2011 October Archive at Inspiration Junkie robayre.com

Archive for October, 2011

Happy Halloween!

Published

robayre

on October 31, 2011

in General Update

. 4 Comments

Happy Halloween everyone!

I’m feeling so happy right now and so I wanted to post here to share all the things I’m grateful for inm.

1. My sister so generously decided to give us her xBox and Kinnect and buy herself a new one with a larger hard drive. This, only a week or two after I asked her if I could borrow her xBox so I could play Dance Central by myself and not feel like a fool dancing in front of other people. Now I can play it to my hearts content. This just means when we get together to play with friends and family I will school them all with my tons of practice, HA! The gift just about made me cry because I’ve wanted an xBox for so long. I really couldn’t justify buying one when Matt already has a playstation AND wii.

2 and 3. It isn’t Halloween without two traditions and that is the Sycamore Pumpkin Parade with my best friend, and Pumpkin carving with Tom. It was tight, but both were accomplished one day before Halloween and I’m elated now.

Picture by my sister, stat1995

The neighboring town Sycamore was celebrating their 50th anniversary of Pumpkin Fest. Erica and I have gone together to just about every pumpkin fest since college, and even marched in it together with band as middle schoolers. This year my brother, sister in law, nephew and sister were able to join us. It was so adorable to hear my nephew (who is 20 months old) waving and saying “Hi!” to all the passing floats.

My brother, sister in law and nephew at the parade.

On Saturday my mom, my brother’s family, my sister, and a friend Chad came over to carve pumpkins. We listened to my Halloween pandora station until my sister had enough of The Monster Mash. Then we watched Yo Gabba Gabba, naturally. Anything else would have been too scary for a 1 year old :p Sunday, late in the evening Tom came by and Matt, Tom and I carved our annual pumpkins. I was so grateful that we were able to squeak by and still get it in before halloween. One pumpkin was missing this year, but by the three of us carrying on the tradition I know Nikki would be happy. The picture above is from Saturday night. The picture below is from Tom, Matt and I on Sunday night.

4. My sister, Dacia and I winterized our garden for the year. The garden was a great success and a huge learning experience and we have bigger plans for next year and I can’t wait. We pulled up all the grass and weeds that we had let go a bit crazy at the end of the season. Then we tore down all the remaining live plants, hauled in 6 bags of fall leaves and mulched it to oblivion with a mower. It looks great, and was fun even if strained something in my back and my hands are so sore a day later. It isn’t even winter yet, but I’m ready for spring already :D

5. Ever since I saw this recipe for Healthy Chocolate Chip Cookie Dough Dip on pinterest, I couldn’t get it out of my head. So on Saturday I finally rounded up the ingredients and made it. It was a huge hit Saturday night, served with nilla wafers. But, let me share one tip. I made it and immediately tasted it and all I could taste was the beans. I thought it was horrible. BUT, I put it in the fridge, let it set for a few hours and magically later that night it was transformed to taste exactly like cookie dough. Pure MAGIC, I tell you!

picture by Heidi Kenney of My Paper Crane

6. It’s our first halloween in our new house and I’m so excited. I’m handing out candy as I compose this post. Inspired by the Halloween extravaganza going over on Heidi Kenney’s blog, I’ve made my own halloween decoration for the front of our house. I was pretty unimpressed by what the stores offered and after seeing her signs I broke out my jigsaw for the first time and made a pumpkin. I want to make a ghost for next year. She also had a couple of great posts about family friendly and adult scary movies for halloween and so I was reminded of Mr. Boogedy, a movie my brother and I used to watch all the time on VHS. So good.

My brother’s family just stopped by, they have a Batman theme going on. Doc is Batman, my brother is the Joker and Dacia is Harleyquin. The neighbors came by and my neighbor created the costume for her daughter. It was a goldfish, an orange hoodie covered in orange cupcake liners for the scales and eyes painted on the hood. So cute. One little year old fairy came to the door and when her mom told her to thank me she said “beeboo”. Oh, the president just came to the door and called me “Mam”.

I hope everyone has had a wonderful Halloween!

new blog banner

Published

robayre

on October 24, 2011

in etsy and General Update

. 3 Comments

Inspiration struck last week.

Earlier this year Etsy had a glitch where certain shop’s banner reverted to old ones. My shop was one of those. The problem was fixed but it got me questioning if my latest banner wasn’t enticing or inviting enough. A week or two ago I actually switched my shop banner back to the old one to see if I’d notice any difference in views.

I liked the old one because it was very colorful and the current one was pretty monotone. The old, colorful one felt more cheerful and more “robayre” to me. I was trying to think of a new look that would be colorful, cheerful and robayre when the idea of confetti hit me.

