30th post- the final day of blogging

I wanted to end my month of blogging with a bang, this could not have been timed better if I tried.... the universe delivered it to me today via good old fashion snail mail.

My whole month was consumed with this and it seems only fitting to finish the month off with this:

                                ahhh
                                it feels good.

29th post!

Today I spent the whole day either sewing or posting the stuff I had sewn into my etsy shop:
The Bird & The Bean

My goddaughters live next door and they are often my models...today was no exception...they had me laughing and remembering what it was like to be 4 and 7 years old.
So here is your reminder in this season of grinchs and unkind words:

don't let the holidays get to you.

28th- I ran back home

We are not one for crowds or congestion or wackadoodle people.
Weekends often involve a trip to FRY's I go when I feel like I need some good people watching... and boy did I hit the motherload when we made a trip to FRY's electronics, post thanksgiving.
I needed to replace my ink cartridge and hubby wanted to look at stuff.

It took a while to find parking, but it was alright, then the police car outside, and the line that exceeded the space for the registers. These did not scare us off.

...past the front turnstile into the approaching toddler who was screaming at the top of their lungs because they were trapped in the shopping cart, no we didn't turn back then....onto the first isle of random things.

A Hannah Montana lamp that did things we could not figure out...it was purple, it caught our attention.

Then onto the next isle...the isle of things that all look the same to me, the untrained tech eye...I am sure they are all very different diodes* and transistors and things...but they all look the same. It must be a total bitch to restock.

Note* I use to work at Dow electronics many moons ago, so I know a thing or two about diodes.

Past the motherboards and onto the game section, I glaze over at this point as I am not a gamer, but live with one and so after many years I have learned to not try and pick out games for him any longer, as my tastes are clearly different:
" Mini Ninjas?...ummm NO"

So I watch the some kid play Rockband/Guitar hero ( I can still not tell the difference)

while hubby sifts thru the new releases.

Then it is time to look at monitors and keyboards and processors....we do the same loop every visit.

Then the quick look at the ink cartridges and realize I could get a new printer for the price of the replacement ink for my current one!! ...still can't rationalize the price, we move on.
Then the TV's and the cameras and then I see this.....

I was actually concerned for a moment that it was real...but I am in an unreal place and this is just the kind of thing that makes sense...this paired with a candy bar.

I stood there staring at it for a while wondering, is the vampire thing that big that you need to feel like you are drinking it straight from the blood bank? I simply turned and looked at hubby, who didn't know what to say about it.

He took my hand and said, "you ready?" ...all I could say was " OH YEAH, I think I have enough to process for today"

27th- Evidence of a good meal

Dinner last night was amazingly relaxing and yummy....

pick one from the appetizer, one entree and one dessert
There was a RAW option in each area...but I went traditional.
I ate it all and left with a full belly and a happy heart!
(you can click on the pictures to make them bigger)

hubby started the day by making an apple pie from scratch

mother and son...and a sunset at the restaurant

let the food begin...

salad option

dinner

mushroom option

desserts!!

peter-in-law

Hey the only bummer about getting dinner out is the lack of leftovers!!

I'm kind of hungry now...

26th-Thanksgiving as a vegetarian

I have been a vegetarian since I was 16years old.
I started by not eating beef, then poultry and it was clear sailing from there.....

Thanksgiving is a strange holiday...besides the obvious embarrassment of being the ancestors of people who lied and stole and killed off the native persons of this land.
(well technically, all my peeps were still in Europe...my hubby's fam were actually on the Mayflower and were the first recorded marriage in the new world, true!)

I am not a "soapboxer", any more, I truly believe that people can come to their own choices about food and there is no need for me to preach my choices to them on spoons.

For me, I choose to be a veggie as a teenager in a time when it was still a "hippie" thing to do. None of my friends were veggie and I was an island to myself. I started off as a teenager veggie, eating french fries and grilled cheese sandwiches and not putting much "thought" into what I was choosing as food.
Over time, it evolved into a deeper understanding and I educated myself as to what the secret words for "animal" were in foods...you have to learn a LOT to be a smart veggie.
I became more and more aware of what I was eating, what others were eating and what I wanted to not eat anymore.
I have settled into a life of lacto-ovo vegetarianism....I flirt and swing into veganism now and then, and recently have been reading about RAW food diets.
I don't drink milk, I only eat egg whites when we go out and whole eggs in cooked items.
No seafood, and read labels on all sorts of stuff still....

Over the years Thanksgiving has been a dreaded time, as the gathering often focus on what people have made "special " for the vegetarians in the group...when it is really just me.
So many moons ago I started traveling around now....I would be overseas where thanksgiving is not celebrated and it was easy to "just eat".
This year, we are going to a vegan restaurant to have a meal with my in-laws. Hubby's idea...it is a relief in many ways...I can just sit and eat, and feel not so "special".

