little black journal

Our p-patch plot, planted 10 weeks ago with tiny little plants in neat little rows, has recently turned into something of a jungle.  We’ve had boatloads of lettuce, summer squash that seems to double in size overnight, and crisp, sweet snap peas that are usually munched on as we make the walk from the garden back to our house.  Just call me Farmer Kelly…

The tomatoes and strawberries aren’t yet ripe for the pickin’, but they show definite promise.

All in all, we feel like we’ve done pretty well in our rookie year of veggie-gardening.  But there are definitely things we’ll do differently next year – a couple of words to the wise:

- Don’t assume that one of those dinky little 2-foot stakes is all you need for your peas – our vines outgrew those things in a matter of minutes, and everything would have been much simpler if we’d built a trellis from the get-go.

- 12 lettuce plants is far too many for a two-person household.  I’m sick of salad.  I was actually relieved when some of our plants started to bolt and needed to be removed.

- Squash and zucchini plants grow freakishly fast and get freakishly big.  Just sayin’.

- Gardening is rewarding and fun, but watch out – it can cause marital tensions; I got very defensive last week when Shane accused my squash plant of crowding his strawberries.  How dare he.

Keeping my fingers crossed that I’ll be seeing more signs of red next time we go out there!  I’m ready for a good, juicy tomato.

These are a few of my newer favorites, hung as part of the show.  The general theme was ‘mixing media’, as I have completely fallen in love the way that encaustics allow me to use everything from my photographs to bits of fabric to old maps from the glove compartment in new and interesting ways.

Note that my next exercise will be in learning how to properly photograph art, but these should give you the jest of things…

pdx, 24″x36″, mixed media encaustic (map on tissue paper, painted nylon netting, photo transfer of trees):

mountain creek, 16″x16″, mixed media encaustic (nylon netting, photo transfer of trees):

rue st martin, 12″x16″, mixed media encaustic (nylon netting, photo transfer of parisian rooftops):

porto, 36″x24″, mixed media encaustic (painted nylon netting, photo transfer of bridge and screen wall):

As is usually the case with any long weekend, I am sitting here with the knowledge that I have to return to work tomorrow and wondering, ‘Where did the past three days go?!’. Time flies when you’re having fun, I guess…

I was up and at ‘em first thing on Saturday morning to head over to West Seattle for my work day at the encaustic studio. The instructors of the workshop I took in March have a great space set up over there for renters, where I had everything I needed right at my fingertips in order to make a lovely little mess. It was a productive day for me, as I finished a couple of pieces and got started on a couple of others, but still, even after nine hours in the studio, I wanted more. These sorts of intense art sessions are exhausting, but completely energizing at the same time. Can’t wait to get back in there. Here’s a sneak peek – more photos to come when I have the whole ‘collection’ done.

Yesterday we zipped down to Portland for a long-overdue visit with my brother and his family. As I’ve said after every trip down there over the past two years, I can’t believe how Elise has changed since I saw her last. She is taller, faster, chattier, and showing major signs of favoritism toward her Uncle Shane (I won’t hold this against her).  One of her favorite toys these days is the Magna-Doodle that Shane and I bought her for Christmas, and she spent quite a bit of time on my lap this weekend, drawing to her heart’s content.  Whatever I asked her to draw, whether it was an elephant, a penguin, or a picture of her Grandpa, she responded enthusiastically with, “OK, sure!” (her latest catch phrase), and proceeded to give it her best shot.  Granted, all of her doodles bear a striking a resemblance to one another, and I’m not sure I could differentiate her giraffe from her representation of Uncle Shane, but she gets an A+ for effort.  She also loves to read, and had a lot of fun pulling books off the shelves left and right during our visit to Powell’s this weekend.  I like to think of her as a future book club member-in-training.  Goodness, I love this little girl!

And so, another weekend come and gone (sigh).  But it was so, so good while it lasted!

Three or four months ago, I started thinking about a blog redesign – Little Black Journal is now over two years old, and has been in need of a little refresh for awhile now.  For any of you readers that follow me via Google Reader and haven’t been to the site in awhile, this is LBJ, circa yesterday:

As I was laid up on the couch last night with a mild case of the cold flu, motivation took the place of procrastination, and I spent several hours tracking down a decent template, tweaking the heck out of the one that came closest to my ideal, redesigning my header, and testing it all out on the beta site that my uber-techy husband set up for me.  And now…Voila!  I’m pretty happy with the direction I’m moving in – the new site seems cleaner, fresher, and allows for larger photos than my old layout could support.  The header is also a great place for me to ‘showcase’ some of latest artwork and will be updated periodically.  Also, FYI, I have started linking my photos to my Flickr page, so if you want a larger-format photo, just click on the image in the body of my blog.

I’m still fiddling around with a couple of minor things – fonts, text color, margins, etc., but I’m gettin’ there.  Don’t hesitate to leave me a comment if something seems funky – I am by no means a web designer or graphic guru, so feedback is always welcome (I just spent a couple minutes opening my blog on 5 different web browsers and it looks different on every single one – I feel your pain, J!).

It’s an improvement, though, no?

My encaustic workshop wrapped up on Monday, and I’m just getting around to taking photos of my work and processing my thoughts on the whole experience.  I had some anxiety about being able to make it through four straight eight-hour days of art-making, but once I got into the swing of things, I caught myself checking the clock regularly in hopes of actually slowing down time.   I was totally bummed when Monday evening rolled around, and my short-lived experience as a full-time artist was over.  But my bummed-ness was offset by the fact that I was walking away with a pretty cool collection of work and a renewed passion for art-making.  Below are a few of the highlights…

This is one of my favorite pieces, made with wax, thread, and tissue paper printed with one of my images of Paris:

This pattern was woven with thread, then cast in a mixture of clear and white wax.  As the class progressed, I became known as the girl with all the white wax – a lot of my work was fairly muted, and I was one of the few that allowed the color of the wood panel underneath to really show through.  I loved the color and grain of the birch veneer, and so I figured, why hide it?

