60 in 60 Days 47-60!!

Well, true to my nature, I managed to procrastinate through the blogging part of this entire self-challenge.  I don't have to challenge myself to do something creative every day because that's just how I live.  It's like breathing.  I don't have to think about it or plan for it, I just do it.  Now, blogging about it, that's another story.

I want to be a good blogger but not if I have to commit to making time for it on a regular basis.  If there is one thing that I have learned in 60 years it's this; I don't like committing my time.  It's so easy to say I'll do something that involves a future time but, procrastination being what it is, that future time becomes the present and then it's panic time!  So I can either be a mediocre blogger on a regular basis or a good blogger when I feel like it.

So, today is the big day and I am just now posting about Days 47-60.

I worked on encaustic paintings for a show this fall at the Smithers Art Gallery. 

Sunflower, Encaustic on cradled board, 24x24

I worked on a lot of different earrings and other jewelry pieces for my table at a summer music festival. 

Earrings made from obsolete Canadian copper pennies

And I took hundreds of photographs! 

This young buck stopped to pose for me before he ran off into the trees.

I'll be back again sometime soon-ish, or a bit later, but eventually I'll post again and I hope you'll be back, too!  Thanks for stopping by.

60 in 60 Day 46

What a beautiful, sunny summer day!

I spent as much time outside as possible today making paper, staining deck rails, and drifting on my floaty chair with a beverage and a couple of jewelry magazines.

Handmade willow bark paper.  I mixed the processed willow bark with recycled kraft paper pulp.  For more info on how I make my paper see my previous papermaking tutorials.

Here are the earrings I made today from re-purposed Canadian copper pennies.

These ones are textured using a hammer and a brass plate from my scrapbooking days.  The stones are a greenish turquoise.

Folded with ammonia and salt patina and turquoise nuggets.

Textured in the rolling mill and patina added with a torch.

I'm not sure how some people manage to do a blog post every day but I'll do my best to keep it up for the remainder of this self-challenge. 

60 in 60 Day 44 and 45

I am having a booth at an upcoming music festival so most of my creative efforts in the next week will be going into finishing up jewelry projects.

I finished these pieces in the past two days.  All these earrings are made from repurposed copper pennies and use some of my favourite patinas - oven heat, torch with peanut oil and ammonia and salt.

I stopped to take some pictures of this Mama Duck and her little one (Common Goldeneye) on my way into town.  I always pull over and let the ferry traffic pass me on my way to town so it's easier to stop for any photo ops.

60in60 Days Nine to Thirteen

I haven't posted for a few days because, even though I did meet my challenge to do something creative every day, I didn't have anything completed to show for it.

I started a wrap bracelet on Day 9.  On Day 10 I was away all day so my creative effort was a photograph of the sunset at the end of the day.  More hummingbird photos on Day 11.  Day 12 and 13 were the weekend so I spent lots of time in my studio jumping from one project to another.

I played with resin for awhile and also got some pennies ready for making more earrings but those will be done another day.

I made pulp for papermaking and I spent about 5 frustrating hours on an encaustic painting on Saturday that became something completely different on Sunday!  Finished the wrap bracelet and made a pair of earrings.

  Posting my challenge is more challenging than the challenge itself!  My life would be so much simpler if I would just stick to one thing but I don't seem to be wired that way...or my wiring is loose!

60in60 Day Eight

I spent a little more time with the hummingbirds when I got home from work today (and the ants and wasps that also seem to enjoy the feeders). 

 I finished this wrap bracelet and used another cool button from my collection as the fastener.

I got a whole bag of vintage metal buttons at my local antique shop a couple of months ago and now  I'm waiting for some silicone putty to arrive so I can make molds of some of the more interesting designs before I use them all.

60in60 Day Seven

It's a good thing I had this little project already set up to go cause I was in the perfect mood to procrastinate, and it's only Day 7 of this challenge.  Once I get started I enjoy making these wrap bracelets cause the repetitive motion of weaving back and forth through the beads is quite meditative.

