Paperwork.

We’re crafters, not accountants. Hubby Dear is determined to finish taxes TODAY. (Fine way to spend a snow day!) He’s done most of the preliminary gathering, and is now trying to make sense of it all. In our efforts of avoidance, Kate has made pumpkin chocolate chip muffins and I’ve made potato vegetable chowder. On the woodstove. As we’re buzzing by, this is what the conversation sounded like…. names have been left off to protect the innocent and to keep you guessing who said what…

… What’s this charge… is it business?

… No, that’s laundry detergent.

… How about this one?

…Ummm… perfume.

…Amazon, Amazon, Amazon, Amazon

… If you spend $25 you get Super Saver Shipping!

…Where is your W-2?

… What’s a W-2?…

…Is this it?

…No, those are quarterlies. They were probably supposed to be sent in last year.

…Amazon, Barnes & Noble, Amazon, Amazon…

…I put everything that looked like taxes in the pile on the counter.

… Michael’s, ASW, Dick Blick….

… Anything that was in the pile stayed in the pile…

…Is THIS it?

… Yes, the words on the outside that say “Important Tax Return Document Enclosed” gives it away.

… Are you sure these are the only receipts you have?

…I was supposed to keep them?

…Call the number… maybe they can tell you what we bought.

…I need your assistance.

… Hold on, I’ve got to add one more thing to the blog post….

…Amazon, Dick Blick, ASW, Amazon…

…Would you like another muffin?

A reminder from yesterday’s post.

A Christmas project or two…

Hello folks! We had a wonderful Christmas and are starting to settle into the winter routine here at the Frey house. The hustling and bustling is over for a while, and once again we’re resolving to start making presents in January! 

Remind me that I said that next year.

One of our projects was exceedingly messy, but fun. And to add to the thrill we did it on the 22nd of December. And then prayed that it would harden by Christmas. And then tried to figure out how to wrap these heavy concrete things! We do plenty of last minute, hair-brained Christmas projects, but my advice to everyone crafty out there is to try a new project out earlier in December to see how things will turn out. And also find somebody sweet enough to mix very thick concrete in small batches by hand for 5 hours straight.

You can remind me next year that I said that also.

They ended up turning out great, though, and were such a hit that we’re going to make herb markers for the store this spring! We had some concrete left over, so Chris decided to make some more yesterday. (He must not have minded the mixing!) We just listed them on our Etsy site, which we’ve decided to use “just for fun.” We weren’t planning on selling these online because they’re so heavy, but we realized we can stuff them into Priority Flat Rate boxes and get them out at a semi-reasonable price. 

And before I sign out, I must share with you yesterday’s “Frey Family Quote of the Day”…

Kate  came downstairs after working nearly all day in the “workroom” (this is the place upstairs that is supposed to be our craft room, but actually is a catch-all for things outgoing and incoming and everything in-between!). She said to her father, and I quote:

“Daddy, come up and see my project and let me show you what you need to do!“

She is definitely her mother’s daughter! 

 

 

Starting a Journal…

Let us, then, be up and doing,

With a heart for any fate;

Still Achieving, still pursuing;

Learn to labor and to wait.

~ Longfellow

Getting started with journaling is not easy. There you sit, with all those white, blank pages staring at you, and with no ideas whatsoever about what to put on them. What’s the cure for artist’s block?

Just do it.

I think I said that before in a recent post, but it’s really, truly the place to start! If the first few pages are too scary, then open up to somewhere in the middle, and sketch something, even if it’s just your coffee mug and the lines are wiggly because you’ve not consumed enough caffeine yet. Then, the journal is no longer perfect, and you no longer have that for an excuse!

I pulled out on of the Bare Books Plus (my “lifetime supply” is quickly dwindling… I hope that has no actual bearing upon the length of my lifetime… I think I shall order some more very soon!) and thought about what it felt like to start art journaling for the first time and tried to think of some activities that might help ease the stress. Here goes… they will work for any fresh new journal!

Make a cover!

