The Other Side of Somewhere

Fifty Cent Dreams and Stuff

The last few months I've had vivid and interesting dreams featuring symbols that repeat themselves (not exact repetitions, more like variations on a theme).  Symbols like elevators, escalators, and skyscrapers, and one unusual dream involving, er, melted butter. 

Being naturally curious, I decided to start keeping track of these dreams and try to divine what, if anything, they might mean.  Dreams remind me of poetry in that they both deal in metaphor.  I love that!

I've been paging through modern dream interpretation books and tomes that include page after page of boring Freudian dream philosophy and Jungian archetype dream philosophy, and not finding a reference anywhere to elevators, escalators, skyscrapers, and, ahem, the melted butter, so imagine my amusement when I found this book at the thrift store today for fifty cents!  Written in 1952 it addresses all of my symbols except for skyscrapers.  Inside is a handwritten dedication in blue ink reading: "to my Darling little Dreamer, Christmas 1952, Your loving husband."

Such a perfect and serendipitous find!  Not only may it possibly help me discover patterns and meanings in my dreams, but will be great for collage work as well!

* * *

On the creative front, I am still plugging along with my day/week/month project.  You can follow along on flickr.  At the 30 day mark I have a few things planned, so stay tuned for that.  I'm only on Day 21, but I'm already learning a lot through this process. 

Today, I went out to swap-bot; I hadn't been there in awhile.  Swap-bot is a wonderment of swapping goodness!  People swap everything from themed CDs, to zines and artist trading cards to postcard and holiday themed projects.  So much fun!  I signed up for these: A cupcake atc swap and flickr favorites swap (which requires no sending of anything and is so easy its ridiculous!). 

Go forth and swap!  It's good for you!

* * *

If you are here looking for the All About Blythe page, I've temporarily removed it from my blog.  I am trying to decide if the Blythe stuff needs its own blog.  I hesitate to do that because I don't like the idea of breaking my interests down into six gazillion blogs, but I want to keep a balance of things here (it's not all Blythe, it's not all art, it's a lot of everything).  I'll figure it out; in the meantime I've removed the page.

However, Blythe aficionados, do not despair!  I am hosting a Blythe photo swap via swap-bot!  You can check out all the details and sign up via the link.

Finally, whether you are Blythe collector or not, you might appreciate this article profiling the designer of the original Blythe doll in 1972 and the revival of the doll in the last many years.

Enjoy!

When I Dream ...

We woke up this morning and went ... fishing.  Well, Mr. P. went fishing and I rode along in the boat.  Friends, it was freezing cold.  My toes went numb almost immediately and for most of the time we were out on the water, I was wishing I had one of these.  Ah, the things we do for love.  Mr. P. helps me with craft shows and I ride along on a November-Almost-December fishing excursion.

Still, I would rather be freezing my toes off in the boat on the day after Thanksgiving, than fighting with my friends and neighbors over the last of a reduced-price Something at a department store before the sun even thinks about coming up.  I'm not quite into the Buy Nothing movement; I am fine with buying and shopping, even on the day after Thanksgiving.  My objection has more to do with the retailers who play to our basest natures by playing games (reducing prices on high ticket items for a limited amount of time or not making enough of something to purposely create a feeding frenzy).  I used to work in marketing (for business to business products and services) and it was such a thrill to provide information to the companies who could use our product/service.  We didn't have to play tricks or create an aura of greed or lack to convince them to buy.  I notice more and more how retailers and advertisers play up competition and keeping-up-with-the-Joneses and it makes me very uncomfortable (the new Big Auction Site's commercials "shop victoriously" makes me ill).  I'm sure there is a middle ground that can be reached here. 

**Putting my soapbox away now**

(ahem)

Not much going on.  Mr. P. is leaving next week ... it's hard to put that aside, but we are doing our best.  Carved out some time to work on a journal page this evening:

Hope all of my American friends had a lovely Thanksgiving holiday!

Autumn Photo Shoot

My backyard is a-flame with leaves in all sorts of dizzying colors.  **swoon**

Took my long-neglected girls out for a photo. Contrary to the rest of the country which mentally seems to have completely glossed over fall and Thanksgiving, fast forwarding straight to Christmas, we are still savoring the wonderful-ness that is AUTUMN!

Except for reducing the size for the blog, these photos are "as is" from the camera.  No photoshop.

Owen (1972 vintage Kenner Blythe)

Scout (Rosie Red Encore Blythe)

Gracie (Prima Dolly Saffy Blythe)

Day Seventeen: NaBloPoMo

Happy Halloweenie!

This is what happens ...

... when you send your spouse to pick up some candy for trick-or-treaters.  "Some candy" in Mr. P-speak = SIX JUMBO BAGS!  The kiddies in our neighborhood are getting HUGE handfuls of candy tonight. 

I found this photo from way back when (1978 to be exact).  I'm the gypsy ...

Happy Halloweenie!

