Woo hoo!

I want to thank EVERYONE for the wonderful comments I've been getting from the One World, One Heart event. It is so encouraging to get your feedback and appreciation! It's also been a very busy week looking at other blogs through the event and making new friends! I just wanted to send a shout out today to Kristen at Kristen Powers Ink. She has a wonderful tutorial on her blog on making some darling matryoshka earrings which I am so grateful for, because now I have a way to make my charms for the Artfest charm exchange! (Hopefully we'll be seeing a progress report on said charms here soon, as the due date is quickly approaching!) Kristen's earrings and more are available at her Etsy shop, Wear for Art Thou.

More encouragement: Some of my friends over at Gritty Jane Cloth and Clay dolls and Nancye's Art Dolls had already congratulated me on being published, but I wanted to wait until I had seen it with my very own eyes. Yesterday I received my copy of Stampington and Co.'s Art Doll Quarterly, and it's true: I've been PUBLISHED!!! yay! It feels good, and doesn't the Green Queen look good on that purple background! I can't wait to share it with my school friends tomorrow, especially the Queen's inspiration, Sharon Treadgold! If you're interested in reading more about the origins of the Green Queen, check out my post here.)

This is the cover of the Art Doll Quarterly issue, which, I believe, hits newsstands this week. Fabulous issue loaded with every variety of doll and creativity, as you can tell from this cover girl!
Also, I wanted to spread the word that anyone interested in making dolls should check out nancye's OWOH giveaway at http://nancyesartandbeautifuljunk.blogspot.com/2010/01/owoh.html
Her giveaway is a doll making class! Or maybe I shouldn't tell you, because I'm hoping to win that prize myself! (among many others!)

And finally, happy birthday to birthday girl Deirdra!!! We had a great time yesterday shopping at the Goodwill to find sweaters we could alter, à la Altered Couture (another Stampington magazine - they're awesome!). Deirdra has great step by step photos on her blog so you can see how hers turned out. Maybe I'll finish mine later today and post later. Ciao for now - got to get busy!

xoxo lulu

One World, One Heart Giveaway

¡Bienvenidos! Bienvenue!

WELCOME ONE AND ALL!!!

The day has come!

Step right up and take a magic carpet ride

to blogging friendship and community

around the world. Let the

One World, One Heart Event

begin!

This is your chance to meet bloggers far and wide, to see what they're up to, and to get to know them. Participating bloggers will be welcoming visitors with a chance to win a little giveaway. The event runs from January 25th through February 15th. On that last day, names of the winners will be announced. Have fun admiring the creativity and generosity of the participants. Click on the OWOH logo here or on my sidebar to see the list of all participants as well as to sign up to participate yourself.

Before I show my giveaway, I'd like to introduce myself to new visitors. (Thanks for the suggestion, Deirdra!) I'm Lulu. By day I'm a humble bilingual school teacher, by night I'm deeply immersed in my true love, ART. I love mixed media, getting paint and gel medium all over myself, playing with paper clay, dabbling in fibers, and giving myself permission to make mistakes and enjoy the journey. I have found that giving myself over to my mad artistic genius has made my life more sane and fulfilling and happy. Being able to connect with others via blogs has also been so enriching. If I haven't scared you off, I hope you'll come back and visit me here or at my etsy shop, even beyond the OWOH event. I look forward to meeting you via bloglandia!

AND NOW, TO REVEAL MY GIVEAWAY... (drum roll, please!)...

This little ballerina is one of my cloth and clay dolls. Her face is hand sculpted of paper clay and hand painted. She wears a sparkly tutu and pearly ribbons in her hair, and she would love to come and dance with you! Read on to find out how to sign up to win her!


To sign up for your chance to win my give away, please leave a comment on this post, and be sure to include a link or contact information so that I can visit your blog AND get in touch with you if you win. (If you don't have a blog but you'd still like to participate, please email me via my contact link up on my sidebar.) On February 15th I'll be putting all the names into a hat and pulling out a winner, who will be announced that evening on my blog.

GOOD LUCK!!!

I look forward to meeting you!

; ) lulu

ta dum!

go see!

Sometimes I'm overwhelmed by everything I think I'm supposed to be doing as an artist in this age of blogs and facebook and twitter... Because I work full time as a school teacher, I often find it difficult to make time for all the "networking" when what I really want is to spend my scarce time creating. Aside from that, I also have a hard time keeping up with the blogs of friends that I like to follow, and sometimes I feel guilty about that. Funny, one of the reasons I wish art were my full-time livelihood is so that I could have dedicated time for reading blogs and keeping up with connections. Does anyone else have these issues? (I'm sure I'm not alone in feeling this way!)

That said, this evening I gave myself the gift of catching up on the blog of the ever-so-versatile and talented Janne of Spindelmaker. I met Janne at Artfest last year. She is making such a wonderful life for herself as a professional artist. It's truly inspiring. I would encourage all to go take a peak and look through the variety of her work at her blog. I am particularly amazed by the commissioned work she did for Skandi Aker. Take a look. (p.s. She's have a January giveaway, too! Click on the photo below to find out more!)

beyond journalandia

Beyond Journalandia other projects call. The little table is busy with fatbook pages for Artfest.

The story is that once upon a time I saw someone racing past me in the forest. I caught only a glimpse of her red hooded cape, and then another creature, stalking silently behind...

