found in my drawing textbook.

Instead, I found these amazing, beautiful images (and objects) from Sara Paloma Pottery.

Something about their clean, yet organic form really calls to me. When I look at them, I think of the sea. I think of bleached-white shells being slowly tumbled to smoothness in the sand and crystal blue salty water. I can just imagine how soft, smooth, and cool they might feel. Their gentle curves also remind me of some of Georgia O’Keeffes work.

I’m usually drawn to color, but this is such a great example of how color isn’t always necessary to make a statement. To evoke an emotion.

Perfectly clean and simple. So inspiring. I want to not only draw them, but have them in every room of my house.

sara paloma pottery

sara paloma pottery

sara paloma pottery

How cool is this? (note: this is not me)

So there’s this band called Florence + the Machine that I recently discovered. I am in love. I haven’t felt like this about music in a *very* long time. Something about her songs evoke a really passionate, emotional response in me.

This is Florence + the Machine’s newest video, “Hurricane Drunk”. It’s not my absolute favorite song on the CD but out of all the videos she’s done, it’s definitely my favorite. I love the colors and the styling and the *blue*.

Another fabulous song, my favorite on the “Lungs” CD, is “Cosmic Love”. No video for that yet, but here’s the song.

I’ve been working on new beads, trying to combine my love of watercolor painting with working with polymer clay. I really *don’t* like the colors polymer clay comes in, so I’ve just started making white beads and painting them my own colors. More time consuming, but definitely more “me”.

More watercolor beads… (polymer clay cores, surfaces dyed/painted/inked). This I put silver eyelets in so they could fit Pandora/Troll/Biagi style jewelry.

I’m re-reading Lynne Cox’s book “Swimming to Antarctica” right now. It’s *so* awe inspiring to me. I’m a very amateur distance swimmer (I swim two miles every day) and the stories that she shares just blow my mind and make me want to embark on some serious swimming adventures. Whenever I grump about getting into the pool, I think of all the massive swimming she has done in diverse waters (a lot of freezing temperatures and murky water…)

One of Lynne’s adventures is swimming in the waters of Antartica. And a while back I came across these images of striped icebergs that can be seen in that region, and they blew me away. How incredibly beautiful… water in all forms captivates me.

I’m not much a traveler, but maybe someday I’ll get to see them in person and take some photos of my own.

striped iceberg in Antarctica

striped iceberg in Antarctica

striped iceberg in Antarctica

striped iceberg in Antarctica

striped iceberg in Antarctica

(top three images are courtesy of snopes, bottom two images were taken by Karl Rollings and Steve Nichol.)

Lately, I have become a bit obsessed with tea. It all started about six weeks ago- a dear friend sent me an Adagio IngenuiTEA.

ingenuitea

It’s a little tea diffuser that makes the perfect cup of tea using water and two teaspoons of loose tea. And along with the IngenuiTEA came a variety of little tins of tea. Each sampler tin makes about ten cups, so I had a few weeks of tea to experiment with and taste and try.

I’ve always liked tea, but never tried loose tea. And it’s REALLY different, but in a good way. It’s much more flavorful and rich and doesn’t have that weird tangy aftertaste bagged tea sometimes leaves behind. And, of course, after I figured out how to use the IngenuiTEA, I went ahead and ordered more tea samples from Adagio. I picked mostly flavored teas, thinking the black teas were probably all the same (I was *very* wrong about that). This morning I ordered a few refills and a few more samples- this time all traditional black teas.

I have a few favorites: Irish Breakfast, Yunnan Jig, Lemon Soleil, Vanilla Oolong, Jasmine Rooibos, Candy Apple, and Candy Cane.

I also found a few I don’t like or flat out despise: Earl Grey Bravo and Cocomint Rooibos (the Cocomint was just awful- it tastes like something a doctor might make you drink before a colonoscopy). I was surprised that I didn’t like the chocolate teas at all. I’m a HUGE chocolate fan and figured tea and chocolate would be a wonderful combo. But it doesn’t work for me.

(image from getty)

I have two cups of tea every day, one in the morning and one in the early evening. It’s like a little ritual I’ve created just for myself. I love sipping at the tea and relaxing, and just taking a break from everything. It’s amazing how a little tiny change to your regular life (like a cup of tea every day) can really affect the quality of your life in general.

It’s been a while since I uploaded anything to Flickr, but yesterday I uploaded a ton of photos from our Christmas Eve trip to the Naples Botanical Gardens. It was a beautiful, cool, breezy day and the gardens were virtually empty. The three of us spent the afternoon exploring and chasing butterflies and talking. We sort of went on a whim, and it wound up being so much fun we bought a membership and plan on going back every Christmas Eve as a new family tradition.

I’m not a photographer by any means- I just try and capture some of the beauty I see, not create it. Some people are true artists with their cameras but I’m just happy if the photo captures something similar to what my eyes are seeing

Here’s some photos I took:

a quickr pickr post

For Christmas, I got myself one of these Hypotrochoid Art Sets from Uncommon Goods.

