Website Update

The SCBWI WWA Bellingham Network had a schmooze last week that focused on a writer's presence on the internet. I got a bunch of ideas for my website that night.

So after a full day of drawing and working on my dummy (yay, my son was better today), I gave my drawing muscles a break and stayed up late tinkering and making some improvements to my regular website.

New stuff:
  • I made it so my home page features the current illustration of the month and handmade book of the week from this blog.
  • I fixed up the goodies page (although I still need to post the handout from my creative journaling presentation). I especially like the old goofy picture I put up on this page.
  • I changed the "news" tab in the header menu to say "blog," I moved the stuff from that section into my goodies section and now I have a tab in the header menu that directly links folks here!
Okay, now I'm off to bed. Maybe I'll get some more drawing done during my son's naptime tomorrow...

War Letters: Journaling Inspiration of the Month, November, 2008

I feel strongly that letters are journals. They are journals unbound and shared through the mail. In honor of Veteran's Day, I'm making my journaling inspiration of the month about Veteran's letters, and in particular, about two "journals" of sorts that share some of these letters with the world.

I got this idea from a story I heard today on the PRI radio show, The World. The story highlighted two blogs that both feature historical letters sent to family from Vets of WWI.

The first blog features the letters of an English soldier and WWI veteran, Harry Lamin. Harry's grandson, Bill, has been posting Harry's letters that he sent home during the war exactly 90 years after the date that Harry wrote his letters. The radio show indicated that the letters reveal a very personal portrait of one man's experience in the war. I've looked at the blog a bit and I confess I'm hooked! I want to read it like a novel. Lucky for me, Bill mentioned on the radio that he is working at translating the blog into a book.

Harry's blog inspired William Hills and his daughter Carol to start their own blog, featuring the letters of an American WWI Vet, William's dad, Paul Hills. These letters also look to paint an intimate picture of WWI. Fascinating and I look forward to reading it in more detail.

Do you have old letters or an old journal from a passed loved one sitting around in an attic somewhere? Maybe you've got a blog to start...

Or at the very least, maybe you could honor these letters by finding a beautiful box to put them in. Then get the box out of the attic. Put it out and show it off. It'll be worth conversation.

Setback!

Sick kid. This means I loose at least one, maybe two, days of work in my current three-day work week. My golden cup goal was already a little insane. It may be impossible now. But even if I don't make the big crazy reach goal of finishing the draft of my dummy by the end of November, I hope I at least make big strides.

And then I'll finish it by the end of December.

But lets not rule out the reach goal yet. There's still a few weeks to go...

Handmade Book of the week Nov 8 - 14, 2008

Cheers!
This week's handmade book of the week is a dos-a-dos wine journal, meaning it’s two books in one. A dos-a-dos book includes two books that both share the same back cover – so they are sewn together into one. One side for red wine notes, one side for white wine notes. This is the perfect journal for a wine lover or someone who loves to go wine tasting.

Click here to see more photos or to buy the book.

Tree Houses

I love what I do. Today, I'm working on my golden cup goal that I posted a few days ago. The dummy I'm working on has a shack kind of tree-house in it. So I'm doing a bit of research.

I always feel that I should somehow put quotes around that word in terms of my work:

"Research."

Try this. Go to Google images. Type in "tree house." Surf for a while. Draw a few sketches. Repeat with something like "shack" or "shanty town."

That's a sample of how I "research."

Lest you think it's all fun and games though, putting all this "research" together into something meaningful and fitting for my book is a bit like giving birth. You are not sure at all how it will happen, when it will happen, but it will be VERY hard to do, no matter what. Only unlike birth, it isn't inevitable. You may do all the work and nothing may come of it...

Which believe me, can be a let down. But it's a fun journey. And hopefully something will come of it.

