Bird and Little Bird

Swap

I've have been a super slacker when it comes to posting lately.  Nothing personal, I've just been so busy with various daily life type things that I haven't been able to look at my computer without going into this really deep space-out place where all I can do is check the weather and read a bit email before logging off again.  Plus, I've had wicked allergies.  I think on some level I used to think that allergies were just pretend, because you know, I didn't have them.  Then suddenly out of nowhere over the last two or three years I have developed crazy allergies.  I sneeze, my eyes water, my throat is sore and I complain.  A lot.  I am generally miserable and hoping that the fog will lift sometime soon.

Anyway, this is not the point.  The point is that a couple of weeks back I received my swap package from Sarah, my swap partner in the Bend the Rules Sewing Swap.  It was such a great surprise.  Super cute bag with some fun embroidery (birds on a branch- cute!) and great detailing.  Plus, she included a recipe, cute notepaper and the best thing?  A new dress for Fluffy the bunny.  I would like very much to show you a picture of this lovely dress but you see, Fluffy is wearing it right now and she is hiding somewhere in the house.  Anyway, it was the sweetest, nicest package and I was so happy to get it!

And let me tell you, getting Sarah's package motivated me to get busy with my own bag for the swap!  Above is the bag that I made for my own swap partner.  I know, it looks a whole lot like the one that I made for myself a few months back.  But I really liked the one that I made for myself and I thought someone else might too.  Plus, I feel like a big bag like this  one is great when it's made of a nice heavy denim because you can really use it. 

Okay then.  More letterpress news after the weekend I think and I'll work on having my pictures be a little less lame as well.  Like I said, I've been sleeping on the job a bit. 

Nesting.

The pound of used international postage serves it's purpose!  These here are the nesting dolls that I made for the nesting doll exchange being organized by Abby.  I have to say that my previous experience with Mod Podge is limited so I was totally unaware of the fact that it is a miracle substance.  Yet another item to add to my list of great but weird inventions which make my life fun.  I did get it absolutely everywhere however and an uncomfortable amount of skin was peeled off of my right thumb as a result.  But what a small price to pay for some good, clean (well sort of) fun that results in a finished project that is both strange and delightful at the same time! 

Sorting through the stamps to find the ones that I wanted to use was an interesting task in and of itself.  There is definitely a large preponderance of grouchy looking men when one is sorting through piles and piles of stamps from around the world. There are also a lot of birds, animals, butterflies and many, many pictures of the Queen of England. 

The best of the bunch? This stamp, from some tiny country in the Middle East which no longer exists, commemorating Nixon's trip to China.  Dan and I are completely obsessed with it because it is bizarre on so many, many levels.  I had a serious fit when I found it in the bag full of birds and grumpy dictators.  It might very well end up in a little frame on one of our walls.  Really it might.  Because we are a little weird like that.

 

I'm still here...

    So the posts have been um... infrequent, shall we say?  But the master's thesis finally got finished for good last Friday (yay!) and my job has been pretty much sucking my will to live, so there hasn't been a whole lot of me to share with the rest of the world.  And there are still six weeks left in the school year.  You see, it turns out that teaching is only partially about the kiddos and a whole lot more about all the adults associated with them and with the running of all the stuff and is therefore, sometimes really, really hard.  Kids are cute. Especially nine year old boys with autism and a passionate love of bowling- very cute.  Difficult adults- less cute. 

    That being said, it is not at all the reason for this post.  This post is not about that.  No!  It is about the very cool letterpress class that I took on Saturday.  I got a call late in the week that someone had dropped out and I was first on the wait list.  Good luck and good times.  So I spent the day pressing letters and the like on Saturday and thoroughly enjoyed myself.  And when I say "thoroughly enjoyed," I mean it.  Really mean it.  I was tired though (see previous paragraph...) and so I only took a fraction of the pictures that I meant to.  I was struggling a bit with the multi-tasking I think.

The picture up top is of the press as I was getting ready to print my first run.  I was using an old lino cut block with an elephant on it.  After that I sorted through some type from one of the big, crazy cabinets full of thousands of itty, bitty tiny letters.

Then I set the type...

And printed these.

At the beach.

 

The weather has been beautiful here the last week or so.  It's been sunny and warm and has us all anxious to be outside in it! A few days back Mariam and I decided at the last minute to drive out to Marin to go tide pooling in Bolinas.  We didn't leave until midday which I thought might mean all sorts of trouble (traffic, unplanned napping etc.) but it turned out to be great timing because low tide was right around the time that we got there. Mariam was hesitant about walking on the rocks at first, but before long she was hopping from pool to pool hunting down anemones and crabs.  We had a great time and drove home in the early evening, wet, sandy, tired and happy.

