Transformation of a Vintage Train Trunk

A couple weeks ago I went to Orlando to visit my most favorite Floridians:

Lorraine (Hot chick on the right) introduced me to transforming vintage train trucks..  mixed media style... 

And then she let me pick one from her 'stash to work on during my visit. 

(This is a true demonstration on REAL GENUINE LOVE)

I forgot to take pictures of the trunk I was actually working on before I started, but it was similar to this in size and style.   

And I was kind of about 6 hours into it before I started to take pictures at all.. 

I started by building my background.  I used blue strips of paper in the background and applied them to the trunk with Mod Podge... tinted with a little bit of light blue paint. 

Why add paint to the Mod?

When working with papers in the same color range that I want to really flow well together, adding just a small amount of paint to the mod adds the exact same base shade to all the papers... so they look like they could have been sold together in a package. 

When applying the papers to the trunk:

First, using a broad paint brush, apply a thin to medium coat of mod podge (hereto referred to as "mod") directly to the back side of your paper.  Then add a thin coat of mod to the surface of the trunk where you intend to place the paper.  Next, place the paper onto the trunk and add a final coat of mod to the front of the paper. 

Why add mod to the paper?  Why not just mod the trunk surface and stick the paper on?

Paper is a wood based product... and what does wood do when it sits in water?  Absorbs and expands.  When applying paper to any surface, 90% of air bubbles develop because the paper is absorbing the water out of the paint or mod, and expanding... buckling and wrinking.  Applying mod to the paper on its own gives the paper time to expand BEFORE its applied to the surface...of whatever you are applying it to.  Way less bubbles, wrinkles, folds... etc, and then...  as the paper dries its going to want to shrink back down.  It can't because, well it's immersed in drying glue...  but what it does is leave a very smooth tight surface.

I worked very carefully around my hardware, as it was not removable. 

Holding the paper in place and then using a fingernail or art tool to indent the paper around the shape of the hardware.  This creates a template but cutting on the crease lines.

My trees are all hand cut out of paper.  Easier than you'd think, just time consuming.  On the backside of your paper trace an outline of a tree.  Using pointy detail scissors, start at the tips of the branches and begin cutting away the negative space working inward towards the trunk. 

If you accidental dismember a tree limb, just remember where it goes and glue it in place.... trust me, no one has to know.. 

Use mod to glue the tree in place.  Start at the trunk and apply mod to small groups of limbs individually rather than attempting to adhere the entire tree in one fell swoop. 

On to design:

I have been contemplating in my personal life about why things never seem to get to that perfect "sweet spot" where everything is perfect and you feel so satisfied with everything... and you just feel that way forever...

... and the realization that never happens. 

It is the very nature of live to evolve and transform.  Each season building on the next.  Ever changing.  Constantly changing. 

A few years ago I started to get very anxious in the fall when the weather started to get cold and the days started to get short.  I have this lifetime fear that plagues me that I'm going to end up homeless and that I will die by freezing to death in an alley behind a Chinese food restaurant. 

I know this feeling is COMPLETELY 100% reasonable and normal, which is why I just don't fight it. 

Anyway, the onset of winter really freaks me out.  Once it has been cold for a few weeks I'm totally fine, but initially... yeah, I'm freakin' out.

Summer is of course my favorite season because no one... and I mean no one has ever frozen to death behind a Chinese food restaurant in the middle of the summer.  At least not in Boise.  In summer, all you have to worry about are dead bodies in the water.  (shivers!)  but I'll save that idiosyncrasy for another art project. (Well, you are welcome!)

On the lid of my trunk case I hand sketched a tree, and then divided the tree limbs into the four seasons transitioning from spring through winter.

"No winter lasts forever,

no spring skips its turn"

This trunk is to remind me that I AM exactly where I need to be, at exactly the time I need to be there.  The winds of change are constantly blowing.  I can trust  that I am where I'm supposed to be.  The people I meet and allow into my life are intended to be connected to me during this time and place.  The challenges which occur in life are supposed to be happening.  And that everything is going to change.

For the better or the worse..  It's going to change.

I shadowed in 4 children flying kites to represent my children, and the connection they have in my life.  It is not random chance than placed these specific souls in my care, they are supposed to be my children.  Specifically. 

All of my tree leaves are hand cut, and the flowers bordering the walkway are hand painted.

Next comes fall and sweaters and beautiful colors... the last hoo-rah of carefree warm days. 

