Archive for December, 2008

I couldn’t ask for more

Published
by
robayre
on December 31, 2008
in General Update, goals and life
. 6 Comments

It’s new year’s eve and I want to wish everyone a wonderful, happy beginning to a new year. I’d give all my readers a kiss on the check as the ball drops, if only I could.

As the end of the year draws closer and closer, hour by hour, I think about what I have accomplished in 2008. I enjoyed following as HulaSeventy crossed off things from her list for her birthday year. I think year-to-year lists might be more productive than life lists, because there is a deadline. It’s a bit harder to get things done on Life lists when the goal is to just complete each item “someday“.

In the meantime, it’s maybe time to go back to the beginning of this year and reflect at how this year has gone so far.
I don’t want to be such a negative nancy, but my goals for the year did not go as well as I had hoped. Maybe it’s just that I am only remembering the goals I did not accomplish, but I honestly can not remember any others. I actually just looked back in the archives from January and it appears I never posted them there.

I know I had dedicated to creating a page a day in my page a day book and less than halfway through the year that fell apart. I blame the move partially. I have a studio now, but almost find that I have less time to spend working on things anymore. Darn that cable television, you are a curse!

I also took a leap and proclaimed a goal of having 100 items sold in my etsy shop by the end of the year. The beginning of the year started out with a bang. I was having a semi regular stream of sales. I was getting decent coverage by other websites. By the half way point of the year I had about 50 sales. Granted I started the year with around 15 sales. But here it is the last day of the year and I am at 58 sales. That is quite a slump. A month or two ago I took a leap and volunteered for my first official shop critique with etsy admin. It went pretty well. Admin, as well as the other etsyers, had wonderful things to say, noting I was quite the crafty diva. All criticism was strictly constructive, noting how links in my profile could be better displayed, mentioning the use of ikea brand frames in my yoyo pieces might take away from the description, and watermarks on my images prevents my products from making it to etsy front page.

I may have not succeeded in my 2008 goals, but this year was a productive one! As Rosa recently posted, having a blog is kind of like keeping a record, leaving a legacy, and if it weren’t for my posts I probably would have forgotten everything that happened.  In fact, the other day I was looking at older posts and saw one where I said I went to see Stomp. I do not remember seeing Stomp. I remember wanting to see Stomp, but if it weren’t for reading that I might still want to see Stomp, lol. That is sad, but true. So there you go, even writing it down doesn’t guarantee that you will remember it.

Anyway, it has been an amazing year and I am happy, I couldn’t ask for more.

I went to Minnesota for the first time. I guess I didn’t blog about it, but we went for Matt’s Oma’s birthday.

I was featured on several wonderful websites.

I sold a handful of pieces of my original artwork.

I joined the create a day group and have met some wonderful peeps. Blogger killed us, so we moved to wordpress and now we’re everyday create, we’re still getting adjusted to the site and often email rather than blog nowadays.

I participated in the Thing a Day on wordpress, and posted daily for the month of

A gunman opened fire shooting 22 and killing 5 before killing himself on campus, where my boyfriend works, in my hometown where I still reside.

My dad broke his arm and had to have a very scary and dangerous operation.

I went to the art institute of chicago and was wowed by the edward hopper exhibit.

I moved out of my dungeon apartment, into a lovely duplex with my S.O. of seven years, Matthew.

Went to the Indiana Dunes again, ahhh, sigh. I don’t think of myself as someone who fantasizes about beaches, but I could really go for some warm sand between my toes right about now.

Finished my next artomat series, still haven’t sent them out though, shame on me.

Saw the Swell Season at the Chicago Theater.

Went on vacation to Door County and left some found art.

Got a little bitty kitten named Bishop.

Found my “secret garden” (I can’t wait till spring to go back)

Got a porch swing!

Got my hair did (dyed pink)

Went to our fourth or fifth renegade craft show in chicago.

Took a segway tour of chicago.

Made my very first edited movie.

Attended my brothers 2nd annual ghost story telling bonfire, where matt and I came in second!

Participated in the first ever Chicago MP3 experiment.

Participated in the first ever Pirates Vs. Ninjas protest in town.

