guess what?

I got the job! As a teaching assistant in a GCSE Art & Design class and I'm so excited! I know i love this kind of job as I've done it before with children with special needs, but it was across a whole school. This time it's here and in an art class and I can't tell you how pleased I am. It's only for 2-3 days a week so I'm keeping my office job too but it just means I feel like my life is starting to go somewhere! (Too many exclamation marks, I know!)

Oh, and I made some cats...





I'm off now to sit in the sun (day off work, what a life!) and read my book and stress about starting a new job in two days time, aghh!

messing about with bits of paper

Book experiments. Folded up bits of paper, sewn together...




This one has a tracing paper spine. I love the 'snap' of tracing paper.


And some more ramdom, odd angles. Sometimes I think I'm too precise with my books, too linear, this is a small attempt at angles other than 90 degrees...





Concertina books are my favourites, so many possibilities...

ahh... the weekend

Busy day at work today... lucky I had this friendly bird to look after the paperclips!

bluebells

Bluebells by the side of the road. A memory from my childhood of walking through the bluebell woods by my house with my aunty, picking a big bunch of flowers for my mum, so big I had to use two little hands to hold them. Selecting the flowers by pulling the stems, when they're ready and come out clean, touching the cold delicate white bottom of the stem to my nose. Bluebells are protected now and there's no picking, but I still love to look. Fields of blue under the trees.



Had a job interview today. Think it went ok, I did a lot of talking, a good thing?? Time will tell!

space...

Feeling quiet this week. Not much going on on the creative front. Im really missing having a space all of my own to make stuff (or just a mess in, without the worry of having to tidy it all up at the end...). Everthing's shoved in different cupboards and draws. In boxes labled with detailed lists in tiny writing then shoved in the top of my wardrobe which I can't even reach without a step ladder anyway. My scissors keep being borrowed and not replaced. Is it just me or should some scissors kept sharp for paper and others used to cut sticky tape (or soap, why use the lovely big sharp scissors for soap?!) I wonder if i'm being unreasonable, but I think it makes me worse when everything is all over the place. Is it too much to want a clean shelf for paper, and a messy one for ink...


The other day I was thinking. I would love a room where I could have floor to celing shelves. Shelves for everything, books could be organised and catagorised instead of stacked up and dusty (size order, subject area, ahh the possibilities). Paper could be flat instead of rolled and tied. In this room there would be a big table for cutting and planning and spreading out, ideas could flow over onto the wooden floor and stay as long as they liked (or until I trod on them, which is more likely, but even then they wouldn't mind, not in this little dream of mine).


one day

an observation

A pair of lifts take me each day to my office on the 8th floor (sometimes I walk, but I must admit it's not often, 8 floors seems like nothing at the bottom but by the 5th you're thinking 'three more floors? three more floors!' So I tend to take the lazy option, rubbish I know.)


Anyway... today I realised that one lift is a girl and the other a boy! So I went in some other lifts in the university and it's the same there too!

Is this a world wide phenomenon?

ta da!

Well I hope I didn't get anybodys hopes up yesterday about this stuff! It's my second go at this gocco thing (first try was a disaster, apart from not being able to see anything but spots from accidentally looking at the flash bulbs, nothing actually came out on the print except for a few dots, not what I intended!)

So here goes...


There are 24 bookmarks for an exhibition as part of the 'Library' project at Leeds Metropolitan University and Situation Leeds. They will be distributed through the librarys of Leeds (there's quite a few!) I like the idea of this project, that bookmarks will be left in books and who knows who may find them or what pages they will end up between...


I love finding random things in books. Whether it's a ticket in a second hand book or something I've put there myself a long time ago, I love that glimps of another life, a different time, something insignifcant at the time...

And I like pressing flowers in books so that's what I printed on my bookmarks!



...And then I felt so sad at having to throw the gocco screen away that I printed on all the random bits of paper and card I could find in my house (and then put the screen in a plastic bag in the fridge, I will use it again, honest! Why can't I throw anything away?)

not quite finnished yet...

Been playing with my gocco tonight, but will show you tomorrow...


...meanwhile, here is the spine of a book I made earlier :)

lazy day

Sat in the garden...


