summoning spring

this winter started up her mess early back in november. the cold, the wet (not complaining there, though) and the dreary. way too early for central texas.

last weekend was winter ice alerts. this weekend was spring awesome perks. tomorrow will be 75 degrees. can i get a what what?

i needed a little sparkle in my kitchen and decided to upcycle some perfume bottle tops as succulent cutting vases. the fitting size for the window ledge and the perfect sizzle of sparkle. if it is shiny, bring it on. truly, i was a rolls royce hood ornament in my past life.

we will be back to the cold rain on thursday, but every moment was enjoyed this weekend.

b.e.fitzgerald || Art is a Facebook status about your winter break.

this made me extremely grateful that i could read and for the good of social media –

I swear to every heaven ever imagined,
if I hear one more dead-eyed hipster
tell me that art is dead, I will personally summon Shakespeare
from the grave so he can tell them every reason
why he wishes he were born in a time where
he could have a damn Gmail account.
The day after I taught my mother
how to send pictures over Iphone she texted
me a blurry image of our cocker spaniel ten times in a row.
Don’t you dare try to tell me that that is not beautiful.
But whatever, go ahead and choose to stay in
your backwards-hoping-all-inclusive club
while the rest of us fall in love over Skype.
Send angry letters to state representatives,
as we record the years first sunrise so
we can remember what beginning feels like when
we are inches away from the trigger.
Lock yourself away in your Antoinette castle
while eat cake and tweet to the whole universe that we did.
Hashtag you’re a pretentious ass hole.
Van Gogh would have taken 20 selflies a day.
Sylvia Plath would have texted her lovers
nothing but heart eyed emojis when she ran out of words.
Andy Warhol would have had the worlds weirdest Vine account,
and we all would have checked it every morning while we
Snap Chat our coffee orders to the people
we wish were pressed against our lips instead of lattes.
This life is spilling over with 85 year olds
rewatching JFK’s assassination and
7 year olds teaching themselves guitar over Youtube videos.
Never again do I have to be afraid of forgetting
what my fathers voice sounds like.
No longer must we sneak into our families phonebook
to look up an eating disorder hotline for our best friend.
No more must I wonder what people in Australia sound like
or how grasshoppers procreate.
I will gleefully continue to take pictures of tulips
in public parks on my cellphone
and you will continue to scoff and that is okay.
But I hope, I pray, that one day you will realize how blessed
you are to be alive in a moment where you can google search
how to say I love you in 164 different languages.

b.e.fitzgerald || Art is a Facebook status about your winter break.

via http://befitzgeraldwriting.tumblr.com

four out of five books

four out of the five books are in the shoppe now.

jotjoy

with cracked tellicherry peppercorns

life without an alarm and homemade lemon velvet ice cream with cracked tellicherry peppercorns--- it doesn't get any better than this.

at the cut 'n' curl

i love these new shower curtains!

through march 9th, there is free shipping and $5 off certain items through this link.

be a baller, shower caller with twenty-inch blades on your impala.

showed some blue

a couple of weeks ago, a winter wind blew a wooden sign over in an alley. the typography had been turned toward the wall, so i am very thankful for that cold gust that showed some blue. i asked the tailor's shop if it was trash. it was trash and ready for the hauling.

the sewing machine and spool of thread are stenciled and the script is handpainted typography. *swoon*

after admiring the yesteryear script painting, i decided where i would hang it. it was the reward for cleaning off the work table.

a cup of holiday cheer

free shipping and $5 off each of my products in my society6 shop.

the promotion is NOT automatically available in my store and only available through this link to my society6 shop.

promotion expires december 8, 2013 at midnight pacific time. *offer excludes framed art prints, stretched canvases and throw pillows with insert.


stay warm and cozy.

outside the window

shadowboxer sees a sale in my etsy shop outside the window.





*10 percent off total with a mininum of $25 purchase through dec. 31, 2013. code :: 10PERCENTOFF
(please take note that it can only be used during checkout.)

the world of lisa frank

layering spree

the past few weeks have flown. youngest child deposited in her new dorm. the new singleton life commenced.

a couple of weeks ago, i went on a layering spree. i don't know why it has taken me so long to add more things to my walls, but it felt right. the new rug begged for a little extra graphic feel. my grandmother's rose still life painting hung and one of my prints (which i handprinted with my handcarved franklin gothic typography) now reminds me daily to be extraordinary.


the kitchen really started it all. i started adding to the wall and finished it up with vintage tin trays and typography. the process reminds me to play more. risk a few tiny holes in the wall because God made spackle for a reason.

i think that i was reacting to the close of one chapter and the beginning of another exciting one. or maybe i knew that once school started that i would be toast. whatever it was, i am happy that i did it.

am, too

sometimes, i am too busy to find words to blog, and images seem to be an easier way to communicate my daily life. my instagram and flickr keep those images in checkity check.

