Hematology Fabric

Last year I stumbled across Spoonflower, a web based business that takes your digital artwork and prints it on a variety of different fabrics for you. I tried my hand at creating designs for my own use. It's harder than you think! Getting a complex design to tile properly is the hard part, and I fought with photoshop for many hours until I figured it out. It's a little bit addictive, really. It's bad enough that I have boxes in my studio stuffed full of fabric scraps. Now I can design my own? Dangerous!

One of the designs that I made a while back was something I thought would be fun to sew into a scrubs top I could wear to work. Since I work in hematology, I spend a good deal of time looking at blood smears under the microscope. I turned a digital image I took with a camera-scope into a repeating pattern and had Spoonflower print it for me. At right is the single tile image I made, it's what normal (healthy) human peripheral blood looks like. To see it repeating, click on the image and it will take you to my design on Spoonflower. I'm a science nerd, I admit it. I finally got around to buying a couple yards of this fabric for myself and I'm sewing the scrubs top tonight. I have grand plans for making other fabric designs like this using various hematological diseases that display characteristic morphologies. Then my co-workers can try and figure out what disease I am today! Did I mention I was a nerd? Yeah. I did.

New Year's Roundup

Today I have an odd collection of items to share with you, so I'll just stack them up and let you have a peek.

Here's a bit of silliness I made for Brian as a Christmas present. Cloudy (our parrot) can be a little grumpy with Brian at times (what can I say? she prefers me, I'm her momma), so I gave him this bit of photoshoppery as a joke. I can't claim credit for most of the artwork, it came from a BBC website. I just 'shopped Cloudy's head on the body of Gastornis. Brian laughed quite a bit. And I'm sure Cloudy would be proud to know her ancestors ran around murdering small mammals.

NH winters inspire me to finish projects to keep us warm, like this rug I started braiding for the upstairs bathroom about six months ago. It's not done yet, but it's a lot closer than it was!

I made a resolution to get a jump on next year's Christmas Cthulhu ornaments by devoting at least one day a month throughout the year just to ornaments. So I've got a pile of snowman parts to show for it so far.

Merry Christmas!!!

Cloudy wishes you a very Merry Christmas! Brian said that one of the gifts he got me this year was Cloudy's idea: a Cozy Toes foot warmer! Apparently she likes to sit on her perch in the studio with me, because it's momma-and-birdy time. It's very cold in my studio in the winter, so I haven't been in there as often as I'd like. Of course Cloudy would want me to have a Cozy Toes, so we can share studio time more often. She's a very thoughtful bird like that. :)

Needle Felted Santa Cthulhu, not quite

Every year for the last few years, Brian and I have made some sort of large Santa Cthulhu project together for the holidays. I know, as Christmas traditions go, it's a little bit twisted. But hey, we have fun. You can see some of our previous Santa Cthulhus here, here, here, and here.

This year, we started another needle felted Santa Cthulhu. The plan was for him to be standing in front of a fireplace, putting icky things into little stockings. Other projects kept getting in the way, though. Then Brian broke his right hand in a tragic Man Cave accident, and his needle felting days were over (at least until they let him out of the cast). I realized I wasn't going to have time to finish the Santa by myself before Christmas this year, so we're just going to have to put him away until next year. This is as far as we got (that's his arm laying next to his feet). Stop by this time next year, and hopefully we'll have him finished!

Specimen Jar, part II

I started this specimen jar ages ago, then got distracted by holiday cthulhu ornaments. In an attempt to clean off my desk, I went back and finished this one up. It began as an attempt to make a latex tentacle using a technique I read about here, which I found while browsing through Propnomicon. Once I had my tentacle, I had to attach it to something, so I gave it an eyeball. And some random spikes. Yes, okay, some of my projects aren't as heavy on the design and planning stages. It was an experiment, and it taught me a few things! I put it together in a bottle I picked up at an antique shop. I think it may have been an ink bottle in a former life, but I'm not really sure. Wax sealer, aging on the bottle, a label, and voila! Monopodidae ocularis is born. You can find this jar for sale at The Odd Luminary, the listing has lots more photos of it, too.

Holiday Coupon!

