texture tuesday~ vintage

this week's texture tuesday challenge from dear kim klassen was to use something vintage as our subject. she provided us with a fabulous new texture "pourvous."

i could have pulled out any number of old things i suppose, but what came to mind right away was a treasured photo i have of my grandma arel, my memere. and no, i am not calling memere vintage.

i made some adjustments in levels, hue/saturation, & contrast, then added a sepia photofilter @66%.

i added a layer of kim's "trust" texture on soft light blend at 100%, then her new "pourvous" texture

on hard light blend at 69%. i erased a bit of the texture from memere.

my mom remembers this was one of the first photos she took with her new "Brownie" camera. i decided to leave the torn bits and worn edges alone, not edit them out. that's me memere is holding - thus the vintage label. as i approach the half century mark in a couple months, i feel i am certifiably vintage.

there are many things i love about this photo, first, that i even have it. there aren't many photos of the two of us. second - i love how skinny my legs are. they didn't stay that way. i love my saggy diaper and memere's saggy stockings. and her slippers, and her fancy watch. we used to beg to wear her fancy watch.

memere was french, born in quebec. she was the most amazing lace maker, and why oh why didn't i watch her closer. i have the sample book she and her sisters put together, another treasure. she spoke in a mixture of french and english, unless she was mad, and then the french flew. it wasn't very helpful french to learn i later found out in 6th grade french class.

at any rate, go check out all the other textured vintage lovlies now here!

welcome to the house of arachnids...........

i have a very deep dislike for spiders. not a lot makes me scream like a girl (other than teenaged sons not taking off their muddy shoes in the house), but a spider, any spider regardless of size, brings embarrassing shrieks from me every time.

at our cabin i expect spiders and have fashioned a routine to deal with them. my husband goes down first, bombs the cabin, and a few days later i go down and sweep up the remains. a dead spider i can handle.

our home in town i expect to be spider free. during an average year we will have the occasional spider visits, which i have learned to live with. i would scream, and devon, my spider killer, would come running and make it go away. it worked well while devon was home. i hope the air force appreciates the sacrifice i am making for my country. because lately, my house is full of these:

i was very brave to take these photos, i think. even now i have goose bumps. this was not just an average "oh ick, a spider" spider, this was colossal. the size of a fifty cent piece. not kidding. no need for photoshop texture here - look at the hair on the back of this thing!!!!

this was just one from yesterday. before him i had one come out of the kitchen sink drain when i was washing my (now broken) coffee cup. how the heck do they get in our plumbing???? there were two more in the kitchen cabinets, one in the shower (sponge bath for me tonight...) and my personal favorite of today, one in the hood of my sweatshirt - that i didn't find until it crawled up my neck....ewwwwwwwww. last night cullan had one in his bed, so i took a good 20 minutes to shake out my blankets & pillows before i climbed in my bed.

why are they so profuse, and so stinkin' big??? was it the week of beautiful sunshine and warmth we just had? if so, give me back the snow and ice. perhaps there's been a bit of unreported chemical leaks, or nuclear stuff floating around???  these guys are so big even my pal duffy won't go near them. i'm pretty sure they could carry him off. i'm serious.

tonight when i go to bed there will be a thorough shaking of the sheets, i am wearing socks, and there will be a flashlight and a can of bear spray on my night stand. if it can stop a brown bear, i'm hoping it can stop these nasty creatures. gerry better hope he doesn't bump into me tonight...he'll get clobbered, sprayed and shaken out.

texture tuesday~ rerun

i know i've recently posted this photo of my pal duffy, but i didn't have time this week to get out and take pictures...an anyhow, doesn't he look like he's just waiting to be a part of texture tuesday?

i set the background on soft light blend, then used a gaussian blur. i placed a layer of kim's golden texture at 54% soft blend, then a layer of kim's mad love texture at 61%  multiply.