(If don’t have a journal that has a blank cover, make a Title Page!)

As you can see, this is not museum quality artwork. Just a bunch of doodles. I drew very light guidelines for the lettering using a triangle, and then an oval for the border edge. Tasha Tudor, one of my favorite artists, often draws lush borders around her pictures, so I borrowed that idea for the journal cover. “Around the Seasons” brought thoughts of different activities and celebrations around the year, so I sort of went with a monthly theme around the oval. Now I’m filling in with greenery to make the border look full. If you enlarge the picture (can you do that?) you’ll see that none of the sketches are anything really grand. The greenery (which sort of looks like rosemary or short pine) is really just a bunch of little lines coming off a main branch all in the same direction. Really not hard at all to draw! Plans for the cover are to finish filling in, and then color it, coloring book style with watercolor pencils, and then take a very tiny brush and some water and wet the color to brighten it and make it look like watercolor.

Inside the journal, there are 30 pages. (Actual sheets of paper… it’s a good idea to count the actual sheets, because sometimes they count front and back on the “page count.”) There are 12 months, and that meant each month could have two sheets of paper. I skipped the first page in case I wanted a title page eventually, and then wrote the name of each month on every third sheet. That divvied up the journal into bite size pieces, gave me at least one two-page spread per month, and left me with about 5 pages at the end for notes and stuff. In the back pages, I titled one page “Inspiration and Resources,” dedicated another to choosing a journal and tools of the trade, wrote “Page Layout Ideas” on the top of another, and the inside of the very cover and facing page is saved for doodling. Doodling is tomorrow’s post. It’s very important. At least I think so!

On the homefront, last night Hubby dear moved a light in the under-the-stairs laundry room/cubby with the cute little door so he could eventually divide the spot into two rooms and put up the needed shelves. He was a very good sport about it, because if I (vertically challenged at only 5 foot tall) have a hard time getting into that tiny little space, you can imagine that it is even more difficult for a full-grown fellow. We girls handed him things, and brought him light, and offered to clean up the drywall mess so he didn’t have to. Which is what I’m heading off to do as soon as I hit “Publish.”

Have a great Thursday!

Art Journaling Resources!

Hello everyone! Before I begin rambling, I thought I’d list a few really good resources for art journaling! Some of these you may be able to find at the library, so you can peruse them to see if they’re something you want to purchase.

The book that really got me started with art Journaling:

The Student’s Guide to Keeping an Art Journal by Barry Stebbing

 

And another great journaling resource for homeschooling families:

The Gift of Family Writing by Jill Novack

 

And another favorite… it does have some “spookety” pictures (scary fairies and goblins) on a couple of the pages toward the back, but it’s a great visual resource:

How to Keep a Sketchbook Journal by Claudia Nice

 

This one has a more loose, sketchy feel to it, but it is a great resource for page layout ideas:

Create Your Own Artist’s Journal by Erin O’Toole

 

For those who are into nature journaling, there are several really great resources:

Keeping a Nature Journal by Claire Leslie & Charles Roth

Wild Days: Creating Discovery Journals by Karen Skidmore Rackliffe

 

And for those who wish to journal with a historical bent… this is one of my favorites, and is quite “dog-eared” I must admit! And we know a couple of the folks in the sketches, which adds to the thrill!:

Living History: Drawing on the Past by Cathy Johnson

 

There are SO MANY resources out there! These are all of the “how to” sort of books, full of methods and ideas for art journaling, what to take with you into the field, how to design a page, etc. You may want to find a good resource for inspiration purposes, but the most important thing to do is…

Just do it!

It doesn’t matter if you think you’re good at drawing or not, or if you have the perfect art journaling plan or not, or if you have all the tools you need or not. Grab a pencil and some paper, and try your hand at sketching something! Allot a few minutes each day to doodle, and don’t get mad at yourself if it doesn’t turn out the way your mind’s eye had imagined. Drawing is a learned skill and improves greatly with practice. Yes, there are a few very talented folks out there that it just comes naturally to, but that doesn’t mean the rest of the world can’t learn to draw well if they devote a little time & effort to learning the basics. You can do it!