Full Circle

I love it when my creative process forms a full circle.  My project today is a reflection of that circle.   

It started with random doodling in my sketchbook.  I really liked the weird little guy on the bottom left hand corner.

I scanned him into photoshop elements and played around with various lighting levels and filters. 

Once I had a look I liked, I created a greeting card design using an easy publishing software program. 

The card looked great but the plain white envelope needed a little something.  I transfered my pencil doodle to eraser carving block and carved a stamp.  Apply acrylic paint to the stamp, press on the envelope and - voila! - a custom printed envelope!

This was so much fun to do!  I can't wait to do additional designs.

Here is the inside of the greeting card shown above.

Switching gears ...

Many of you have been emailing me questions about Blythe dolls.  I've created a special [permanent] page on my blog to answer your questions.  Access the page here (or through my sidebar).  You'll also find a few Blythe-specific links in the sidebar.  Just keep scrolling down ... you'll see all of it.

I hope this helps out ... if you have additional questions, please leave a comment or send me an email.  If I don't have the answer you are looking for, I can probably find it for you.

Catching Up

Whew.  It's been a crazy couple of weeks ... haven't had much time to devote to my blog and creative pursuits.  This is the first day in awhile that I've had all to myself!  Wheee!

Mr. P.'s work situation continues to hover over us.  The entire process has been a twisty, dizzying roller-coaster ride (I don't like roller coasters, literal or figurative).  It's been hard not to just crawl into bed with the pillow over my head until everything is finalized and official.  There is still hope he will remain at home, but I have to ready myself for the possibility that he will leave.  It's a very weird place to be emotionally, stuck somewhere between hope and despair.

My Blythe doll obsession has proved to be a worthy distraction from all the stress.  Working with them and photographing them is such a challenge, something totally new for me.  I actually spend a lot of time reading my digital camera manual, twisting knobs, and pushing buttons (and using a tripod!) to take more considered photos.  I'm still traveling a major learning curve, but it's fun! 

In addition to being a great distraction, Blythe is also a gifted ambassador.   I had the pleasure of meeting Amanda (a local blogger) last weekend to drop off her first Blythe doll (I predict the first of many!).  It was such a treat to meet her in person after following her blog for awhile ... Amanda is charming and kind and she is already well on her way to creating her own Blythe fashion line!  Can't wait for that!

Beyond the dolls (and worrying!), I've spent a lot of time paging through this book.  The tone occasionally borders on over-zealous (though the D.I.Y. movement is one I support), but the photos and ideas for different graphic design projects are verrrrrry inspiring.  I'm itching to spend some time with my publishing software and my printer making cool stuff. 

I've also been working on pages in my newest art journal, which you can see at my flickr site.  I found out recently that a few of my journal pages have been selected to appear in a book of art journal pages to be published in the near future.  I've never had my work published in a book, so that's kind of fun news.  I had to submit my artwork to the publisher electronically and I got a very thorough education about scanning, resolution, and file sizes ... it's a completely different ballgame when the photos have to look good printed on paper instead of the computer screen. 

This is becoming a monster post, and though I could probably write more, I should stop so I can go make stuff!

Hope all is well with you!

Breakfast

Donuts and coffee.

Yum.

Guys and Dolls

Sophie
Originally uploaded by Jeannine P..

It's been kind of weird week as we continue waiting for official word about Mr. P's status. There are a few different scenarios and it could very well be favorable for us, but we just don't know at this point. It may be awhile until we know something solid.

In the meanwhile, I'm just trying to remain calm, busy, and distracted!

I'm in the middle of art journals right now and haven't felt much like playing in them this week. I'm almost finished with my Don't Spare the Powder art journal and I have another journal "curing" (more on this process next post).

This week, I switched my creative attention to my Blythe dolls.

The Blythe thing is hard to explain. You either get it or you don't. :)

I loved to play with dolls as a kid. I never cut their hair or dyed it with Kool-Aid, I was more interested in the stories I made up for them. I remember being very sad when I was "too old to play with dolls" and had to put them away.

It's funny to me, that now I have these dolls (at my age!) and that what I enjoy about them is fixing them up! I cut their hair, sand their faces, rip out their eye chips and replace them, use pastels to add color to their faces and any other number of customizations.

The Blythe thing is a different kind of art project for me. I'm working with real tools (that I secretly swipe from Mr. P's stash in the garage ... do you think he'll notice he's missing screwdrivers and pliers?).

Working on these dolls requires me to take risks (the risk being potential mistakes that could ruin what is a relatively expensive "canvas").

Photographing them requires learning new things as well, such as how to set up a "shoot" and really seeing what my camera's capabilities are.

I love to make the stock doll into something totally unique.

Blythe is a fun [and plastic!] departure from my normal world of paint and paper. It's taking me a long while to get these dolls in the state I want them, but I am sure having a lot of fun with the process. (And Blythe peeps are among the nicest and most creative people out there!).

Hope you are having a good week!

More on the journal curing process next post.