Leather wrap bracelet with vintage button and assorted dyed glass and stone beads.

60in60 Day Six

I spent a little bit of the day in my studio and a huge part working outside and all I want to do now is sleep.  I am making these little pendants as thank you gifts for some volunteers from CAAT who will be in Burns Lake doing free spaying and neutering for low income families.  If you would like to know more, check out the Lakes Animal Friendship Society website.

I am using copper pennies as the base for the pendants.  Some are enamelled and some are just the copper. 

60in60 Day Five

I spent a couple of hours with the hummingbirds this morning before getting down to work in my studio.

This isn't a perfect photo but it's pretty cool nonetheless.  I caught this one as it was dive bombing another hummingbird that was infringing on its territory.

Back in the studio, I made some sterling silver earrings out of an old bracelet that my sister found in some junk jewelry.  After annealing the bracelet to soften the silver, I rolled it through the mill and then cut out the earrings.  They are textured with a hammer.  On one pair I used vintage beads that I bought several years ago from a seller on Etsy.

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Both are listed in my Etsy shop.  My goal was to have 100 listings in my shop by May 31st but I only made it to 42.  I tend to set lofty goals for myself that I have no hope of meeting.  Maybe by the time I reach 60 I'll know better!

60in60 Day Four

What a beautiful sunny afternoon to come home to on the start of my weekend!  I spent about 4 hours out on my beach trying out different settings on my camera, taking photos of hummingbirds.  I wanted to stop the wing action but the really fast shutter speed also made the photos grainy.  I'll have to work on finding the right balance.  I should probably get out the tripod, too.  And some good bug repellant.  The black flies were beastly!

 

Counting Down - 60 in 60 Day One

In 60 days (as of yesterday but I ran out of time to post), I will be 60.  On the one hand, I'm really pleased that I'm getting older cause you know what they say about the alternative!  On the other hand, I'm feeling very aware that I don't have a lot of time to waste, which is bad news for a born procrastinator.

Fellow artist and friend who I have never met in person but greatly admire, Violette Naranjo Clark, recently started a personal challenge of creating 60 cartoons (which she calls 'uptoons' for their uplifting messages) in 60 days in honour of her upcoming 60th birthday.  She invited other friends to join her for their special milestones.  This seemed like a good challenge to conquer my own procrastination challenges and celebrate who I am, turning 60.

My personal challenge for 60 in 60 is to do one creative thing each day, and to post about it on my blog, for the next 60 days until my 60th birthday on July 26 .

Day one (which was yesterday):  A triple wrap adjustable leather and bead bracelet with vintage button.

One a Day in May - Day 16 - Oooohhh....Aaaahhh

I got an exciting packet in the mail today full of all kinds of bits and baubles for mixed media from some of my friends on the Melange Team on Etsy. I think using materials that I don't have a preconceived idea of how they were intended to be used will be fun.

 

The weather today just begged me to go curl up under the covers with a good book when I got home from work, so I did.

Big change from yesterday!

 But I did manage to get one card done before heading to bed...again...with my book!

Moose poo paper card

One a Day in May - Day 14 - Raku

I had a great day today taking the first part of a two day raku pottery workshop.  It involved 5 hours of driving to get there and back but it was worth it.

 We were each given a bag of clay to make as many pieces as we wanted.  I made two fairly big pieces.  I can't show my vase yet cause I already had it wrapped up in towels and plastic before I remembered to get my camera from the car.  But here is a small sunflower wall hanging (about 12 inches tall) that I did.

I still have lots of clay so if I have time I'll make some more small pieces and bisque fire them at home before the second day of the workshop later this month.

One a Day in May - Day 13 - More candles

I hand dipped another 20 pairs of beeswax candles today.  Spring has finally arrived and so much is calling me so loudly outside.  It's going to be more and more challenging to do something in my studio every day as the weather gets nicer.

One a Day in May - Day 12 - More Moose Poo Cards

I worked my shift at the Lakes Artisan Centre yesterday after my day job and completed several moose poo paper cards while I was there.  I tried to post yesterday but Blogger was down.

