Archive for the ‘wish’ Category

Darn.

Wednesday, July 16th, 2008

Well, at least I know how long I can sustain productive behavior – a week. I have done nothing since Saturday, and I only have two more days off. Why am I sitting here writing about it instead of doing something? For one thing, it is easier to eat pizza while typing than while spinning, and for another … I hit a block. I don’t know what kind of block, although I think it had something to do with the writing rather than the art.

That and trying to fix the website is frustrating at best, because it’s really not a skillset I have and so I’m procrastinating. At least I’m good at that. Unfortunately, the update is what really needs to get done now. I just don’t know where to start (or how to make it look the way I want it to).

That said, the crane curtain did get finished, which is something at any rate.

I scoff at your fancy tools.

Friday, July 11th, 2008

Well, actually, I’d be thrilled if I still had access to a press. Any press, really, I’m not feeling picky right now.

It turns out that I did have some ink left, so I got started with a bit of printing.

Well, that’s just ducky – it took some improvisation (plastic spoon and waxed paper, because nobody has randomly stopped by and said “by the way, here’s a press for you”), but there are now a whole bunch (all right, only thirty-something) of wish broadsides half-finished and all over the floor. I suppose I should finish them and find somewhere else to put them before anyone comes home.

Actually, now that I’ve looked at both versions next to each other, I think they’re finished. There’s something about the way the blocks of type are lined up that I think looks better with just one butterfly.

Huh. Look at that, offcuts from a student reading broadside, with lino prints on. I think they might possibly need a few more layers, but that was fun.

Oh boy, suddenly I’m thinking it’s a good idea to try printing on cloth. This might be a problem. Well, at least nobody can say I haven’t done anything this week, unless they’re some kind of … weird printing-hating type.

And for once, I’ve been consistently productive.

Wednesday, July 9th, 2008

Not necessarily focused, but that never works anyway. I’ve done some spinning, some former-thesis work, and some writing.

This is going to be an image-heavy post, but … well, what do you expect from me?

Well, I started spinning. This is a silk/merino blend.

 

Did I mention some yarn? I cooked some yarn. From the left, it’s merino/tencel, silk, bamboo, and silk/merino.

And, with some help, I ended up with more than seventy little felt beads.

Oh, right, and we made some significant progress on the crane curtain.

Along with some very tiny – 2″ square – books.

Oh, heck, I have some more pictures of the curtain.

In which there is reading and writing, but no ‘rithmetic.

Friday, June 13th, 2008

Seriously, please go look at my etsy shop. It’s forgetgutenberg.etsy.com, and it’s over in the sidebar as well. 

Today, I finished Hell & Earth, which is one of the many books Elizabeth Bear has coming out this summer, and The Titan’s Curse, which is the third book in the Percy Jackson series. They’re both quite good, although in no way alike. I wish I knew some convenient middle-school boys to give the Percy Jackson books to. I know some people who will want to read Hell & Earth, and a few who probably should whether or not they want to. The pile of books I need to read continues to grow – I’ve added A. G. Mojtabai’s All That Road Going and Mo Yan’s Life and Death Are Wearing Me Out. (I loved Republic of Wine, so I clearly needed the new one.)

Other than that, I’m working on making words. It seems to be working, which I’m pleased about. I’ve given myself an unreasonable deadline in the interest of finishing wish. I’ve got this schedule all planned out; I’m not going to follow it, because that’s not what calendars are for in my world. On the other hand, I’ve got a concrete goal for the project, which should encourage actually doing it. Then I have to decide whether or not I want to try taking it back to Alabama. I think that’s going to depend on what direction the work goes in this time. Given the idea I came up with – assuming that one can spin the paper I want to spin – it might just not be a book arts project anymore.

I scraped in just under the wire and finished a charming skein of bamboo on Wednesday night at knitting. The only problem, since I had to leave the store, is that I’ve got something like half of a bobbin of singles left. Oh, the tragedy. I’m pleased with the yarn, although I’d really like to get the next bit of bamboo spun to a lace weight.

What I really want to know is why this writing thing is making me so much more productive about all the other projects. It’s probably exactly the same principle as having a paper to write causing your house to be clean. I know that’s not just me.

