Posters From Days Gone By

Quietly tucked away on the website for the Library of Congress is a collection of 908 beautiful posters created from 1936-1943 for the WPA in order to promote health, art exhibits, musical performances, tourism, etc.

There's a plethora of colors and subjects. These are just a few of the ones I've found that I love.

(Click on them to enlarge)

You can download high resolution scans for most of these boldly colored gems. All they need after that is a little bit of Photoshopping and a little bit of love and you can print them out and frame them for some gorgeous and unique wall art.

Go check them out. You're bound to find one (or more!) that you love.

All New for the LDQ!

See what I did there? It rhymes!

I finally finished this piece for the LDQ! It took me a good three weeks, but I finally have my favorite lyrics from my favorite song (Romeo and Juliet by the Dire Straits) quilt-ified! This will run down the entire length of one side of the quilt. It's in two pieces, they're shown side by side here.
All those little letters were extremely tedious, but worth it in the end.

After all that tedium, I wanted a few "just for fun" pieces. This is what I did. Both patterns are from Elsie's Etsy shop.

That little lion makes me smile.

And finally, I made these little peach cobbler tarts the other night.This is pre-baking, but they didn't look much different after, just a little browner and less gooey. They were SUPER simple to make. Want the recipe? Here it is:

Ginger Vanilla Peach Cobbler Tarts

1 can of peach chunks
1/4 cup of sugar
1/4 cup of milk
1/4 cup of AP flour
1/4 teaspoon vanilla
1/8 teaspoon ginger (Add more or less according to your taste, I like alot.)

Stir all the ingredients together in a bowl and divide among 3 or 4 ramekins (depending on their size). Don't worry about them overflowing, they won't rise that much. Sprinkle a little brown sugar on the top of each if you like, I did and it was tasty!

Bake at 350 for 20-30 minutes or until they aren't runny in the middle anymore. Wait for them to cool a bit then eat up!

Hope you had a wonderful Tuesday and will have an even better Wednesday!
Goodnight.

I *Love* Etsy!

I'm supposed to be studying for a test and working on a drawing. Instead, I'm sitting on Chris' couch with his laptop, half-watching the Superbowl (mostly for the commercials). Even though I have alllllll of that going on, I thought I'd share a few of my very favorite Etsy finds. If you aren't familiar with Etsy, it is a website that allows individual sellers to sell handmade and vintage goods. There are some seriously talented people out there. Here are just a few of the wonderful things you can find on Etsy.
Here we go!

(Click on any of the pictures to go to the shop where it can be found.)

This purple owl lamp stole my heart. If I had $100 to throw away, it would be mine. Also, how cute is that little red dog?

I want it over my couch so baaaaaaad! This is a hand printed replica of a WWII era poster by sfgirlbybay (whose blog I also frequent). It makes me wish I was English. There are lots of pretty colors available.

Prints from AshleyG make me happy... especially this one. Loooook at that moustache! So cute. Speaking of moustaches....


This little Moustache Man bag is so precious and funny. And can you really ever have enough bags? Make sure you check out the Robot bag, too.

These are hand screen-printed votive candle holders. I am obsessed with all the colors and patterns. The Ferris wheel is by far my favorite, but I wish I could have one of each!

I saw this necklace last week and ever since I have had an itchy "add to cart" finger. It's just so pretty. Also, I think I saw it the same day as I watched The Secret Life of Bees, so that could have something to do with the bee theme. This shop has LOTS of gorgeous jewelry.


These photographs of miniature worlds by James Spicer are tiny little pieces of joy. I love how dainty they all look. The photographs themselves are even small. I just love them.


And then there's The Black Apple, whose prints just make me so happy. This is probably my favorite shop on all of Etsy. I would cover a whole room in these if I could. Her blog is also a favorite.

Okay, I think that's all for now. Enjoy your Etsy-ing!

Love Is In The Air!

Okay, Love is on my door.


Got this at Hobby Lobby for $4.99. It was unfinished wood, so I painted it white. It's just so cute for Valentine's Day!

Plus a bonus picture: GNOMES!

