walking with instagram

River trail by my office.

I signed up for Instagram a few months ago, mostly so I could see the photos my nieces were posting. I had it set to private, thinking it would just be family-related stuff, but as I've been using it more it has evolved into a fun ongoing project. I've decided to make it public and link it up to the blog.

Last September I started on a plan to work my way up to 10,000 steps a day (about 5 miles). I started at 5500 steps/day and added 500 steps a week. At first I could get there just by parking a bit further away at work and the daily workout at the gym. Then I added a daily walk during my lunch hour. I kept coming up short on the weekends and needed to do something a bit more than going to the gym Saturday mornings. So I started going on long walks around my neighborhood. I kind of hated them at first. It took so long and I could think of lots of things I'd rather be doing. But I kept at it. (Btw, I am now surpassing 10,000 steps almost every day!)

There was so much glare on my phone, I just aimed and hoped for the best.

One Sunday morning I was out braving the cold. It had just snowed like mad so I took a photo mostly to pat myself on the back for being out there (see above). But it turned out pretty cool and I thought that would be a good little challenge: take one interesting photo per Sunday walk with my phone. The walks became a lot more exciting after that. I spent the time scoping out what I would use for my one photo. The idea has eventually expanded to my lunchtime walks and the newly added Saturday walks. I love it. I look forward to my daily walks, which amazes me because they were such a chore at first.

This walk prompted me to get some decent boots.

Even going to California for the holidays did not stop the walks. Spring Lake flooding.

More Spring Lake.

Lunch walk by the office.

No longer phased going out into this for a walk. I've got some awesome boots.

Got myself an Olloclip. I love the Macro Lens.

 

Yesterday I ventured beyond the neighborhood for the first time. Rock Canyon, Provo.

So that was a long-winded ramble to basically say: enjoy these photos I take on my daily walks. :) Oh, and apologies for the occasional cat photo that pops up. But hey, that's what the internet is for, right?

viva las vegas

The M in my Living Room.

Las Vegas is about a five and a half hour drive south from Orem. I usually head down a couple times a year to visit an ol' pal of mine (we've been friends since we were 5!) So last weekend was one of the bi-annual trips down, and it was a fine time. We mostly shop or go to movies and shows but sometimes Lisa earns her BFF points by allowing herself to be dragged to various kitschy Vegas attractions. We've been to places like the Liberace Museum (very sparkly!) and the Neon Sign Boneyard.

I was telling some folks about the Boneyard so thought I'd post some photos. Pretty cool place. I'm a little obsessed with taking photos of any marquee-style signs I run across. I think I have it in my head to make one someday. I have no idea why or what it would look like, but there ya go.

eta, here's their website: neonmuseum.org

icon dump

Sometimes at work I get to do really big projects like animate a song. Or a cool online game. Or illustrate books I wrote. Sometimes there's a lot of busy-work. It's all good, it keeps life from getting dull. Lately I've been making icons of words for a game that teaches syllables. Here's a taste from the 40 I've done (40 more on the horizon).

the mighty nathor

Yet another co-worker doing a cool thing (see yesterday's post about Jed's kickstarter).

Nate Baertsch is starting his own 30-day challenge. A connoisseur of toys, he'll be posting a sketch a day for August, each a potential design for a toy/action figure. Have fun Nate!

ukiyo-e heroes

Jed Henry just started his Kickstarter project and it has already been funded in an hour! That should tell you that it's pretty awesome. Jed has turned classic video game characters into traditional Ukiyo-e style prints.

He has also joined up with printmaker Dave Bull to print some as traditional woodblock prints. So far they have Mario cart ready to buy. The more orders, the more woodblock prints they can do.

Jed has done an amazing job. Go get yourself a print, I got mine!

day 30: the logbook

Nothing to do with the 30 day challenge. Just some puppets I made when I was 12.

30 Day Challenge Complete!

My self-appointed challenge to blog everyday for 30 days is done. It flew by! It ended up not being too tough to sit and spend a few minutes posting some photos and links and a bit of rambling text. I maybe had to reach a bit for content, but the habit wasn't hard to set. So what did I learn from this?

1. I don't really have much to say. :) I think it didn't help that nearly everything I was spending my time doing I couldn't post. Plus, I leave all my deep thinking to the TED speakers.

2. Although I did not end up doing any personal projects over the last 30 days, having to think about what to post every day was a helpful break from deadline deadline deadline. Gathering inspiration or putting together a tutorial helped me keep invigorated for the projects I was working on.

3. I learned how to make a screen recording. That was cool.

4. Keeping a logbook is a good idea. One of the suggestions in the Steal Like an Artist book is to keep a logbook and I decided to do this as an offline companion to the daily blog post. Before trying the logbook, I just had a simple calendar to keep track of deadline. But after keeping the logbook for 30 days, I definitely think I've done better with my time management and general awareness of what I do every day.

This was the first logbook. I picked up a day planner from Target and wrote bullet points about the day. The bottom section I used to keep track of exercise and what I ate. I used the top of the page to write down the one best thing about each day.

It became clear pretty quickly that I was writing the same sorts of things every day, and since I love a good checkbox, I decided to make a new logbook that was totally personalized. (Hooray for Kinkos!)

This is what I came up with. I've got sections to keep track of diet, sleep, exercise, how much time spent on project, a place to prioritize my daily To Do list. I kept the idea of writing the Best Thing for each day, plus added a spot to write down what I could have done to improve. The column that has been the biggest eye opener is writing down every penny I spend each day. D'oh.

I wasn't perfect, and didn't fill in every slot every day, but the overall concept has been really informative. It will be interesting to see if there are any trends to analyze once I've done this for a lengthy amount of time. 

5. Ultimately I'd say the 30 day blog post was a success. Nothing massive happened or changed because of it, but it's been good to step outside my little box and share some of what I know and what I enjoy. It probably won't be every day, but I'm planning to keep posting fairly regularly.

Thanks all who have been following me for the past 30 days!

post 29: pajaro valley encaustic show

 

Earlier this year I got two pieces into a juried show at the Pajaro Valley Arts Council.  I decided to head home to California for the weekend to go to the opening show. It was a lovely weekend spent driving down to Santa Cruz with my mom, going to the show, seeing old friends, and melting in a very very warm gallery.

I'd taken a lot of what turned out to be terrible photos of the party, and thought I'd accidentally deleted them when I uploaded them to the computer. Couldn't find them anywhere! But when I was looking for those needle felting photos the other day, I stumbled across the photos I took. They'd been filed into 2008. Crazy computer. So here are my photos of the show as well as some taken by my mom. Hers are the ones in focus.

Me and my little paintings.

This is Daniella Woolf, one of the curators of the show. I've taken a few workshops from her. She is the most fabulous teacher and a delightful person. Someday I want to be in California long enough to take a class at their studio Wax Works West.

A quick primer on encaustic.

The place was packed all afternoon, and about 100 degrees...inside.

 

Apologies for such dreadful photographs. I think I would have been better off using my phone camera than the thing I was using. Oh well. Hope you enjoyed seeing some of the different things people are doing with encaustic. I'm getting myself inspired for my next 30 day challenge. I'll give you a hint. It has to do with encaustic painting. :)