...thinking I should probably mow the lawn, but instead reading this. Lovely.

birthday birdie bag

Another hand sewn creation (and another project that has been sat patiently waiting half finished for over a month...) I hope the stitches hold! Perhaps I will have to tell Emily not to put anything heavy in it, it's for silk scarves and feathers only...




p.s. check out the giant nann bread...

birthdays

Am off out for Ruth and Emily's birthdays tonight. Two of my best friends in the world.



The pencil case went down well. The sign of a true penaholic (that's the word...) she is going to use it for her favourite black pens. A compliment I assure you!

birthday mushrooms

I've been doing a bit of sewing these last few nights. The sewing machine is still broken so it was hand sewing all the way, which is ok in its self, I enjoy doing meticulous things, it just takes longer and this is for my friends birthday tomorrow. Why do I always leave things until the last minute? I've had the material for weeks...


It's a pencil case as she is a lover of pens just like me. Is there a word for that?


Anyway, my sewing skills are a bit rusty and I kept stabbing myself with the needle. Right down the finger nail, I hate that! If I was to make this again I would do things in a different order (ie sew on the mushrooms first, why didn't I think of that?!) but I suppose it's all a learning curve isn't it! I love this green corduroy, and even though it leaves green bits all over the light pink carpet I have plans for the remainder of it, I just wish I could sew trousers...

baaaa

Went home to see my parents, and the field was full of lambs...

lettuce flowers

These pretty little flowers grew from some oriental lettuce left outside over winter. What a nice surprise!

bit of a shopping spree...

I made a little trip to Oxfam Books in Headingley today. It's giant Oxfam shop filled with books, books and nothing but books! And all bargains, which I think is my downfall...


It hurt my shoulder carrying them all home, but I think it was worth it...

trees and thoughts

Hmmmm.... what shall I write about today? The sun is shining outside, the birds are singing (it's spring! it's spring!) and I've got the day off work, hurray! It's amazing the difference an extra day off can make to my state of mind... all I need to do is capture this feelng and extend it to everyday life, now there's the challenge!



I've been trying to make these trees pop up today. Not too sucessful yet, the paper is too flimsy, think I need to go back to basics, again... but i'm enjoying the random letters that appear on the trees, the shapes of the text, the overlapping of curves. In the past I've only really worked with plain white paper, focusing on the book structure, the way the pages overlap and how the shadows fall. I didn't want to complicte that. But (another but!) it's actually quite nice to see the text on the page, it almost turns into a pattern until single words jump out. Like spider.



I like the shadows they cast too... I was putting my face down low and pretending to be in a curly tree forrest. Next plan is to make a bigger one, and add in some birds... I've been thinking about birds a lot.



I've also been thinking about this bloging business. There's so much good stuff out there, so many people writing about interesting, thought provoking things and showing the beautiful things they've made. So much inspiration I sometimes feel my head will explode! So much to see I sometimes feel I will get lost and never find my way back, or worse, miss something... Although I don't like to admit it i'm a bit (a bit!) of a control freak. When I make my work I write down every possible option and get frustrated when I can't make them all. I find making choices between things hard. So imagine my trouble when evey blog has a list of links to other amazing blogs, and each one of them with a list... and every day more! How do you keep up?!



But really, I do love this thing that's going on all around me. I find it intriguing, being invited to peek through the windows of other peoples lives, into other worlds (or infact the same world, which is what makes it so nice). Perhaps it's because I'm nosey, but I think it's more than that. It's an exchange of information, a community I never knew existed. I'm really glad I've discovered it all. Very inspiring...

sleepy

Lovely sunny day today. Made me feel all summery, sat on the grass outside to eat my dinner for the first time this year!


Lots of thoughts going round my head tonight, and I'm too tired to put them into words (or words that make much sense anyway...). So i'll leave you with these pictures of the lovely Cleopatra chicken...





Sleep well!

just more ramblings

Watched the helicopter landing on the roof of the hospital opposite my office today. I work on the 8th floor so it was a pretty good view. It looked just like a giant bumble bee wobbling through the sky. I think they were practising manoeuvres because they kept landing then backing up then spinning round and flying off again. Don't fancy a ride in one of those things! Although it would be a good view...




Looking forward to an extra long weekend this weekend, thanks to the bank holiday. Five whole days of freedom to use as I please. Only problem is I think I'm winding down a little early, it's only tuesday! Note to self: must try and stay awake tomorrow...