Hypotrochoid Art Set

I was thinking about tools I could use to design mandalas, and then I started thinking about the Spirograph I had as a kid (which is no longer available- the new version, like many “re-invented” toys), and then my searching led to this kit.

I haven’t had much time to play with it, but it’s a lot of fun. I don’t use the pens provided in the kit- instead I use either my ultra-fine tipped black Sharpie or my Micron drawing pen.

My only complaint is that it’s tiny. I was hoping for large-ish designs I could paint, but these are very compact. I’m definitely going to try doing a series of ATCs with them, though. I have tons of watercolor paper of all presses, weights, and textures and a drawer full of paper cutters I could use to make the perfect sizes of paper for these guys but I am craving a tiny little block of paper just the right size for them.

I am also eyeing this toy- Quercetti Spirogiro, which seems to be a little bit bigger. It’s only $16, but after the holiday crunch and the insane amount of tools and art supplies I already *have*, I’m going to wait. However, it looks very cool.

Quercetti Spirogiro

I know I should try drawing my own mandalas, but I’m not there yet. I’m too obsessed with things like symmetry and I don’t want that fussiness to effect (affect? yikes, sorry) my enjoyment of mandalas. Right now I’d love to emboss a black image of a mandala on watercolor paper and then color it in using my watercolors. The emboss would act as a resist. So I’m experimenting with image transfer onto watercolor paper, and resists, and dry embossing techniques.

One of the blogs that has been inspiring me so much is Daisy Yellow. I found her blog by doing searches on drawing mandalas and was instantly sucked in. I’m still working my way through the archives, but whenever she posts something new, it’s like an INSTANT shot of inspiration and motivation.

In addition to drawing and painting, there also a lot of information about creating art with kids, which I love because Gracie and I spend a lot of time working in the art studio together. I’m always looking for new ideas and projects to share with her.

Here’s a Flickr collage of some of her work:

Art by Daisy Yellow

Her blog and images have inspired me so much- not only to start drawing again, but also explore the boundaries of the materials I’m using. (I’m currently trying to figure out how to create a resist using dry embossing on watercolor paper…)

Daisy Yellow also has a “Art=Happy” campaign at the moment, which resonated with me.

art = happy @ Daisy Yellow

The basic idea is- art makes people happy, so do more of it. I’m trying to remember that. Even on days when i don’t feel like doing anything but starting into space, I force myself to grab my pencils and doodle. Usually I get sucked right into it and keep going, and it DOES make me feel better.

So thank you, Daisy Yellow, for providing me with so much creative inspiration.

I’m going to try to keep a public blog again.

Years ago I used to keep a series of weblogs/journals called “Bliss”. They were images of artwork I loved, plus snippets from life, and quotes, and poetry, etc. Then I got married and Gracie came and the adoption blog became my focus for a long time.

But now that Gracie is four and I’m finding more time to myself, lots of things are capturing my interest and inspiring me. I love blogs that are a mix of personal expression AND inspiring things culled from around the web.

So I’m going to try that for a while.

Short list of things that currently fascinate me:
mandalas (especially ones that are drawn by hand)
circles and spirals in art
TEA tea tea tea (I love tea!)
flowers
music (rediscovering the emotional response to music)
children’s art (inspired by Gracie and her artwork)
photography (other people’s)
basic drawing- lines, shapes, form
pretty clothes
weird sealife
textures on paper and in art

So much I want to try and explore and share. There’s so many amazing artists on the web, so many awesome photographs, so many cool facts. So I’ll just randomly post whatever, whenever.

Gracie, my “Self-Rescuing Princess”, turned four a few days ago.

Happy Birthday, my sweet, sweet girl!

Gracie did some painting the other day and I took a zillion shots of her.

She’s SO serious when she does any sort of art. But I love how she just DOES it- she doesn’t think too much about it or agonize over it like I do.

As far as the princess pajamas… we’re going through a bit of a Disney phase around here and her grandmother indulges Gracie in her every “princess” wish, including pajamas.

My watercolor beads were featured in a post on Craft Gossip. I was very, very excited to find this out.

My little boy, Chester P. Arlington, is five today!*

Chester was a rescue- before he came home with us he had been dumped and severely abused. To this day, even when he begs for pets and cuddles, he still will subconsciously duck his head out of fear of being hit or kicked before instantly raising it again to nudge us for more love.

He’s terrified of most people, and only allows a handful of people he’s known for a while to see him. But with Tom and I, he’s one of THE most affectionate, personable, loving, and PRESENT cats we have ever had. He’s demanding and silly and playful and LOUD. He follows me around all day and night, and sleeps on the foot of the bed, never far from me. He even sits outside with me while I swim (it’s inside a screened in lanai- no worries!) and waits for me to finish.

I love you, Chester. I hope you know how much happiness you have brought to my life.

*Actually, we don’t know if it’s actually his birthday, but when we adopted him the vet “assigned” him 4th of July as his date of birth.

