Quakers, Shakers and Candlestick Makers

Winter in New England
Originally uploaded by mlee.etsy.com

Just a quick post before I head off to bed, hopefully tucking myself in before ten tonight. I've had a touch of a cold this past week and haven't been sleeping well on top of that. I have to wear a mask when I sleep or I have eye pain and sometimes that mask comes off in my sleep and I end up with the pain again. I saw a doctor awhile back and he gave me some goop and drops and said it would be better in a week, but it wasn't. But if I wear this mask and it stays on, which it does most of the time, I don't have any problems. Something in bed just seems to irritate my right eye.

Things are pretty good here. I'm drawing and writing a lot these days. New work is being made weekly, I'm hoping to do some printing this week. Lately it has been very relaxed and simple collage work. Reading an old favorite book of mine called Wise Blood and The Screwtape Letters right now. Both dark but in very different ways. My near complete lack of reading since blee was born has been bugging me for ages now and I am finally doing something about it. And what a perfect time to grab a book and cuddle up in bed with it. Jon is a total non-fiction political/social/ economic book junkie but I think he would enjoy Wise Blood. He read The Screwtape Letters years ago. Wise Blood was one of my favorite novels when I was in high school.

Went to a Shaker village in New Hampshire on Sunday kinda spur of the moment. I needed to get out of Boston in a major way and it was too icky to go do the cliff walk in Newport, RI like we had planned. It was a quiet little trip but I think the three of us had a good time. The Shaker religious sect is a pretty interesting one. Except for their complete celibacy to the point of not even communicating with the opposite gender I can really stand behind them. It is sad that they died out, but great that there is so much that is preserved.

blee is growing tall more and more each day and eating like a little piggy. At lunch she just couldn't get enough of her baby food and the adult food that we gave her. Then on the road home she drank a full 14oz bottle of whole milk! And then for dinner she ate chicken and some blueberries. She likes fruit and meat a lot, but veggies are a struggle with her. She will do sweet potatoes and squashes and carrots if I mix them with (a lot) of applesauce but that is about it. Oh she kinda likes cucumbers.

Okay, time for bed I've rambled enough. Hope everybody had a great weekend to start off a great week. Keep warm!

New Love

Overgrowth
Originally uploaded by m.Lee

Hello, it's me. Marissa. I used to fit pretty nicely in an artistic box and I was comfortable with it. I mean, I may have only done printmaking for the past two years but I did do unconventional printmaking. And I really enjoyed going back and doing it again on Wednesday. It felt fresh again now that I have many other things to feed my artistic spirit.





But today (Thursday), I drew a card from my little inspiration deck that said "do the opposite" and this is what I came up with. Yesterday was all about printmaking and today was all about taking an old not quite good enough but still too cool to rip up and turn into various things print into something new. First I painted the sides and attached the print to the gallery wrapped canvas. Took a break to eat lunch and get some blee love and then I got down to it. Honestly not much thought pre-construction went into this piece. I started by putting some papers down and moving them around, cut a few new ones for it and then went about attaching and sealing everything. Finished off with some Sharpie lines before the final topcoat.

I am pleased. Right now the reproduction is listed in my mLeeRedux shop while I work out a price for the original. I'm pretty attached to the original, but at the same time I want to set it free to a loving home so it will be priced significantly higher than the $10 reproduction, but will be a fair price considering how much time, effort and I think skill went into this piece. Until then it will be sitting above my computer desk away from the sun so I can enjoy. I think on a nice day I am going to go outside and use some UV sealant on all of my collages. Don't want those fumes in here, especially with blee around.



Lost is on tonight. We are going to Tivo it so we can skip the commercials, of course!

Goodnight to some, and good morning to others.

ACEOs are Love

ACEOs
Originally uploaded by m.Lee

Back to my roots, well one of my roots. The ACEO! (or art cards in general as I do love trading for these little gems) These have been one of my favorite methods of experimentation. My first mixed-media woodblock print collages were ACEOs and there is no reason for me to stop now that I have moved on to larger pieces. They are still fun to make and still the best for experimenting. The two I made on Tuesday night are no exception. Enjoy!





