Pinterest

Before the Christmas holidays I usually try and think about which handmade gifts I will make for everyone. I always try and think of something I haven't made before so no one gets bored of the type of gift year after year. I used to go through all my saved Martha Stewart magazines and see if there was anything I hadn't tried out yet. This year I found a wealth of crafty how-tos through Pinterest. If I didn't see something on my home feed that I had thought of I would just type it into the search bar and probably find that someone somewhere had tried my idea. 

I just love Pinterest as I'm a very visual person and I love the ability to scan through hundreds of gorgeous photos posted by like-minded crafty people. While my foremost interest on Pinterest is for the how-tos, I also enjoy being able to browse tons of inspirational artwork. Really, this site makes me sigh with admiration. Below are a sample of some of the pins I've put on my boards. You can find all of my boards here. What do you like to use Pinterest for?

Inspirational art

To try list

Baking inspiration

Cuteness

Wordless Wednesday

Sea Spray Blue

Erin Tyner

Nice Harpy

Groundwork

Take me back to the future and back again please.

Darn it, time is flying faster than I would like and I'm just a wee bit behind on everything. Have you noticed the older you get the faster the days seem to go by? I think I always feel this a bit more after one of my daughter's birthdays. That's when I remember how small and cute they used to be and how it really seems like it was just last week. The addition of grey hairs on my head tell me otherwise.

For fun I thought I'd show an artist that I've been seeing around the net quite a bit. This fits in with my idea of trying to hold onto my youth for a bit longer. Irina Werning has this great series of images called Back To The Future which uses circa 70's portraits alongside 2000 portraits of the same people in the same poses. Take a look and see how little people change over the years. I see that another series is being done for 2011.

For my own bit of nostalgic fun I altered an image of myself with the help of Yearbookyourself.com. You like my do?

Self portraits and self image

 Lately I've been preparing for a local Christmas craft show and I'm trying to remember all the details to make a good-looking table. I haven't done this type of personal selling of my work in a very long time and I've never done it with my more personal artwork. I'm hoping to gain a little exposure locally and I feel my work presents itself best when it's viewed in person.

So I decided that I probably need to have a bio and information sheet at the back of  my packaged prints and that they should probably include a picture of myself. I've been told often that I need to show pictures of myself if I want to sell my artwork but I rather like the anonymity of the internet and the ability to show my artwork as a substitution for my face. Truth be told, I take horrible photos and find it really hard to look at a photo of myself without being critical. My husband says that my face changes as soon as I see a camera. I don't have any decent photos of myself since my wedding. To make matters worse, I'm getting to an age where the years of sleepless nights with young children are catching up with me and the bags and wrinkles around the eyes are showing. See what I mean about being critical? So I'll suck it up and take some pictures. You tell me what you think. Do you want to see the artist head on or is a profile picture fine? Can you tell more about me if you see my face? What I want you to see is a creative and kind soul without my insecurities.

I have a link to a cute animated short  "How Happy are you with the way you look" that I think goes well with the whole self-perception angst. Enjoy.