Nina Laden Class at the Community College

Thanks to Nina Laden! I took her day long workshop about creating children's picture books at Whatcom Community College last Saturday. I love Nina's work and have heard her speak at conferences and SCBWI events in the past, so even though I knew the class at the community college would be an intro class I signed up and I'm glad I took it! I'm especially excited to check out some of the picture books that I hadn't read that she talked about. Also she talked about a birthday book she uses sometimes to help her with character development called "The Secret Language of Birthdays" by Gary Goldschneider. Looks fun! Nina was also generous enough to do a little abrieveated critique at lunch. Thanks for a great day, Nina!

I Wasn't Always A Paper Artist...

A bunch of my SCBWI writer friends have been posting their high school senior pictures on their blogs. Here's mine:


My Uncle Billy took these.



My uncle is a professional photographer. He does lots of architectural stuff and Chinese stock photography for magazines and such. But he's really nice and often agrees to be the official photographer for family events.

I loved my senior pictures. My uncle captured just perfectly who I was at the time. He even took quite a few pictures of me with my friends. I have all the photos in a handmade book I made a few years ago:

The patches on this book are all ones I used to have attached to my backpack in high school.

The only sad thing about my senior pictures was that we didn't get them taken in time for the yearbook deadline. I wanted a picture for the yearbook so I went to the free photo session my high school provided. They took three pictures, real fast, all in a row. I got to choose between the three. There were two where my eyes were closed and one where I wasn't smiling. I choose the non-smiling one. I hated it.

A couple of years ago I found a notebook with some creative writing essays I wrote for a senior English project in high school. I folded them up and put them in envelopes that I attached every few pages in the handmade book here.

I guess it's kind of a yearbook itself -- only handmade and way cooler than the one with the non-smiling photo in it. I wished I had had my friends sign this book instead of the school's version.

Maybe someday some arty high school kid out there who buys one of my handmade books will make their own yearbook too. Maybe their friends can sign it and I can live vicariously...

Illustration of the Month: October, 2008

I gave myself a challenge this month to make an illustration using a very simple background and a very limited color palette. Here's the sketch:

And here's the finished piece:
I LOVE puppets. I collect them. They are everywhere in my house.



I like the idea of shadow puppets though; think of all the puppets I carry with me in my handy dandy hands!

I watched a bunch of you-tube videos with hand shadow puppets as "research" for this piece. I stumbled upon some super cool videos. This one is my favorite:



Creative Journaling: Show and Tell

Thanks to Mary Cornish's students at Fairhaven College!

Last week I visited their class to share my creative journaling presentation with them:

CREATIVE JOURNALING: Expanding The Realm of Possibilities for Keeping a Journal Through Content, Form and Style.

I hauled in 4 suit cases full of a selection (!) of all of my personal journals and photo albums as a kind of show and tell. I haven't given this particular presentation in a while and I was agape at just how many books I felt I HAD to bring. I guess I had forgotten the sheer volume (and weight -- ugh!) of my journal collection.

Anyway, it was a lot of fun and I was even inspired this time to make a nice hand-out with a list for students' future reference so people would not have to take too many notes.

And since my photography equipment is still out and I haven't put the journals away yet, I've decided to do a big photo blitz of my beloved and well-loved journals in order to start posting some journaling inspirations and examples for all you journal maniacs (and journal maniacs-to-be) who've visited my craft booth or my etsy sight. Stay tuned...

Handmade Book of the week Oct 18 - 24, 2008

My 18 month old son was an owl last year for his first Halloween (picture below). So, in celebration of Halloween, this week's book of the week is a photo album with an owl on the cover. The dimensions of the cover of this book are 8.5” x 9.5.” The pages are standard 8” x 8” screw post binding slip pages filled with colorful text paper.
Click here to see more photos (of the book, not the baby) and/or to buy the book!
Isn't he cute? Clue for next week's book: It's based on my son's Halloween costume for this year.
What would a little boy named Oscar who was an Owl last year, dress up as this year?
Hmmm... Check in next week to find out.