More white and clear, set over a tissue transfer of one of my sketches:

I brought a couple of the ‘seed pod’ sketches that I used for my food art back out for these two pieces:

One of the things I liked most about the class was the opportunity to experiment with different media.  My instructors brought all kinds of new ideas on how to achieve unusual effects with every-day materials.  This is what happens when wax is coated with shellac, then heated with a torch – lovely:

And this is shellac sprayed with India ink.  This charred effect comes from some kind of chemical reaction between the two elements – no fire necessary.  I love it – I never knew painting could feel so much like a chemistry class!:

I am vowing not to let this new-found interest fizzle like so many of my other artistic intrigues, so hopefully I’ll be posting more encaustic work in the future.  Aaaaagh!  So many possibilities, so little time…

I am now in the midst of a four-day intensive encaustic workshop at a local art school.  Eight hours a day of slopping wax on pieces of plywood, melting it with my new blow torch, layering on sheets of tissue paper, coatings of shellac, or whatever other random materials my experimental instructors have on hand, and generally just making a lovely mess of things.  It’s all a bit overwhelming, and my inability to really control this new medium can be frustrating, but I love it.  It’s been awhile since I’ve really been immersed in an art project, and it feels good.  Here’s a small sneak peak of things…

As I mentioned earlier, Shane and I are in the midst of our frugal January, trying to stick to a grocery budget of three dollars per person per day.  I’ve embraced the challenge, but have been unwilling to give up certain ‘necessities’, such as dessert.  As I perused my most economical options for sweets on Friday night, I decided that carrot cake seemed to fit the bill as 1) cheap, and 2) still slightly decadent, when topped with fatty cream cheese frosting.  I pulled from couple of different recipes to come up with a cake that contained mostly ingredients that we already had on-hand, and it turned out quite well:

Carrot Cake with Cream Cheese Frosting (makes 8 servings):

2 eggs
2/3 cup vegetable oil
1 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 1/4 cup grated carrots
1/2 cup chopped pecans

1/4 cup softened butter
4 ounces softened cream cheese
1 2/3 cup powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
extra pecans, to sprinkle on top

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.  Grease an 11×7 or 8×8 baking dish.  In a large bowl, beat together eggs, oil, white sugar and 1 teaspoon vanilla. Mix in flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, nutmet and cinnamon. Stir in carrots. Fold in pecans. Pour into prepared pan.  Bake in the preheated oven for 35 to 40 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean.  Set the cake aside to cool.

To Make Frosting: In a medium bowl, combine butter, cream cheese, powdered sugar and 1/2 teaspoon vanilla. Beat until the mixture is smooth and creamy. Frost the cooled cake and sprinkle with pecan pieces.

Cut a slice and serve with hot chamomile tea.  Consume while watching football on a rainy Sunday afternoon.

I was happy with how this one turned out, considering it was my first attempt at a carrot cake – moist, cinnamon-y, and dang, I love a good creamy frosting.  I have already made two cakes in three days to share with friends and neighbors and will be adding this to my go-to dessert list.  The best part?  The only ingredients I had to buy were a couple of carrots, costing 60 cents, and a small package of cream cheese, which I got on sale for an even dollar.  Now that is a sweet deal (pardon corny pun)…

I was so proud of my 2009 homemade calendar, but in the end, doing a drawing or painting for each month got to be too much, and so November and December were never even completed (meaning that according to the calendar, it was October in our house for three months).  But I liked the idea of personalizing a calendar, so this year I took a less labor-intensive route and worked with photos I’ve taken over the previous year.  Each month in our 2010 calendar holds a photo that was taken during the same month in 2009.  I like it – the whole calendar turns into a nice little trip down memory lane.  March holds a picture of our trip to Paris, June reminds us of our hike up Little Si, and November is captured with a photo of our annual trip to Minnesota.  It took a few hours to sort, print, and trim all the photos, but it was worth the effort, and it’s nice to have the whole thing done and ready to flip to with the changing of each month.  Also nice to find that I had at least one print-worthy photo from each month of the year – I’ll work on keeping with that rhythm for the year to come.

I’ve always loved the look of hand-knit stuffed animals, and decided to take a stab at a teddy bear pattern I found in this book.  Mr. Bear didn’t turn out quite how I’d hoped – one of his legs is a little longer than the other, his stomach is rather lumpy, and his stuffing is showing through in places – but he’s got lots of charm and is still soft and cuddly.  Plus, he’s bright pink.  Awesome.

These were the final few prints that I cranked out last month – I held off on sharing them because two of these were a late birthday gift for my mom, but she received them last week, so I’m no longer in danger of ruining any surprises.  These are all monoprints, done with hand-cut stencils loaded with ink and run through the press.  I’m pretty happy with how several of them turned out – none of these are perfect, but I’m coming to learn that these imperfections are the beauty of printmaking.

These are two of my favorites, which will soon hang on the wall of my parents’ newly remodeled bathroom (my first piece of art to ‘grace’ someone else’s walls!):

These are all part of the same series…

And so my intro into printmaking has ended.  But due to the generosity and thoughtfulness of my ever-supportive husband, I’ll be able to occasionally rent space in the print studio next year with my Pratt school gift certificate!  I have some thinking/organizing/prepping to do before I’m ready to get back in there, but there are lots of ideas swirling around in this busy ol’ brain of mine.  Can’t wait to see what comes of it…