And into the frigid, low down, good for nothing, COLD winter.  Yup...  I'm not a fan.  

I did at least try to make winter pretty and enjoyable, and I suppose if I could sit behind a large very thick window in a very well heated room and watch this little scene I may enjoy it. ;) 

I did hand piece from paper my little snowman.  Closest I'll get to making a real one.

And into spring... and tweeting birds, and love and romance.

This is when I can finally exhale (and begin eating Chinese food again).

The leaves on this tree were made in a typeset fashion, by pressing a leather stamping tool into an ink pad and transferring the ink to the tree, then outlining in black.

Handpainted tulips. xoxo

(or maybe they look more like orchids?)

Little personal Brave Girls Club message...

Texture.  I used mod to adhere thread to the trunk for my kite strings.  I love the way all the textures play into each other.

Finally coat the entire finished trunk with a layer of mod, tinted very lightly with dark brown paint. Then load it up.   

I'm so excited.

Someone needs to invite me over to make art so I can carry my trunk around.  :) 

You know how sometimes you have a concept in your head, but find actually implementing the idea can prove to be challenging at best?

This was not one of those times.  This is exactly what I was going for, and I am in love with my trunk.  (and sooo happy!)

xoxo

Cam

Creating Safety and Trust

It's my creed.  My statement of belief.

Before all else, before Love, and Trust, and Faith, and Passion and Commitment there must first come saftey.  If there is not safety then how can anything else be expected to survive?  We all have the natural instinct of self preservation, avoiding pain and discomfort.

Do we take RISKS?

Absolutely.  Until they proof to be too dangerous...  too risky. 

What is it about personal relationships that challenges our our basic common sense when it comes to safety?

You see a HOT fire.

::You don't stick your hand in it::

Yet there are certain people in our lives who hurt us, over and over again... and what do we do??  Keep going back for more. 

Maybe it's the hope that people can (and sometimes do) change? Maybe it's optomistic attitudes that tell us the good outweights the bad?  Maybe the person is so good at manipulation that the facts are discombobulated, and nothing seems as it is or was, and maybe YOU begin to feel responsible?

Maybe it's our life expereinces that make us feel like we deserve to be burned... or that we're going to be burned anyway, whether its here and now or in the next relationship. 

MAYBE we begin to feel like it's suppose to burn... and not in a Johnny Cash kind of way.  Maybe it burns for so long that burning becomes what is safe?

 What else is there?

xoxo Cam

Body Image.

(Paraphrased from Wikipedia)

Body image refers to a person's feelings of the aesthetics and sexual attractiveness of his or her own body... Human society has at all times placed great value on beauty of the human body, but a person's perception of their own body may not correspond to society's standards.

A person's body image is thought to be, in part, a product of his or her personal experiences, personality, and various social and cultural forces. A person's sense of his or her own physical appearance, usually in relation to others or in relation to some cultural "ideal," can shape his or her body image. A person's perception of their appearance can be different from how others actually perceive him or her.

What others SEE, and what I see.

That's all. 

I've been over this topic about a hundred times on my blog so I don't want to do it all over again.  I'm just tired and frustrated of always stressing about really stupid stuff...  Like can I wear this outfit, or will I look fat and lumpy when I sit down, or stand a particular way? 

Ugh.

What I wouldn't give if I could go without even consider my body image again and feel perfectly content and happy about it.   

xoxo

Cam

Three Ingredient Spaghetti and Meatballs Recipe.

Lungfish. Did you know a lungfish can survive up to 4 years without eating? That's what I want for children. I'll trade them for humans when they grow up, because lungfish are really ugly.

Since going back to work full time, I have lost any joy I once took in cooking...  which was always minuscule.  Since then, there has been a lot of take out, dine out, premade, frozen and box meals in my house.  Why, because I have kids, and they like to eat.

Every night it's the same old.. 

"Mom, can you start dinner now?" 

"Mom...  I thought you were going to start dinner?" 

"Mom, what's for dinner?"

"Mom, I'm starving." 
"Mom, can you start dinner NOW??"

(Ahem.  My son just walked up behind me and read this...  his comments: 
"That is so true.")