I couldn’t wait until this weekend to actually do it. I cut up all the confetti myself. I like it and I’m going to try and start adding some of the confetti to the background of product pictures as well, for an entirely cohesive look.

Check out the confetti theme on my blog, etsy and twitter.

And then, here are all my old banners in chronological order (completely forgot about the rabbit one, and I had it on my etsy shop for about two years)

worry not

Published

robayre

on October 21, 2011

in General Update

. 1 Comment

worry not, originally uploaded by robayre.

I’ve been really stressing out in regard to personal and work related issues for the last month. The kind of stress where I’m so tightly wound that when I finally get any sort of relief I just want to break down and sob to let out all the stress. Normally I’m the type of person who leaves work stress at work, but it’s been hard to let it go after I leave work lately. On the plus side, I’m working Fridays again, so I’m back to full time 40 hours and bigger paychecks, yay.

My mom always says “do not borrow trouble”, which is great advice because I have a tendency to play the “what if” game. If I can only remember those words of wisdom when I need it. This morning she was giving me advice and reminding me of a hymn from church “be not afraid” and so I guess the conversation kind of inspired this piece.

As I posted a week or two ago in the pinwheel post, I’ve been wanting to create a painting with a pinwheel of rainbow colors. Today the words Worry Not popped into my head and so I put this piece together really quickly on the computer. Maybe it will become the inspiration for a future painting, or maybe it will just remain this digital image. Either way, I like it and need to post it in a prominent place.

instagram mosaic and a few links

Published

robayre

on October 20, 2011

in Cool Links and General Update

. 0 Comments

some of my favorite recent instagram pictures

I love this post by Claire over at Bicoastally (Does He Love Your Chairs)

One of my favorite authors, Chuck Palahniuk, has a new book out and Kaylah posted a review of it here.

Lastly, here is a funny video that an old art teacher sent. Cell phone prank/skit. It had me cracking up.

A Pretty Collection: Silver and Gold

Published

robayre

on October 12, 2011

in etsy and shop update

. 0 Comments

Rilo kiley – silver lining by epb21
I was your silver lining, but now I’m gold.

Here is a pretty collection in silver and gold.
From top (left to right) shineel’ilboaz, Autumn Moss Blooms, Gold and Silver Garland, Silver Ruffle Wristlet, Lucite Ring Trio, Gold Metallic Abstract Painting

This week I added the first new item to my etsy shop in a very, very loooooong time. The item is the silver and gold paper garland above. It’s based on a tutorial I posted last year, but I loved the garland enough that I wanted to make some to share.

Nada Farm Barn Sale

Published

robayre

on October 10, 2011

in life

. 4 Comments

Picture driving out in the midwest countryside during this beautiful fall season, the sun is setting and the light catches the passing prairie and farm fields. Hold on a sec, there are cars parked all along the country road and there’s a pasture field loaded with vehicles. You park and approach a beautiful old homestead, romantically lit tents and plenty of people buzzing around. It’s the Nada Farm Barn Sale.

I’ve posted before about Nada Farm, but it’s been a few years. It’s an actual location AND a blog (written by owner Anne Marie). The blog is a unique treasure to read and poetically captures life in the midwest prairie.

Friday night my sister-in-law Dacia invited my sister and I to the Nada Farm barn sale. Dacia is real life friends with Anne Marie and was going to be performing at the Barn Sale the next day, playing guitar for the patrons, vendors and students taking classes.

Entering the barn was like moving into another reality, as you might be able to tell from the pictures above. These feathers were huge murals painted inside the barn by Anne Marie herself, watch this video of the process. Don’t believe it was inside a barn? Notice the rafters at the top of the first picture.

We each found a treasure to take home from the sale and enjoyed homemade soup and apple cider while listening to the music of Greg Wheaton. Here’s a shot while I sat in the haystack lounge.

Ann Marie’s barn sale event is held twice a year (Ithink) and I can’t wait until the spring event, and hope I might take a class then.

Happy Weekend

Published

robayre

on October 7, 2011

in Cool Links and General Update

. 0 Comments

Oh yeah, it’s the weekend! As a way to celebrate I’m sharing some fun links of things I’ve come across on the internets.

This message above was created using straight pins on paper, but can you imagine how impressive it would be straight onto a wall… HUGE?

I’m loving this trend where people are coupling old pictures with the new to juxtapose the difference over time. There are a lot of places out there to find collections, but here are a few one two three four

My sister sent me this link to a tutorial on the 3Rs. You can make your own, OR buy one in her Etsy shop. We’ve been shopping and looking around for something to replace the chandelier in our “dining room” area. I’d like a big statement piece. A year ago I was absolutely obsessed with the Ikea Maskros. See one in action at Heidi Kenney’s home here. But since then I feel like they are EVERYWHERE and Ikea even knows it because when you go in, they have them hanging EVERYWHERE as well. Now I worry that it is overdone and I want something a bit more unique.