Etsy has a fancy new coupon system, so I figured I'd take it for a spin. Starting now and finishing at the end of Monday (11-28), you can get 10% off any purchase in my Etsy shop if you use this coupon code at checkout:

HOLIDAY2011

Get your Christmas Cthulhus while they last! :)

Santa Cthulhu Ornament

I've had so many requests for Christmas Cthulhu items this year that I'm having a hard time keeping up! But here's a new one that I've made. I sculpted the original in polymer clay, made a latex mold with an epoxy clay backup mold, and then used polymer clay again to make a few push-casts. Each one is hand-painted, and I'm selling them on Etsy for a very reasonable price. Happy holidays!

Finish It!

I'm still thinking about unfinished projects. And before you tell me to stop wasting time pondering and go get something done, I will admit that I'm typing this from work. It's my weekend on shift at the lab. Add a snowstorm to a weekend and the hospital gets pretty quiet, so I have extra time to ruminate. Trust me, if I could bring art projects to work for the slow times, I would. But there's that whole biohazard issue; spilling blood on my latest needle felted critter might add a nice touch, but then it would have to be incinerated. Heh.

Anyway, I started thinking specifically about WHY I don't finish certain projects. I know I emphasized previously that it's because I have too many things to do, but there's undoubtedly more to it than that. I have a few ideas.

Sometimes it's because the project is boring. Take my insulated curtains that I mentioned in my last post. I had a lot of fun making my Totoro door quilt, but the window quilts I have planned for the living room are plain white. Pretty boring. Which is probably why Totoro was finished last winter and the living room windows are still bare.

It's also easy for me to get distracted (oooh, shiny!) by new projects before the old ones are finished. Then I feel guilty for having too many projects on the go at one time. I tell myself to finish one before starting the next, but if I've lost interest in the first one (or if the new one is particularly exciting) I just work myself into a dither and get nothing done at all.

Other times I think projects remain unfinished because I am disappointed in the way they are turning out. Art projects always have a certain degree of ambiguity for me, especially sculptures. I always start out with a vision of what I want to create, but often as I move through the process of sculpting it I find the project straying further and further from the original concept.

Well, let's see if I can flip these reasons around. I'm imagining mirror-me giving me a pep-talk:

This is so boring ...

If it's boring, why are you doing it? Instead of worrying about finishing everything you start, you should worry more about starting only things you know you'll finish.

You sound like the Mysterious Sphinx ... but what if it's obligatory AND boring?

Find a way to make it less boring! Artists are creative, right? Live up to it!

I have this great idea for a new project, but if I start it before I'm done with my current project I'll feel like a loser.

Why? Linear thinking is a bad habit. Humans are capable of multi-tasking and you're no exception (except for that pat-your-head-while-rubbing-your-tummy thing ... don't try that one again, it just makes you look like a freak). Spend ten minutes on this project, ten minutes on that project, and before you know it you'll have them both done.

This isn't turning out the way I intended.

Why is that a problem? Happy accidents aren't limited to penicillin and Bob Ross. Just run with it and see where it takes you.

But it's turning out ... just plain bad.

That doesn't mean you shouldn't finish it. Getting better at anything involves practice, grasshoppah. A bad result doesn't invalidate the process of creation. You have to make a lot of bad art before you figure out how to make good art.

I tried squeezing a little more inspiration out of mirror-me, but she muttered something about sparkly donuts and ran off while singing "All You Need is a Montage". Guess I'd better work on those curtains when I get home tonight.

Never thought I'd finish typing this post ...

Welcome to my studio ... knock down all three bottles and win a prize from the top shelf!Do you ever feel like you have too many projects? I sure do. Let me give you an example to demonstrate how much of a scatterbrain I can be. When I started this new website and journal back at the end of July, I was just getting into my Cernunnos sculpture (which still remains largely unfinished). Then I ran into the nice folks at The Odd Luminary who were excited about carrying some of our (Brian's and mine) art in their shop. This caused Brian and I both to want to finish some of our old (and odd) needle felting projects, so we dug out the Creepy Bunny and finished him. That inspired us to felt the Zombie Bunny as well.

The Odd Luminary folks sent me a list of random items they happen to love. On that list was 'specimen jars', which also fascinate me. In between felting the two unfortunate bunnies, I figured out a process for making specimen jars that I liked and made a few little ones as a prelude to larger ideas. I also wandered around flea markets and antique shops looking for old glass bottles to use for larger specimen jar projects.

