Beautiful Buffalo

It has been a long time since I was on Ebay but this morning I was purchasing more bottles for my sand collection and happened upon this, white fiberglass buffalo. 

Wouldn't that be great, just as is, white, as backyard art? Then I found The Spirit of the Buffalo website. Loving the Picasso buffalo and this Indian headress, below.

These two beautiful sculptures below by Emily White.

"Standing Buffalo" by Carl Kauba 

Let's not forget the wonderful Buffalo Nickel.

Dumbarton Bridge Buffalo

The making of The Buffalo Trail by artist Richard Loffler

Some Buffalo statures on AluminumYardArt.com 

Oaxacan Wood Carving Damian Morales Buffalo 

Springing up

In one day, every little thing seems to be sprouting new leaves and flowers are popping up in dead leaves. 

 

Secret ingredient

Well, I am not going to Texas tomorrow. Instead, my friend has a publisher for her book ... and we will be spending the week putting that together for a 3/15 deadline. ;)

Before I am off into InDesign-no-man's-land ... I have been working on Brantlers, on and off the last 2 days. 

The secret ingredient. ;)

Painting branches red and recycled metal leaves from Goodwill (painted my favorite green).

Trying to get two branches that match up is a real challenge. The reason I have so many in my garage. Tell my husband that. ;) One is perfect ... will have to go out and get another matching one. 

In print (again)

I have been creating some logos for Ron Hansen but I have not had any work printed for a long while. Yesterday, my first piece in the Everett Herald. Woo Hoo. 

Visual illusions

 
A new one from a friend!

 
More visual illusions here.

Purple Passion!

Great to be home. Lots of work to get caught up on. VistaPrint has been having some promotional sales, and when they do ... I take advantage! I am making a Purple Passion card set. I really, really love to see my flower photos in print! Isn't it fun? Putting them up on Etsy soon.

 

Stopped off foraging for branches on my way home from North Bend. And found this wonderful weed and some branches (hidden from my husband in the back on my truck.)

 

This is my life

It’s Your Life, So Make the Most of It

My FB activity increases whenever I am dog-sitting. Which is where I am this weekend. I just documented some details of my surroundings while I walked the dogs outside, followed them around the house and watch them, watch me working on my computer. 

For a the last 2 weeks, I have been employed part-time at The Everett Herald. It feels great to be back in a newsroom. Hoping I can remember how to *work* in the newsroom again. Have done a few illustrations and maps. I feel so lucky. 

Still compelled to search out jobs every week. But I have discovered in the last two years, every 3 months, the same companies advertise the same jobs. Makes you wonder what kind of job it is that they can't keep an employee for more than a couple of months. And I have applied several times to many of those places. The last 3 months I made a decisions NOT to apply with those companies. Not that I am bitter about either my having application being ignored or after an interview being passed over for "a candidate that meets our needs more closely" ... :} --- more of the thought that I really don't want to work for those companies. I know those companies well. I know lots of people who work for them and are required to work 50 hour weeks, long commutes, longer meetings full of corporate crap. I finally came to my senses, corporate life is not for me. My curmudgeon, introverted personality does not do well in an environment where I have to smile and sit through long meetings that have no meaning (for me) but to add to the layers of bullshit. 

In my last position, this night owl was given the 430a shift that required several meetings during the morning. Two things on my list of things I DO NOT do well. I was always the one that volunteered for the overnight, late night gig because everyone knew I was better for late, late night than at 430a in the morning. My response to the art director was that "if I didn't know better, I would think you were setting me up for failure, cause for firing". That did not go over well with him, but it was the truth and I saw that coming for 4 years. That's businesses, I am aware of that. I just don't think I want to subject myself to that on a full-time basis.

I feel so free, so relieved! I have made it over the "I-have-to-be-fully-employed-by-a-giant-company" hurdle. I have been doing some freelancing, dog-sitting, now part-time job. I can just keep doing lots of odd jobs instead of one (uncertain) secure one while i get my other art interest off the ground. I am decorating my life.

I sold two more Brantlers at butter home. I tried to get to the studio last week. My band saw came back from being repaired and David cleaned up a big mess we had both made. Ready for me to get back to work and make some fun! 

It is frightening how much TV/online I watch when I am out here. I watched Parade's End on HBO (thanks to the heads up from Maggy) (on my HBO to GO). It was a terrific series, just too short. I caught up on all of my shows I like, Project Runway, the teenager inside of me loves to watch Beauty and the Beast, some new stuff on Netflix. Of course, I am also working as watching ... I am very good at multi-tasking.

This is my six word memoir: "he has always believed in me". More Six Words on Twitter.

I really love Becca Stadtlander illustration style. Prickly Pear below by Becca Stadtlander ... so see more of her terrific work.

I have started following The Reverse Wine Snob.