Even before seeing this tutorial I decided that I was going to build something of my own and have already constructed a drum base shape to cover. I thought this fortune teller technique would be cool to cover the drum. Every year Matt and I create a kusudama paper folded Christmas ornament, so I figured we’d have fun creating a light shade together. While looking at that etsy shop I found she already had the same idea, check it out here.

Airmail tape, ‘nough said.

For my birthday my sister bought me the Paige bag from Fabric and Handle. I can’t wait for it to arrive. You see the snaps on the handles? They allow you to lengthen or shorten the handle according to your needs.

One last image to hopefully inspire you. How lovely is this sidewalk chalk art by camila.leon on flickr?

Have a great weekend!

Birthday Presents – Fuji Instax 210

Published

robayre

on October 5, 2011

in Fun, General Update, life and My Artwork

. 0 Comments

For my birthday I got some AWESOME presents. For real awesome, not just “yay, socks and underwear” awesome. I’ll have to post a couple separate posts to share. My brother and sister in law got me the Fuji Film Instax 210. I’ve been wanting one of these forever, but could never justify spending that much.

People, it.is.so.awesome! It’s an instant camera, much like the beloved old days of Polaroid instant. The only (itty bitty) downfall (for me) is that the pictures are rectangular, where my heart really lies in the square format. Thinking about that, it’s kind of funny because in art school we were always ushered away from using a square format because it is harder to create balanced compositions, but I’m a rebel. Back to the camera, did I mention it’s awesome? Because it is. It comes with a lens to take close up pictures. What I would have done for one of those on my old polaroids (shaking fists towards the sky). If you are unfamiliar with instant fuji film, they also have pull apart films that I use on my Polaroid Colorpack II Landcamera. They have a second smaller Instax camera that comes in white and takes itty bitty baby instant pictures. I preferred the larger just because I already have my Polaroid Pogo Printer, which prints tiny digital pictures from your camera or phone.

When Polaroid announced that they would no longer be producing instant film I went into hoarding mode. Sadly, I still have packs left because I was afraid to use them all up, but the film is going bad because they are all REALLY expired. I realized with this new camera, only 2 pictures in, and I’m already being waaaaay to cautious about using the film. I need to lighten and loosen up and have some fun. I need to take pictures and enjoy my birthday present.

Instant film aside, I realized the other day that it was a good thing that I’d fallen in love with instagram and taking pictures with my iphone because since we moved I couldn’t find our battery charger. If it weren’t for camera phones, no pictures would be taken during this time. A few weeks ago I broke down and just bought regular batteries at the store to tide me over. Next thing ya know, Matt uses them, AND the batteries from my camera, to put into his wii-motes. Yesterday after hunting (for what felt like hours hours) through boxes of storage in the basement I finally had a meltdown. That was all it took for Matt to go to the basement and 10 minutes later return with the battery charger, sigh. Well, now I can take pictures AND Matt can have friends over to play Super Smash Bros.

Mailart365 160-166 PINWHEEL MANIA

Published

robayre

on October 4, 2011

in Cool Links, General Update, Mail Art and My Artwork

. 2 Comments

I have a new pattern I’m loving and it’s the pinwheel. It started out earlier this year when I was seeing this pillow by Fine Little Day all over the craft/art/design blogosphere.

Seriously. I was obsessed. The things I loved the most about it was the use of a wide range of colors, AND that the color application looked very handmade. It didn’t look like a store bought and manufactured design, it looked like someone just colored on this pillow with some markers.

Next I saw this awesome garage door on pinterest. How can a person not smile while driving by this house?

Then a couple weeks ago I saw this post by Elise Blaha. This girl is awesome, if you don’t already follow her blog, do so now! Turns out I wasn’t the only one inspired by the pinwheel. She made this lovely painting above, WITH a tutorial on how to make your own to boot! I think I will be making one of these shortly for our new home. (I love to say that)

The pinwheel is so cheerful I think. This week I present to you my pinwheel mailart, tada!

I’m starting out with my favorite, which was also the last card I did in the series this week. I painted all the yellow and then had the idea to draw in a floral pattern like some of the vintage fabric I have. The solid yellow is watercolor and the flowers are colored pencil. I’m so in love with this, don’t be surprised if I do a whole series based on this idea for next week.

Thinking about it, it makes perfect sense, the fabric inspiration and the pinwheel. The pinwheel pattern in a very common quilt pattern. My mom is a quilter and I was regularly taken to quilt shows as a child. The pinwheel pattern inspiration really touches on this art, design and quilt kind of a thing for me.