Hobby Juggling

How many of you do the old hobby juggle? You know, doing projects in 2, 3, 4 or more crafts at one time. like painting in the morning, sewing in the afternoon, gardening in between, crocheting in the evening or drawing while watching TV?

A lot of us I believe. I feel like I have been doing it my whole life. 

No day has ever been long enough. 

Even when I'm totally focused on one big project, all the other ides or WIPs are in the back of my mind waiting for their time to come into the light.  

In the last couple months I finished up an old idea and work in progress and one of those random new ideas that you just have to try right away. And along the way kept working away on a  painting project that I haven't decided how to use yet.

The random new idea:

Not that new really.  Just another bookbinding project, but I wanted to try using metal latches for a change. I learned something about installing latches, how to buy the right size and quality of latches, and got more practice doing this neat longstitch bookbinding pattern.

 

The old half done idea finally finished: Half Square Triangle Design Blocks. 

Half Square Triangle Tile design is a method that has literally been done for centuaries in different cultures for different purposes. I became facinated with one such method decades ago after reading the book "Half Square Triangles Exploring Design", 1987, by Barbara Johannah.   I've created designs by by hand using graph paper and pen, I've used various programs on a computer or iPad, and now, just for fun, I made a pile of 74 painted 2" blocks to unleash some creative fun in a much more organic way, even three dimentionally. 

Painting all the blocks took some time. Six sides but only a couple at a time, drying time in between, two coats of white, taping off all the areas for black triangles, clear medium on the tape edges to get crisp black triangles, finally the black triangles.

A pile of Design cubes to play with:

 

 

 

Making the designs:

 Examples:

 

Finally, the on-going painting project with no end game:

Just old pieces of denim painted according to whatever mood I was in and with whatever paint happened to be within reach. Trimmed and stacked in a pile waiting for the next inspiration to strike. Maybe mini book covers, maybe cut up for an art mosaic, maybe sewn into a pouch. 

That's all for now.

Thanks for reading.

Aileen

 

 

 

 

 

 

Odds and Ends form 2023

Hey, 

Still here. Been awhile. No problems, just staying busy, but not feeling very chatty.  But I'll catch you up on some of  other things I did in 2023.

My last post was in July 2023 and I had posted an update for 2022/2023 in  February 2023. But what did I do in the other 9 months of 2023?  Well, that's a bunch of stuff to write about and a lot of it was hobby activities I don't usually mention. Basically 2023 was a random collection of small new craft projects, unfinished older projects and several all digital projects, things like photo archive management, digital fabric designs, and formatting and printing photo books. 

In February I was sorting, organizing and cleaning up stuff in my craft room and got completely side-tracked on a spur-of-the- moment mixed-media project to use up an overabundance of collected security envelopes and some painted canvas.

 

 

And while I was at it I made a few more books.

 In March I finished a collection of Mixed Media collages that I'd neglected for a very long time.

 

In April I finished the Plaidish Quilt I started in 2022.  I love the colors, it makes me happy every time I see it.

 

By May I'm busy with gardening and digital projects, continuing to do acrylic painting in sketchbook every day and doing a few other bookbinding projects.

These are painted canvas paper thin sketchbooks.

 

And my last "big" project for 2023 was another spur-of-the-moment project that took about 6 weeks and also came out of a "cleaning things up" effort with all my art supplies.  I call it my Palette Paint Transfer project. You know all that excess paint that ends up on palette paper, or in my case also on big pieces of freezer paper that I put under artwork and I save all those papers. ... just because I might find a way to use them... well, I used them.

And this is what I made:

Thanks for reading.

Aileen

So Many Charms

It's been awhile.  But I've been busy. Sitting down and writing about what has been keeping me busy seems like one task too many, even if it's something I want to do.

Working backward from today seems easier than starting in March.

So most recently I've been making charms. It all started with one little pack of evil eye glass beads I got for no specific reason at all.  One thing led to another and a few weeks later I have a dozen+ Charms hanging in my house presumably protecting me from every possible 'thing' out there. I've got 9 different color evil eye beads, gemstones for all the Chakras, and various medalions all hanging out together doing whatever they are suppose to do. 

I really just like them because they are fun and easy to make and pretty.

 

That's all for today. More later about fabric designing in June, gardening in May, quilting in April, and bookbinding in March.

Thanks for reading.

AIleen

Happy February!

It's 71 degrees here today and it shouldn't be. It should be between 30-40.  I miss winter. 

But it is still February so instead of painting Christmas trees and snow I painted a bunch of Valentine Hearts.

 

And now It's also 2023 and I haven't posted an update in a long time so this is a quick bullet summary of what I did in 2022, besides grow marigolds.

So what did I do last year?

Some crochet: Another Project Linus Crochet Along blanket.

Some more crochet: This time tiny baby aliens with my own mods. I ended up making 4. They are a lot faster to make than their big brothers.

 

Started a new quilt: I saw these Plaid-ish quilts all over Instagram and loved them. The pattern is free and I have more fabric than any one person ever needs. I did finish piecing the top but I still need to quilt and finish it, hopefully this year.

 

Gardening: Lots of porch gardening, in addition to the feral marigolds.  The Celosia is my new favorite flower. They bloom and they stay 'bloomed' for months! I named this one Groot. It's just too obvious. Right?

Lots of different color Coleus, several Celosia of different types, Red vine, Morning Glories, and a Poinsettia.

Lots of watercolor art: Experimenting with paints, brushes and methods.

 Swatching all the watercolor paints I have.

 

Some bookbinding: Call it an art journal or a junk journal? I'm not sure? But it is just a collection of papers I'm painted.

 

 

But almost every day just filling this giant book with abstract acrylic art.

This is the first 100 pages of that big book of acrylic painting experiments.  There are also videos for the other 200 pages on my YouTube channel.

That's it for today. Not sure when I'll be back.

Thanks for reading.

Aileen