Falling down on the job.

Monday, January 7th, 2008

I keep looking at the paypal options for tip jars, and thinking “eh.” That, however, is no reason to neglect my digital broadsides page. The first one is up, and I’m sure there will be more. If nothing else, I’ve got an interesting backlog of designs from my coursework. 

The theory here is to get stuff out there, so people can look at it and play with it, and maybe one day I’ll have it come back in a shiny new form and get some more ideas. You know, art.

Also, funny thing: wish is starting to gel a little. You’d think it wouldn’t take two freakin’ years, but you’d be wrong. Giving up on everything I’d thought I was doing with the project did push it a bit. I’ve got cranes in one-liter canning jars; the next step is to get labels and print up mini-books to add on. If Lucy is still willing to put them in her shop, they’ll be for sale, and people will see them, which is kind of the whole point. 

Website noodling

Saturday, January 5th, 2008

I’ve finally gotten two of the three wish project galleries up on the website. It occurred to me that perhaps being a perfectionist about this stuff is ridiculous. (Wish galleries here.)

Of course, the third one is going to be the hardest, since it’s the part that’s still in progress. Ah, well, so it goes. I’ll get to it.

The next step is to figure out how I feel about Paypal and start setting up downloads. Oh, I do believe I am getting the headache. Living in the future is hard work. 

In which we find out how cranes burn.

Friday, October 26th, 2007

It has been one of those weeks. You know the ones I mean – they’re not bad, so much, as intensely … unproductive, maybe. There’s been some stress, in other people’s lives, but mostly I’m just frustrated and tired of banging my metaphorical head against brick walls. Strike that, reverse it … No, wait… Ok, and I’m using an awful desk at work, so my wrists have been sending me nasty notes, which means I haven’t really knitted or spun anything. Except for this one thing I started Wednesday, but we’re not going to talk about that.

There’s only one failproof solution to weeks like that. Fire.

(Actually, there are two, but none of the books I wanted were immediately on hand at either of the bookstores I checked, so I couldn’t start researching a particularly geeky and involved project just yet.)

We drove to the beach and had ourselves a viking funeral, with wee boats, the ocean, oncoming airplanes, and a bit of rain.

fire.jpg

(The cotton paper doesn’t float. Which doesn’t surprise anyone. The commercial paper, that floats. Of course, it also burns a truly impressive shade of green, so one doesn’t want to burn much of it. Perhaps the next set of boats needs to be made of something … less processed.)

Bike path outside Davis Square

Saturday, September 8th, 2007

Because I went into Magpie and felt a little like a failure.

davis.jpg

I still haven’t charted the Iliad.

Saturday, August 18th, 2007

But I have another crane shot.

fence.jpg

… I have to confess, this is a recycled crane. It had been hanging somewhere, but fell and got rained on and probably run over a couple of times, and it was holding up to the abuse so well that tucking it into the fence seemed like the thing to do. This linen paper continues to amaze me, even though I’ve been running linen paper through the wash for years.

Thought I’d forgotten, didn’t you?

Sunday, July 15th, 2007

Well. No. In fact, this little project is never far from my mind. For one thing, I have a rather large box of cranes taking up space in my house … so I trip over it sometimes. Then there was this telephone pole, with a convenient bit of wire wrapped around it at just the right height.

telephonepole.jpg

In the interest of not having quite so much backlog of materials (no studio space, dontchaknow, and it’s the one thing I miss about being in school), I’ve been working on strange projects designed to make certain things into objects which might be able to go have an independent life. For example, a cashmere nautilus. (Eh, I’ve been thinking about it ever since I saw the pattern in Knitty. Ok, not the cashmere part. I got the cashmere intending to make something practical, and because I was having an awful week and a dear friend took pity on me, but it just wasn’t enough for a scarf and it wasn’t quite bad enough to justify cashmere fingerless gloves. It’s been sitting around for quite some time now, and enough is enough.)

Also, it’s striped in very bright colors of a sort I am distressingly fond of but can’t actually bring myself to wear.

nautie.jpg