Disclaimer: no squirrels were harmed while taking this photo.

don't forget to go check out all the other awesome photography at kim's texture tuesday link-up here!

texture tuesday~ a cuppa joe

this week's challenge from kim was to use a photo of a coffee or tea cup, and her sweet texture "luminous." this is probably my favorite texture so far, i love what it did to this photo...like looking through an old screen door.

i used two layers of luminous on this, one on soft light mode and one on multiply.

this time i left them both at 100% as i really liked the aged look it gave the image.

my dad and i found this old rusty cup years ago while walking behind our old house back east. we used to hike on an old stage coach road that ran along our property, and we found all kinds of great treasures~ old bottles, china doll parts, tools. he loved it, and so did i. maybe that's where my obsession with rust came from...and pack-ratting...this cup has moved everywhere with me, been to college, art school, for some reason it even came to work with me in bristol bay...i'm just glad i've hung on to it all this time.

here's the before:

isn't photoshop something? and, just for fun:

this is using luminous once on hard light blend at 58% and once on multipy blend at 74%.

the modern quintessential coffee cup... now, go check out everyone else's photography here!

make art while the muse shines~

it occurred to me that the only thing i've posted about lately has been photos for texture tuesday, when, in fact, i've been busy in my work room with other stuff too. having deadlines helps. this year's Whale Fest art show has been up for a month, and i finished two pieces to enter in it. after a serious non-creative blah spell, it felt good to get back to it and accomplish soomething.

this is an altered tin i titled "robert service's retirement plan". i forgot to measure it, i believe it's 2" wide and around 6-7" long. i let the tin get nice & rusty outside for a few weeks, then layered torn charts, a bit of rusty screen, a spot of embroidery i did on some rusty muslin (i love rust), & an old button all attached with beeswax. for the crowning glory - a beautiful old fork handle found on the beach (score) & a little compass i soldered to a piece of something metal, also from the beach. these i attached with rivets and wire.

the detail on the fork handle was so pretty, even after being in the sea for who knows how long.

i think it deserved to be dressed up with some pearls and crystals.

here's the inside. i'd never seen this particular robert service poem before, and it is what inspired this piece.

"When I have come with happy heart

to sixty years and ten,

I'll buy a boat and sail away upon a summer sea;

and in a little lonely isle

that's far far from men,

in peace and praise I'll spend the days

the gods allow to me!"

to that let me just say AMEN.

i layered it with gel medium to a chart on the inside top of the tin. on the other side i did a fabric collage with more rusty muslin, more bits of beach metal, some pearls & buttons & beads, a snip of old lace and a flower from some hand dyed silk ribbon. of course, there must always be a mermaid (especially if one is retiring alone) and i found this one from the graphics fairy (a fabulous site & my go-to spot when i need any type of clip art, that gal karen has it all and if she doesn't and you ask her, she will find it. a-maz-ing.) i printed her out on some pfd muslin and stitched her on.

"a red halibut" (un fletan rouge) was the other piece i did for whale fest. it measures roughly 11x14". i  machine embroidered the halibut onto yet even more rusted muslin (i know, but i really like it), then sandwiched it with some cotton batting and machine quilted it. sewed on a chunk of a chart with the latin name for atlantic halibut (realizing too late that it should have been PACIFIC halibut, oh well) with a chunk of lace, & added a chunk of well-patina'd beach metal. i prepared the foundation board with some paint, some tide tables, a few teabags and other stuff. added a really awesome strip of copper to the top (another beach score) drilled some holes in it, then sewed the quilted piece onto the board with -get this- butcher's twine i RUSTED and waxed. okay enough with the rust.

i also made this:

a real lemon merange pie, made with fresh duck eggs. check out that merange! i was feeling pretty cheffy. and it didn't fall, it stayed that tall to the last piece. from now on, it's me, donald and daffy in the kitchen.

in closing, i need to share with you something about that little bit of embroidery on the cover of the robert service piece. i have no clue how to embroider. my mom embroiders entire quilt tops. i did one cross stitch panel when i was in junior high. but i wanted some embroidery on that cover, and was determined to not have to ask mom not to do it for me. (you know, i've never been able to shake that "i can do it all by myself" thing)  thank goodness i discovered mollie johanson's blog wild olive, and feeling stitchy. between both these sites i found a plethora of tutorials, pictures, patterns, and help. they are both just beautiful to visit, with excellent photography to boot. so after a few hours of this:

(i couldn't have done it without my glow in the dark mary back there. she always has her eye on me)

and the smallest of tension headaches, i was able to stitch the little lazy lotus blossom (on - you got it - rusted muslin) all by myself. i showed it to my mom, but the poor thing just doesn't get my art. she came out of her laundry room with a bottle of Mrs. Stewart's Liquid Bluing that she thought would help me get the rust stains out.

