Star Wars :: A New Hope

We figured it was about time to introduce our kids to Star Wars. It's the first "grown up" movie they have seen. I think of it as a kids movie, but there's a lot of fighting and a damn lot of people sitting around talking. The kids pretty much loved it once it got going. We watched it over the course of two nights. Bea wore her Star Wars shirt...

Tell Me Your Dreams

I want to illustrate your dreams!

Up at the top of the page, there is a contact form you can use. (Or, alternately, you may email me at tinyyellowbird at yahoo dot com.) Let me know if you want your real name and a link or if you would prefer to remain anonymous.

Send me snippets or full dreams, as much detail as you can muster. Was it an all night epic, a fleeting vision at dawn, a vivid recurring dream? What feelings were attached? Did it have that nostalgic sense of longing or were you filled with terror or was it totally mundane?

If you can remember the date of your dream, submit that as well.

Readers, I'm excited about this! I've been thinking about it for a while and I really hope you participate. This will be an ongoing project, so there's no deadline. But I'm going to check my email now and see if you've already submitted something...

This Week :: a link and list post 2

(via)

This collection on The House That Lars Built is so perfect!

I'd take anythings from this print shop, but the date posters take the cake.

These fonts are better for inspiration than use, pricey but pretty!

Here's plenty of beautiful hand-lettering. New favorite site!!

Online classes suck, right? Not when they are free and from top universities!

(There's one on the Ancient Greek Hero and another called Was Alexander Great?)

Ever wonder what to do with the broth left over from boiling your collard greens? 

These photographs are lovely, but they are freaking me out.

This makes me really happy. 

Persuasion

I may have concocted a solution to my class cancellation issue. (I mentioned it yesterday here.)

If I can get permission and approval and all that stuff, I'd like to get 3 credit hours for an independent study in advanced printmaking. I took Printmaking 1 last semester and totally loved it, but I felt like there was just so much more to explore!

My goal would be to go in with a strong concept and delve into it from various print angles throughout the semester, possibly with a research essay thrown in for good measure. I would like to have a hefty amount of exhibit-ready material by the end of term, showing a rich depth of subject matter, a high level of craftsmanship, broad appeal, creative variety and technical prowess.

Now to convince someone to be my advisor...

The Week So Far

via

You know how sometimes you just need to get away? A freezing cold, silent hotel room or a day at the beach without any children...

Over the weekend, a relative said something really hurtful about my house. It's taken me this long to accept that the individual was trying to be ugly, not stating a true fact about my house. My house is fairly tidy. Not pinterest clean, not pinterest decorated. But for no budget, it looks pretty good. And for housing two tiny wild creatures, it's pretty damn tidy. 

I vacuum and sweep every day and mop, like, once a week! We always have three square meals, 98% of which are planned and made by yours truly. And we always have clean clothes. So there. 

So that happened over the weekend and then today I found out that a really essential graphic design class has been indefinitely cancelled. A class I was registered to take this Fall. Now I have to find another class to make up my hours when that was the last thing I needed. So for years to come, I will have to live with the knowledge that rather than paying off debt for a useful, much needed class, I'm paying off a superfluous waste of time. 

I'm trying to find a way to turn this around, but it hasn't come to me yet. 

It will.

...   ...   ...   ...   ...

I guess the graphic above could be misleading. The relative wasn't my mama. Or my husband. Or anyone in my own immediate family. 

Cooperation Bootcamp :: Reboot

Some things started to slip away (cooperation and quiet voices to name a few!), so this week is a reboot edition. Two days in and things are already looking up.

You know how kids are stubborn and think if they ask just one more time, they'll get their way? Well, if you go a whole day showing them that you are even more stubborn... Well, in our case, it gets significantly better. And I'm good at that whole stubborn thing.

It's getting better. (For example, we had more cuddles in the past two days than all of last week combined.) School is starting soon and it's really important that we have these things worked out. It takes consistency and stubbornness.

Today, the kids painted. We had craft paints, not real finger paints. Still, it was a lot of fun. I covered the table with trash bags and let them pick from the four available colors.

Messy hands, messy house, messy bathtub for me to clean up now... But I love their art!

Herbs

I found this book at a thrift store and I can't put it down! Being slightly too lazy to scan my copy, I tried to find an image to show you what I'm talking about, but all I could find was this copyrighted image from amazon. The book is really old and not much in fashion at the moment.

It is fascinating to me! Back in college, I took a botany class and still feel pretty comfortable with the terms and parts. Having family members with a somewhat specialized knowledge of wildflowers and the like has given me a natural tendency to be interested in the area. And it is so practical. 

The Herbalist has a lot to offer for such a small book. There is an illustrated, encyclopedic section telling the various names, descriptions and uses of the herbs. Then a lot of recipes and directions for making teas, spices, wines, cordials, bitters, potpourri, sachets, dentifrices, gargles, cosmetics, dyes, smoke mixtures and curios. 

(Now I'll be able to get some use out of my Rosemary's Baby necklace...)

I think the next thing to do is start collecting examples of these plants, pressed for reference. And eventually do some further reading. Here are some other books on the subject. 1 // 2 // 3 // 4

Delving into an area of special study for the purpose of independent enrichment is so good for the brain. Do you have an area of interest like this? For one of my brothers, it seems to be early roman emperors and for James it is American folk songs right now...