 

 

Obsession

    You may (or may not) notice that a new category has been added to this here little blog.  I added the "letterpress" category because folks, I intend to use it.  I took my letterpress class at the San Francisco Center for the Book this past Friday and it was probably the most fun  I've had in years.  The class was nine hours long but went by so quickly because everything was so interesting and cool.  Wehandset type, mixed ink, printed, cleaned up (which takes forever) and washed our hands about a hundred times.  The process of letterpress, how the presses actually work, is much different than what I expected but is impressively intuitive.  I kept thinking "These machines are genius, I can't believe they stopped making them!"  At one point I became a complete and total dork because I just started giggling for no reason other than the fact that I was having a really good time and couldn't help it. I made some simple thank you cards and also printed The Red Wheelbarrow by William Carlos Williams
on a flat card.

 

So I think that I've found a new craft addiction.  It's a funny thing.  When I first began this blog it was in large part because I was so inspired by the blogging of people like Amy Karol and Hilary Lang.  I loved the cool, clever and innovative sewing that they were doing and wanted to do a bit of it myself, while also sharing some of my adventures with a few other people if they were willing to read.  And while I do love sewing (and have a fabric stash that I should actually be really embarrassed about), I think that the actual gift of throwing myself back into the world of stitch crafts has been that it has led me farther down other paths of crafting as well.  I have always loved letterpress but I don't know that it ever would have occurred to me that I could actually learn how to do it if I hadn't happened upon the amazing (and infinite) community of crafty bloggers.  So thanks all!

    My next letterpress class isn't for a few weeks.  I'm a little sad to have to wait so long to do it all again but I also really have some other things that I need to be working on right now, most especially a couple of items for swaps that I signed up for.  More on that to come...

Printing.

     So printing of all types has been the obsession around here of late.  Most (if not all) of my crafting attempts over the last month have been printing related although not much of my makings have been posted here. I have had a hard time getting things to look just so, you know? And I have a hard time putting myself out there with work that I'm not really perfectly and completely proud of.  A couple of times I have posted things and then deleted them right away when I looked at the post and thought that I didn't quite like the look of it.  Totally neurotic and semi-weird, I know.  And I do apologize for the complete lack of sewing related posts lately, because I know that there are a small number of people out there in the blogiverse who started reading this ridiculous little site because of the fact that I apparently used to find time for sewing...

    The thing is, printing is just so satisfying right now because amidst all the thesis writing and life crazy that I've had happening I can get out my gocco and do a little project pretty quickly and then feel productive.  Productive, it turns out, is a really good feeling that I need to have sometimes in order to stay emotionally afloat. It is good that I know this now.

    Anyway, the above cards were made a few days ago with said gocco and I decided to go ahead and post them because I am happy with them.  The picture that I managed to take of them in my not-so-well-lit living room maybe not so much (I really do need to learn how to use my camera- does anyone have good suggestions for this?). 

    In other printing news, I am in love with the new Lotta Jansdotter book  that came out last week.  I love all things Lotta actually, so I had pre-ordered this book about eight years ago and anxiously waited and then they finally arrived last Monday. I say "they" because yes, I ordered two copies. But one is for a friend, I swear. 

    Anyway, it is just the best, coolest book.  There is so much information about printing of various kinds and Lotta's designs are (as always) clean, light and simple.  Just beautiful.  I am seriously ready to start screenprinting in my bathtub exactly right now except for the whole thing where I have a job that I am supposed to go to and a four year old to chase and a thesis to finish and and and...  Anyway, you might not know it yet, but you actually really need this book.

    But wait! The really big printing news this week?  I start my letterpress classes at the San Francisco Center for the Book this Friday.  I think that the last time I was looking forward to something quite this much I was having a baby. 

 

Poem.

 

    So it turns out that this month is national poetry month.  As a teacher, you would think that I might have known this already but alas, I actually learned it by reading craft blogs.  Jo over at Little Yellow Bird posted a poem in honor of the month of April, a lovely little piece by Frank O'Hara.  I am officially inspired and have decided to post one of my favorites as well.  Since I am going to hear Billy Collins speak in San Francisco on Monday night, I decided to choose a poem written by him.  So here goes! "Litany" by Billy Collins:

You are the bread and the knife,
        The crystal goblet and the wine...
        -Jacques Crickillon

You are the bread and the knife,
the crystal goblet and the wine.
You are the dew on the morning grass
and the burning wheel of the sun.
You are the white apron of the baker,
and the marsh birds suddenly in flight.

