From a Blue Day to a Glue Day

It's been pretty quiet out here with the out of town schedule my husband's been keeping.

The first two weeks were glorious in the long sunny days with plenty of time to catch up on all of my stocking of inventory in various shops for the summer season.

Time for lawn mowing and feeding myself on my diet change, eating when I am hungry instead of "meal time" and watching Netflix series that I know would put him to sleep.

I'm getting to eat all those things that he would turn his nose up upon such as curries and eggplant, tempeh and okra. ( please no comments about the okra!...I know it's not the most popular vegetable but I am on a serious okra kick if you can believe it)

The next round has bee a little more lonesome. It hasn't helped that it rained for days on end. That seems to be when I desire the caffeine I have sworn off for my anti-inflammation, detox and general well being goal.

Sneaking little bits of those tiny Starbucks Via packets into my dandelion root brew.

I do get a dose of the public once a week at the Farmer's Market on Saturdays in Fairbanks 100 miles away.

It had been sweatingly hot at the market and a trip to the Chena Lakes brought on the impending thunder storm and wind.

I awoke to pouring rain next morning and no incentive for much except putting on my yoga pants thinking that it might propel me into actually doing some yoga.

Indulged myself in some Netflix in the morning and perhaps that's what threw me further into a funk.

Too rainy to walk to the paper.

Somehow I pulled myself out of it enough and went to the studio to play with glue & paper.

Mail art, a glue book and journal.

It had been a long time since I had approached the paper stash and collage-able goodies, I had been so focused on the beads and head pins and all of my jewelry making.

Getting started is the hardest for me so my first piece was to cover a big packing envelope for some mail art. If you look on the map you can see that it's heading to a certain studio in Massachusetts as soon as I figure out what to put in it.

Then I decided to fill up some pages in my moleskine.

I just recently heard the term gluebook. I'm wondering if both sides of every page are filled.

so far I'm only collaging one side. It helps with the drying of course too.

I finally got to use some more of my vintage Japanese business correspondence for collaging.

There's more available on Etsy right here

Just about all of my imagery is vintage from books and thrift shops .

That would be over 20 years old technically  but most is even older.

Make sure to click on this one I like the names on the map in the middle.

Then there was this journal that I started a couple of years ago.

It was an old cookbook from the 30's from Fellows Balls...ahem... Bellows Falls, Vermont

( although it looks as if this dude's have shriveled a tad)

This is the front cover

and this is the back. 

I discovered recently the joy of painting with bubble wrap.

Did you know that glimmer mist on watercolor paper with large bubble bubble wrap pressed against it comes out looking like roses. Of course you all knew that but I DISCOVERED IT on my own!

...so proud...

This book had a masonite cover with binder rings.

i thought if I gessoed the pages I would have  a great surface to paint or draw on.

Well, gesso on thin sheets of paper curl up like some 1st grade science experiment so I sewed several pages together and then gessoed them. They've been waiting for me now for 2 years.

faces aren't my strong suit just yet!

I found this lovely stretchy tie dye tube stuff at the Saturday market in bangkok years ago. They had the best colors, Sure wish I could find some more of this sort of thing. It's part of my supply hoard that I only let go in small pieces because when I'm out, that's it!

I do dabble in stamps once in awhile but try to come up with combinations that aren't too homogenous with a certain ubiquitous look that I've come to know.

(ooh, did that sound snobby?....sorry)

As soon as I get away from the straight on collage, things begin to get messy.

Oh OK, things are pretty damn messy with just paper and glue, I admit.

So the funk has lifted and I'm happy once again

( but don't get me going about my computer issues!)

My update to Snow Leopard means that my scanner driver for my Canon no longer communicates.

Ever try to download anything with dial-up?

Now I've got to haul my desktop computer somewhere that has wifi just to download another driver.

Ooops, I guess I got myself started on that one.

And today I got a package of ephemera from Crystal Neubauer over at Other People's Flowers.

You can follow her blog to her Esty shop to see the good closeout deals she's offering in ephemera.