On perfection...

I am a perfectionist. I'm not saying that I'm perfect, or what I do is perfect, but I am always striving for perfection. This is a horrible affliction. It's stopped me from doing things my whole life for fear of not doing them perfectly. When I was in school, I loved art class but I rarely finished my projects - I'd agonize over them for ages and then discard them when I deemed them imperfect. The little canvas above, I worked on for days and days - moving things slightly, fiddling with the paint, making the papercuts. I have decided that I really have to loosen up and follow the Japanese concept of wabi sabi - beauty in imperfection. Because, perfection is absolutely impossible to acheive - I don't think it even exists. I'm getting better though - I've made huge steps in recent years by starting this blog, getting out there, and showing my work to everyone.

Having said all that, I'm planning to do a series of these little bird canvases - 8x8 square and 4 inches deep - so they'll look really cool on a bookshelf or mantle. We've had loads of hummingbirds in our backyard lately, feasting on bee balm - so I might do one of those next.

If it's a long weekend in your area - hope you have a happy one!

I love Ice Cream

Another unintended blog break. I think that this week, my mantra was - if you can't say anything nice, don't say anything at all. I just had a bit of a bad week - felt a bit blocked with making things, and had lots of electrical problems with our house. No hot water, oven, dishwasher for a couple of days and the prospect of a large bill to fix it all permanently. I know I shouldn't whinge because I am lucky to have these things in the first place, but it just all combined to put me in a foul mood. But, it seems that when I am in these states, something really nice happens to cheer me up. My friend Denise, who is here in NS for the summer, dropped by and gave me this amazing piece of fibre art. She runs a little business with a friend called Waterside Fibre Art, and they make these lovely pieces.
The detail is absolutely amazing. Literally zillons (okay, maybe not zillions, but you get the idea) of little pieces of fabric formed into an image with freehand stitching. I was really touched that she gave me a piece of her artwork. I love it so much, and I am so happy to have such a good friend who knows me so well - she knows that I really appreciate all sorts of ice cream. ( ; Thanks Denise!

Paper, Rock, Scissors

Actually, the title of this post is a bit misleading. There is no rock included in this post, just paper and scissors - and a blade. I just thought that paper, rock, scissors sounded a bit...catchier. Anyhow - I've been doing loads of papercutting lately, and relying pretty heavily on these three tools, so I thought I'd talk a bit about them. First off is the blade - I broke down and got the Martha Stewart Crafts blade, because it's rubberized and has a kind of ergonomic shape - a lot easier on the hands. Also, it has it's own pretty brown storage box. Next up are these little scissors that I use for really fine cutting. They are super sharp, and are shaped like a tweezer. I love these - they are so handy.

Finally, my scissors - another fine Martha Stewart product. These are really nice and sharp, and also came in a very pretty brown box. Now, back to the cutting at hand....

More Scenes from the Studio...

I've now got a couple of employees in my sweatshop...I mean studio. One helps with the cutting...
...and the other one is here just to boost morale. Ok guys, back to work!

Great Quotes

I love this quote by artist Sol LeWitt, from his NY Times obit -

"To the sculptor Eva Hesse, he once wrote a letter while she was living in Germany and at a point when her work was at an impasse. “Stop it and just DO,” he advised her. “Try and tickle something inside you, your ‘weird humor.’ You belong in the most secret part of you. Don’t worry about cool, make your own uncool.” He added: “You are not responsible for the world — you are only responsible for your work, so do it. And don’t think that your work has to conform to any idea or flavor. It can be anything you want it to be.”

Here is another great one from him -

"Irrational thoughts should be followed absolutely and logically"

Sol LeWitt passed away a few months ago, but I just discovered these quotes, and his work. A very sad loss - his work and his thoughts are so wise and inspiring. I'm going to pin these quotes up in my studio.

Blue

Mixing paint to work on some new paper on canvas pieces.

Still Life with Book Covers

Another productive evening here at double happiness inc....

Sunday

What do you call a blog when the posts only happen about once a week? Right now, I guess you'd call it "double happiness." I really admire bloggers that can post everyday. I get ideas for posts each day, but then don't get time to do them, and then it seems like it's all too late. I resolve, from this day forth, to endeavour to post everyday - even if nothing happens. Which, actually, is most days.

Anyhow, the subject of today's post is today - Sunday. It was beautiful and sunny. We went to the beach and Milo came along. It was his first time at the beach, and I am sad to say that he hated it. I'm not sure if it was all the people, the wind, or the sound of waves crashing on the shore - but he was very uncomfortable. Forget about even going in the water - he hated sitting on the sand. We didn't stay too long, but every once in a while he would make this strange noise that I interpreted as - "please get me out of here -please!" Maybe he will grow to love it?