(Jumping down off my soapbox.)

Back to real life… Kate & I worked most of the morning yesterday on organizing those cubbies! What joy! The very large cubby under the stairs still needs some shelves, but hubby is going to build them in for the large items like crockpots and griddles. It is the cutest little space, and was ingenious of the men (my dad, my hubby, and hubby’s dad built our house!) to make that space usable! The little door was a great attraction to little people who would come to visit our home… they always asked to peek inside, I guess because it was just their size!

 

 

All our canned goods used to be under there, and when I had little people at home, it was the perfect place to keep them… I could send someone smaller than me into the cubby to retrieve needed items or to put away groceries. Then Jo grew to be taller than me. Then Kate caught up to me in height, and since then, nobody really fits into that little cubby without some difficulty. So, if we put things in there that we only use once a week or so, we girls will be happier on a daily basis.

Informal Poll: How do you pronounce “cubby?” In my “I twice taught phonics” mind, it rhymes with “hubby” and thus should have a short “u” sound in the middle. On all the decorating shows, they call them “coobies,” which really confuses me. Just wondering if I’ve been pronouncing it wrong my whole life, or what. (However, I’m not sure it really matters, because “coobie” is just one word I can’t convince myself to say.)

Have a great Tuesday!

Sunday…umm…Monday Sketching…

Yesterday didn’t afford me much time for sketching. I did a lot of card printing and folding before anyone woke up, and we made a command decision to stay home for the morning, and just spent some much needed family time. Then we took Kate to work and ran errands (see below!) in that area for the three hours she was at the museum. Sundays are usually very relaxed there, and she and a co-worker had actually planned to work together so they could practice irish whistle, but alas… in only three hours, they had 32 visitors! Perhaps museums are the thing to do when it’s seriously bitter outside! I know we surely didn’t want to be outside much, and instead of opting to shop the outlets for new sheets, hubby & I hibernated inside a bookstore for the last 45 minutes of our wait for Kate! We almost made it out without a purchase… I was looking seriously at a new papercutting book but it was $25, and I didn’t quite want to spend that much on a whim. Chris was checking out a $20 book about planning houses, which I told him to get but he didn’t. Then, on the way out, there were two little books by Eric Sloane… an artist and historian we both love, and we got them both for under $10. Not necessary, but “Needful,” and well within the “whim” budget.Mama moment… Kate says she wishes she’s get some comments on her new blog! Any takers? Tell her that her Mom sent you!:-PErrands included going back to Lowe’s to return some racks I bought the other day that weren’t what I was expecting them to be. And I had a whole list of goodies from the organizing area to pick up! Hubby helped, and we came home with some treasures! I had picked up a couple of things on Friday, which he installed right away, and then last night he installed the rest… more to come, too! I’ll have an entire new pantry system by the end of the week! And nothing out of pocket, as we were using gift cards from Christmas. Usually they go to tools or something like that, but this year we’re using them for some organizational and sprucing up projects. And, I’m a very happy woman.Through the magic of flash photography, I just discovered another place that needs a little cleaning. Please ignore the flluff in the bottom lefthand corner of the cupboard, and just take in the splendor of empty racks waiting to be filled with beautiful, reachable canned goods!:-)We went to dinner at hubby’s parents, and got home after 9… and Chris commenced to installing what we had bought. So, I attempted to do some Sunday Sketching. I didn’t last long, and was snoozing on the couch pretty soon. My eyes were just plain done.Did get a little bit done last night, though, and this morning, when I sat down with my coffee, there was the picture sitting waiting for some final touches. I think I’m going to proclaim it finished.Not really happy with the background. Did end up adding a bit of ink details… it didn’t seem “finished” without them. But, it is done, and now I can move on to other things!I will be adding more about art journaling soon… perhaps tonight! Stay tuned and thanks for stopping by!Oh! I just found out my bio made it onto the Farmgirl Flair site!