I woke up early yesterday morning and laid in bed with the cats.  In that half asleep, half awake state, I had an idea for the table favors.  It wasn’t fully formed, but enough that I could sort of picture how it would work.  I got up, got breakfast, got my car in to get the oil changed and got laundry and cleaning done, as I really wanted to leave my afternoon free to be creative.

I started designing the doll soon after lunch, and knew that I wanted to use my collaged bottle caps for the heads.  I had to make some though, and since the resin takes overnight to cure, I needed to do it quickly.  So that was the first step.  I got the body designed, and had a flash of inspiration for the stand.  Unfortunately, the flash required a trip to Michael’s.  By the time I got home, it was late.  I started on the first body, found some black felt that was in my fabric pile and, flash, another inspiration.  I got one done enough last night that I could see what I needed to do.

So I finished them up about 4:30 this evening, except for the one I’m giving to Pamela for her birthday.  Unfortunately, I did nothing on the crow this weekend and only got a little bit of the prep done for my trip to see Pamela.  So, tomorrow is another day for that, with the trip to the post office in the middle.

Here are the dolls.  I’m going to make some more of them, as Mom wants one and I want one.  I think I’m going to make some to add to my submission for the Christmas Art Bazaar I’m going to apply for.

Aren’t they cute?  Weird, but cute!

As weeks go, this has been a very, very unpleasant one.  I had to force myself in the studio this evening and was literally counting beads to attempt to redirect my thoughts.  I switched the ipod over to playing all of my Train CD’s and after a few songs and a good deal of beading, my mind was no longer replaying unpleasant moments.  I was very happily in the creative zone.

I’m so excited over the crow page!  Mr. Crow is beaded, has a beaded necklace and is now situated in a leafy background.  In addition, I added a metal “W” to fix where I forgot to include it in the quilting.  Oops!  I started beading down the trim which is going to frame the page when it was time to stop.

I’m sitting in bed as I write this post and both of the cats are here with me.  Mari is curled up next to me purring and wheezing.  Everyone once in a while, she reaches with her front paws for me.  It’s a nice end to the day.

I’ve continued to bead on the crow, in between finishing up the computer.  I’m 2/3’d of the way done adding beads to his body.  They add sparkle, which every self-respecting crow needs.  I think I mentioned that I covered the cathedral transfer with silk gauze and stitched it down.  The picture of that is here tonight as well.  It has been a frustrating and exhausting week at work, so I’ve not accomplished as much in the evening as I’d like.  The good news is the work week is half-way over.

Boy am I glad to be done with the garage sale.  It was such a hot day yesterday – I am still tired today and haven’t left the house, except to get the paper and put out bird seed.

I spent yesterday evening and most of today reinstalling my operating system and all of the software on my computer.  The performance had become so bad I couldn’t do anything.  That combined with all sorts of very ominous error messages whenever I started up or shut down convinced me I needed to start fresh.  So, here I am, almost 24 hours later, and I’m completely back up and running.  There are a few things I haven’t redone yet, but I’ve got the necessary bits completed.

I didn’t sell any of the journals yesterday, so all of them have now been posted in my Etsy shop.  So, if you would like any of the following journals – they can all be found in my shop.

I did a bit more beading on the crow, working on his body while I was reinstalling my Photoshop Elements catalogue.  I also attempted to transfer the cathedral to a piece of silk gauze and will go check how it ended up here shortly.  As a last resort, I’ll take off the binding and take the page apart to fix it.  I hope it doesn’t come to that.  I’m going to do a bit more beading this evening before calling it a night.

I scanned my journal page, hoping that it would be a better picture.  It is, mostly.  I added pen and ink last night after posting, but didn’t do any work this evening on it.  I haven’t felt well since just after lunch.  As such, I’ve been a bit distracted (ok, a lot distracted) and not very productive.

I finished beading the outline of the crow, but due to spending more time reading blogs than beading, I didn’t get both feet done.  Actually, I don’t have clear or white beads in the right size to finish his feet, but I could have finished up the outline of both if I hadn’t spent so much time reading art blogs.

I finished up the 3rd soft cover, long-stitch book this evening.  I’m very pleased with the way it turned out.  It was a good thing I prepped it last night.  I woke up with a head-ache that stayed with me all morning and the ibuprofen left me very groggy the remainder of the day.  Darned allergies.  The downside of getting rain is getting mold afterwards.

I continued to play in my journal this evening, which I spent part of on the phone.  The sound track for this evening was Train’s “Save Me San Francisco”.  I’ve been a Train fan since they hit the national airwaves and get each one of their albums as soon as they are released, but I have to admit that Save Me San Francisco is my favorite.  Not only that, but I’m hearing it EVERYWHERE I go.  I heard a track from it in Hobby Lobby this weekend!  Anyway- ‘nuff about music.