I'm pretty sure my cooking skills have regressed... or deteriorated... or something.  I use to be pretty good in the kitchen.  I made my all my own bread, canned food excessively, cooked from scratch...I even wrote recipes and everything. See:

My Peach Tofu Smoothie Recipe:  http://shesonehotmama.blogspot.com/2009/03/my-famous-peach-tofu-smoothie-recipe.html

My Herb Chicken in Creamy Tofu Sauce Over Spinach: (This is SERIOUSLY Good!) http://shesonehotmama.blogspot.com/2009/03/herb-chicken-in-creamy-tofu-sauce-over.html

 The (not mine) Heart Attack Monte Cristo Sandwich: http://shesonehotmama.blogspot.com/2009/02/heart-attack-monte-cristo-sandwich.html

And Now...  well lets just say there's a reason I'm not assigned cooking duties at Brave Girls Camp.  I'm going to try and get back to cooking more (no I'm not.  Really.  Not.  I just can't figure out how to transition to the next part, and that sounds like the best thing to say).

And so tonight, I'm going to cook up some deliciousness.  You can too, but simply following my instructions below.  (see what I mean about the flow?)

Spaghetti and Meatballs

Ingredients:
1 bag of frozen meatballs, to taste
1 can of spaghetti sauce
1 bag of spaghetti noodles.  Cook it all, or cook half, depending on how much usually sticks to the bottom of the pot.
1 bag of frozen steamable veggies (optional)
1 loaf of garlic bread. (Optional) (Most grocery stored sell it this way... which is cool.)

Step one: Empty a bag of frozen meatballs into a pan.  I think it's called a saucepan.  Try a double boiler, I think it will burn less that way.

Step two:  Pour in a can of spaghetti sauce. 

Step Three: Put the saucepan thing on the stove on low heat. 

Step four:  Fill a large pot with water and add about a tablespoon of salt.

Step five: Heat water to boiling.

Step six:  add spaghetti noodles to boiling water, reduce heat to medium high.

Step seven:  Now you have some free time while your stove is working it's magic.  I would recommend filling it with facebook, or blogging, or that report you haven't finished at work.  It's okay to just lose yourself in distractions.

Step eight: After about 7-10 minutes, or anytime you smell burning, check the noodles and stir the sauce and meatballs.

Step nine: When the noodles are done....  how do you know when they're done?  Try throwing a noodle against the wall.  If it sticks supposedly that means it's done... drain the water, and add a bit or olive oil to stop the noodles from sticking together.  If the noodles have cooked into one massive clump, never fear... you can cut portions with a steak knife. 

Step ten: When the sauce is hot enough that it's bubbly pour over the cooked noodles. 

Step eleven: microwave the veggies about 5 minutes and empty into a bowl. 

Step twelve: slice the garlic bread.  Sometimes you have to put the garlic bread in the oven to melt the butter.  If that's the cast, you're sort of on your own.


Wah-lah, and you're welcome.  Now, If you're trying to woo that special someone, start sucking up those noodles and pushing meatballs around with your nose.  IT TOTALLY WORKS, AND SEND PICTURES.

As for me and mine...  We're now working on our lungfish skills.  My next recipe will be posted in about four years.

xoxo Cam

KONY 2012

Scroll down and turn off the music, and then PLEASE watch this video.  It's time for action.

No more ignorance.

http://vimeo.com/invisible/kony2012

xoxo Cam

It's All About Good Fortune...

I have this old table in my office.  I make all my art sitting at this old table.  It's covered in Mod Podge and paint, and generally hundreds of scraps and bits and pieces of wanna-be art supplies, my kids school work, unfinished projects, and tools.

I love it.   

When I moved the table into my studio I started decoupaging items of interest to the surface.  Mostly fortune cookie fortunes, Brave Girl quotes, and other text and pictures which seem to reach out and touch my heart.

I need to have my heart touched

(sometimes)

Sometimes life feels so off.  Like nothing I do is ever good enough...  Ever makes a difference...  ever is-- well, enough. 

So I push and Push and PUSH myself to do more, better, faster.  Always trying to figure out why I am not the best, why I am stretched so thin, and where my time goes.

Then I heard something today...  If the situation isn't improving you don't have to stay, you can QUIT. 

What?

What is this "quitting" you speak of?  And how do you know when it's okay to quit.  How do you know what you can quit? 

Nice in concept, difficult in application.

Sometimes I feel like I would love to quit FOOD.  Evil devilish stuff.  Makes me so frustrated that my body needs calories, and yet everyone knows calories are the enemy.

Food.... the greatest necessary evil of all time.  Mostly I think food and calories frustrate me because having children has changed my body in ways I can't successful change back without the aid of surgery, and that frustrates the hell out of me.