Can you believe these paintings by Karen Woods? Yes, that is a painting! Via Lost At E Minor
 

I am in a remote place this weekend with bird calls that I am not familiar with. Yesterday at dusk, I heard these distinct "whistle" calls. Long, strong, whistles, many of them out there in the thick of the woods. I started searching bird calls and with the help of my FB friends was able to figure out it was a Varied Thrush. How exciting. I thought at first it was a Cedar Waxwing.   

Mega Brand Mandala

In Houston, the Swedish artist Gunilla Klingberg treads the same ground with an installation called Wheel of Everyday Life. At Rice University’s Rice Gallery, Klingberg has laminated the floor with a massive black mandala--the Hindu and Buddhist iconographic tradition -- that explodes from the white-walled gallery into the arcade outside of it. Via Fast Company and Rice Gallery. See more work by Klingberg here.

 

Snowflakes

I love this description on even cleveland ...  

"What sort of diary should I like mine to be? Something loose-knit and yet not slovenly, so elastic that it will embrace anything, solemn, slight or beautiful, that comes into my mind. I should like it to resemble some deep old desk or capacious hold-all, in which one flings a mass of odds and ends without looking them through. I should like to come back, after a year or two, and find that the collection had sorted itself and refined itself and coalesced, as such deposits so mysteriously do, into a mould, transparent enough to reflect the light of our life, and yet steady, tranquil compounds with the aloofness of a work of art. The main requisite, I think, on reading my old volumes, is not to play the part of a censor, but to write as the mood comes or of anything whatever; since I was curious to find how I went for things put in haphazard, and found the significance to lie where I never saw it at the time." ~ V. Woolf 

I found this on even cleveland. Illustrations of Snowflakes (1863), plates from this book - Snowflakes: A chapter from the book of nature (1863). Since I have been a little obsessed with snowflakes, especially since I started a snowflake pinterest board.

 

"Fresh Guacamole"

Did you see this on CBS Sunday Morning? "Fresh Guacamole" looks good enough to eat (but don't). This video was created by short film director Pes, who has a ton of other amusing clips on his website. "Fresh Guacamole" is being featured in Showtime's Short Stories series. 

Can't embed the video, but you gotta go see it!  Found it!

Mirrored tray

I saw this little setup the other day at a local home decor store. Old bottles on a vintage, interesting mirrored tray. Then, I found this cute little mirror the Goodwill ... now I just need to add a twig or two. 

Paper Mache

Love these instructional videos on how to make paper mache creatures by Dan Reeder. Be loose! And his blog.

Nuture

Mom called this morning to read me my horoscope (as she does every morning). Today was a good one ... "Pisces (Feb. 19-March 20): Today is a 9 -- Nurture the seeds of your growing business. Don't be talked out of it; listen to feedback from loved ones. Use creative tactics. An old enemy changes tunes. Work comes in." 

I saw that tomorrow is the 2-hr finale of Downton Abbey! 

It is snowing-raining and I hope it all goes away by tomorrow so I can find my way home.

The pups and I are getting along in a grand way. I think they all like/trust me now. 

I hear Pebbles is sleeping on the sofa, by the door, waiting for my return. ;( This photo taken before I left home.

Laying with the dogs

I am baby sitting. And trying to work in bed with all the dogs laying on top on me ;) There are a two more dogs in the house. One is still trying to warm up to the idea that I am here instead of mom.

 

 

Dead Flower Society

Awesome nature

Look what I found this morning, little hairs on the seed tail, gleaming in the sun. 

 

 

 

 

  More Beautiful Afterlife.

My stamps arrived!

Is that kind of like "My ship came in"? I order them from RubberStampChamp.com. I think I should have gone for the extra charge for the higher resolution. But these will do for now. So excited, somehow, I feel official. ;)

Anniversary

I am so lame. So busy. So frantic since last week. I forgot my anniversary! Thankfully, my husband is very understanding about these little misses. Thankfully, I had purchased a little present for him but had not wrapped it yet. I had planned on a very special gift wrap. Oh, well. 

He gave me Frida and Diego finger puppets. Get it, the crazy artist (me) and the real artist (him). ;) 

 I found this adorable Love Tree by 2 of 2 on Etsy. I really love it. It small but wonderful. Aren't these little trees just the cutest?

Finished a logo before 8am this morning that I have been working on the last couple of days. Finished a mock-up skin for Rick last night. Almost done with 2 ongoing websites. Had two days full of detour maps and revisions. 

Also, bit of good news. I will be selling Brantlers at Butter Home in Seattle. Thank you, Claire! Tomorrow, to the studio!!! Leave this silly computer for a couple of days to create. 

And I might have a part-time job at a newspaper. Will find out today.

Murmuration

Makes me want to be in a small boat, in nature. More from Islands and Rivers

 
Murmuration from Islands & Rivers on Vimeo.