this summer has been super. it seems that i write that every summer, but this has been one of those monumental summers.

my youngest child is off to university and this big change is at the forefront of our thoughts and our to do lists. with ten days before she goes off to college, we are crazybusy getting everything (and making all of the fun things) that she needs for her dorm and collegiate life.

i am crazyexcited for her and this new chapter in her life, as well as my own new chapter. for some reason, i equate that with having rugs–not that my kids would have peed on them when they were little (haha), but because rugs seem so incredibly grown up.

grown up. my kids are all grown ups and i feel like i am, too.

the photo man

'flies dried

this afternoon, i spent time in the studio making tiny collages on tags. i feel that i am really in the artistic process when i don't have an agenda, but i am creating for the sake of creating. after these butterflies dried, these tiny collages morphed into sets of gift tags which are now in the shoppe.

biergarten under lights

when the studio redo was under way, i had to remove all of the outside lights that were attached to it. the electricity to the studio was completely redone with no more janky cording connected from the roof of the house to the garage. legit stuff.

one of the splurges was an outside outlet in the biergarten for twinkle lights and music.

two nights ago, i finished rehanging all of the twinkle lights and then some. now, we don't need an extension cord to turn them on.

this photo makes me really happy and i love how the garden has matured these past five years.

tuteuring ol' luckenbach

this summer has been half relaxation and half preparatory for change. with the womanchild moving off to university in less than a month, i have been readying this house for the next chapter.

having less stuff calms me.

saturday was the second of three garage sales this summer. at the end of the day, a customer was loading his stuff up that he bought and unloaded two old wooden ladders that goodwill wouldn't take. i knew exactly what i would use the six-footer for.

my luckenbach rambler has been growing like crazy this year and sending out long, thorny canes. she had been using the kumquat tree next to her as a structure to climb on. i know that next year will be balls to the wall and staying true to the old adage of "first year, they sleep. second year, they creep. third year, they leap." this old ladder is a perfect tuteur for it. i had been meaning to build another rebar one, but hadn't gotten around to it yet.

score!

bedroom games

i bought a stack of vintage scrabble gameboards for $5 last month oh, the possibilities of five dollars gambled on possible future creativity.

it turned out that the stack was not enough for most of my walls in the house, yet the colors matched perfectly with my duvet. with some measuring, i knew that i had exactly enough for this little wall that frames my bedroom door.


after cutting them to measure, i hammered them lightly into the wall with dressmaker's straight pins. i bent every other one, so a yoga session would have helped me here. the paper game sheets are not glued square on the boards, so i just kept the cuts square to the board and not to the gameplate.

it adds just enough visual interest and ties in with the duvet. five dollars wellspent!

utilitarian femininity

well, i finished the studio two nights ago. the only thing left to do is customfit a strip of polygal on the side of the toolshed and hang the business hammock.

once i hung up the antique horseshoe, i noticed the old signature on the doorframe. so love this bit of past.

the great thing about this rehab was that i had recycled and upcycled all of the materials that i had been saving. the old roof became interior cladding. the wood from the exterior back wall became the interior wall. the old garage door became the toolshed enclosure and the one of the old walls became my new worktable.




for years, i have been terrified of circular saws. fingers are not overrated and i kept it as such. when i set out to enclose the toolshed area, i knew that my trusty little jigsaw would not cut it and so i pulled on my handygirl pants and bought a saw. can i tell you that building the enclosed toolshed myself was the highlight of my summer? after framing it out, i recycled the old garage door to enclose it. making a curtain out of an old dropcloth that i had gives it just enough utilitarian femininity.

reuse

one of the goals was to reuse everything. that old fridge door was under the floor and it makes the perfect memo board for the desk area. usually everything is thrifted around here, but i had to break down and buy something matchymatch. these lights were under $15 at ikea. i just love them.

the floor was painted with minwax polyshades. the first coat was bombay mahogany and the second coat was their classic black. the bottom boards on the wall were missing so yesterday i cut a scrap of polygal down and made it a sliver of lightwall.

i ran out of time this weekend to tackle the toolshed area. i need to pull everything out, insulate and the clad its walls. i think that i have enough leftover materials to do that.

during this process, my cordless drill lost its battery juice. i had no idea that they had such a short life. did you? i bought that drill only six years ago and didn't use it all of the time. opting for a corded drill this time, i think my handygirl self grew by six inches.

progress

another step is done!

the only purchased supplies were the new 2x4s and the window. i had the polygal left over from my old house and this wall is clad with old shelving and the old back wall.



i freaking love my new worktable. it was an interior wall and i had rescued an old rusted metro shelving unit from the curb. i cut it in half with my trusty dremel.

the weekend list::

1) hang lighting
2) stain floor
3) enclose workshop
4) move in another worktable

once everything is done, i can't wait to compare before and after photos.