texture tuesday~serendipity

after making some changes in the hue/saturation and levels of this photo, giving it the "stormy" look i wanted, i added two layers of kim's serendipity texture: one using the soft light blend at 57% and the other using the multiply blend at 100%. am i nuts taking a rare perfect sunny day on this island and turning it grey & stormy?

here it is before i made my changes

this week kim gave us a beautiful texture to work with, called serendipity. i suppose like most things, serendipity means different things to each of us. i think serendipity is when we return to our cabin on the bay for the summer. right after we get the windows thrown open for airing, get the dead spiders swept out of the tub, get the water running again, the beds made up, and can finally sit out front and relax, listening to...nothing. silence. no cars, talking, doors closing, engines running, clocks ticking. just the quiet of being far away from everything. well okay there is the drone of the no-see-ums buzzing around our bug nets...

 i've posted this photo from last summer before, but it's a fave of mine and i didn't get a chance to take any inspiring shots this past week. the halibut tails for the kicvb chocolate lover's fling and halibut tail art auction are due soon, and that's all i've been working on for days. i'm almost done. i'm pretty sure when i am finished and it is loaded in the car to deliver to the fine kicvb folks, i will be having another serendipity-ous moment...

until then, go visit all the other beautiful photography from around the world by clicking here!

texture tuesday time~

this week's challenge was to use two of kim's textures, sweet treat and silence. i used two layers of sweet treat, one on multiply at 50% and one on multiply at 100%. i also used two layers of silence, one on soft light at 100% and one on multiply at 100%.  i like the grainy, aged look it created, covering up the stains of age on memere's doily.

here's the photo au natural:

i know. it's like eating a bowl of plain shredded wheat while the person

across the table is having stuffed french toast from ihop.

give me texture.

i love texture tuesdays. i love textures. textures are like spa treatments for my less-than-professional, non-perfect, poorly-lit photos. thank you sweet kim klassen. really, if you are reading this and haven't yet checked out kim's site yet, click here for a visit. viewing her images are like a little vacation for your eyes. and click here to see what other folks are doing with kim's textures. it's a whole other vacation! and proof that spring is blooming somewhere...

meet our evening visitors~

we've always had a group of deer wandering around the woods surrounding our house. they weren't around much after our neighbors cut down all their trees (i am still bitter and they still haven't gotten the xmas fruit cake from me since.) during the winter they returned to the neighborhood and i'm loving how at home they've made themselves in our yard. they are smart enough to not visit until after gerry is asleep. i think they can pick up on the vibe that the man sees anything with fur and four legs as a potential meal.

 there are five in the "family,"  three does, who are the shy ones in the group, a beautiful buck, and this little guy~ i call him tippy. his little hoofs click on the driveway, sometimes that's how i know they're here. i think he is a yearling. he lost his spots finally, but he still has that cute baby face. and look at that belly!

tippy's not very afraid of anything, he and my pal duffy the small white dog are working on a type of friendship that involves a lot of you-chase-me then-i'll-chase-you around the back yard. duffy takes it as long as he can then comes in and guards his food dish. you never know, tippy might be able to fit in the doggy door...

look at this guy! isn't he handsome? i took all these photos out of my really dirty windows (i can't reach to wash the outsides of them on that side of the house...and our ladder is old and scary) so everything is muted by the dust. but he really is beautiful. he follows along behind tippy every night while the gals have some girl time down back.

i'll be sad when the grass greens and they move on for the summer.

time flies...texture tuesday already~

this week kim shared a beautiful texture she named "silence."

(i love silence, pure calm quiet. i have enough rattling around in my head all the time without adding extra sounds to it. lately my pet noise dislike is the rapid-fire tic-tic-ticking of my youngest son's texting. might as well be fingernails on a chalkboard....)

the day i took this photo was a wonderful calm day, no breeze, not even a seagull cry.
just a bit of splash as the slack tide slapped on the rocks.
the next day it was blowing 50 and pelting snow...

we live on a wondrous island.

i used two layers of silence, 100% soft light & 42% multiply.
 i also blurred the whole image with a gaussian blur at 27%.

visit all the other texture tuesday participants here. you will be amazed...

texture tuesday with ms. kim

i took this photo last spring at the oregon coast. i'd never seen anyone fish into rolling surf like this before.

 i watched him for about an hour. never did catch anything.
but it was a beautiful day.

i adjusted the hue/saturation levels and added two layers of kim's warmsun texture;

one at softlight, 100% and the other at multiply, 73%.
check out all the other amazing texture lovers here!