So I keep working and dieting...  I drink a "weight loss shake" every morning for breakfast, and most days have another for lunch.  I have had people I don't know come up to me in the grocery store and chastise me for buying them.

My answer to that is, "If I'd been drinking them for as long as I have and I still looked like I needed them, wouldn't that be the real problem?"

I don't have an eating disorder and I do snack and get plenty of calories so seriously, no worries... 

I'm just frustrated.

Mostly the fortunes and sentiments just remind me of things I really should know, but don't always feel or believe... or trust that they could be possible.

I love this next one best.  It's okay to keep my plans secret sometimes... and sometimes it's in my best interest to do so.  Secret plans sounds like scheming and conniving....

I want to rub my hands together and say...

"Mwahahahaha..." 

And sell my ideas...  ha.  I get it. 

Sometimes I think that if I quite my full time job I might actually have time to make a living creating art...  but I'll tell you, anytime art feels like work I lose interest. 

 Yes, I am working on some inventory for an Etsy store, but it's never going to be well stocked.  I'm not going to have "spring lines" or anything of the such.   just whatever rare and unusual concept pops into my head (or Shawna's... you know... cause she has great ideas which she continues to share with me...). That is what will be available in my shop.  Weird odds and ends intended to be incorporated into other art projects.  Some finished pieces, and of course leather cuffs. 

I intend to open my shop with about 10 listings... and I'm hoping it will happen in 2012.

Fortune cookies are real... and do not have to be followed with the phrase, "in the bedroom"... although that sure as hell makes the last one crazy inappropriate.

xoxo Cam

More on Tooled Leather Cuffs... and Tooled Leather Flowers.

I have owed my friend Shawna a cuff for  an embarrassingly long time.   

It's hard to make stuff for her because we get together and create art all the time... and she's so talented in her own accord, so I feel kind of silly making her stuff.  Hence the procrastination.

So I decide for Christmas (yes, I realize it's nearing the end of January) that I would make her a cuff.  I spent forever trying to decide what to put on the cuff.  I found all sorts of quotes about red-heads that were perfect for Shawna, but would have been weird on a cuff. 

For example:

"You'd find it easier to be bad than good if you had red hair," said Anne reproachfully. "People who haven't red hair don't know what trouble is." (From Anne of Green Gables)

 "When a fellow has a home and a dear, little, red-haired wife in it what more need he ask of life?" (This actually need to go on a cuff for Shawna's Husband...)

"I would always hesitate to recommend as a life's companion a young lady with quite such a vivid shade of red hair. Red hair, sir, in my opinion, is dangerous."

Ha!  If you know Shawna, you know the definition of a sassy red-head.

Love the quotes, but not quite right. 

I strongly considered stamping the bracelet with:

"Icarus was a moron-

Fly high."

But I hesitate.. the explanation could go both ways.  "Fly high regardless of danger?"   And then the quote also really didn't work with the design I had planned out...  and all that goodness and confusion so.... pass.

So I went with a good old standby..  Tried and true:


I wanted to try something a little different with this cuff, so I've incorporated two new techniques.

1. leather tooling by hand, as opposed to using stamps.

2. Applying sculpted leather flowers.

First I sketched my design onto the leather with a pencil, then to sculpt the leather I used a leather tooling swivel knife. 

I cut the flowers out using the same technique I always use. 

ie.  Cut a circle, draw "pie lines" on the back and then trim the petals using the pie lines as a guide.

I then used a moon shaped texture tool to add dimension to my flowers and a small circle tool to create the flower centers.  Once all the tooling was complete I molded the petals by hand and let the flowers dry.

In the meantime, I used flower punches to fill in the background on my design and the swivel tool to add additional detail and leaves where they were needed.

Next paint. 

Paint is the scariest part of making a cuff because color choices, application, and technique can completely make or break the finished product. 

Trust me...  I'd show you pictures of my first WonderCam cuff...  but I had to burn it.  It was that

B-A-D.

 I went a little vintage 70's with Shawna's cuff.

Finished with dark umber brown (my absolute favorite brown)  diluted with water, and a coat of Mod Podge.  Oh, and I added blue rhinestone rivets to a couple of the flower centers.  <3

She loved it.

That, or shes a really good actress.

Makes me sooo happy...  Because the second most scary thing is actually giving someone something you've made for them and hoping you've nailed it.  

Agony. 

I love you!!

xoxo Cam