My hope is that people just THINK about what they are eating, where it came from how it got there and how it feeds you.

I had my last bite of turkey at the age of 17, and my first bite of pumpkin pie at 27.
I am thankful for all I have learned about food since then, I am glad that hubbys family survived all those years and gave me a great man, I am thankful that my peeps crossed all that land and ocean so I could meet him.
I am thankful for my 5 senses, my imagination, my emotions, my dreams.
I am thankful to be a sister, daughter, wife, godmother and aunt.
I am thankful for being able to read, write and communicate freely.
I am thankful for food on the table, and in the earth.
I am thankful for bad, so i know how wonderful the good can be.
I am thankful for the good , so that I can share it with others.
I am thankful.

25th - Wine

I have had two glasses of wine.
A plate full of mashed potatoes, broccoli and "quorn chicken" cutlet with BBQ sauce.

I have fallen asleep twice, I will relinquish to the haze and enjoy the sleep.

Tomorrow, what a vegan thanksgiving looks like and what I am thankful for.
tonight...sleep

24th day- Garden

I watered the garden today, it was quiet and just before sunset.
Alone with only the sounds of the birds busy before nightfall and the water hitting the ground.

The pamelo tree that is over grown with fruit

a neighbors cabbage

morning glory finding new items to climb

the scarecrow that amuses the crows

sunset creeping in

23rd day-the honey makers

So I have posted for 23 days this month...kind of strange.

When I visit my garden, I often stop on the way out and watch the bees...they are so soothing and warm.
The other day many of them had bits of pollen stuck to their legs and were drinking what nectar they could find...Thank goodness for the honey makers. They make life sweet.

All Images © Monica Wiesblott 2009

All images © Monica Wiesblott 2009

22nd

Today would have been my grandmothers birthday, sadly she passed away just last year.
it is 2:30am and I am awake with thoughts of her.

21st..You like me, you really like me!!

As some of you know, I have submitted to a very prestigious printmaking group in Los Angeles.

Los Angeles Printmakers Society (LAPS), is a very well respected printmakers society that considers new membership twice a year.

I submitted earlier this year, but was not accepted (you can view the gritty details HERE).

Keeping their comments in mind and talking with a dear friend and art mentor,Nicole Strasburg, I created a new strategy and submitted again.

I received a call Saturday afternoon from the press that is hosting the jurors...needless to say my heart sank...
"I am sorry to tell you but your disc is unreadable"
I started by saying I was so very sorry and apologized for this. Then came the tech details and my offer to drive down my submission, or email it.

I was asked if I had a website, and on seeing it (while still on the phone with me) he asked if I had submitted before, he remembered my work!

I was given instructions about emailing the files and calling back.

I called back and was greeted with a "cancel that order...(pause) we got your email and you got an immediate thumbs up."

I think I said thank you a million times, I thanked him, the jurors, the chance, the phone call; in fact I said thank you so many times he started to laugh and ended the call by saying "congratulations"

So ladies and gentlemen, meet the newest artist member of the Los Angeles Printmakers Society!!

My submission is viewable here:

http://monicawiesblott.zenfolio.com/p378343524/slideshow

Friday funday the 20th day of blogging

I have a lot of commercial building around me, well not directly around me but where I live and work.

I use to find them boring, but then something clicked in me and I started to find them interesting to look at.....
I have found myself photographing some of the many commercial buildings around here....

There is a strange lonely quality to them at times...like something was forgotten there.

19th...Due date day

I could not stop thinking about my submission to the LAPS...in fact the USPS made sure it was on my mind way more then I wanted it to be.

I mailed the submission on Monday with the assumption that it would arrive overnight as normal. Well you know what they say about assumptions...
Boy did it make me feel like ass...

According to the USPS tracking site...it sat in never-never land for a whole day and then materialized in Los Angeles for half a day, then half a day in Santa Monica...before finally getting delivered today.
****ON THE DUE DATE...the last day.*********
urhg I think I need an antacid or something.

So it is there.
I have to ween myself off the thoughts of it now...it is totally out of my hands.


Here is what my workspace looked like in the middle of it all:

18th day of November

I got a cryptic message two weekends ago to join a friend for cake.
She was bringing it, but I was to bring a fork.

Hello, no need to ask twice.
I am always happy to help a friend.

This was the cake, the swirling around the cake was how I saw it....all else went blurry when in the presence of this CAKE. Chocolate cake, chocolate buttercream frosting, raspberry topping and filling.

