At a Loss

I'm always at a loss for something to write. Do I write more about my interests, my day-to-day life, only what I make, only book-related things? I still haven't figured it out. 

But I still keep myself busy. And then at that point, I don't make time to write on the blog. 

Lately, I've been helping out with a new online company that has not made its debut yet, but it's going to be awesome. I hope it turns out big because I fully support the concept, design and people behind it. The downside is that I have a lot of work to do! And I'm feeling way under qualified, although I know it's not true.... it just feels like homework all over again. That's why I was done with school, right? Never have a deadline ever again? ;) Yeah, just kidding. 

And on Friday I'm going to have a booth at the Riverwood's Happy Valley Farmer's Market. It's going to be fun! If you live around here, or have friends that do, tell them to drop by the Riverwoods from 5-9 pm this coming Friday! They have live entertainment, great food, and really awesome vendors. 

Speaking of inspiration....

There is a wonderful fellow bookbinder named Sonya from Australia who owns a shop called Sago on Tuesdays who posted something wonderful on Facebook that I wanted to share:

6 of these Sunday Pace journals, each with the same cover but different spine colours, are on their way to Boston, for 6 best friends to use them to share and swap recipes, garden photos, 

thoughts, prayers, family photos and many other special tokens of friendship.

Personalized with custom bookplates, and a common poem about friendship on the first page.

How wonderful, and a joy to make.

The SUNDAY PACE journal is the most tangible, tactile, versatile and comforting journal I make. It is by far the most popular, with both men and women. I am trying out new ideas and formats, but this one is indeed perrenial. Check it out at Etsy, including the COLOPHON which describes the nittygritties about how it's made.

www.sagoontuesdays.etsy.com

*This is NOT my book. This is Sonya's. Isn't it beautiful?


So, speaking of inspiration, how inspiring is a set of 6 or so books for friends to swap? I sure wish I had at least 3 friends to something like this with.....

Searching for Inspiration

First of all, I want to express my great frustration with publishing this post - I had it all neatly written on my smartphone, but for some reason, it didn't upload to the internet. When I published it, it spun its wheels and never did anything...except keep me from ever seeing the post ever again in order to rewrite it. So this is what I get for not writing often enough that one lost post feels like the end of the world. And for ever trusting that Google had Blogger worked out on their own Android OS....


But apart from that, I'm going to try and recall as much of what I wrote before again.


Inspiration is an interesting thing. Isn't it fascinating that people create things every day, each vastly unique from others. I was reading one of Etsy's "Quit Your Day Job" articles and they ask shop owners where they gather their inspiration. More often than not, it's somewhere along the lines of, "Everywhere".


How can a collection of people be looking at roughly the same ocean, beaches, forests, night sky, experiencing the same bus ride, shopping trip or household chores, create the variety of things that they do? It's beautiful. I love it.


Click post to read more...

Daily Crafting

Today is another one of those days where I have to cross things off my never-ending To Do list so I can feel a sense of accomplishment. Yesterday it was the dishes and dinner, and today it's spray painting our ghetto dining room chairs. 

No, really, they are. Thanks to some abandoned chairs (and yes, they truly were) around campus, I started our chair collection. Then just last month when my mom and sister were visiting, we dropped by the surplus sale they have every few months and found some matching chairs. So now I have a set of 4. Hooray! But now to clean them up and bring them out of 1978 (that's what the tag on the bottom said). 

Here's a bit of a product placement (non-sponsored, shucks), but I have to say that Rustoleum brand spray paint is the best in my opinion. Trust me, I've used my fair share of spray paint being an industrial designer. Whether it's been sprayed on polystyrene, bondo encrusted foam, metal, wood, or whatever random material, Rustoleum beats Krylon hands down. The stuff I'm using on these metal chair frames is the Hammered line that leaves a really neat finish and covers up any dinks that may be left behind from years of lovin'. It also doesn't require primer, which gives it an A+ in my book.

Next step in finishing the chairs

What to write?

I know it's been 2 months since I posted, but I'm always at a loss for what to write. I envy those bloggers that can post daily or even weekly with captivating and fascinating posts. That's probably why some of them get paid to do so...I'd pay them to read what they have to say most of the time. 

Since posting last, we've finished the semester and officially started summer. The weather had been very typical spring up until last week, with all the back-and-forth temperatures (rain, hot, cold and blustery, pleasant). This weekend it decided to be blistering. Welcome summer! And welcome A/C! :) 

This past weekend we were at the Provo Farmer's Market for their opening day. We had a booth and met a lot of really nice people. Many people stopped by our booth and said they had also taken a bookbinding class. Some even took it from the same teacher, and that was pretty cool. We were across from a booth name My Cutie Pies, that made mini cupcake-sized pies that were delicious. We were also just down the sidewalk from the neatest Swedish fiddle guy that made some really cool music. Even when we don't make any sales, I love being at the farmer's market to see the great skills and talents of local artists and later this summer, to get some amazingly fresh and affordable produce. 

If you haven't been to a farmer's market, you should go to one this summer. Most of them are at the end of week, sometimes Thursdays and Saturdays. And buy a snow cone. New favorite thing of mine. Yumm....