I took a long road trip with my B.F.F. of 25 years, to Colorado and back. Stopping to see Carhenge, the largest ball of twine and the worlds largest truck stop along the way.

Participated in my own solo art show, thanks to my dear friend Erin who invited me to show concurrently with her.

Had to put my dear pet rabbit, Theo, to sleep very unexpectedly.

Held my third annual Gingerbread House Making Contest.

Went on our annual voyage to the Cheese Chalet.

Made a lot of awesome artwork, yay me!

I took down my show, and I’m very excited about posting and listing lots of those pieces from the show, as well as finally saying a last adieu to my artomat series as I send it out.

Goodbye 2008, you were a good year!

Happy Holidays

Published
by
robayre
on December 26, 2008
in General Update, life and Projects
. 1 Comment

I hope everyone is having happy holidays.

Yesterday I made two things that I found out in blogland, to bring and share at family festivities. Pictured above are ginger crinkles and that recipe can be found at Wise Craft. They were very buttery and made 4 dozen, but even people who said they didn’t like ginger, liked the cookies.

 

And the inspiration and directions to make these candied citrus peels came  The Small Object. I used one orange, one grapefruit, one lemon and one lime. The picture makes the colors look a lot more vivid, but the truth is when they are boiled repeatedly the colors in the peels become more pale. We boiled them 3 times, according to the 3-5 times suggested, but if I do them again, I’ll probably boil them 5 times.

features

Published
by
robayre
on December 23, 2008
in Cool Links, Coverage, etsy and General Update
. 0 Comments

Today I was very happy to find that my recycled envelope and stationery sets were featured on the blog Indie Parade.

 

And then my yoyo set was featured in this treasury “elegant dreamer”

2008 Gingerbread House Making Contest

Published
by
robayre
on December 22, 2008
in Fun, General Update, goals, life and Projects
. 2 Comments


I can cross one more project off my list. This Friday was my Third Annual Gingerbread House Making Contest. Once again I failed at preparing ahead of time, so we used graham crackers again. I rented a hall with the help of my sister in law and we had a record number of people; 17 to be exact. The invitations went out only a week before and the day of the party we had a winter storm so I was very delighted with the turn out. I put paper down on the floor and when people came in they took off their shoes. My sister in law called her husband and friends ahead of time and so they brought slippers. We played Christmas music and had hot chocolate to sip and chex mix to munch on.

I think each year the houses get more and more creative. You can see we had some daring structures regarding height, and some creative structures with theme.  Check the photoset to see the houses better here.

Next year I think I will send out postcard invitations and hope for even more attending. I’ll also recommend everyone bringing slippers :)

fused glass

Published
by
robayre
on December 18, 2008
in General Update, goals and My Artwork
. 1 Comment

Last weekend I got a call from a friend who was over at this glass place in town (I don’t know the name yet). A couple of friends were there working on fused glass and invited me to join them. I’ve never really been huge into fused glass before, so I wasn’t sure about it at first.

I had actually been in the store before, because I wanted to see if they offered classes in hot glass. That is an area I am really interested in and have wanted to do for so long, but alas, they do not do hot glasswork there.

Anyway, my friends were putting together these pieces, shown above, that consist of layers of all types and sorts of glass. There is big sheets of different colors, patterns and textures, rods of glass and all the way down to almost sandlike pieces. You assemble pieces however large you want on the tile. The entire tile is put in an oven or kiln and then fired to meld the layers together. Once I got to see how it worked and the samples that my friends were making, I realized how limitless it is, and how each piece is like it’s very own little canvas, only dimensional. They let me make a couple, and I’m officially hooked. I can’t wait to go back and work on more. Here are what my finished pieces looked like, below.

They also do stained glass at this place. By luck, a coworker of mine was there at the time working on a stained glass piece and I got to watch her soldering it together. It looked pretty fun as well.

recycled envelope and stationery sets

Published
by
robayre
on December 16, 2008
in etsy, Fun, General Update and shop update
. 2 Comments

After what felt like a long dry spell in my shop this summer, I’ve been having a little success recently with my paper products, namely my recycled envelope and stationery sets.