Today

Today I:

• Ate a chicken sandwich from Burger King.
• Spent $5 at Goodwill.
• Spent $16 at Hobby Lobby.
• Studied Caravaggio in my Baroque Art History class.
• Had Ruby Tuesday's salad bar and a grape Jones Soda for dinner.
• Signed a witness statement for the Statesboro Police Department.

I know what you're thinking..... "How did you get out of Hobby Lobby for only $16?"

Okay, seriously. I was in my apartment tonight minding my own business when I heard a loud pop. I froze. I waited about a minute, heard a siren, then called Lydia. We were both freaking out a little, so I went over to her place. Soon there were 6 police cars in our parking lot (the lot only has space for about 5 cars total.) We watched from her window as two guys that we didn't recognize were arrested. After lots of being nosy and wondering what was going on, an officer came and knocked on the door. Apparently he was sitting on the side of the road in his car when he heard the shot... it was definitely a gun shot. He told us that he was pretty sure the shot was aimed at him. They actually found the gun outside the apartment next to mine, though the shot came from downstairs near the grassy area. By now, Lydia and I were totally freaked out. They asked us if we recognized either of the men or the car. We didn't. Then they asked us if we'd write witness statements. So we did. We finished the statements in Lydia's apartment then went outside to give them to the officer... and they were gone. All of them. It was the weirdest thing. The whole thing was kind of weird and scary. Nothing ever happens over on this side of town. And our neighbors are mostly really nice (there is the guy that lives below me who slams doors constantly and breaks beer bottles at 4am sometimes, though). Oh well, at least the guys are in jail and nobody was hurt.

Now, about the other parts of my day...

I went to Goodwill, but didn't find much. At least, I didn't strike gold like I did with the orange salt and pepper shakers.

I did find a glass Pyrex pie dish for $3.

I also found these strange little handmade pots for $0.79 each. I don't know if I like them or not, but I wanted to take them home.



At Hobby Lobby, I spent most of my time on the scrapbooking paper aisle, thanks to this article from the most recent issue of Martha Stewart Weddings. Damn that Martha for having so many amazing ideas! These pictures from the article were particularly inspiring:



So I spent $5 and got 20 sheets of 12x12 scrapbook paper. A worthy investment, I do believe.
Looooook at all the pretty colors!


And if it turns out that I can't use them for a wedding-y purpose, I'll just use them in some other craft.

I'm going to bed now. I've had a headache all day and my nose is runny. I should get some rest before it turns into anything worse.

More Bad Drawing. Lucky You.

Funny story. After my professor looked at my drawing (as it was in the previous post) and gave me some ideas as to how to fix it, I worked on it today in class for around half an hour. It helped. Alot. See? The spoon is more.... round-ish.


Here's the funny part: The object of this project is to take a direct-from-observation drawing and abstract it slowly over 4 drawings. To help us abstract the original, she photocopied some of our drawings, mine included. When she came back from the copier, she said "Okay, guys... now I know this is weird, but some of the photocopies look better than your actual drawing." Oh yeah, she was definitely talking about mine. Here's the photocopy:



I'm baffled. I suppose it has alot to do with contrast, and the way everything is either black or white, not gray like the graphite in my pencils. In any case, I thought it was quite strange.

And here's a sneak peak at the first abstraction drawing, it's just zoomed in on part of the image. And this is in no way finished! I've got whole areas that aren't shaded at all. It needs about another hour and a half or so of work.


Sorry I don't have anything more interesting than drawings to share. Although I did get a nice surprise today when I found out that my financial aid check hit my account this morning... which is a very good thing since I've been rationing shampoo and toothpaste for a few days now. And I haven't seen my refrigerator this empty since I moved in. I think there's one wedge of Wee Brie and a single serving of applesauce. Pretty pathetic. Tomorrow I will go to Wal-Mart and buy lots and lots of groceries.
Happy happy!

Glittercorn!

That's what I've named it.

I just really wanted to take a picture of something that looked sort-of artsy with my new camera. I thought this old snow/glitter globe was fun. I've had it since I was little. I kinda remember that I had a sliiiiight obsession with unicorns as a 6 year old.

Here's the same picture, Poladroid-ed. I can't decide which I like better.

See, I'm a much better photographer than I am a drawer.