Happy New Year

This year will go down in my own personal index as one of my favorites, but it has had enough change in it that I think I will skip the tradition of making resolutions for 2008. Instead, let me offer a short and lovely essay by Verlyn Klinkenborg from today's New York Times, and wish you the best for the new year.

Bookarts workshop fever

Penland, 2006

After all the presents from the holidays are open (or your birthday, if you're a holiday baby like me), it's time to start browsing the internet to see what some of the book arts teaching organizations are cooking up for 2008. Here are four sites that I watch. Penland won't announce their schedule until mid-January. But the others offer some good hints while working on the details.

Garage Annex School, run by Daniel Kelm and his wife Greta Sibley in western Massachusetts, offers weekend workshops on specific techniques.
Haystack Mountain School of Crafts schedules 2 week sessions throughout the summer from the cliffs of Deer Isle, Maine. I never got over seeing the enormous bowls of cookies at lunch or looking at the ocean all day long.
Paper Book Intensive is a free-wheeling and fun 10-day session that finds itself in a different part of the country each year. This May you can find it at Arrowmont in Tennessee.
Penland School of Crafts, probably my favorite of them all. Located in a sunlit bowl of the Blue Ridge Mountains, the school has been in existence since 1923 when Miss Lucy Morgan formed a weavers guild to teach the skill to local women and develop a market for their work. The sense of history is palpable, but so is the fun. You'll find seed beads in the dirt paths, fun mottos stamped onto your soup spoon and llamas in the meadow.

Haystack at night.

An impromptu concert from PBI 2003.

The Day After

The snowfall here in MN is getting a little crazy. I think a lot of us thought "ok, nice to have a white Christmas, now it can stop"...like we had some control over the matter. But it started up again on Christmas afternoon until last night and we woke to a few more inches this morning. One wonderful benefit of the snow is that it is a great equalizer when it comes to yard comparisons. Mine has a few more paw prints, but the envy/guilt of a neighbor's green grass is now on hold until the spring.

I was ready to find my way back to some healthier eating today until I cracked open the container of Christmas cookies..."for just a few." The carb rush came roaring back and I felt like it took some super-human strength to push the container back into the fridge.

And here's what was in my mail on Christmas eve. Nicely timed, I think.

Christmas preparations

Christmas tree (thank you, Dad!)

Wooden village from Ebay.

My grandmother's famous orange cookie recipe.

Vintage cookbook (1974) and beater (1979?)...still working!

Christmas cards drying (thank you Print Gocco!)

Christmas cards received.

Sarah's Christmas card on display. (Thank you Sarah!)

Christmas snow.
Warm wishes to all of you for a wonderful holiday week.
I hope to have a small but fun announcement for the new year!

Morning candles

I didn't realize that today was the solstice until I started writing this post. In Minnesota we have 8 hours and 45 minutes of light today (although the skies are cloudy this morning, so we might not see the sun at all). But the better news is that the sun will now start rising a little earlier each day now.
Last year about this time, I visited a friend who lives in rural Wisconsin. Even though we were drinking morning coffee, there were various candles lit on their table. Like the Swedes and Norwegians, my friend lit candles for their natural light when the sun wasn't there. I take inspiration wherever I can find it these days and I've started lighting candles now first thing when I wake up. Amidst the clutter of Christmas work on my dining room table, I have 3 tapers in my favorite holders lit while I drink my morning coffee. And I don't miss the sun quite so much.

A few more Belgians

I visited my KC family this past weekend and had the fun of a night of present-opening before Christmas. As a gift for my niece, I took the lined paper I got from Golden and made two books with the Belgian Secret binding. I knew that she had just moved into her own bedroom and I wanted to make one that matched the colors she had chosen for her walls. It turned out that the book on the left was perfect. Her name is spelled out in the inside with glitter alphabet stickers from a scrapbooking store. (I might have to make a similar one for myself with my own name in glitter. ;-) The book on the right is a little more sophisticated, so I gave that to my sister-in-law as a thank you for a wonderful weekend.
I've adapted the technique a bit now to make the binding a little more sturdy. My original instructions say to weave the cover thread through the text block sewing at the top and bottom. I now do an additional "weave" midpoint as well and it really makes the book feel a little more solid.
I can't quite tell you why I love this binding so much, but I do!...you can now see a collection of them on my Flickr page.

Web site to watch

I really love the work of Carmencho Arregui and am so delighted that she's building a web site to catalog all of the different things she's done. It's a true gift to those of us who can't find a way to get over to Italy to study with her.
The Untouchables is an article from The New Bookbinder, 2001, reprinted on her site. It outlines the solutions she has devised for preserving prints which cannot be bound, because they need to remain untouched, ie, they are "untouchable."

