Friday, July 31, 2009

:: kusudama (paper flowers) ::



my sister's getting married in just two months. one of the cool things she's doing is having ten cakes. (we had three small cakes at our tiny wedding; don't little sisters just always have to outdo their big sisters? and yes, i'm just kidding.) and for the top of each cake, she's asking the wedding party and parents to make cake toppers that somehow reflect the bride and groom.

i'm going to make these gorgeous kusudama flowers. i haven't decided whether i'm going to use a book of love poems for my inspiration or if i'm going to go with a comic book. the bride and groom are both artists and see every superhero movie and really love that stuff. i think that might be cool.

anyway, there are tutorials for the flowers all over. this post at rag and bone, where i got the image from, has the best links i've found.

and for inspiration, you can also check out these posts here and here. you can get your own here if you don't want to make them yourself. personally i can't wait to get my hands on some paper to practice. i just feel like learning to make these flowers will make me cooler.

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

:: new work ::

it's show and tell day here at up up, the blog. just thought i'd pop in and show you something i've been working on these days. i'm thinking i'll share some of the custom designs i've been working on soon, too, but for now, here's some new personalized stationery i just finished.

it's not in the shop yet. i'm actually thinking i might use it for a freebie i've been asked to provide (more on that next week). would you like to be able to download a customizable version of this? in both sizes? does that seem like a good giveaway? and a good representation of my work? something keeps nagging me to make something a little bit funny or sarcastic for the download. which would be better?

Sunday, July 26, 2009

:: sunday, in pictures ::

during breakfast, as i hurried to finalize a wedding invitation that i needed to send to a client and then worked on a few posts for each penny pretty for the coming week, going to the lake today seemed like a bad idea. i'd taken yesterday off to spend with my mom and sister and the to-do list in front of me seemed long enough to consider not going down for the day today.

but of course once i got there i was glad we'd gone. while evan slept i read. for about ten minutes. and then i also slept.

after his nap he went for a bike ride with daddy and brought me back flowers.

and then on our way home, with evan alternating serenading us with sesame street songs and sucking his fingers in exhaustion, we saw a rainbow: evan's first. he was pretty excited, and so were we. it's cool that he's old enough to see things like that off in the distance and also realize what they are. very cool.

and now here i am at 9:45 sunday night, two custom orders completed, files sent to clients, posts prepared for the week, plans planned for evan and i. i got it all done after all.

** note: the bracelet shown above is, indeed, a scrap of fabric. i'm working on altering a favorite shirt pattern of mine for maternity (i'll post pics when i'm done if it turns out) and i had a scrap that was long and skinny and reminded me of this post from a friend to knit with that apparently has been haunting my brain for the last year. i made it using lake water, in honor of leslie's girls. it's one of those things you do as an adult to remind yourself of who you were as a kid, i guess. it's like when brian wears his chucks and i am immediately reminded of our early courtship; this bracelet -- dampened in the lake, twisted in my teeth and then wrapped awkwardly around my wrist -- took me back about two decades. and now each time i look down at my wrist i feel a little bit more connected to myself, silly as that might sound.

Friday, July 24, 2009

:: bike wallpaper ::



i made myself some new desktop wallpaper, and then i decided to share it with you. with everyone. tell your friends.

inspired by the tour de france. just a few more days left and then our tv will get a much-needed rest.

i've never made wallpaper before so this may not be perfect. after some research i found that most people recommend making it at 1600 by 1200 pixels because then most anyone can use it without tiling. but if this looks weird or wonky on your computer let me know because i'm still learning.

to download this for your own desktop, follow this link to flickr, click on "all sizes" (it should be one of the buttons above the picture when you get to flickr) and then choose the original size to download.

