Thirty

Thirty it is.

And I got thirty presents from my mom.

And a bunch more, too.

Thanks everyone!

I took an I-Spy type photograph of some of the thirty gifts from my ma:

Can you find the delicious Mr. B's Chocolate Bar?

There are assorted antique brass bells that will be great hung on a hook or maybe on a wreath.

Vintage metal stencils may find there way onto a book cover.

A tiny white charm dog from my Great Grandma Mort's jewelry box is very mysterious, much like the odd vase that was my Grandma Myrtle's GRANDMA's (that goes back more than 120 years), very intriguing item!

Threads and soaps and sticks, fun fun.

And me! How serious I was and am.

An orchid now graces the presence of my messy studio area. Studios are meant to be messy. I have recently decided this despite all the magazine articles that pressure me to spend January organizing. Thanks for the fleur, Peter!

Fear of Sleep

I came down to the kitchen this morning, groggy, ready for a cup of coffee, needing a little wake up time. Surprise! We never cleaned the kitchen last night. Oh.

Now, it's 1:30 and the lunch dishes are piled on top of the supper dishes.

Not to mention the other chores, and Fredrik's been wearing the same socks for two days (gasp!).

I keep filling my sketchbook with ideas...but they don't get started.

It is the fear of sleep.

I finally diagnosed it.

Nothing has been working to get that 23 month old to sleep (except holding him in the sling that had been retired to a drawer a good 10 months ago).

We've tried the cry-it-out which was more of a yell-it-out, he just yelled, "mama, daddy, eggs, outside, thomas..." until he was hoarse.

We've tried soothing music, putting the lights down, calming baths, negotiations, snuggly toys, switching to a toddler bed (QUICKLY BACK TO THE CRIB!), our bed, and skipping the nap.

He looks so bedraggled.

So does our house.

Then, today we visited the Monroe Family Playroom at the Monroe School-which was awesome by the way, and free, and included 45 minutes of parent/child yoga-and during the free play portion of the morning I picked up a copy of "What to Expect...the Toddler Years (or something close)" and they mentioned that some sensitive kids will develop a fear of sleep. The cry(yell)-it-out method usually just makes it worse.

I think it fits.

He just wants to be up, to play, to read, to learn, to talk.

So, they suggested laying with your toddler until he falls asleep so we tried that today. He, in his exhaustion, fell asleep almost immediately on my shoulder in his room. I waited a good 10 minutes to transfer him, then covered him up (still sleeping at this point), covered him up so he felt secure and rested my hand a bit longer.

Soon, he opened his eyes and said,

"Screwdriver."

Seriously!

And he's been in his crib a good 20 minutes now listening to guitar music and talking about Thomas.

He's so tired.

The house is so dirty.

Well, up I go to try again.

Patterning

I love the making of patterns. Who knew?

These are some of my favorites thus far.

From the Love Ostriches line:

And the Veggie line:
Also from the Veggie line, made out of elf shoes:
And the Dala line:
It is extremely playful to make these. I use photoshop. Cutting, pasting, rotating, sizing, coloring, repeating...it is great fun. I'm thinking about selling some of the papers in paper packs. Could be fun. And, who knows, maybe someday Moda will ask me to design fabric. You never know.

Me+Me

A few weeks (months?) ago I split myself into two, swirling tree and swirling tree people.

The books vs. the drawings and prints.

My book shop was feeling cluttered with the prints and notecards so I thought they should be seperated.

Well, now I've brought them together into one big "me" collaboration.

I was crabbily working (tis frustrating to learn new things) on patterns to go with my new designs for about a week and a half and now I have produced these:

A whole "elephant ballerina" line of papers and even some printed fabric for the brag book pouch. Phew. I wasn't sure if I was going to pull it off. As you can see, the green elephant paper is made of repeated smaller green copies of my original elephant which is on the large album. The flower pattern comes from the corner detail on the drawn frame around the elephant. I'm selling all three books together as a set. So darling, if I do say.

The inspiration for these projects came from some christmas gifts from Peter. "Bend the Rules with Fabric" by the Angry Chicken blogger Amy Karol, and a silkscreening kit from the Center for Book Arts, and from my parents (with sis's help), the letterpress printer from Archivers. Aside from the book, none of these were exactly used for this project, but getting all of these printing related products spurred me to think about patterns and making my own decorative papers and fabrics. The letterpress and silkscreen are taunting me to learn more.

I have some veggie-people albums and brag books on the way, and then dala horses. I'm not sure if the movie fox will be appropriate as these seem geared towards baby gifts. Anyone have any input? Would someone want a set of albums and a brag book with a sly and cynical movie-loving fox on the cover?

Hmmmmm.

Toddler Muffins

Freddy and I made muffins the other day and much was learned about baking with people of the toddler variety.

1. Have things ready as though we are on a cooking show. A quick trip to the cupboard to get vanilla may result in eggs in the honey jar.

2. Use the biggest bowl possible if you are to let the little one stir.

3. Flour is slippery (more so with gluten-free flour?)

4. Do not expect the product to "turn out"

5. The toddler will fill with pride and adore the baked creation, even if it crumbles to a pile of dust when touched.

Next time we may try instant pudding.

January Sunshine

I'm a big fan of January. I put my cuddle duds, wool sweater, wool coat, wool everything on and embrace the bitter cold. There is always so much bright sunshine in January that the cold is made tolerable ---OK, to and from the car is basically the only time spent outdoors on days like today when it hovers around zero degrees, but still, I have no bad feelings about it. The days are getting longer...and it's almost my birthday which is, of course, a cause for celebration. It's the big 3-0 this year. Despite the frozen tundra, we have some blooms in the house. Peter just scored a huge jade (monster plant is what he and Freddy are calling it) at Mississippi Market. IT IS HUGE. It took the place of our Christmas Tree, is is THAT BIG. Peter is freaking-out excited about it. Bonsai plans are in his head (Jade's are fun to trim...sculpt...not sure what the correct term is there). It's even blooming. I didn't even know that they could bloom here. Here is some photog of the monster tree:

Now that Law School is back in session, I am putting things back onto the back burner to simmer. I did, however, have a majorly productive couple of weeks so I feel OK for slowing up a bit and getting back into the normal routine. Here are some 5x7 albums that are among the many things I finished during the break:

Happy 2010!

Happy New Year!

I am extremely excited for 2010. I have SO MANY ideas for new drawings, books, kits, and the like.

For example, I had decided that I wanted to draw a fox. I like foxes, especially those of the cartoon variety. So, as I sat down to draw a fox, I drew this guy, sitting in a chair with popcorn and pop. What the? I guess I had watched Avatar in 3-D the night before (it was totally awesome), so that must have been my inspiration.

I am one of those artists that just starts drawing without a plan. It's the opposite with bookmaking, since the structure sort of necessitates a plan and cutting accuracy.

Below Movie Fox is one of my new journals, Red and Green Clock Journal. It's cute. It's clever. Both items are in their respective shops and more are soon to follow.