When I stay focused and put blee first everything falls into place. It is okay for her to have a bad day. And by the same token it is okay for me to have a bad day. But even with her teething as long as I keep my head everything pretty much falls into place. With these revamped modest yet inspiring goals I can afford to have a bad day and so can she. I might completely evaporate from online for a day here and there and it is not the end of the world like I sometimes like to think it is. It isn't going anywhere and neither is my Etsy shop, Trunkt account, Flickr or what have you. If it takes me an extra day to ship stuff as long as the customer knows that is alright. If I take longer to respond to questions that is fine too. I've been putting far too much pressure on myself. She's teething and yet today I still managed to start a new woodblock carving! Who knows when I will finish it, could be this weekend it could be a month from now depending on how things go. But I will have new work every week in some form.



Just a friendly reminder that I am having a Studio Sale in my Etsy Shop. This is by far the biggest sale I have ever had. Nothing is over fifty US dollars. This may be the last chance to purchase some of these pieces, at least online.

Now dear readers even though it is a mere 9:17pm EST here in Boston I am exhausted and am considering heading to bed right now. As much as I would love to work on my carving a bit more or even draw I just feel too tired and too unsteady to do either one. Carving would be unsafe and drawing would be safe but most likely a waste of paper with my fuzzy brain. I hope my fuzzy brain hasn't showed itself too much in this post. My apologies if it has.

Goodnight and good morning! Soon the work week will be almost over! Thursday is great because one has Friday to look forward to, while on Friday I just end up anxious for the day to end. Of course I am always on call being a working from home mother, but on the weekends I have some extra hands!

Giddy!

Mermaids - #18 Collage
Originally uploaded by m.Lee

I am so ridiculously proud of this piece that I am giddy. And I managed to do this with a teething baby. Basically every moment she gave me piece I would work on it a bit more. You can check out the time consuming process here.

You can fine the original in my mLee shop and the reproduction at mLeeRedux. The original is ready to hang, the reproduction is easy to hang.

Jon is sick and I ended up sleeping on the sofa last night because his congestion caused him to snore and that was keeping me up. I don't know how women sleep with husband's who snore! One night was bad enough. So I was on the couch with the dog. Despite this I got a decent rest because I brought my good pillow with me.

Time to wrap up blee for some soothing that beats a teething ring and a shot of baby Tylenol any day. Moby wrap time.

Happy Friday and have a good weekend. I probably won't be back until Monday but you never know. Don't forget that my contest ends tonight! Mail goes out early tomorrow morning for 1PM pickup.

I declare

Collage #14 - Collage Challenge
Originally uploaded by m.Lee

That I am done with the collage challenge . The original challenge the creator Magic Jelly set up was two weeks. Well I of course decided in a manic fury that two weeks was nowhere near big enough so I would go to the end of the month. Heck maybe until my birthday next month!

Nope. Not happening. Don't get me wrong I loved the challenge and am so glad that I participated in it. But It also wore me out emotionally. The rush and the roller coaster of it. I need a break, even if by that I just mean being able to not feel pressured to make a new one each and every day. I'm a bit disappointed in myself, but at least I accomplished a lot in those 14 pieces and progressed as an artist.

I tried a bunch of new things; stitching, gocco, drawing and other more subtle changes to my work. Heck I even used crayon! I think I am in a new phase in my art. It started with the washi additions to my ACEOs and now it has come full circle into complete multi media pieces. I still adore my pure woodblock pieces and am certainly not tossing them aside. But I needed to grow out of that and discover new challenges. And here I am, in the thick of it for better or worse.

Sometimes I think it would be good for me to take a complete break from the computer. No Etsy, no blogging (writing or reading oh my), no flickr. Nothing but having Jon check my sales once a day so I know if I need to ship anything. But I don't think I can do it. What do you think? Am I too much of an addict? Yeah probably.