Two layers and big enough to serve 20!

the cake was in honor of a dear new friend and local SUPERSTAR!!

She can easily be recognized by her sparkles, grace and beauty.

Plus she strikes this pose when spotted.

****

We (there were three of us) took on to the task of eating the cake and overdosing on sugar.

I was the first to fold. One piece complete with ice cream had be begging for mercy.

The Superstar and her like minded cake eating accomplice went for a second piece!

Many giggles, and spoonfuls later, we shared tummy aches and the quiet that only a sugar overload can provide.

All in all I am impressed, three people took out almost half the cake...

I think I will be dreaming of buttercream for the next day or two.

What a great way to celebrate being a grown up and eating cake for dinner!

day 17...I have fallen but I am getting back up!

OK OK I messed up and forgot to post on Sunday and then last night I was suppose to post about Sunday...
Well I am gonna give it a try again:
Day 17 offers new hopes for my month of blogging!

Sunday was a lot of bouncing...and sugar

It was a celebration of my nephews 2nd time around the sun!

I am so lucky that I get to make the birthday cake...it makes my heart full and happy.

plus when I see this It makes all the world stop and laugh!

blue teeth, red teeth, fingers....clothes.

It was a lot of fun and I spent a good bit of time bouncing in the huge bouncy house in the middle of the back lawn with squeeling skreeching little clowns!

I was a little deaf and rattled by the end of the party.

***

So that brings me to yesterday.

I had also spent all of Saturday printing.

I set a goal to submit again to the LAPS (Los Angeles Printmakers Society), the process means you submit work to a jury that reviews (only two times a year) it and decides if you are really a printmaker. I was given a lovely,rejection letter eariler this year telling me that they did not see enough "hand of the artist" in my solarplates. I was hurt, but I got off the pity party train and submitted again. This time I entered new work, in different printmaking styles:

a collagraph called "sweet pea"

a linocut called "Harriet & Rae"

and a solarplate with chine colle

called "Searching For "

Hopefully I will get a different letter in the mail.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

Now I am off to start sewing....Thanksgiving is around the corner and I have things to do!

oops...

Blame it on the bouncy house...it rattled my brain and I forgot to post last night.
I will post more later today.
ugh my brain.

On the 14th day, it smelled of ink and latte

I am working still on my submission to LAPS, I am down to the wire and because of that I am multitasking!
I am working on the linocut the most...I think I will be up late, tired is the new cool look for me.
I am also making cupcakes for my Nephew's 2nd birthday party...I am thrilled and hope that it can become a tradition for us.
But that is later....here is my progress so far on the linocut:

Back to the blades....

The 13th

Well being Friday the 13th...people get anxious.
I don't find this day any different in in any way, life rolls on....but for those of you out there that are spooked, here is a warning sign from the machine shop:

Watch yourself

12- work in progress

I am one to set goals for myself, and being an artist who works from home mostly and depends on my hard working husband to make sure we can still pay bills on a regular basis...I feel it most important to not look or act like a freeloader.
I am currently working on my newest submission to the LAPS (Los Angeles Printmakers Society) again.
I got rejected earlier this year; their reason was that I did not demonstrate enough "hand of the artist" in my work...
So typical of me, I am acting to the extreme and submitting new solarplate work as well as the newest linocuts I am working on...ideally.
Hopefully I can get two of them done by Monday so I can mail them to meet the dealine for judging.
Keep your fingers crossed for me:

New Location

This afternoon I head out to a local boutique to drop off some pendants I made.
The shop owner saw me at Artwalk and wanted to carry my tiles, but asked if I could make a "two tree" image as she felt it would sell well.
Well, as a resident of Ventura, I had yet taken my obligitory photo of the two trees on top of the hill, a landmark here in Ventura. This gave me the chance and I took it.
my other tiles are made with my images, and or recycled stamps and made on upcycled scrabble tiles.
These new ones are made using my image of "two trees" and added to upcycled scrabble tiles.
I think I have a different spin on them...here are my pendants available soon at a boutique near you...:

© Monica Wiesblott 2009

#10-better late then never

I fell asleep last night before I got a chance to post this...
so here is day10's post:

I went to the garden to water the seedlings that we planted the day before yesterday. It was just before sunset and it was quiet. My favorite time to be at the garden, We have plots at a community garden and at times there can be a lot of people ther or simply no one...I like the quiet personally.

Well the area where I had planted my sweet snap peas and wildflowers looked amiss.

I realized as I started to water that, the sweet little sparrows had turned up the earth to eat the wildflower seed, leaving all my snap pea seeds exposed and uncovered.

The ground was polkadotted.

the broccolli seedlings were unfazed.