The Readers Calendar

For the last two years I have given my sister-in-law, Liz, one of my 4 x 6 digital calendars.  She collects readers....photos of people reading as well as figurines...so that was the perfect theme for her calendars. Her birthday is in September...so her calendar goes from October through September.


Here is a sampling of some of my favorites from the past two years.


Most of the images I use for these calendars are found on Pinterest.  I have not sold the calendars...I have just given them as gifts.  I do not have the sources where the images came from and I apologize for that.  I am mindful that they are someone's beautiful artwork and I am grateful.  If you are one of the artists I would love to give you credit.  Or if you do not want them posted here...I will gladly remove this post.

The 2016 Readers Calendar

My sister-in-law Liz just had a birthday.  That meant it was time for the 2016 readers calendar.  I collect images of readers all year as I see them on Pinterest and Tumblr. I understand that they are someone's beautiful art....but I often do not know whose.  I do not sell these calendars...they are just gifts for people I love.

Thank you to all the talented artists.



These are screen shots of the calendars....all mixed up and collaged onto a Pages document.  I absolutely love making these calendars!!!  They are a perfect gift to personalize for someone! Maybe I can help you make one!  They can be ANY subject and you can use your own art or photographs.

The Hands Calendar..and a New Skill!

Screen Shots!
Who Knew?

I'm not sure what
gets me more excited...learning a new skill or sharing some of my calendar projects!

My niece Clarke was visiting for the weekend and taught me how to do a screen shot! I can't tell you how excited I was! It will be an easy way for me to share some of my digital projects.
(I will explain more about screen shots if anyone is interested...it takes a minute to learn)


OK....back to the calendars...

I have been making little 4 X 6 calendars for friends and family for quite some time. Some are digital and some are individually collaged with photos etc.  I love giving them as gifts because they can be personalized so easily. This particular one was for my sister Nancy who has a series of beautiful hand photographs hanging in her bedroom...I have always loved them.  I gathered the images, and using my simple "Pages" program on my Mac...created the calendar.  Each month's page slides easily into a plexiglass stand up frame you can get anywhere.

Warning:  I love my little calendars...so you will probably see more...and I have made several. Nancy's birthday is coming up and I am working on her new one...and it's not digital this time!  Stay tuned!  It will be finished soon.

Six Word Story Book....a Shared Art Project

Becky, Tracie (both from Wisconsin) and I shared an interesting project that we called "The Six Word Story Book.  Each of us started with a blank cardboard children's book.  Our goal was to write about what was going on with us at the time in just six words and then illustrate it.  We started with a page in our own book then sent it on to the next person. The books went around the circle three times over the course of a year. Our final book had three pages from each person.

This is my book....I collaged punched squares from one of my old "Sun, Moon, and Stars" calendars for the cover.   (click here to read about these calendars)

The most interesting aspect of the challenge was to describe our current "story" in just six words.  Every single word had to count. (That's a good six word sentence!) Here are most of my pages and a sampling of Becky and Tracie's. 

Easily distracted by bright shiny objects.

I borrowed the concept from my friend Anita....but it soooo describes the story of my life...I'm very distractible.  I think her line is "bright shiny object syndrome"...or something like that.  I had this advertisement of bangles in my stash and I just embellished the heck out of it.  

Welcoming fall nesting and cozy evenings.

I used photocopies of actual leaves from my yard, metallic origami paper, and little village images from a Christmas Card.  

Making peace with sadness and loss.

During this project I lost my younger brother Rich after months of fighting a brain tumor.  It was a tragic loss....but it was my "story" so I found a way to illustrate it. In many ways that process of creating this page helped me work though some of the grief.

I used the sympathy cards I received....starting at the top with the color gray and the actual personal words of grief, sadness, and support.  I moved down the page to soothing blues and purples and beautiful images from the cards.  

Christmas doodling while watching favorite shows. 

There is nothing like a little doodling to soothe your soul.  It was a winter of rest.





Making new piles from old ones.  The constant story of my life!












Every day's a beautiful hair day!  

Believe it or not I also lost my oldest sister, Becky, to breast cancer during this project.  She was an amazing woman and I miss her dearly.  One of the things she was known for was her messy hair...but we loved her for it.  What came to mind when I was contemplating this "story" was that in heaven every day must be a beautiful hair day.   I created Becky's hair with some of the things she loved...including flowers and birds...and even worked in a waterfall off the side.  I miss you Becky!

An art teacher told me once that I overworked my pieces.....I needed to learn when to stop....not this time.

Stretching her heartstrings coast to coast.  During this difficult year my "story" had taken me literally from coast to coast spending time with family.  I used my sewing machine to illustrate not only where I had been, but most of the places I have people that I love.

And finally.....

The End, or just the beginning?  I was playing around with all the stitch options on my new sewing machine wondering what would be my next project.







A Few of Becky's
January, armed with flannel, wool....umbrella?
One of those strange Wisconsin winters with
back and forth temperatures.

Hiding clutter in pretty colored boxes.

This page ended up being opposite my 

"making piles" story...Becky and 

I have always made a good match!                                         

Lifetime searching for the perfect pen. 

Actual photos of Becky's pens...by the way.













 A few of Tracie's

Dreaming of reading on the beach.

 Don't we all!






Learning to enjoy a new perspective.
(Tracie's two beautiful daughters)

Sweet memories lead 

grief toward acceptance.