I continued to add paint to the two pages I’m working on, and decided to tone both of them down, as they were very bright.  I then started adding more texture, in the form of dots on the left page, and lines from a hand-carved stamp of mine on the right page.  Then more paint.  The left one was screaming purple cone flower to me (which I have blooms on my plants in the backyard again), so I drew one in with sharpie and then painted it.  I stamped “Hey Daisy” in black paint and am now going to add pen and ink in black and white.  The left page needs a focal point, but I don’t know what/where yet.

I also have been beading on the crow outline.  It’s not really exciting picture-wise, so I’ll wait until I get more done.  I’ve got about 3 inches to go on the outline, then I get to do his feet and bead his body.  Yippee!  Tomorrow I should have a picture of him to show.

Art really is the best medicine.  As long as I’m in the studio and focused, I can ignore all sorts of unpleasantness, including a headache and gritty, sandpaper eyes.  Once I stop focusing, though, I remember what hurts!  Go make art!  It’ll make the world a much nicer place.

I managed to focus my attention this evening on journals, with no distractions, no frustration, and a fair amount of creative juice flowing.

I got the second of the three soft cover journals prepped and bound and got the signatures for the third punched and the cover cut and scored.  I quite like the cover for the third book.  I have another piece of this water color paper that I mono-printed.  I may use it to make a book for me, and one for another purpose, perhaps a give-away? 

I also spent time prepping another spread in my journal with gesso.  I then had a pleasant hour, in between editing pictures of the above journals, slapping paint on in a random fashion to the rhythm of the music provided by DJ Rekha’s “Basement Bangra” album.  I also collaged the corners I cut from the coptic journal cover paper on these pages and some tissue paper.  I pulled out a bunch of mark-making implements (read cardboard and a wood-block print tool) and hand-cut stencils and used those.  I don’t know what thing in my studio I’m going to sketch in on top, yet.  I have several more skulls, some hands, a bunch of dolls and antique jars and then just general mess to chose from. 

I added a bit more paint to Life and Death.  I’m still not happy with the vase.  It stands out too much.  But it is a problem for another day.  There are two pictures here, from different angles to try to compensate for the effects of the flash on the acrylic paint.

I had signatures torn down with the outer page of each signature a piece of marbled paper.  I had enough for 2 books and the signatures were so pretty I knew that they needed to be an exposed spine structure.  The easiest one (read, least amount of required mental energy) for me to do on short notice is a Coptic Stitch spine.  The only downside is you have to cover the boards and let them dry before sewing.  I got one set of boards covered before lunch and in the press.  After lunch I pulled that set out and got the second set covered and in the press in time for the World Cup final to start.  I pulled my supplies into the living room so I could punch the signatures and boards and sew while the game was on.  It took me most of the regular time to get the first one done.  I finished up the second one soon after Spain scored their 1 goal.  The covers of these are some of my paste paper.

The purple one has marbled paper on the inside of the cover, but it’s marbled using a size of methyl cellulose instead of carragheenan.

The pink and yellow one has paste paper on the inside cover.

Both of these are 6.5” tall by 5 3/8” wide, with 8 signatures.

The third one is a soft cover book made with signatures I’ve had so long I can’t remember when I tore them down.  It’s a bit smaller, and I have enough signatures to do two more.  It’s a soft cover, long stitch binding.  The cover is hot pressed water color paper I mono-printed years ago.  I’ve got more of this paper, and another sheet for the remaining two books.  This is a glueless structure so it takes less time.

Last, the latest progress in my journal (which hasn’t been touched since Friday night, when I last wrote in it).  The Crow Zentangle hasn’t had much work done on it and what I have done on it was sort of screwed up when I tried a resist technique that didn’t work with india ink.

And here is the latest version of Life and Death.  I added some pen and ink to the bird, birdbath and skull.  I’m not done yet, though.

And here is the spread, where you can see both of them at the same time.

This evening, I figured out what the journal page needed to finish it off, and got part of it done before getting sucked into finishing the etsy pictures and listing them on my shop.  I also did a bit of beading on the crow.  His left edge is almost completely beaded now.  The beads are sparkly without being over the top.  I quite like them, but no pictures of him this evening. 

Instead, I leave you with the almost finished journal page:  Life and Death as Inspiration.  The picture is not so good because it’s dark and my studio lamps are reflecting off the acrylic paint, but I’ll get a better picture once I’m finished.  I sketched a Styrofoam skull and bookend I have on the shelf over my desk where I’ve been working in the studio.  It seemed to fit my mood and might serve as inspiration for my Stretching Art and Tradition piece which I have to decide on by next week.  This is the quilt piece, in addition to Mars and Venus.  The theme is Famous Pairs (or Pears).  Mars and Venus are the two dolls I completed last year, knowing I’d put them in this challenge.  I’ve been thinking of doing a black and white piece for my quilt and doing a zentangle.  I may still decide to do that, but life and death is another good pair with a lot of maneuverability – always a good criteria for responding to a challenge!  Especially if you have trouble making up your mind, as I do, on your designs until the deadline looms a bit more.