Monday, December 12, 2011

lunar eclipse


Photo by Frank Blau www.frankblauphotography.com


Did you see it?
I was up early Saturday and drove up to the Highlands Park and Ride, which happens to have one of the best views in Issaquah, and watched it out in the cold. It was beautiful, stunning, ....leaves you speechless to know that this is something I did with a lot of the rest of the world....
yes, it teared me up with it's silent, humongous beauty....

Sunday, November 27, 2011

Huge thanksgiving sale on now!!



Happy Thanksgiving!
Stop by and enjoy 30 - 40% off almost everything on our web site...


Monday, November 14, 2011

Tim Holtz Limited Edition Winter Distress Inks




..........are here!
From Ranger's press release:

Tim Holtz® Winter Seasonal Distress Ink
• Limited edition seasonal colors
• Acid free, non-toxic dye inks
• Stylish vintage color palette
• Unique ink ideal for water techniques

Get them while you can! :)

-Dawn

Friday, November 04, 2011

JournalFest 2011

Home again after an enchanting time in Port Townsend. This was my first JournalFest and it was just incredible. I feel as though another creative part of me has been opened up and opened wide.

After unloading my car into my dorm room look what gift appeared outside for all of us:




My first class was Orly Avineri's Face Lift. We were treated to some very disarming exercises and revisited the meaning of true beauty....and being human. Thank you Orly and my fellow travelers...My friend Gwen was in this class too!

Here are is a shot from the back of the classroom and a couple of my journal spreads from that class:








My Friday class was with the fabulous Juliana Coles. I didn't take any photos in the class but here are a couple of my spreads from that class which are in a different journal - a large history book I bought at Value Village especially for this class:

This book is surprisingly lightweight for it's size, about 9" x 12"






Finally, Saturday was Learning to See with the warm and wonderful Lisa Cheney-Jorgensen. We drew with our pens and learned how to slow down, quiet the left side of our brains, and really draw what we see:


first we did some symbolic (from memory), contour, blind contour, and modified blind contour drawings of a coffee cup.



We also did an upside down contour drawing of a drawing Lisa provided. Drawing upside down forces you to focus on lines and shapes instead of the whole picture. This helped us not get so anxious and wound-up about what we were drawing. It worked well for me. Some people were smart and turned their journals upside down before starting so that once they were done their image would be right side up in their journal. I didn't do that but I'm ok with that - it reminds me of the lesson and the learning.

The drawing on the right is of my personal object, a leaf I picked up while enjoying the grounds at Fort Worden. I am not done painting it yet - watercolors....but like how the drawing turned out :)
Here's the leaf for your reference:


Finally, I had time to draw my iPod in it's case while others were completing their drawings of their personal objects

AND, Lisa had us all do the coolest collaborative drawing. She took a photo of Tracy, cut it up into a bunch of squares and then we all drew 2 or more squares onto post-its without knowing what we were drawing. This again focussed us on shapes and lines - and turned out great!
I loved doing this with my fellow travelers.....this will always connect us together and connect us to JournalFest, and Teesha and Tracy

Here are the wonderful trades I came home with too:




What a great time I had -here's my new friend Connie:
we went out to dinner at the Fountain Cafe Saturday night with Josie and her mom Nancy (who was in my Learning To See class) and it was so much fun - great food and great company...what more could you ask for?


Connie and Nancy in their party garb:


good times were had by all!

Namaste,
Dawn

Saturday, October 22, 2011

Journal Fest trades....




For once I have actually finished some trades BEFORE heading off to the retreat! :)
I wasn't sure what to make but knew I wanted to use what I had already -not go buy a bunch of stuff. Amongst my piles of paper and supplies I came across these cool pre-cut pieces of card stock.


I inherited these from my sister after she bought them, along with several other wonderful things, to make my bridal shower invitations. These are 4.5" X 6.5" so that set the size.
Next, I searched online to find a free calendar template that I could shrink and customize.

Cut the pages - ugh....I somehow decided to make 52 of these....how did I come up with that number....unknown. So here's some math for you: 52 of these little guys X 15 pages per = 780. Since I could get two 4.5" X 6.5" per sheet of paper, that resulted in 390 sheets of paper to cut up. zoinks!


I then made a prototype....


and decided the back wasn't as stiff as I would like.....gee, do I have any chipboard in my piles of paper? I remembered buying some 12" x 12" sheets a while ago but, the eternal question: WHERE did I put them? :D

Found!
Cut, punched and stacked!

The final product:



What a relief to have these completed

Woo hoo!! - day after tomorrow I'm heading to Port Townsend :)

Namaste,
Dawn


Friday, October 14, 2011

Tim Holtz Seasonal Distress Inks -Autumn 2011


Great news!
I was able to order some of these fantastic ink pad sets from Ranger from there second run!



These are a limited edition collection of Distress Inks in harvest hues and like the changing of the seasons, this Autumn set is only available for a limited time, so collect them now before they’re gone.



Watch for an update next week when I hope to receive them and add them to my online store. I will have a VERY LIMITED QUANTITY so if you are interested stay tuned and asked to be added to my email list at info at motherrubber dot com.







Cheers!

Dawn