Baby Z, baby B & Mail Art, of course.

 Doesn't Baby Z look like she's shouting out a Rock Song? Yay! She was on her Da's lap swinging on the porch swing and having a great time. She was all giggly. My honey was her destination on each forward swing. What fun.

 Baby Bizoo looks good on a striped mat, doesn't he?
He likes lying about on the porch even though it's 90 + degrees out there, IN the shade.

 These Washi tape and circle pieces of Mail Art were done on a day when I had to move quickly and get out and about.

Going to those two things as my default never fails me.







I felt like they also were very much about summer and activity. Slow when it was too hot to move fast, then fast when possible.

 I printed out some faux postage stamps and punch them out with my special hole punch.

The brown paper is what remained and I loved the way it looked.





These two are from Thursday. They remind me of two things - clowns and apartment buildings. Right?

 These two are special. I made them on Friday and they are numbered -
365.2 #350

 and 365.3 #200

These numbers are amazing as I've almost completed my 2nd year of daily Mail Art, and am more than half way through my 3rd year. Yikes!

 These are today's Mail Art.

They represent the big thing that happened today - I got a new car!

I'd been planning to get another car this summer because a) my car has 2 doors, b) my car's a/c has been broken for 2 hot summers c) it was time, the Beetle was 14 years old.

What do I need more doors? Because at some point, Baby Z will get to ride with me and I need easier entry to the back & the future car seat. Why do I need A/C?
Aaagh. It's so hot here in the summer. It's a health hazard!

I had to get a very small car with 4 doors, so I had a limited number to choose from. I got a car that wasn't at the top of my list, and a year that I hadn't thought possible. Do you recognize this car?
The color - violet-gray!

Sunday: update on rooms, Mail Art, and more

 Here's my terribly messy studio, which I'd planned on straightening up this summer.

 Here's my studio as of this morning. The clearing up and out happened sooner than I thought.

That pesky draining A/C unit created a waterfall in the wall dividing my studio and the TV room.

I'm a bit tired but, surprisingly, not cranky about this. Just tired.

 Here is my temporary studio, that I set up on the enclosed side porch off of our bedroom. I have a nice view to my right, of the big tree in the back garden. Not sure where this lap top will go. Perhaps after I cut up a bazillion black squares using my paper cutter, I'll put the computer on that little table.  I think I've kept essentials at hand.

365.2 #322

365.3 #172

These are Friday's Mail Art pieces. I like the paleness of them. A bit of topo map, some Washi tape, and my new circle dots rubber stamp.

365.2 #323

365.3 #173

Saturday's Mail Art: some more topo map scraps, stickers from a map sticker set, and since I didn't think the compositions were working, I added an ink swoosh! Yes! That works.

365.2 #324

365.3 #174

More topo maps in today's Mail Art.

Most of my stuff had been moved to the new space but the work area was in the old so what to use. I started with two pieces of paper torn from a magazine print of a Leger painting.


I put a piece of topo map behind the bits. Glued down, they looked okay, but not great.

I still had my tin of Washi tape handy, so I added bands of tape and that just made the composition work for me.
Tomorrow's Mail Art will be made in the new space. I'll be able to get out of bed and just steps away will be my studio! Nice!

 Here's Bizoo. He's exhausted from helping out, jumping in and out of boxes, checking out where things were going, watching stray ants on the window sill, tossing scraps of paper. He does like this perch on the old high chair which is in my new studio space.

And here's the cutie pie, Baby Z. Can you believe it? She's 3 months old, and looking so serene.

Structures and Mail Art

  I'm very fond of old timey factory smoke stacks. This one is on Hull Street across from ArtWorks. Quite impressive. I don't know the factory that it's attached to, however.

 This structure is across from Plant Zero and can be seen from Hull St. I don't know what it's used for as I've never seen anything being done on it, but I like it and see it as a large sculpture. The electric wires, pole, and lights add to it.

