mercredi 28 janvier 2015

2015 Goals


 It took me almost all of January to come up with a list of things I'd like to come true this year. Some goals are easy and some are just unreachable, at least for 2015, but i'm OK with it.:p

  • Curb Find: The first goal I wrote on my list was to find  a piece of furniture on the streets of Paris that somebody tossed away and that I'd like to keep for my own. The other day I passed by a nice old looking side table that would have been nice to put my sewing machine on. By the time I got Greg to help me bring it home, it was already gone. I'm very hopeful about this goal because since I've lived in Paris, I've come by so many cool pieces of furniture right on our very street. A lot of people in Paris seem to love throwing away perfectly good things.




  •     More Cooking: Add 20 new recipes to my personnal cook book. In 2014 I added things like gougères(cheese puffs), chocolate chips cookies (I had never been succesful making cookies before) , pasta and many more... I'd also like to try more of my Julia Child's cookbook.


  • Yoga and Drama Class: Well, I know I won't cross this one off my list any time soon. But it's nice to keep this here as a friendly reminder of what I should do one day. I took a drama class for 8 years from the age of 11 to 19. It was my reason to live. The best thing that ever happened to me. I don't miss it anymore but I know how good it was for me, my self confidence and my creativity. About yoga class, I don't know. I'm not sporty at all. But this is a sport I feel good about. 

  • Craft fairs and Selling at Companies HQ: This year I hope I'll particpitate to a bunch of craft fairs. I've only done one, ever. That was so much fun and so thrilling to meet new people and customers eye to eye. I've also come up with a plan of selling my jewelry at companies' offices but I don't think I'll be able to do it. You need some kind of a permit here in France so I can't. Getting the permit will probably be on next year's list :p

  • Taking a Greyhound Bus: We're planning to go to Portland, Oregon, in september and we realized it was way cheaper to take the plane from Paris to Seattle rather than Paris to Portland. So we thought of taking the bus. It would be so cool to travel by this mythic bus. But in the end, I don't think we'll do it. (Obviously I like listing things I won't be able to do) Greg wants to visit Seattle, and not just for a few days. He wants Seattle to be next year's destination for a month. He says it would be too frustrationg to just spend a few days there. I don't agree :p But I understand his point. So we'll see.



  • Making Music with Greg: Greg is a musician. He plays the bass guitar and upright bass. Ever sice we got together we thought it would be awesome to make music together. He would play the bass, I would sing. More than two years later we still haven't done anything and it's all my fault. I feel too shy to do this. He's been a professionnal musician and it's very intimidating. I asked him to record a bass line so I can find lyrics. Will 2015 will be the year we start a musical project?

  • Project 365: I started taking a photo a day exactly 7 days ago. I decided to use my film camera to make it more special. :p Honestly I don't really like to read 365 project blog articles. But I couldn't resist doing it myself. And I love the idea of using my film camera EVERY SINGLE DAY. :) I guess it won't be very interesting but I like the idea of keeping track of a little thing every day.

  • Try more wines: 2014 has been a great year for wine tasting. :p I tried a lot of different ones and I was happy to try American wines as well when I was in Chicago. I'd like to take pictures of every single label of every single bottle I try. To keep it as a record of what I like and don't like. I do that from time to time on Instagram. I love wine. :)

This is my tiny list of things I'd like to get done in 2015, even though I'm very aware a lot of these goals won't happen. At least I can keep track of what I want and check if next year I still want the same thing.



 

mercredi 21 janvier 2015

Paris Modern art Museum - Altmejd Exhibit




Today Greg and I decided to take a day off. We went to the Altmejd exhibit at the Modern Art Museum. It is really not my thing, I'm not a fan of modern art, but Greg loves it. So I spent the time taking pictures of all the pieces and loving it.






This was the first room. I really don't get it. There were giant sculptures, it was fun and all but it didn't get to me at all. I didn't feel anything. Except maybe for the hawk guy who kind of freaked me out, and the man made of bananas that I found quite funny.




This one was cool. Hanging from the ceiling. But still, nothing more.






A lot of Altmejd work was based on thread. Very intricate work with thread in huge plexiglas boxes.
I was still not getting it at this point but still having a blast taking pictures.








These were parts of the biggest piece. It was kind of the making-of of all the other pieces. A lot of the elements in the previous pieces were in this one.








In this room was my favorite part of the whole exhibit. I'm quite obsessed with portraits and faces so of course I thought these pieces were quite interesting. I love how the glass eyes make them look so realistic and I can see a story or a message in almost all of them. Finally!!

So this modern art exhibit wasn't quite an epiphany on my part but it was interesting. I had no idea what to expect. A few days ago I bought doll eyes off ebay and I am planning on making art dolls out of clay. I guess that it is partly why I enjoyed the last pieces so much. :p

dimanche 11 janvier 2015

Re-use recycle Bits of Thread, Yarn, Fabric...


When I sew I keep a trash can by my side to put all of my scraps of felt, fake fur, yarn etc.
Once I have enough of it I make a cushion. :)




I made kind of a pillow case out of thick velvet to make the cushion and I put all the scraps inside of it.


I even put old yarn that I have been given and that I don't use because it breaks very easily whenever I try to use it.


The fun part! Stashing all of it inside the pillow case! :D


Then I just have to sew the open end of the pillow case and done! A nice comfy pillow made of recycled material! :)

Happy me :)

A while ago I even made rag dolls with my sewing rejects :p


Now I have 4 cushions :) 






vendredi 9 janvier 2015

Looking For Inspiration...



Lately I've been feeling uninspired. I've been saying it a lot on here, I should probably stop because it's getting depressing! :) 
I thought it would be a good idea to draw again. Doing something creative with my day always helps me feeling better. Since I had no idea about what to draw, I tried to find some pictures off the internet to inspire me.
 One of the most inspiring person out there for me is Marguerite Gisèle. I love her blog and her pictures. It's always my go-to website when I feel uninspired. So I selected a picture and tried to draw it.

A few months ago I did this drawing:

I had a lot of fun doing it and it was inspired by Maguerite Gisèle as well. 


So I did another version with a twist.


I also googled 'teal haired girl' to find new pictures and came upon this one that I liked:

Here is 'my version':


And I got the idea for the last drawing I did from Google typing 'pink haired girl'. I found this:

And did this:


It was nice to try my hand at these. I'm definetely not good at realistic drawings.
But it is fun to see the original version and mine.
At least it got me to draw again.