Somewhere in there, one of my previous customers on Etsy contacted me requesting a custom Halloween Cthulhu figurine, so I sculpted that. Working in epoxy clay invariably leaves you with a little extra clay mixed up and needing to be used before it cures, so I started a few Christmas Cthulhu things along the way. I sold a whole bunch of my Cthulhu Snowman ornaments last winter and promised myself that if I made a handful of them each month all year I'd be all set this winter. How many do you think I actually made? Yeah, about five. So the Halloween Cthulhu got me in the mood and I cranked out a few more holiday Cthulhu beasties. Half them are still waiting to be painted.

Then Brian and I went away for a weekend vacation to Maine. On the way home we drove by an awesome fabric shop and had to stop. I bought a few different Halloween fabrics to sew into scrubs I can wear at work. I had to clean all the clay, paint, brushes and sculpting tools off my art desk so I could set up the sewing machine, and then clean all the light tent and studio light stuff away from the cutting table so I could cut fabric for the scrubs. I did manage to sew two of the three tops I bought fabric for, but the third one is still laying un-sewn on the cutting table (since Halloween is the day after tomorrow, I guess I'll be wearing that third top next year).

But wait, there's more! Last weekend we had a pumpkin carving party at our house. We decided we ought to put up some Halloween decorations. Not wanting to be boring, Brian had the idea for the Jack Skellington figure we made. It was a lot of fun, but the idea arrived on Monday night. We spent much of Tuesday-Friday making it in between cleaning the house, gathering supplies, and baking treats for the party.

After the party, the weather took a sudden turn toward winter and we're due up to a foot of snow tonight. Last winter I started making insulated curtains for all the windows in the house to help cut down our heating costs, but I only got about half of them done. This is partly because I invariably have to get creative with my home projects. I think I spent the better part of a month working on the ONE insulated curtain that goes over the door between the kitchen and the mud room (but darn it, I was pleased with the result!). I put the finished curtains up on the windows again and dug out the stuff to make the rest of them, inspired by a desire to make it through the winter on less fuel oil than last year. That brings me up to date, I think. That must all make me look more than a little ADD ...

Also keep in mind that all of this is happening in between my full time job at the lab and all the other tasks of daily living like tending the garden and chickens, spending time with Brian, and obeying Cloudy's every command. Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining about any of this. I love my crazy life. But it does sometimes leave me pondering a lot of things.

For instance, how important is it to finish a project? If I do a rough tally of all the projects I just listed, I have one unfinished project sitting around for every two I manage to complete. Not bad, but it does still leave a lot of sad and lonely projects in my studio waiting for attention. Do I have to finish them all?

Have I failed if I abandon a project? I never think of those unfinished projects as truly abandoned, but let's be realistic. There's a polymer clay head in my studio that I started sculpting in 2004. I've gently packed it up and moved it to a new home with me now five times. Am I ever going to finish it? Perhaps. But even if I abandon it entirely, squash the clay up and use it for something else, is that a failure? Or just a course correction? A learning experience?

What would happen if I told myself I couldn't start any new projects until I finished all of the old ones? I'm really not sure. Unfinished projects usually make me sad. When I paw through a drawer and find one tucked away, almost forgotten, I feel a little pang of disappointment. Would digging them all out be too much of a downer? Once in a while when I stumble across an unfinished project, I feel rejuvenated. I dive back into it, excited to finally complete it. But that's generally the exception. And more importantly, new projects keep me energized. If I forbade myself from starting anything new until I complete all the old, I fear it might lock me up altogether.

And finally, am I weird for bothering to think about this stuff at all?

Jack Skellington

I got derailed a bit from other art projects this month because Halloween is fast approaching! Brian and I held a pumpkin carving party here at the house last weekend for friends and neighbors. As usual, our last minute ideas consumed us. Brian thought it would be cool to build a Jack Skellington figure to stand in front of the house. In about four days, he managed to whip this fellow together out of nothing more than PVC pipes, black duct tape, and a light fixture for his head. Not bad for a rush job! I helped on a few parts, but it was mostly Brian's work. My intention was to make a large papier mache pumpkin for him to hold in his hands, but we simply ran out of time. So we bought the little plastic pumpkin that lights up. I was also going to set his PVC-and-wire hands with epoxy clay and make them look a little more bony. From the road, he looks pretty cool. We can always work on refinements for next year! In the meantime, our neighbors all think we're a little odd ...