Tracie also suffered loss during this project.  

This was a good thing we did Becky and Tracie!  Thank you!

The Heart Calendar

Like I mentioned in the last post, my sister Nancy's birthday is coming up on Valentine's Day and I am working on a new calendar....not digital this time.  But I thought I would show you (using my new screen shot skill) another digital calendar I did for her a few years ago...using the obvious theme of hearts.

I will show the new calendar in a few weeks...once I've mailed it.  I'm having a lot of fun with it. Nancy, and my sister-in-law Liz, seem to really enjoy the calendars so they get one every year.  More about Liz's calendars a little later.

More Calendar Squares

I had fun with this two page spread I did in my Pinterest Inspired journal using more punched squares from the "Sun Moon and Stars" calendars.  I want to try something similar on a wooden canvas.

These pages were inspired by this pin on my "interesting art" Pinterest board. It was done by another of my favorite artists,  Loretta Grayson and her blog can be found here. I'm going share a little more about Loretta sometime soon. I love her work and own one of her delightful tree prints.

After writing about these calendars I did my research. The artist is Maret Hensick and she lives in Maine...which made me smile!  She designs and paints for several different companies and her work can be found on everything from cards to t-shirts and her website can be found here.

I was quite taken with Maret's statement of inspiration...

 Reprinted from Maret's website

Win Win!

My sister-in-law Liz's birthday was a few days ago....that means I just finished her 2017 Readers Calendar. As I've mentioned before she collects "readers" so I look for images all year and make a 4 x 6 calendar for her desk at work. It's fun for me...and fun for her.  Win win!

You can see more of my homemade calendars here: http://joyfulputtering.blogspot.com/search/label/calendar

I make two months on a page in my Pages program and cut them up with my rotary cutter. I enjoy matching images to the months...and using the tools in Pages to find ways to make the art work within my 4 x 6 space.  

I now make the number part of the calendar on a spreadsheet so I can change the font and size easily keeping everything nicely lined up. I add the name of the month with a text box and can easily place it where ever I want....even turning it sideways.

I am aware that all of these images are other people's art I have found on Pinterest and am grateful for their use in this personal gift.  These calendars would never be sold.

Colorful Chaos

This is the colorful chaos that is currently on my table. And the funny thing is I cleaned it up a bit before I started all this. 

I was so pleased that Anne was inspired by my recent "Surprised by Joy" experiment...and is now experimenting herself. This couldn't make me happier!  

She's using a combination of her own painted papers and other recycled papers such as calendars pages.

The sky's the limit with this technique! In this case the sky is hand painted. This is the perfect way to reinvent and repurpose your art. 

Thanks for sharing your process Anne! Now YOU'RE inspiring me to get back to this technique!

Intentions

"Set Intentions Not Resolutions...our intentions create our reality."

I came across this quote on Pinterst...it originated here.  I'm terrible at making and keeping resolutions....but setting intentions...I think I can handle that.

I intend to doodle, color and collage more!

I've learned a little structure is good for me...so I'm going to follow prompts from a variety of resources like this book, online workshops, and Pinterest.

My first doodle session was a page of "sunshine circles" inspired by Lisa Condon on the Creativebug website. I included a few fused fabric circles and cutouts from my favorite "Sun Stars and Moon" calendars.

Who doesn't need a little sunshine in their day!

The Quote Journal Exchange

                   
A year or so ago Ellen, Lynn and I finished another creative art exchange. We each started with a used chunky children's book to alter. We were to pick favorite quotes and illustrate them. We started with three pages in our own books and sent it to the next person. ...then on to the next.



The pages in these books have a little bit of a gloss...so we found it helpful to give them a light sand and cover them with gesso...and artist's canvas primer.  





This was my cover...similar to my Six Word Story Book using punched squares from my favorite used calendars. I used washi tape on the binding because it's very flexible.  I covered the whole thing with matte medium to seal it.

Washi tape is a Japanese paper tape...

kind of like masking tape.  

It comes in great colors and 

has a lot of uses.

I am thinking about the quote journal today because Ellen is flying home from visiting her son in the southwest.   While she's there she enjoys happy hour by the pool.

So...what's the connection?

When I had Ellen's quote book I used a picture from her Facebook page from her last visit, and using my pages program, transposed her onto the beach....another place she loves to be.  The quote was perfect for her and the book.  Cheers Ellen!

More pages from the quote journal to come.

What We Want To See

Sometimes...we see what we want to see.

As we approached this sunflower on our morning walk I saw a face....and was sure it was carved into the center somehow.  But I couldn't have been more tickled to find there were actually two perfectly placed bumble bee eyes....and the center of the flower made the perfect nose. 

I stayed up late (for me) last night to watch the January 6th hearing....

and I cut out all the birds from a 2002 calendar.  It was a good distraction from the unsettling testimony.  

When Liz was here I pulled out all my calendars looking for images that could be framed...she found several.  

I almost have every calendar I've ever bought....and some, like this one, that have been given to me. This one had birds of all sizes....including little black and white sketches.  It was a gold mine of birds! 

Did I mention that I cut them ALL out in one sitting?

And once again, inspired by Kit Davey....I'm going to make more simple bird collages.  I wrote about them here. It's a good way to ease my way back into the studio and an excellent way to use up some scraps.

But first I have to clear a path....and I'm not kidding.

And it's done!  I can't wait to start one of Philippa's!