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

:: who needs meditation ::



i vividly remember thinking in my early twenties that i would never be so busy that i'd hear myself say there just aren't enough hours in the day. a graduate student at the time, i was no stranger to long days, close deadlines, and stress. but even when i was working 40 hours a week at starbucks and attending school fulltime, i still had free time. i went for a run whenever i wanted to. i never felt pressed to plan my errand-running in the most efficient way. i read books in the afternoon sometimes.

i was 22. i was unencumbered.

now, not so much. i'm busy. i can't get it all done. i literally don't have enough hours in each day. this morning i had to sit my kid in front of the TV with elmo visits the doctor so that i could pay bills that i hadn't had time to pay over the last three days (i always pay this set of bills between the 18th and the 21st to ensure that they arrive on time). it was not a good start to the day.

all those years in grad school, unemcumbered as they started (i was in grad school for eight years, mind you), did teach me about time management, about prioritizing, about list-making. but they didn't really teach me about how to make the most of even the fullest days.

work-at-home parenthood is teaching me that.

today it was a trip to starbucks with my sister-in-law and nieces and videos of the three kids dancing around our table. it was nectarines, eaten with evan on the deck in bare feet. it was a sprinkler in the front yard while i knocked three quick items off my to-do list (dear laptop, i love you). and then we got out the burley. (best craigslist find ever.)

julie and evan: 1; bad moods: 0.
stress can eat our dust.

tell me: what do you do to stay sane when you haven't had time for a shower in two days?

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

:: read this blog ::



{this image is from pretty good.}

a blog's not a blog without images, at least in my opinion. in fact, one of my favorite new blogs is almost nothing but pictures.

you must go check out pretty good. you must. it's a photoblog with just the tiniest bit extra, and that tiny bit takes it to a whole new level. plus it's totally gorgeous.

Monday, July 20, 2009

:: bedtime anxiety with a side of calm ::



(the above picture is from our little trip to the adirondacks last week to visit friends. it isn't really related to this post except insofar as it's a picture of nighttime. and calm.)

last night was weird. it has the makings of all your worst dreams: it's 10 p.m. on a sunday night and you suddenly realize that you have forgotten about several important things you need to have done.

the difference is this: i realized that running your own business makes it so that you answer to yourself and no one else. i also realized that that fact opens up a whole new relationship to prioritizing. my priorities can really honestly be my priorities and not my understanding of someone else's priorities or my fear of their reaction to my not meeting their deadlines.

so i got done the things i felt were most important and i let the rest go until today. after the initial rush of anxiety (oh my god! i forgot to do l, m, and n (why is it always x, y, and z??)!) i actually ended up going to bed (albeit still a little bit late) with a prevailing sense of calm.

it's good to be your own boss. if only it paid well, too.

Sunday, July 19, 2009

:: word.play update ::


the rules are the same: there are no rules. simply be inspired, make something by august 20th (a few extra days since i'm posting late), and share on your blog, in a comment on my blog, and/or in the new word.play flickr pool.*

the word for august is SUNDAY. in the words of my friend from boston, i'm wicked excited about this one.

- - - - - - - - - - - - -

* word.play flickr pool details:
  • you can find it here.
  • you don't have to join to see the images, but you do have to join to add images. once you join (i think i set it up so that you have to request membership in the group) you can submit your photos to the pool.
  • it's that easy.
do go ahead and add your images from round 1, won't you? right now it's just my pics in there and that makes me sad.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - -

so here we go with round 2. tell your friends!

Saturday, July 18, 2009

:: blog housekeeping ::

a few blog-related items to tackle today:

(1) the new navigation. fancy, eh? just trying to clean things up, make navigating a little easier, and make things like my email info a little bit easier to find. now includes links to my flickr photostream as well as my book recommendations. you'll notice that the "i am" button doesn't link anywhere. that's because the "i am" stuff is still here on the main page and i haven't moved it yet.

(2) i'm thinking of opening up a few advertising spots on the blog. i've gone back and forth on this for YEARS and i've been torn but i finally decided that if there are people out there who want to support this blog well who am i to stop them? i'd like to support their shops and small businesses, too. seems win-win. if you are interested in ad space, please contact me via the email link at right.