Golden Rules

I have been on a search for ruled paper (lined paper) for journals for years. So many book artists love making blank books and so many people are terrified of pure white pages...the obvious answer is to use lined or grid paper in books. But up until now, I haven't been able to find the paper.
One line in a blog from the Green Chair Press sent me on a search to a little company in Iowa called Golden Business Forms and its owner, Sue Pratt. Sue has a beautiful ruling machine (made in 1932) which is able to create lined paper of all sizes and colors as well as ledger paper and other business forms. There is a wonderful video on her site showing how the ruling machine works. She uses a lovely linen/cotton combo paper but has access to Mohawk Superfine as well or can rule on any stock you provide. She's happy to send you a sample book and talk over any project you have. Her web site also has pictures of work that she's done for other artists and binderies. I'm thrilled to have found her.
There are a few ways to determine how well run a business is: is their customer service good? Do they offer valuable products? Are their products priced well? These are all important, but I believe that any business with Goldens running it...literally Golden Retrievers....has got to be a quality establishment.

For your workbox

Restoration Hardware used to be a lot more fun and imaginative in their stock. Now they're what I call "over-branded"....everything has the same silver-sage labeling (the color they're famous for) and comes with a price tag to match.
But I did find this good buy in their stocking stuffer section. 12 tiny little clips for $10. The clips themselves are 2" long and open to 1/2". Just the right size for your workbox with a few extras to give away at your next class or book arts group gathering.

Winter veggies

Bella and I were walking through the community garden just before the sunset. (Sadly, I didn't take this lovely picture...but it's pretty close to what it looks like there.) In the 10 inches of snow, a guy was hacking off some frozen vegetation and I wisecracked to him, "still harvesting your crop?" And he started to tell me seriously how great Brussels sprouts are after they've frozen. "They're like candy," he said. "I never even eat them until after they've freezed."
If my friend-who-needs-to-slow-down is reading this, let me assure her that I believe that frozen Brussels sprouts are still Brussels sprouts and I won't be eating them again soon.

7 random facts

Eero has tagged me for seven random facts, so here's a few things that are true about me:
1. I used to collect float pens. I don’t anymore but I still have over 100 in a box in the basement.
2. I may be naming my dogs in alphabetical order: Agnes, Bella….
3. Inflatable lawn decorations scare me.
4. I once walked on the roof of Chartres Cathedral.
5. My iPod has some Burt Bacharach on it and I don’t care.
6. I make awesome pies.
7. I’ve crashed two parties in my life: once to show off in college, the second to meet Georgia O'Keefe.

Finished projects

We've had snow and more snow and another dusting today. But here's what the world looked like at the leadership retreat I was at earlier this week.

The two "Belgians" that I was working on last week were thank you gifts for our facilitators. The book itself was fairly simple to put together, but I had collected quotes from my group and had to format and print them on rice paper to be tipped into the book. My printer was not terribly thrilled with the whole rice paper thing, but it cooperated in the end.

The other project I was working on was a series of boxes to hold some personal objects. I love sets of any sort and have thought about creating one for myself out of my beloved japanese paper. There are nine boxes here which nest in a tray with a favorite poem from Mary Oliver.

Big Snow

We haven't had a great deal of snow over the past few years, which is unusual for Minnesota. As a result the weather people have become a bit like Chicken Little, over-hyping what turns out to be a dusting or, even, rain. But we got a big one yesterday...something like 6-8" and the outside world is beautiful this morning.
What amuses me, however, is how Minnesotans take on this weather. The worst time to be out in these storms is during them (not after). Yesterday morning, at the height of the snowfall (with the roads at their slickest), Home Depot, Target and the grocery stores were full of people buying supplies like the end of the world was announced for that night. This morning all is quiet. The plows have been out overnight and the roads are clear. But this morning, everyone is now nestling in their homes, grateful that they don't have to go out today.

Snowy dog.

Time to put away the bulb planter.

No more porch mornings.

World Aids Day with Open Arms of Minnesota

A wonderful organization in town, Open Arms of Minnesota, commemorates World Aids Day each year with a special sale of Monkey Biz products. Open Arms started as a way to serve people suffering from AIDS, but now has expanded to include anyone living with HIV/AIDS, going through treatment or surgery for cancer, or living with other chronic illnesses such as MS and ALS.
I picked up one of the charming beaded animals from Monkey Biz a few years ago, but I have never been able to attend the sale until today. I had heard that it drew quite a crowd, so I got there about an hour early. I had a notebook with me in case it was quiet but Open Arms knows a party when they see one and they kept us entertained for the entire hour before the doors opened. In fact, I'm not sure I've ever seen such a group of joyful people. They first came down our line with a beaded angel for each of us. Then they passed out muffins and fruit from Whole Foods, copies of a local magazine with an article on Open Arms and just chatted up the crowd.
At 10, we picked up shopping baskets and walked into a mind-boggling display of the most imaginative animals ever created. The penguins were a big draw but there were pigs, chickens and 4-legged animals of every color and size. The Open Arms staff was visible everywhere in their distinctive red aprons and were ready to offer their enthusiastic opinions (they loved 'em all!) or put one back if your basket became too full in relationship to your budget.
And Ms. Eunice Mlotywa from Cape Town, South Africa was there as well to demonstrate the art of beading these creatures.
I think I must have been thanked about 7 times as I was leaving (I didn't buy that much!)...as I said, these were joyful people.