beating the blogging blahs~

i've been in a crummy slump lately. i don't really know why, but i just haven't felt like doing a dang thing. not even cooking has been fun. (thank goodness for a freezer full of venison burger and boxes of hamburger helper at times like this...) (and nope, you won't be getting daily posts from me as i follow julia childs' cookbook...)

as i read blog posts from folks all over, it seems the joy of spring has hit in full force everywhere. i'm just not feeling it yet.

at this point i would be remiss in not taking notice of the plight of those in japan right now. long time kodiak residents can certainly relate to them, sans nuclear nightmare, having lived through similar tsunami devastation after the earthquake of 1964. i hope we all continue to pull together to help these people regain their homes, their lives.

whether i'm able to romp through cherry blossoms or not, it's time to get myself out of this rut. the whale fest art show is less than a week away *gasp*. as i type this, sitting right next to me staring in it's eyeless sort of way, is my naked halibut tail, ready to be turned into a work of art for the 3rd annual KIVCB halibut tail auction. it needs to be done...soon.

earlier this week i did manage to go through all my sweatshirt pockets and the ashtray (used only for beach finds) in my rav for the little baggies of sea glass i've been collecting with my pal duff on our morning walks on the beaches. i perked myself up enough to get a bunch drilled and fashioned into jewelry:

Note to local lurkers: (i know you are there) you can now purchase these and much much more at Emerald Isle Framing, 334 Shelikof St next to the brewery, open T-Sat from noon. 907-486-0884. if you are not local and interested in my sea glass jewelry, please email me!! i haven't been keeping up my etsy store, but am happy to work with you on a custom purchase.

yesterday i hit the spring cleaning. right down to throwing open all the windows and doors and scrubbing and waxing the floors on my hands and knees. i know, who does that anymore? i have to admit it felt pretty good going to bed last night knowing every surface in the house including the toilets and the top of the fridge had been slapped with a hot rag and bleach. and when i got up for coffee this morning i was touched by my pal duff's little love notes to me in the form of perfect little muddy paw prints across the kitchen...we had a chat about feet wiping and the meaning behind the phrase "tan your hide."

{and if you are reading this devon, happy 20th birthday. we miss you and love you.}

i love my jug of sourdough starter

my family doesn't understand my deep attachment to my jar of sourdough starter. i can't explain it to them. it's taken me years of training to get them all to the point of understanding that if the jar is on the counter behind the sink, leave it there. if it's on the ledge behind the toyostove, do not move it. if it's on the bottom shelf in the fridge, don't bump it trying to make room for your sunny d. they all finally understand the basic sourdough rule: do not touch the jar. every summer i wrap it up and hand carry it with me on the boat ride to the lodge. the boys tease me that i should strap an EPIRB on it.
i don't know that i understand why i am so attached to it. it's not like i'm ma ingalls in a sod house in the middle of the prairie~ i can pick up a loaf of bread at safeway lickity-split. maybe it's a nurturing thing.
my friend veronica gave me a cup of her starter several years ago so i could get mine going. a friend of hers shared a cup with veronica long ago, with the story that it originated from relatives who carried it with them over the chilkoot trail in the 1890's.
i don't know if that is a valid fact or not, but when veronica handed me my jar of gooey, yeasty history, i felt a certain obligation to keep that starter alive. so far so good. i feed it, stir it, keep fumbling hands away from it. in return it turns out amazing muffins and sourdough french bread. and last night, a fantastic batch of pancakes. i wonder if they could be called vintage...

why i don't listen to the news~

i've been thinking about my middle son devon a lot today. i haven't seen him in over a year now. well, thanks to skype i have seen him, but you know what i mean, i haven't touched him, or fed him, or done his laundry for him.
i showed you him going off to air force boot camp, and let you know he made it through with flying colors. since then he's been sent to texas for training, over to florida for more training, and now is stationed at seymour-johnson air force base in north carolina, where he is a crew chief and engine specialist on F-15 fighter jets. two days ago he texted me a photo of himself in his dress blues, right after he received his second stripes. they are beautiful, and he looks so good...
it's been an emotional journey having him choose this path for himself. mostly i have been filled with pride, seeing him follow in his grandfather's footsteps, hearing his pride in himself over the phone as he met each test & obstacle over the past year. i know he loves what he's doing. i know he's being taken care of and that he's going to the dentist and eating meals. i know he still has a few months of tests and things before he is "deployable." i've chosen to focus on feeling the pride and telling myself he is on the ground fixing the jets, not flying in them...

