Blue Plate Special

For some reason, I got it in my head that the Easter bunny should deliver a hearty breakfast instead of chocolate, peeps and jelly beans, so I decided to create some crocheted delights small enough to stuff into plastic eggs.



For the egg, I simply crocheted a round and increased my stitches until it was egg size. I did the yolk the same way, but added a little stuffing before sewing onto the white. I made the bacon crinkly by slipping a stitch instead of single crochet every 5 stitches or so, every other row. To make the coffee cup, I started with a round of 6 stitches and then steadily increased until it was the width that I wanted. I did one row in the front loop only to make the cup go up. I kept going until I got the height. The coffee itself is made the same way as the egg. I use stuffing to make it look like a full cup. The toast is a square with brown stitched around the outside. The butter pat is a square also. Maybe I'll make some orange marmalade next time.

Bon apetit!

Vintage Pop-Up Valentines

Valentine Greetings:
Down love's highway let us stray,
We two forever, side by side,
The honey-moon will light our way,
And Cupid will be our only guide.




















A friend of mine found these old pop-up cards in a box of family memorabilia. They appear to be from the 1930's. I love how ornate and lacy they are. The detailed cutting around the bower makes for nice shadows.

Pop-up Valentine Workshop

How to mend a broken heart? Cut it up and glue it to some cardstock! Join me on Saturday, February 6th from 2 to 4 for my Pop-up Valentine workshop at the Modern Spool studio. Nothing says "Don't you think I'm cool?" like a pop-up work of art. I hope you can join me!

New Pair of Glasses

Here's a little paper cut I did just before the new year. I was inspired by a contrasty photograph of a butterfly I found in my uncle's artist morgue. I scanned it into Illustrator, increased the contrast, and printed it out for cutting. I mounted it on some translucent paper from discarded paper samples. I love reusing and recycling when I can. Sometimes beautiful paper comes through our mailboxes and heads straight out to the recycling bin.

I like my butterfly, but I can see some rough places in my cutting. I think of this first try as an experiment. In the process of trying to do this detailed work, I discovered that I need new glasses. I'm looking forward to clear vision and more challenges in 2010!

Winter Tree

Cut from a watercolor done by Janet Lindell














Song

You're wondering if I'm lonely:
OK then, yes, I'm lonely
as a plane rides lonely and level
on its radio beam, aiming
across the Rockies
for the blue-strung aisles
of an airfield on the ocean.

You want to ask, am I lonely?
Well, of course, lonely
as a woman driving across country
day after day, leaving behind
mile after mile
little towns she might have stopped
and lived and died in, lonely

If I'm lonely
it must be the loneliness
of waking first, of breathing
dawns' first cold breath on the city
of being the one awake
in a house wrapped in sleep

If I'm lonely
it's with the rowboat ice-fast on the shore
in the last red light of the year
that knows what it is, that knows it's neither
ice nor mud nor winter light
but wood, with a gift for burning

Adrienne Rich
Diving Into The Wreck

when I am among the trees

Birthday card for a friend inspired by a Mary Oliver poem.

When I Am Among the Trees

When I am among the trees,
especially the willows and the honey locust,
equally the beech, the oaks and the pines,
they give off such hints of gladness,
I would almost say that they save me, and daily.

I am so distant from the hope of myself,
in which I have goodness, and discernment,
and never hurry through the world
but walk slowly, and bow often.

Around me the trees stir in their leaves
and call out, "Stay awhile."
The light flows from their branches.

And they call again, "It's simple," they say,
"and you too have come
into the world to do this, to go easy, to be filled
with light, and to shine."

~ Mary Oliver ~

let it snow let it snow let it snow

It all started when my friend Anne gave me a waterlogged copy of a pop-up book called Leonardo DaVinci, A Three-Dimensional Study. Sadly, Leonardo did not make pop-up books, but his 3D geometrical designs inspired me to make a 3D snowflake. My kids told me that snowflakes were flat, but I took artistic license with the subject anyway. Besides, they look all fluffy and big when they are falling from the sky and school is about to be canceled.

I took to my studio determined to recreate the feeling of the design. It reminds me of translating poetry. There's no way to duplicate it, but you try to capture the spirit of the thing in your own native language. What I found out in this process is that I really should have paid better attention in geometry class. Guessing got me nowhere. I had to be precise to get the angles and the movement right. I used Adobe Illustrator to do my measuring for me on the basic structure. I looked to The Elements of Pop-up by David Carter as my reference for creating a stable platform, strong enough to support the fully extending snowflake as it opened. At first my base was too high and looked awkward, but I didn't give up the idea of the two different levels of the structure. I'm enchanted by the fact that something completely flat can be tall and multi-directional when opened. I don't think pop-ups have to be complex to achieve this, but they do have to be interesting.

I'm pretty happy with my little snowflake. Now that I have it drawn up in Illustrator, I can recreate it easily whether I hand cut it or use my CraftRobo to do it. I can now make minor tweaks as needed or take a completely different direction, using the structure to make a flower or a tree. Of course I would never make two of my snowflakes exactly alike.