News!
03/22/06
I pieced my first baby quilt! Well, I guess this is my second sorta quilt... I did a doll quilt and pillow for Laura's 3rd birthday but I didn't take any pictures of it. It was pretty crooked! haha. But this one is going to be much better. I bought Charm packs from Fat Quarter Shop. The one I just pieced is called "Oh Baby." The colors are nice and subdued and simple prints. I bought some cream flannel for the backing and will find some nice elegant yarn or ribbon to do little knots in the corners where squares meet. I also bought a quilters' book so that I can find some more complicated patterns (this was just basically sew one square to the next!). I have two more charm packs to make. One of the quilts will go to my friend Lourdes who is also having a boy a week or two before me! Maybe I'll save the third for my sister when she finally has a child.
03/15/06
I finished another Pocket full of dreams-type book and uploaded some pics in my "hand-made journals" album (button on the right). I've decided to start keeping little thoughts and letters in it during my pregnancy and the first year. I've saved a few tags from baby clothes and put them in the little pockets. I stuck an old cabinet card photo of a toddler into the front and may mount that onto the cover or just inside somehow. I haven't decided how to finish the cover. But please take a peek. And now I've promised to make one for my coworker who is one month ahead of me! Well, I already have several covers ready to go. Just have to cut and prepare the paper. This one went pretty fast because I used scrapbook paper I had laying around.
02/10/06
Late report... but Art & Soul was great! We were at Asilomar near Carmel. Beautiful place! Very peaceful; no phones or tvs- and a herd of deer seemed to live right on the property. I took To Have and To Hold with DJ Pettitt (where we collaged with fabric and then made a purse), Pocket Full of Dreams with Nina Bagley (making a lovely fabric-bound book), and Composition Conundrum with Claudine Hellmuth (basically talking about several types of composition styles). There was a wonderful vendor night where I bought a little purse from DJ, two pendants from Sally Jean Alexander, and a Poppet collage with "nest" as the theme from Claudine. We also had show-and-tell night and it was really fun to see everyone's work from the classes. I've uploaded my pictures from Art & soul to my flickr account. My Pocket Full of Dreams book is in "hand-made journals, the collages done in Claudine's class are in "mixed-media collage" on the right. I haven't taken a picture of the purse from DJ's class because I'm not done!
11/21/05
I've finally uploaded pictures of my Pullip & Blythe dolls here.
11/7/05
I was just doing some shopping on Amazon and clicked on the listmania list I made for altered art books and was shocked to see that my list has been viewed over 2000 times! I've even received a couple of emails from people who liked the list. There are a lot of folks interested in altered art! If you want to see my list, click here.
11/5/05
I've been scouting out some new art classes to take. I signed up for a short class on distressing techniques at our local Stamp on Over store. Then today I checked out the winter catalogue of courses offered through Stanford's Continuing Studies program. I found two that I LOVE- Drawing in the Cantor Arts Center (basically museum sketching), and Artists' Books for Creative Writers (exactly what I've been toying with). I KNOW I have to take the artists' books course.. but I also really want to take the drawing class. Registration doesn't start until Dec.
11/3/05
I'm signed up for Artfest and the mini Art & Soul retreat in Monterey, CA. I'm working on fat books for each of them. I'm sure going to be busy for the next few months! At Artfest, I'm taking classes from Keith Lo Bue (metal, jewlery, found objects) and Diane Culhane (fine art- acrylics & collage). At Art & Soul, I'll take classes from Nina Bagley, DJ Pettitt, and Claudine Hellmuth. So excited!
10/18/05
I've been accepted into the Mixed-Media Collage Artists' group! I'm so excited! These are seriously professional artists! DJ Pettitt is a member as well as my new friends Katie Kendrick and Misty Mawn. If you click on the link, you can go look at the gallery of all these wonderful women. I'm working on some new pieces I can upload for their gallery.
10/15/05
I took a cool class! It was UTEE Jewelry with Suze Weinberg (yeah THAT Suze!). She invented UTEE (Ultra-Thick Embossing Enamel). It was all day long and I was totally tired at the end, but it was great. We learned about image transfer with UTEE (pretty similar to packing tape transfer), faux soldering, marbling the new opaque colors, faux dichroic glass, etc. Now all I want to do is use my melting pot! I bought an extra pan so that I can use it for beeswax.
9/27/05
I'm taking a Collage/Assemblage class this quarter at Stanford in the Continuing Studies Department. The teacher is Michael Paulker. There are about 15 or so of us in the class of all different kinds of backgrounds
9/24/05
I won Honorable Mention in the ATC Contest at the Original Rubber Stamping Convention last weekend! The ATC was a breast cancer awareness theme made with colored cardstock, found phrases, a pebble, watch dial, bead, and a ribbon from a candy shop in Madison, WI. What I find ironic is that at a rubber stamping convention, my ATC was the only one entered that didn't use rubber stamps! The prize was $10 in "mad money" to spend at the booths at the convention. I bought some fancy vellum paper.
This website is under construction. Please excuse the mess! :) Currently, none of my writing is online yet- just the photo albums of some of my artwork.
 About Me
I started out loving books. I have fond memories of riding my bicycle to the library every other day in the summer and reading every book I was allowed to check out. It wasn't too long before I began writing my own fiction. Mostly science fiction... as that was what my parents liked to watch. In elementary school, we saw Star Trek, Star Trek the Next Generation, and Knightrider. In high school, I began reading science fiction and a little bit of fantasy. I won a short story contest in ninth grade (not science fiction!). Left high school early for college and started writing science fiction. Over the last 14 years, I have written short stories and worked on several novels.
Meanwhile, I loved art. I always wished I could be an artist. In high school, I started making jewelry with beads and wire, and took painting and drawing classes. I put aside the paints to work on my writing and took up knitting. Later, I rediscovered my love of art and recently became fascinated with altered art. Now that's what I do with my time! I remember the "Aha!" moment when I learned about altered books. Here is a medium where I can combine my writing and my love of books with my love for art and my short attention span! I always have to be learning new things. Now I'm starting to get into assemblage.
A lot of subjects influence my art, but the key ones are religion, equal rights for women, the dark side of some things, and infertility.
Gifts
I love making gifts for people. I don't take photos of the cards I make (except for that one elaborate card for Judie), but everything else that leaves my hands, I try to have a picture of. You just never know when you'll want to go back and see what you used to do. So this website will organize my images and help me see my journey to get better and better at finding my own personal style.
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