365.2 #270

365.3 #120

 More circles and Washi tape in these pieces of Mail Art. My default when I can't find any images that I like. Actually, I'm running low on images and need to get some old magazines, then I need to spend some time cutting things out.

365.3 #121

These two pieces of Mail art use only 2 pieces of paper for the collage. I cut up an abstract expressionist painting, and these were the scraps left from the main image that I cut out. I decided that I liked the random shapes. These make me want to paint again, for some reason.

365.2 #271

I'm using a coated white cardstock background for these pieces. It's necessary to use a strong adhesive for them. I've been using Pioneer glue stick and it works well.

Caught up with myself, whew!

 This morning, after I quickly made and posted my 365 Mail Art, we drove up to Washington, D.C. with friends, to see the Smithsonian Craft show. And a special treat at the Sackler, the Cyrus Cylinder.
Amazing! It's sooo ancient. Check out the link.

 My friend took this reflection of our honey's. You can tell that she's a professional photographer, right?

365.2 # 267

#365.3 #117

These two pieces of Mail Art were made on Saturday after I hosted the Slow Art Day 2013 at the Virginia Museum of Fine Art and had dinner with friends. It was late, I was tired, what to do, the day was almost over!


Because I was rushed I grabbed the Washi tape and put a strip down on each card. What to do? Circles of course. And you know what, I actually like them a lot.

365.2 #268

365.3 #118

Since I felt that yesterday's mail art was successful, I used Washi tape and circles again today. More tape, more circles.



I'm quite satisfied with the results of these, also.


What can I say, I'm just satisfied to be making Mail Art every day. I think that sums it up for me.

Here's another view of the entry to the Virginia Museum of Fine Art. I was relaxing on a bench, a couple days ago, after having done a walk through to check on the route for Slow Art Day 2013.  I really like the reflections in the curved window. I like how Robinson house is condensed and it appears that there's a vista beyond.

Catching up on Mail Art Monday

365.2 #230

365.2 #231

365.2 #232

I decided to put a few of my Tiny Town prints in my Etsy shop. I had three that I couldn't fit into the gallery space so they are immediately available. I thought, why not try it! This is one of the prints.

365.3 #80

Surprised

365.3 #81

365.3 #83

365.3 #82

The following 6 pieces of Mail Art were done during the past week. I was running on empty, or so I thought, but somehow, ideas came to me. How, I just looked at what was on my studio table, or in one of my little tins of cut out bits.





















My friend Katerina had sent me cut off strips of color paper from her projects. They've come in handy.










Washi tape is always a favorite default of mine, as well as, the ubiquitous circle.











Surprise! We had snow yesterday. Big, fluffy puffs of it fell from the sky. Lots of those big puffs fell in a short period of time and cause havoc to reign. Lots of fender benders. We made it home okay and found our hen and her chick surprised by the snow, as well.








3 bits of paper and I have a composition!!

365.2 #233

More of Katerina's strips of color. The substrate is cardboard cut from boxes and any other source that appears in our house.

Sunday - continuing to catch up

#198

 For today's mail art, I used "left over" hole punched paper. I was thinking about how nice this would look. After I put the black background down, it really popped!

#197

Here's another for the Banana Action series.  A banana floating along while water skiers rush by.

#46

The colors in this piece are the punched circles from  #198. Bet you already guessed that. Randomly tossed circles, colors I do not like together, some Washi tape, and voila, a composition. 

#47

The scene is the Indiana Dunes, a memory from my childhood. I put the Victorian girl in the lagoon, since she looked a bit sneaky about something. Surely she'll get a scolding from her ma for this.

#196

More of those awful color circles with a tape of a non-coordinating color. More experimenting. However, in the end, these always seem to work for me.

#48

Here I used the other hole punches "left over" paper.  You can see the circles in use on the previous post. Again, the placement of the black paper as a ground makes the colors really look good. They got lost on the white ground. The funny thing is that after I glued them down, I looked at this and it was like a cute, little face was looking up to the corner to the card. Did you see it?