Each time I see a sale in my shop I am just thrilled.

The sales have inspired me to create even more envelopes to add to my product stash. I’ve got stacks of old magazines, catalogs, and calendars from which to make the envelopes. Today I got the idea that I should also add new stationery designs as well. Right now each pack comes with 4 different types of stationery I’ve designed and printed on recycled paper.

They are a really fun product. It fits in perfectly with my love of the mail as well as my love for print design. Check them out in my etsy shop if you like.

circle series

Published
by
robayre
on December 15, 2008
in General Update, My Artwork and shop update
. 2 Comments



new piece of original artwork in the shop this morning :)

Polaroid Pogo

Published
by
robayre
on December 14, 2008
in Cool Links, Fun and General Update
. 0 Comments

While erica and I were on our trip we took lots of pictures. She had this really awesome canon compact printer that is roughly? 6x8x4 inches in size and allows you print pictures, postcards and stickers from your digital camera. It turned out such great quality pictures in the matter of moments. Another great thing is that each paper pack comes with the amount of ink it requires to print all the pictures, so no need to buy paper packs and ink separately, or worrying about running out of ink before paper, etc. It’s something like this.

I was determined to buy one for myself and headed to Target, where she bought hers. They were sold out of compact printers, but what I did see was the Polaroid Pogo. Have you heard of this? I saw this and immediately thought “oh, no!” Imagine the canon compact printer, only 1/3 the size AND can print from your bluetooth camera phone. I’m assuming this means it runs on batteries and you can then print there and then, where ever you are at the time. This is something right up my alley. I assume this is their method of appeasing the disappointed crowd of customers who have been left without polaroid instant film. I would have scooped it up in a heartbeat, had I not started running down the list of times Polaroid has lured me in with a new product, only to discontinue it in a few short years. Well, that and the fact that I haven’t stepped into modern times with a bluetooth compatible phone.

I concluded that I would live happily without the Polaroid Pogo. That was, until I clicked on this link over at 52 Projects.

“They’re small, about 1.5×2″ (they say they’re 2×3 but they’re not.  Very contrasty, not very color correct, but in my book they’re not supposed to look good. They look like mini polaroids.  Kinda like the mini bites at Cinnabon.”

That was all it took to read, and now I want one…and a new phone.

staple books

Published
by
robayre
on December 12, 2008
in General Update, life, My Artwork and Projects
. 2 Comments

One of the things I was wanting to work on when I should have been focusing on the show was staple books.
I could put them together real quick at work using our quartered down recycled scratch paper. I actually first started making these back in the day when I worked at the newspaper and of course we had a ton of scratch paper there as well. The boss would come in and say “less chat, ladies” and so we grew to passing notes. Yeah, I know, pretty childish, but it worked. So, my notes would often contain little scribbles and drawings and so I would staple the pages together to make little books so I wouldn’t lose the pages. Somewhere I have kept a bunch of them from back then.

Fast forward to the recent past. I would be at work and realize I need to write a to do list, but wouldn’t have my sketch book or journal with me. One sheet of paper is easily lost, but staple a bunch together and you have a little book and much more easily kept and found.

I needed to write lists or notes to self so I made some staple books and next thing I knew, it was all I wanted to do. It’s just scratch paper so there isn’t this huge pressure to make it beautiful.

Make one, it’s fun, I guarantee :)

recycled ornament

Published
by
robayre
on December 10, 2008
in Cool Links, General Update, life and Projects
. 4 Comments

recycled ornament, originally uploaded by robayre.

Last night matt and I worked on this ornament. I had visions of covering a tree with these recycled ornaments after seeing them here. But, shortly after starting, I realized it would be a bit of work. Starting with 4 inch square pieces of paper cut from a Toast catalog, this ornament is about 6 inches in diameter, so it is a little big to be hanging from a tree. It also took us about 3 hours to put it together, working non stop in a fast paced, competitive “who can make more pieces” mode. Oh yeah, and it said to use glue, but we cheated and used this double faced gummy tape stuff, which made it go A LOT faster.

Maybe one decoration a year is more feasible.

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