However, you are not the wind in the orchard,
the plums on the counter,
or the house of cards.
And you are certainly not the pine-scented air.
There is just no way that you are the pine-scented air.

It is possible that you are the fish under the bridge,
maybe even the pigeon on the general's head,
but you are not even close
to being the field of cornflowers at dusk.

And a quick look in the mirror will show
that you are neither the boots in the corner
nor the boat asleep in its boathouse.

It might interest you to know,
speaking of the plentiful imagery of the world,
that I am the sound of rain on the roof.

I also happen to be the shooting star,
the evening paper blowing down an alley
and the basket of chestnuts on the kitchen table.

I am also the moon in the trees
and the blind woman's tea cup.
But don't worry, I'm not the bread and the knife.
You are still the bread and the knife.
You will always be the bread and the knife,
not to mention the crystal goblet and--somehow--the wine.

Reading out loud.

There isn't a whole lot to report on the crafty front these days.  By not a whole lot I of course mean that there is nothing to report.  Really big nothing.  I have been pretty much living in  thesis writing mode for the last week and a half and haven't had much time or brain power to do anything else.  The results are good though: I'm mailing in my first "final" draft to my readers today!  Yay.  I might also have jury duty.  Less exciting.

We have been doing a lot of reading at our house since Mariam got a number of really great books as birthday gifts.  One that we've been really enjoying is Three Tales of My Father's Dragon by Ruth Stiles Gannett.  I have always loved My Father's Dragon and read it with kids at school but somehow didn't realize that it was part of a trilogy.  The books are great as first chapter books to read aloud to small children (if they can listen that long) and Mariam is so, so into them.  We read all of My Father's Dragon in one sitting!  We took Elmer and the Dragon a little more slowly and read two chapters each night before bed, finishing the book last night.  Mariam woke up early this morning and said that she wanted to read the first two chapters of Dragons of Blueland before school because she had to know what was going to happen.

When I was looking for an image of the book to post here, I happened upon this fun blog dedicated to reading with children.  They have great reviews and book suggestions for reading with kids of different ages.  We are super crazy book lovers at our house and I'm always on the look out for new things to read with Mariam, so I subscribed to the feed.  We will not speak of the fact that there is not an inch of bookshelf space left in our house. 

Preparations.

Tomorrow is the big fourth birthday at our house.  I've started getting ready for the little party that we've got planned for Saturday morning and today, Mariam and I rounded up things for putting together party favor "bags."  I put "bags" in quotes because actually, we aren't using bags at all.  Instead, we covered empty Illy coffee cans with pretty paper a la Paper Source.  I used the miracle machine to complete the job.  I'm so pleased with how they turned out!

I put an assortment of goodies inside, mostly art supplies, although we also included a cute little kit for growing a strawberry plant.  Yay for party favors that are not just little plastic doodads destined for the trash! 

We'll do a quiet little family birthday celebration tomorrow and then spend Friday getting ready for Saturday's guests.  I have bold aspirations for cake baking and this year, am going to make a "real" cake instead of the usual applesauce/maple syrup concoction.  A little sugary indulgence for the smalls is okay for special occasions, right?   It is so great that I have this week off from work (Spring Break), it makes this all so much less harried and stressful.

I have, by the way, been extraordinarily well behaved in reference to the big thesis writing obligation.  I have been working on it whenever my family will give me the time and space and have written 66 pages!  I had no idea that I had 66 pages worth of things to say.  I got busy fast when I realized that my deadline is much, much closer than I realized.  The goal is to have my draft sent to my readers by Monday.  Think happy thoughts! 

 

For reasons I cannot explain...

I have purchased an entire pound of used international postage stamps.  No one knows about this except for you.  My husband is going to think I am seriously nuts.  But you know what?  When you find that you have the opportunity to purchase used postage by the pound, it is a strangely attractive proposition which is hard to pass up.  I might just have an idea or two for using my newly acquired ton of stamps, but I think I'll keep that to myself until it actually happens.

In other news, I have added a button to my sidebar that links to the Bend the Rules Sewing Swap that is being organized.  If you are a fan of Amy Karol's awesome book then sign up for the swap!  I am currently signing up for swaps like it's my job because honestly, I really need some motivation to pull me out of my productivity hole.