Hey! I'm in a book!

I didn't want to say anything until I actually had it in my hands and saw for sure but yeah...

Check it out here!  

  

I'm one of the 1000 in this big thick book put together by Dawn Sokol of  D'Blogala.  

This is the journal spread I sent her and it made it into the book.  I'm on page 254 if you're interested but I just showed you the whole thing, so don't buy it on my account. 

There are, of course, plenty of other artists in it and some that you'll recognize too, including the lovely and super-talented Catherine Witherell.

You should totally buy it because it is PACKED with  really incredible journal art.  It'll take you a week just to look at it all!  It's quite a pleasant little stroll through other people's minds. 

In other news: 

I got pink hair!

And I never want to NOT have pink hair again.

And because my obsession demands it... I'll leave you with this: 

Thundering Mediocrity

I've lost the will to blog! 

I've been trying to get back on this horse for a few days now.  It's been so long since my last update!  HOLY MUTHA!  It's like... that was a long time ago, dude.  OH the pressure to explain where I've been and what I've been doing and why I haven't updated.  And I appreciate all the the emails and comments asking what's going on with me.

But the answer is just not that interesting. 

What's going on?   Uh.  Nuthin.  

Went to Artfest, came back... went to Puerto Rico shortly after that to visit family... and become a Godmother x2!  Went to Philly right from there to visit more family, came back... wandered into my studio... sat down... and proceeded to do NOT a single damn thing.  Not.  A.  Thing.  For like... weeks.

Especially not a single artistic thing, up until a week or so ago when I took a Visual Journaling class taught by my friend Tally Oliveau.   It was awesome and inspiring and just what I needed to get creative again.  If you're in the area you should check her workshops out.   Here, I'll make it easy for you... Click it.

Things moved pretty fast in that class.  I don't work fast.  I'm ridiculously slow.  So for me it was scary and horrible.  But in a good way?  Okay...  I'll show you what I ended up with even though most of it is kind of fug, so you can kind of get what I'm talking about. 

Here's the first journal page I did:

I know there's really no place for perfectionism in art but this, to me, is a hideous, sloppy mess!  GEUGH. 

I'm only posting it to show my progression.  I'm much happier with my second journal entry... Obviously it's not finished but I like it much better than the first beast.  It means something to me... so that's good.  Right? 

My third journal entry from this class is my favorite.  I won't give away the secret teaching technique of Tally's that inspired this, because that was just COOL!  Painful, but cool!   I'll just let it speak for itself: 

It's still pretty sloppy, and keep in mind I'm not showing you the other side of the page that Tally totally forced me to scribble all over, but this page is a perfect balance of what I wanted it to look like and what just came out of me without thinking too hard or agonizing over details.  

So, yeah, I like it.  

I've been feeling kind of slumpy these days, actually.   I feel like... with some distance... looking back on the things I've been doing... I kind of suck at this art stuff.

Okay maybe not suck.  I just think... there is a thundering mediocrity to it all.  I want to be better... I'm just NOT.  I guess it would help if I actually worked at it more instead of spending way way way too much time reading about what's going on with David Cook on the fan forums.  (Yes I do and no I don't care if you think I'm a big dork.)  

But I just haven't been feeling it and I can't force it.

I am currently working on something for a special project with my Dorm Chix at Artfest.  I stayed in a hotel because I'm a wuss, but I partied with the girls in the dorm and now we're doing this fat book project together.  I have procrastinated... A LOT... but I think I'm getting close to doing something sort of good and fun... kind of... in a way.  I'll show you when I'm done.  

And so that's it.  I'll leave you with some cool (non-people) shots that I took on my visit to Philly last month.  If you want to check out my gorgeous nieces and nephews in both Philly AND Puerto Rico, just check out my Flickr page.  Nothing is labeled though.  If you want, you can make up names for them.

These are all from an area in Philly basically known as South Street.  Very artisic, wild and fun place to be.