Moose photos printed on handmade paper prepared with digital medium; mounted on moose poo paper cards.

One a Day in May - Day 11 - Planning

I was already in bed last night before I stopped long enough to do anything creative.  The electrician hooked up the plug for my kiln yesterday so I did some planning in my sketchbook for some small projects. 

Sketches for slab built soap dish and tea light candle holder.

To start with I'm going to create some pieces to compliment some of what I already do - soap dishes for my handmade soaps and candle holders for my pure beeswax candles.  I don't have a wheel yet so I'll be hand building all my pottery.

One a Day in May - Day 9 - Moose Poo Paper Card

It's coming into tourist season so I'm getting started on my moose poo card production.  I made this card today using moose poo paper that I made last fall.  My photograph of the moose is printed on hand made plant fibre paper coated with digital medium.

My daughter-in-law gave me a box of moose poo for Mother's Day so I have a good start.  I found a few more deposits over the past few days that I'll gather when I have some time on the weekend and then I'll get busy making paper.

If you're interested in the process of making paper from moose poo, look in the tutorials under Making handmade paper from plants.

One a Day in May - Day 7

I spent the whole day today making soap; 7 batches and I created some new blends, too.

Soaps in molds.  They'll spend the next 24 hours under layers of blankets.

 I also created one heck of a mess and that's it for today's creativity!  I'm wiped!

One a Day in May - Day 6 - Paper Bag Tutorial

Here's a little tutorial for a simple gift bag.  I love making these in all sizes for gifts of jewelry, handmade soaps, candles, etc.  You can embellish them with pressed flowers, photographs or art to make them extra special.  I usually use my handmade papers but they are also a great way to use up your stash of decorative commercial papers.

 The sample shown here uses my handmade gladiola paper.  I left the top deckle edge but you could also fold the edge down at the start to if you would rather have a sharp edge and also to add strength if you are putting something heavy into the gift bag.

For your form, choose a scrap of board or other object the size of the bag you want to make. 

Your piece of paper dimensions: 
height - how tall you want the bag overall plus the depth of the base and the width of the fold if you are folding over the top edge

width - the total of the front, back and 2 sides plus about 1" overlap.

Adhesive - I like to use a glue stick but you can use any adhesive that will dry fairly quickly.

Fold over the top edge if you are not leaving a deckle edge.
Wrap the paper around the form and glue it closed.  It should extend past the form (the width of the base).

Fold the bottom over 'gift wrap style', gluing each fold to the paper beneath.  For an extra strong base, insert a piece of cardboard against the form before folding the paper in and glue the paper to the cardboard.

While the bag is still on the form, embellish if desired.

Remove the bag from the form.

 Pinch the edges together on each side and crease.  This will leave a triangle at the base on each side.

 Fold the base over to the back at the top of the triangle and crease.  The bag will lay flat (how flat depends on the bulk of the paper you use) for storing.

Now you can punch holes near the top of the bag if you wish, add brads for strength, and close with string or yarn.  Or you can just leave as is, fill with tissue paper and add a gift.

Have fun!

One a Day in May - Day 5

I used to agonize over the design of every card I made, trying hard to make each one different from the last.  But many years and many hundreds of cards later, I realized that at $7 or $8 a piece, each one did not have to be an original design.  Okay, I realized it, but I still agonize.  It's my nature!

Pressed pansies and viola on handmade gladiola paper.

One a Day in May - Day 4

I had to push myself to produce something this evening.  After working all day I succumbed to a nap and then I had a meeting to attend which is for a very cool project to market and sell the arts in our region (The Enterprising Artisans Project).  Then I came home and submitted some photographs of my work for the power point presentation they are doing at trades fairs in the region to promote the project.  And then there was 'Survivor!'  So I really did have some excuses but I knew if I used them today, I would find new ones tomorrow and the next day and pretty soon this One a Day in May challenge of mine would go the way of my diets.

Mixed media (acrylic, watercolour, ink) mounted on kraft cardstock card.