Handmade Books of the week Oct 10 - 17, 2008

Yay! I'm reinstating my Handmade Book of The Week segment on my blog. I'll at least keep it going from now until Christmas.
This week I'm featuring 15 ticket stub journals, pictured above. I thought since I've taken a few months off from this segment, I'd highlight enough books to make up for lost time.
A ticket stub journal is a small book, slightly larger than your average ticket stub, with empty pages meant to be filled with -- you guessed it -- stubs. In it you can store ticket stubs from sporting events, movies, fairs, plays, museums, concerts, tours or whatever else you can think of.
The ticket stub journal pictured here is an example journal that I've filled so you can see how the ticket stubs look inside my ticket stub journals. The ones I sell are, of course, blank inside.

I suggest mounting tickets by using a glue stick, double stick tape or photo mounting squares (found at craft stores). It's also a good idea to make a note on the page about who went with you to whatever you went to -- It will make your journal even more special.
I'll be putting up at least one of these books every week in my etsy shop from now through Christmas (along with up-coming books of the week). To buy a ticket stub journal or for more photos check out my etsy shop.

Cairns

My family drove to the Canadian Rockies during the last week in September. Along one of the stunning and inspiring roads, we happened upon a small field of cairns.
For those who don't hike: a cairn is a stack of rocks that usually is built along a hiking trail in order to help hikers find their way. They are built at spots on the path that are confusing or where you might mistakenly go straight when you were meant to turn or where you might turn when you were meant to go straight. They are happy little path-marker sculptures.
But the impromptu cairn sculptures we found here didn't really mark a path. It was more like they marked a viewpoint.
Maybe they marked the viewpoint as part of the path, the path being the parkway on the beautiful road between Lake Louise and the Columbia Ice Fields.
I had to stop. I decided to build a few.
I couldn't resist.
In my most wishful dreams I hope that some of my art marks the view as part of the path for someone, somewhere, sometime.

New Journals Preview

I've finally got a big stack of journals and photo albums ready for the holiday season. Here's some preview pictures (taken with my VERY messy studio floor in the background).
I'll be re-starting my journal of the week feature here by the end of next week and continuing at least through Christmas.
I 'm especially excited about my new scissors design and the wine journals.

I rarely have sales of any kind but I've also decided to clean out my old inventory and sell stuff off so look out for some great deals on my Etsy site in the next few months.

Papermaking

The main ingredient in all of my paper art: my own handmade paper.

A couple of weeks ago, my sister happened to be visiting when I made a fresh batch of paper. So I conned her into taking some fresh pictures of me making my fresh paper. I'd already made the pulp when she arrived:

I have an

abbreviated run-through on how I make my paper over at my normal website

(including the pulp-making process).

But I'm pretty psyched to share my new photos so why not go through the sheet forming process right here, right now. Here's how I do it:

I pour my pulp into a floating, framed screen (also called a "mold and deckle").

I agitate the fibers and spread them around inside the frame:

Then I pull the screen out of the water and let the water drain through the fibers back into the tub.

I carefully remove the frame from the screen (or the deckle from the mold).

I press a drying felt (also called a couch sheet -- pronounced "cooch sheet") into the wet paper.

I flip the screen-paper-felt stack onto a pile of other newly made sheets of paper (this stack is often called a "post" of paper)

I sponge out as much water as I can through the screen before...

I pull back the loose screen to see my new paper!

The new paper is attached to the drying felt. After pressing the entire stack of new sheets between boards with a clamp and letting any excess water drain for a while, I hang the new sheets to dry outside on my special drying porch (still attached to their drying felts). When they are dry I peal the new sheets off their felts and voila! New paper is made.

Handmade Book of the week July 12 - July 18, 2008

I don't usually post a book that has been up in my shop for awhile. But this coming week's new book in the shop is a sale item -- a flawed book that I've had sitting in inventory. Since I haven't had any craft shows lately, I thought I'd try posting a deal in my Etsy shop. But a flawed book is absolutely not allowed to be the book of the week here on my blog.

So this week's handmade book of the week is one of my favorites in my shop right now because it's a triangle book! When you write in a triangle book, you never know which side is the top. You step out of the box -- you open your mind to new and creative possibilities.