The other thing we did today is go to a yard sale. They had all these great ceramics - I really loved the colours and couldn't resist. The one above is by Beauceware, a Canadian company based in Quebec. The piece below is just marked "USA". I love the colour and the shape.
I am not sure what I'll do with these pieces, or where I'll display them - but I do love them. Maybe I'll become one of those mad collectors, scouting every yard sale, salvation army store and e-bay?

Craft Inc.

This book looks really great. More info here. Short post, must get to work.

Rock in the Country

I had a fantastic weekend in Pictou with my dear friend Denise (she is the one who makes these amazing fabric artworks - I got to see some over the weekend, and they are even more amazing in person!). She invited me up for the Riverfront Jubilee, but we did all sorts of other lovely things like swimming in the ocean, eating fish & chips and pizza (both in the same day!), shopping and relaxing. Denise is here for the summer staying with her parents who live in a beautiful renovated farmhouse in the country. They were all so lovely and hospitable, I was waited on hand and foot and loved every minute of it! Above is a funky old shed that's on their property.
The days were relaxing, but the nights were devoted to the god of RAWK! As mentioned above, we saw Sloan (pictured above) and Joel Plaskett. Another act I loved was Inflight Safety - they were really great too. It wasn't like a typical rockfest though, in that we weren't standing knee deep in mud, we could see perfectly, and everyone was so polite! People asked if it was ok if they stood in front of us! I love the country. Denise has suggested that we make this a yearly thing and I'm all for that!

Eight Things

I've been tagged by Shona to share 8 facts/habits about myself. So, here goes...

1. I'm a daydreamer. I guess you could say that I have a two-track mind - part of my mind is in the present, and another part is always dreaming away. This is why I'm always getting myself into predicaments - driving down sidewalks, locking myself out of places, forgetting things. But, now that I think of it - I wouldn't have it any other way.

2. I love to read. I feel lost if I don't have anything to read.

3. I'm a bargain hunter. One of my favorite things to do is shop at yard sales and flea markets. I also love those really junky shops that are a bit scary when you first walk in.

4. I love bright colours, like red and pink, but the colours in my house are all pretty muted. I am thinking of painting my TV cabinet turquoise.

5. I love all flowers, but peonies are my favorite.

6. I don't wear make-up. Well, occasionally for special occasions I do, but it's not an everyday thing.

7. I don't own a mobile phone and I never want to.

8. I love to travel, but I hate flying. It's not just fear of the plane crashing, but all the other stuff - walking through the x-ray machine, being searched, the endless waiting, being treated like crap, etc.

I'm meant to tag some other people, but it seems as though this has already made the rounds. So, if you haven't done this and would like to - please go ahead. Thanks to Shona for tagging me - as you can tell, I've been struggling to write blog posts lately - guess it's just a summer thing.

This weekend, I am off to visit a friend in the country. I'm very excited about catching up with her, and we are doing some fun things like going to a music festival and seeing the likes of Joel Plaskett and Sloan, going to the beach, relaxing and eating lots of yummy things. TTFN!

Still here...

Making little books....

Watching the ships in the harbour...
...and lunching in the gardens.More news soon. Right now, I'm off to try and finish the last Harry Potter...

Xavier Rudd

Last night, we went to see Xavier Rudd. He's pretty amazing - we have one of his older albums, and I like the songs - but until we saw him live, I did not realize that he is basically a one man band. As you see above, he's got guitars, digeridoos and bongo drums, and he seems to play a lot of them at once. The music was much "trippier" live than I remember from the album - but that was cool. It was a bit like being at a hippie rave - I especially liked some of his instrumental tunes. As well as being a great musician, he is an environmental and human rights activist - check out his "Better People" campaign - an all around nice guy.

Flight of the Conchords

Flight of the Conchords - this band has their own HBO show, that you can watch by clicking the link. It's kooky!

Sat-day

That's the way Martin says Saturday - Sat-day. I guess it's an Australian thing, but it kind of makes sense - Mon-day, Tues-day, Wednes-day, Thurs-day, Fri-day, Sat-day...all the same number of syllables. Anyhow, I digress. On Sat-day, we drove to Wolfville, about an hour away and had a great morning. We started off at the Farmers Markets with coffee and pastries. Milo had a great time, there were so many other dogs there. As well as lots of amazing veggies, there are some great craft vendors. One that stood out was a little 9 year old girl who made stuffed horses - very "Science of Sleep"-like. Unfortunately - I didn't get any photos of the market because I was juggling my coffee, the dog and a bag of fresh rocket. Then, we went to see a client of mine and sell her some books for her shop. It was lovely to see her again - she always oohs and ahhs over my work and is so encouraging. She even gave me some really cool new paper to make books from! The photo above is from a drive out to the beach. We ate veggie calzones that we had bought at the market while looking out at the sea. You can see in this photo what a little squirt Milo is!