(3) word.play stuff... coming tomorrow. i'll have links to the other participants from july, info about joining the flickr group and adding your photos, and most importantly, the NEXT WORD.

see you then, peeps. i'm off to have dinner with brian's family and my adorable nieces.

Friday, July 17, 2009

:: just perfect enough ::

yesterday was the kind of day amateur poets die for and more weathered, professional poets (of the modern ilk, anyway) feel they must somehow dirty up. it was shot like a sam mendes film, all clarity and perfection (think American Beauty) but without any of the mendes creepiness lurking underneath.

the sky was blue. the kind of blue you can only find in your crayon box because markers just make it too bright. the clouds were creamy as whole milk and the texture of cotton candy.

lying on the deck in the backyard all i could hear was the sound of the sprinkler and evan's giggles and sharp inhalations and a lawnmower in the distance. it filled me with nostalgia even though i was right in the middle of it.

Thursday, July 16, 2009

:: the maybe house ::



each night before bed we ask evan what he's going to dream about. each night he says gramps. if pressed he'll add gramps' jeep and my sister-in-law's dog to the list. but last night, without a word from either of us, he said he was going to dream about gramps and the maybe house.

on our visits there he has expressed three concerns and has had all three fears allayed:

  1. the guy (our realtor) will not always have to be there to unlock the house for us. mommy will have a key, and so will daddy.
  2. the loudly barking dog (locked in a cage in the basement) will also not be there.
  3. evan will have his own sheets on his bed and not the flowery sheets on the bed in the room he's been told will be his.
so that does it. i think we're finally getting into "it's okay to be excited" mode with the maybe house. we've rented our condo in ohio (in two weeks strangers, people i have never even met, will be living in my condo), we've made it through the inspection and had all of our conditions met, and we have made the formal mortgage application.

please keep your fingers cross for us, won't you?

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

:: sugar and... ::




a day late and not exactly perfected yet, here's my contribution to the word.play project for this month.



i wanted to do something a little bit outside my usual repertoire, and something i could work on while evan was playing outside, so i decided to hand carve this ampersand stamp.



i carved it from that rubber stuff they sell next to the linoleum blocks in art stores. much much easier to carve but in the end i think i'll probably end up remaking my stamp in real linoleum because the rubber is so bendable it makes it impossible to get a reliable print.



i made 8 or so prints and each one turned out so different. i don't mind a little noise in my print but some of these are kind of ridiculous.



anyway, the original plan was to make this cream and sugar piece, but then i got babies on the brain and went ahead and experimented with a print for a little girl's room: sugar and spice and everything nice. since only the ampersand is a print and the rest is hard written by me, i can make a boy one, too, if i want to (snip, snails, puppy dog tails).



actually the sky's the limit.



what a fun little project. a nice diversion from my to do list. so who's on for some more word.play next month?

Tuesday, July 14, 2009

:: word.play reminder ::



to anyone who may have forgotten, the "deadline" for the first wordplay round is today (july 14th). i, of course, don't have my project entirely done yet, but i actually do plan on having it done tonight.

here's an odd little preview. well, the preview's not odd. it's just that you might yet have some trouble figuring out how on earth this ampersand lino cut i made was inspired by the word sugar.

well, puzzle it out and i hope to be back tomorrow with the answer. in the meantime, leave me links to your word.play projects or email me images to put in our flickr pool and i'll work on getting that all together, kay?

Monday, July 13, 2009

:: Two News Bits ::



two bits of shop-related news today:

1. check out my new exhibit at papernstitch, live now through august 16th. don't forget to leave me a heart so i can win some cash!

2. enter to win 25 up up creative invitations at the bright side project. stick around and enter the other giveaways, too. there's so much amazing stuff being given away over there every single day.

Sunday, July 12, 2009

:: work work ::

i've spent a very long day quote-unquote finalizing a bunch of business documents: my wholesale catalog, a wholesale order sheet, and this little beauty featuring top sellers.

the part i can't believe is that i have about 20 items still unreleased in the shop that i will soon have to add to these new documents. it's all just so much work.


ugh.