And then there was all that soup. Have you ever been to a soup swap? I was invited to Sara's (WONDERFUL photographer and teaching friend) soup swap last night, and how delicious it was. Each guest made up 6 individual quarts of soup. Then, at the party our hostess passed out numbers from a hat, and you got to pick one soup at a time each round in order of your number, until all the quarts were taken. At the party we ate Sara's yummy chickpea soup. When I got home I had to sample Karen's gourmet cream of mushroom - very sophisticated (and nothing like that Campbell's soup!). Today I had Elephant Delicatessan's recipe for tomato and orange soup along with my cheese quesadillas - a nice play on the homey grilled cheese sandwish with tomato soup. For dinner I sampled my own curried squash and mushroom soup. Mm, mm, good. This is a mighty fine kind of party for chilly January, and everyone agrees it should become an annual event!

Chatted with the oh so busy Deirdra today. Good thing, because she reminded me that the One World, One Heart event is coming up! One week from today, January 25th. This is fun event to get to know other bloggers around the world. Susan Swifka, of A Whimsical Bohemian blog, is the creator of this event and has all the info you need to participate here. About time I thought about my give away. Good thing this little girl is almost ready to go. Here's just a sneak peak silhouette - we don't want to give too much away!!! At least, not before the event!

I hope you'll join in on all the blogging fun! See you there!

January journal, inspirations

Last week's journal prompt from Misty was choose a different artist each day to be inspired by. As it was such a busy week for me, an artist a day did not come my way, but last night I was visited by three: Chagall, Kahlo, and Klee.

First I shmeared some paint across a two page spread. (As you can tell, even more artists came to visit via teachings: LK Ludwig, Judy Wise, and Katie Kendrick come to mind.)

Next I lightly sketched in a couple floating as they danced across the page, à la Marc Chagall.

Then I started cutting out Klee-ish shapes, as in his painting, Landscape with Yellow Birds.

I glued shapes down and added others with paint.


More paint, yellow birds, a few words, and the journal entry is done.
(I think it's Frida's fault that Klee's landscape garden morphed into saguaros and nopales.)

(Question: Would Frida's art have been as powerful if she had not suffered so?)

sweet dreams.

January journal, day 9

Variations on a theme: Fatbook pages for Artfest 2010, Once Upon a Time, Little Red. In spite of all the vintage images I've clipped and saved, I've opted to go original: photo of one of my doll's face, hand-carved tree stamp, red felt hood, painted and stamped paper, and button embellishment. What can I say? It's fun to play with dolls. And paints and stamps.

Context, perception, and things that make you go Hmm...

Way back years and years ago when I was an undergrad art student, I learned an important lesson about putting your art out there in the public eye: it becomes vulnerable to interpretations never intended by the artist. It was always fascinating to sit anonymously in the lobby of the School of Art & Architecture after a show had been hung and listen to the passers-by discuss your work. I recall how one large installation I did, which for me was full of darkness, angst, pain and obstacles, was seen as light and playful by one viewer (who later became a very dear friend). How does that happen? Well, of course, no one can ever be inside your head and have all the personal background knowledge you're privvy to.

As such, a journal page I posted the other day got a very - interesting - response, perhaps based on the viewer's misinterpretation of the page out of context. It would be funny if it weren't for the sadness I felt at the resultant reaction. [My wise daughter has reminded me that 99% of what people do has nothing to do with you or something you've done, so I've decided I don't want to explain the whole thing after all. But I will say that the unfinished page on the left was a call to God I had a few weeks ago, and the page on the right surprised me.]

January journal, day 7; Resolutions, Part 4 of 4

Must sleep... but must post, too! Finally finished, the last of my New Year's resolution pages.

And just for fun, what the room looks like when I'm "auditioning" letters to go into the journal.

I hope your year has gotten off to a great start!

: ) lulu

January journal, day 5

Resolutions, Part 4, will have to wait until tomorrow. This is the page that wanted to come out tonight.

Color and light sing a duet,

playfully calling out to one another.

January journal, day 4 - Resolutions, part 3

I only have 4 resolutions this year. This is número 3:

Time to get serious about this fun stuff!

January journal, day 3 - Resolutions, part 2

(bring on the dumpster)

January journal, day 2

Today my blog will have to be my journal page, as I need to hurry up and go to bed so that I can wake up at 3;30 a.m. to take my Emily to the airport - it's time for her to go back to school.

: (

Has she really been here since Thanksgiving already?

It was a very busy artsy day all day, with my sweeties niece Summer and nephew Aaron. This was their Christmas present! I decided our art workshop day would be making cloth and clay dolls. I am astounded by how quickly they were able to learn each step, and with such wonderful results! Take a look:

Summer and Aaron are so great to work with - they really get into it!

Aaron poses proudly with A.J.

(Aaron, Jr.!)

Didn't he do an incredible job of sculpting A.J.'s face?

And here is Summer with her beautiful Angelina.

Lovely!

Ta dum!

A great day of sculpting, painting, and even collaging (see the little paintings they did while we waited for the paper clay to bake in the oven!).

A wonderful day!

Thank you for sharing it with your Auntie,

Summer & Aaron!

xoxo lulu

A New Year Begins

Happy New Year!

Once in a BLuE MoON

the sKiEs over the NoRthWeSt

actually CLeAR UP so thAt

yOu can See the FulL bLue MoOn

at the stRoKe of MiDniGHt

on NeW YeaR's eVe.

I wonder if it inspired

this mysterious little face.

I happily spent all of New Year's Eve and New Year's day
keeping my hands and heart very busy.
These dollies are being prepped for
"Auntie Linda Lou's Artsy Workshop Day"
for Summer and Aaron -
the Christmas gift they requested from me!

I had cHicKeNs on my mind.

I'm not sure why, but they made me HapPy!

Here is one of my little HeN paintings.

And FiNallY,

jaNuaRy JouRnaL

page 1,

PaRT 1 of this YeaR's ReSolUtiONs.

BeLieVe.