This area is really beautiful. Just a short drive from the sea is all this gorgeous farm land. Martin had to stop the car and take this photo, because the trees on the top of the hill look a bit like a bunny. I like to think that maybe the farmer planned it that way. A giant topiary.

She shoots, she scors-it!

Ahem, please excuse the bad pun in this title. Today, I'd like to discuss the "Scor-It." It's a gadget I recently picked up for scoring paper. "Why do I need a gadget for scoring paper?" you might ask - "I already have a bonefolder and a ruler!" you exclaim. Well, a bonefolder a ruler are great - but I score a lot of paper, and I wanted something that might make it easier. I had seen the Scor-It at the place where I buy my cello bags, and always wondered if it would work. I had previously been using a scoring blade on my Fiskars cutter - which would also probably be a fine option if you were scoring fewer items - but I was having all sorts of trouble. The scoring blade would cut into the paper, it was really hard to line up the measurements for my accordion books, and if I was using heavy weight paper, I would sometimes get that horrible cracking effect. If you work with paper, you know what I mean. Anyhow, I bit the bullet and ordered the Scor-It, and it works great. As you can see from the photo, it's pleasingly old-school. It's basically a metal strip, mounted on a rubber covered board with a wooden scoring tool. You line up your paper with the ruler and stopguide on the top, and then just run the tool down the metal strip to create the score line. The lines it creates are very strong, and there is absolutely no paper crackage. A great little tool if you like to score.

PS - when looking at their website, I noticed that the company that makes the Scor-it is Vandelay Industries! How great is that - I wonder which came first, the company, or the Seinfeld episode.

Scenes from a studio....

Milo curled up on the rug today and chewed on a bone as I worked away. I love it when he lies like this, with his little legs splayed out. This is probably a new low in my blog posts - resorting to photos of a dog's bum! It will be better tomorrow, I promise.

Time Management

I'm having a bit of trouble with time management at the moment. I've been really busy with double happiness lately - don't get me wrong - it's fantastic and I'm not whingeing, but I'm starting to feel a bit overwhelmed. I just finished my commission, and in the past week all the shops I sell to have called to order some books. I also work full-time, so I only have the evenings and weekends to make books, as well as all my housework, socializing and family stuff. I don't want to (can't, in the case of work) give anything up at the moment - so I am looking at a way to make more "me" time - and also time to experiment with other artwork. Doing the collages was great, and I'd like to have more time to experiment and develop more product lines, but I am a bit of a slave to my little books.

An obvious thing would be to cut down on internet surfing/blogging - but I find it too inspiring to quit. I have tried to give up on housework, but things are getting pretty feral around here - we haven't been keeping up on the washing, and I nearly had to wear the bottom of my swimsuit as underwear last week. My husband helps out when he can, but he has been working long hours and has also been away on a few business trips. There are a few good hints over on apartment therapy ny today, and I'm really open to hints from anyone out there. I have to say, my hat's off to people with children - I don't know how they find time to do anything - I can't even manage with a puppy!

Summertime...

...and the livin' is easy, puppies are lounging...
...and the poppies grow high.

My first commission!

A couple of weeks ago, I mentioned that I was going to be really busy working on a project, and well, here it is! It's my first commission, one of my clients asked me to make it for her bedroom. The brief was that the canvases had to be 18 x 30, with a turquoise background - and possibly include some cherry blossoms. The turnaround time was fairly quick - about 3 weeks. I had an idea about composition right from the start - I wanted the little birds to be looking at one another, and to kind of do my own take on the traditional Chinese scroll painting. Once I decided to use papercuts, "coloured in" with Chiyogami paper, it all came together. I really enjoyed working on these - the process of making the cuts and choosing the patterned paper was a lot of fun.
This is a closeup of one of the birds, which shows the detail and pattern in the paper a bit better...
...and here are the cherry blossoms. It was such an honour to be asked to do this commission - I so admire my clients taste and style, and she really put a lot of faith in me. She'd only seen my books, never any other work I'd done, but still asked me to do these for her. Doing this project has really given me a boost and opened some new possibilities for me. I will be working on some smaller versions of these canvases over the summer, and I'm really excited about it. I'll keep you posted...