Saturday, July 11, 2009

:: can't get over ::

there was an episode of grey's anatomy, i think it was, that featured a woman who'd had four heart attacks (or something) on the exact same date over the course of many years. turns out it was the date that her next door neighbor slash secret lover of years had died. she had never realized the correlation or the significance until her seattle grace doc pointed it out to her.

amazing what the body remembers even when the brain does its very best to forget.

and then there's me. i am the keeper of dates. i'm the rememberer of events past. and it's not really a cognitive thing. i actually easily forget birthdays and other dates like which five days brian is going to be out of town in august. it's more like i have a special center in my brain that is in charge of keeping ties to my own emotional past.

and usually the way that center files emotional data is by date.

i remember the date of my first kiss ever (february 7th, 1991) and can faithfully reconstruct on a mental calendar the entire beginning of my relationship with brian from the days of our first dates to the night he finally kissed me to the first time i ever saw him naked. on june 29th of this year i had the nagging feeling that the date was significant and i eventually remembered that it was at one point evan's due date (that was later changed to july 4th, he was born june 25th).

so it astounds me that i somehow missed a huge anniversary.

if you follow me on twitter you know that on tuesday morning i woke up to pee (damn pregnant uterus) at 3:26 and never did fall back asleep. at 5 a.m. i finally got up. at 6:30, just before the house started waking, i was suddenly and forcefully ill.

it lasted through the day, growing worse as the day grew longer. thankfully evan was with his grandparents because i felt horrible. at times i found myself inexplicably sobbing in between bouts of getting sick.

at 6:00 at night, i had to start packing us up for a trip to the adirondacks the next day, and somehow i remained well enough all night to get the laundry done and the clothing packed. i got my orders ready to send out in the morning.

in the midst of all the busy-ness, i realized: it was july 7th. the day of my total breakdown last year. the day i stood crying in the kitchen of our ohio condo and told brian i needed my mommy. the day my mom hopped in her car and drove 400 miles to help me. the day i saw my doctor, started on antidepressants. the day i found myself gripped with fear: of the shower, of taking walks, of lying on my right side.

i know i'm doing so much better and all but jeez. how in EARTH could i have missed this anniversary? how could i not have anticipated it the way i anticipate other "bad" date memories? how could i not have prepared myself for how i might feel on july 7th.

in the days since i sort of find myself reeling a bit, trying to get my feet back under me. trying to figure out how i feel about what happened this week. trying to reflect, maybe. trying to figure out how a date passing can leave me in this memory hangover, sitting here feeling like something inside me is different than it was on monday before the big bad anniversary snuck up on me.

our bodies and minds astound me. i can't get over how they work. i can't get over how inextricably linked they are.

and apparently i can't totally get over having forgotten this scary anniversary.

Tuesday, July 7, 2009

:: Parades Are Good ::



First, there were firetrucks. With sirens.
Then, there were marching bands.
Somewhere along the way there was a tractor or two.
And finally, there was a lollypop. A sweet, sticky, orange lollypop.

I think that face says enough: parades are good.

Saturday, July 4, 2009

:: green green ::



on this weekend of reds, whites, and blues it was green that got my heart beating a little faster. one thing i've noticed about the gray days here in rochester, of which there are none too few, is that when the sky is gray the greens (fields, leaves, trees) couldn't possibly seem any greener.

i snapped this picture quickly as evan i drove home from the lake last night. he was singing sleepily in the backseat and i was stopped nearly cold by this field. i wish i'd captures the shot from about 100 yards further back on the road because that chartreuse just laid itself out like a blanket across the landscape. but there's something nice about the peek you get here, too. it's more modest. leaves more to the imagination.

i'm now determined to create something for the shop inspired by the green of this field. not the closer green but that small pop peeking out just below the gray horizon.