The day we brought him home, he was trapped, neutered, and up for adoption in the span of 8 hours. The rescue knew nothing about him- they assumed that he was a fully grow adult cat when he was actually a VERY large six month old kitten.

——————————————

Also, Happy Fourth of July!!

I have to admit, I was never much of a “patriot” until I watched John Adams a few weeks ago. I highly recommend watching it, even if you’re burned out on politics or not into American history.

It’s an amazing, engrossing mini-series. (I actually went into a bit of withdrawal when it was over, and wish HBO would do more of them on different presidents…)

The proverb warns that ‘You should not bite the hand that feeds you.’ But maybe you should, if it prevents you from feeding yourself.

- Thomas Szasz

This is so true. It’s great when people give you help, support, whatever- but if it’s not what you need, or if it’s forcing you to go in a different direction than you *need* to be going on, it’s perfectly okay to say “no”.

I was born in 1974. So I was, in every way, a “child of the 80’s”.

When I was a kid, popular music was in a strange place. The birth of MTV brought about a lot of different sounds- new wave, heavy metal- music completely different than anything that had ever been played on mainstream radio before. The music my friends and I listened to was REALLY alien and strange to our parents. And the music they listened to… well, let’s just say the golden light hits of the 1970’s AM radio didn’t do anything for me, or any of my friends.

So all of us argued with our parents over radio stations, snuck MTV at each other’s houses when our own parents forbid us from watching it, swapped cassettes with recordings made from radio. Since we didn’t have cars or money, we relied on each other for our music fix.

Then came Michael Jackson.

To kids, his music was like nothing we had ever heard. It was electrifying and raised goosebumps on our arms. We were addicted- we listened to “Thriller” over and over and over, loving a different song every week until we loved them all and then started over again. We watched MTV constantly, hoping for one of his videos to be played so we could see him and learn the dance moves. There were no VCRs, no DVDs, no YouTube so we were at the mercy of the VJs and our memories. We tried to emulate his dance moves, his voice, his whole style. He was completely unlike anything we had ever seen, and we wanted some of whatever magic he had.

To our parents, Michael Jackson was one of their own. The Jackson 5 and the Motown Sound were both huge parts of their own musical history, a sound they thought had been forever abandoned in favor of electronic blips or headache-inducing screaming guitars. When we started talking about Michael Jackson, they finally started listening.

Michael Jackson made music a common ground for parents and kids. It was the first album that was a favorite of both adults *and* their children. The first album our parents got for us without us having to ask for it. The first album that made us start sifting through our parents collection of LPs, hoping for something else in there that might be half as good. The kids started asking our parents about the Jackson 5 in our desperate search for information on Michael Jackson, and then our parents started playing us other things we might like, music they loved but that we didn’t know existed. (For me, it turned out to be Simon & Garfunkel and the Hollies- bands that the radio stations my parents listened to never played.)

Michael Jackson brought back an obsessive passion about music, a passion that bridged generations. Music has ALWAYS been an integral part of my life, and it was an integral part of my parents’ life, too. The mutual admiration of Michael Jackson allowed parents and kids to recognize that maybe we were all more alike than we thought.

Yes, this sounds hokey, but I don’t care. For most people my age (mid-30’s), Michael Jackson’s songs are the soundtrack to our childhood. To us, he wasn’t a strange recluse with legal problems and pale skin, he was the stellar performer who shocked and awed us with his ability to moonwalk, something we spent hours trying to emulate. And as his life grew complicated and controversial, as his behavior grew puzzling and disconcerting, our Michael would always be, first and foremost, the guy who danced with Zombies, the guy who sang about Billie Jean, the guy who changed music for everyone we knew.

Although I no longer count Michael Jackson as a “favorite” (“Thriller” marked the beginning and end of an obsession with him- Duran Duran was the band that stood the test of time for me…), it breaks my heart that he died. I truly believed that he had a tremendous comeback in him, that he would redefine himself as a talented musician and awe-inspiring dancer/performer and not as a weird guy who hid behind surgical masks and compound walls. I can’t believe he died before it happened.

I just hope he passed with some sense of how important he was to *so* many people. I hope he knows there were still a lot of people who still loved his music, who were anxiously awaiting for him to return to the spotlight and astonish us all once again.

I’ve finally found more time to get into my studio and start playing with clay again. I found myself wanting to paint and wanting to make new beads, so I decided to mix the two.

These beads are a work in progress- a mix of polymer clay, watercolors, alcohol ink, vinegar, baking soda, UV light (and sunshine!), different finishing agents, resist materials…. I’m trying to figure out how to get the color to stay and how to glaze the beads without ruining the patterns the inks/paints/natural ingredients made on the clay.

Anyway, here’s the first of my experiments.

A snapshot of Gracie from a few weeks ago (taken when we went out to eat for my birthday).

She’s now 3-and-a-half years old.

“Trust that still, small voice that says, ‘This might work and I’ll try it.’ ”

- Diane Mariechild

“Your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart. Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakens.”

- Carl Jung