snowflakes and more snowflakes

i am teaching a tatting class tonight. i am really delighted that people signed up and i hope it is lots of fun!
becka on 11.29.04 @ 04:32 PM CST [link]

the dog ate my...

SCREEN PRINTING INK! yep, that's right. chewed up a brand new tube of BLACK ink on my ORIENTAL RUG. i got home from my class last night and was greeted by a very odd looking dog. she swiped the box of ink while andy was doing dishes and cleaning the kitchen. he had yet to notice that she had been experimenting with being a raven haired beauty. i looked down and most of her face and both front paws were black. andy washed the dog, while i washed the rug. fortunately, screen printing ink is very thick and does not soak in to dogs or rugs. andy dosed lucy with vegetable oil (maybe he will blog about why this works so well) and i dabbed at the oriental with nail polish remover. this morning, the dog is a little grey and still has a blob of ink on one ear and the rug is looking remarkable unscathed. how did she get the ink? it was in a box of other art stuff on the kitchen floor. she is really not able to resist cardboard in any form and i think that she was after the box more than anything else. ink was just a bonus. was the dog up all night? nope. she seems to have suffered no ill effects, except for some interesting colored poop.

becka on 11.24.04 @ 11:24 AM CST [link]

a little christmas card shopping....

i love looking at art! it is fun to look at a bunch of different interpretations on a theme, kind of like illustration friday. i collect abc books for this very reason - simple concept with so many ideas for illustration. so, today's theme is christmas cards. i have run across some really unique and beautiful cards so far this season. here are a few....

Scraps of Paper - "with a collage of holiday recipes and a cute 50's woman reading a cookbook. The kraft envelopes are also printed to match the cards."

Loobylu.com - Seasons Greetings Cards
Holiday designs by Claire Robertson.

Kept Fresh - (faithful readers know i'm a fan of erica's stuff)
becka on 11.22.04 @ 03:05 PM CST [link]

Illustration Friday: Regal

this one was hard. i went through ideas and sketches and nothing was right. i tried a snowy owl. i tried great danes. i kept getting images of crowns in my head. then i thought of a picture that my dad gave me of my great-grandma as "queen of the ball". i hate drawing people. i think it is about 20 times harder than anything else. so i drew from my remembered impression of the picture... i like what i got.

see the other "regal" entries here... click on comments...
becka on 11.19.04 @ 09:52 AM CST [link]

a mini lesson on batik

Even though its exact history is uncertain, fragments of batik’s projected origin dates back to the first century where it was discovered in ancient Egyptian tombs. Evidence of early Batik has also been found all over the Middle East, in India, Central Asia and Africa. By the nineteenth century, after the importation of more finely woven cloth from India and Europe, it became a highly accomplished art form in Java and Bali in Indonesia. The word Batik seems to come from an Indonesian word 'ambatik', a cloth with little dots.

the example from the previous post below is done on plywood. the artist that taught us has done batik on many different materials, but wood is her favorite because it is so easy to remove the wax after you are done. we just popped our pieces in the oven for a few minutes to melt the wax and then wiped it off with a paper towel. on my piece, the paisley pattern in the right was drawn right onto the plain wood with a tjanting. then i painted on some yellow, orange and blue dyes. i picked up a small paintbrush and added wax over the dye on the right in a pattern of diagonal lines. finally, i put red dye over the right side.
becka on 11.17.04 @ 11:59 AM CST [link]

Batik Day

today i learned how to batik. one of our new teachers taught us all a workshop on how to batik on wood, paper and interafacing. we used melted beeswax and regular fabric dyes. this is my wood piece. it was great fun. tonight i get to see how my first shibori dye project turned out. we put our pieces in the dye bath last week and tonight we pull them out.
becka on 11.16.04 @ 05:20 PM CST [link]

Snowflakes...

illustrator grace lin has created an event called "robert's snow for cancer's cure". she has gotten a collection of fabulous illustrators together and they have each decorated a snowflake, which will be auctioned on ebay with the proceeds to go to cancer research. visit the website to see all of the snowflakes and read a little about the illustrators and the cause. my favorites are polar dance by eric brooks, snow mouse by denise fleming, winter fairy by gary lippincott and especially rats! by diana magnuson.
becka on 11.15.04 @ 03:44 PM CST [link]

Illustration Friday: Vintage

...to see more i-fri entries, go to Lopie's Journal and click on the comments for her "vintage" entry.
becka on 11.12.04 @ 09:06 AM CST [link]

girl power.

west wing is my favorite show on tv. in fact, it is just about the only show that i actually watch.

2 new reasons i love west wing: (no spoilers here, this is nothing you haven't seen in the promos)

1. in the storyline, they just promoted a woman to the president's chief of staff.
2. they have hired kristin chenoweth for a new recurring character. (kristin chenoweth is the original glinda from wicked, which i also love)
becka on 11.11.04 @ 09:34 AM CST [link]

one of those days....

i went to a meeting that didn't exist this morning. i didn't read the email that told me that it had been recheduled. i have lost my seamripper so i can't work on puppets this afternoon. (the seam ripper is essential for making holes for their eyes.) i can't seem to get the hang of crochet and i have a really odd shaped scarf to prove it. sigh. but here are some really cute pictures of my dog, Lucy, that my hubby took this weekend...



becka on 11.09.04 @ 04:23 PM CST [link]

Illustration Friday

this week's topic is "Search"... see more here...
becka on 11.05.04 @ 08:28 AM CST [link]

two things that made me smile

reading blogs was depressing today. everyone seems to be in a gloomy sort of mood (with reason). so, instead of adding to the gloom, i thought of 2 things that made me smile today.
becka on 11.03.04 @ 10:38 PM CST [link]

don't forget...

becka on 11.02.04 @ 09:20 AM CST [link]

Don't forget to Vote tomorrow!

one little site update for me. there is a new link in the left column called "Puppet Gallery". i took pictures of puppets today and put together a page...
becka on 11.01.04 @ 06:33 PM CST [link]