and then i read the news this morning. two u.s. air men shot and two wounded, in germany. one of devon's best buddies from boot camp was recently stationed there. the air force base in germany is home to the only F-15 fighter wing in europe, and it's on devon's "wish list." my heart is heavy as i wait to hear from him. i can only imagine how his friends' parents are feeling.

pride can only carry a mom so far.

i see the person who did the shooting is 21. so young.

devon is 19. his 20th birthday is the end of this month. and i'm thinking if i would have talked him into college, he would have been worried about what he was going to be doing for spring break instead of doing the final pre-flight check on a fighter jet engine...

bless the families of those four boys.

hot off the deck

yesterday i completed our last assignment for kim's skinny mini photoshop ecourse. i can't believe how much i've learned, she is a fantastic teacher. i can't wait to take her essentials course now.
in between snapping photos and manipulating them (gosh i love being manipulative) i managed to finish one project i can check off my list...
i found this funky little table/lamp unit a few weeks ago at a friend's yard sale for $2. i'm not much for wrought iron, but one can never have too many lamps in a house in alaska in the dead of winter...

...before....

(i just realized i'm showing my really ugly mud room to the world...great...)

...after...

i decided it would make the perfect "knitting at night" table. i spray painted the base "tomato soup", what a great name, huh? i stitched up a quick bag for the bottom to hold my numerous unfinished knitting projects...slapped some fabric scraps on an old lampshade, and popped a full spectrum bulb in it. after sanding down the table top i painted away, then gave it a few coats of sealer and put it all back together. it's bright & happy & keeps the boys out of my stuff. all for under $5. i'm feeling so frugal...

wow~

 

i think the only thing photoshop can't do is fill up my gas tank.

i know how to wield the magic eraser tool.

no one need ever know what a horrible photographer i am again.

thank you kim klassen.

it's a software miracle~

i've been working on kim klassen's skinny mini ecourse for photoshop elements this week. ms. kim is nothing short of amazing. in a series of well executed videos and homework, she has managed to unlock the mysteries of layers, blends, adjustments and textures. she's a great teacher, and so generous to offer this class at no cost. if you've been intimidated or discouraged by this software, i really recommend signing up for one of kim's classes - just click on one of her buttons i have over on the right to see some of her work.

look at the difference!

swap-o-rama

linda at a swap for all seasons hosts the best swaps ever. her latest swap challenge was to create a 5x7 fabric collage piece, simple & sweet, inspired by something our partners liked.
my partner was nancy from the vintage dresser . we share a common like of vintage kitchen linens and old stuff. and the colour green. (she has a couple of great tutorials posted for mini note pads and a sweet mini album made from coffee filters (!) go check it out!)
so, here's what i came up with for her:

the image of the fairy princess is courtesy of karen the graphics fairy , who keeps us supplied with wonderful images to use however we will. i printed her out in sepia (the princess, not karen) and freshened her up a bit with coloured pencils.

a couple of the background fabrics are actual old feedsacks, the rest are reproductions. the linen trim on the left edge is a precious piece from my memere's sewing stash, as well as the old buttons. am i the only one who has stashes of these things and finds it incredibly painful to actually use?? i don't know why, even my memere used to say "c'est tout simplement" which i think was her way of saying "it's all just stuff", and i always like the way everything looks when i'm done...

i gave it a bit of machine quilting and added a jar of pixie dust so she could sprinkle her 3 wishes around. it was very hard not to sew a binding on to this....but we were supposed to leave them unfinished for our partners to finish as they like. i mailed her off to nancy today, hope she likes it.

linda has set up a link here to all the finished pieces, go have a look, there are some beauties!

happy valentine's day!

can you find the heart?

look close.... it's on the cliff below the leaning spruce tree,

by the furthest breaking wave...

have a great day!

sunday sunshine

eat your supper....

today has been a really windy, rainy, cold cold day. gerry has been working out on a boat all day, so i know he will be frozen and wet when he gets home. the perfect day to make turkey pot pie for dinner...
i get his call to let me know he's on his way home. great timing as the pie is done. i set the table, then do the usual clean up of the counters, etc. when i turn around to get the plates, this is what i see...

never turn your back on a small white dog.