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Tuesday, July 31, 2012

Work in progress - textile patchworks

Today I can say, that my post-travel transition back to normal life has come to the end, because now I’m back doing EVERYTHING, from drawing, knitting, watercolouring, etc.etc., and finally sewing. I told, it takes time to reconnect and not get lost in new ideas/projects/redefinitions/remakes/rejects of this or that, what I’m always tempted to do after travelling.

Well, my rhythm is back and Monday to Friday I get myself to the studio without spending much time juggling all the possible and impossible projects in my mind.

Now I’d like to show you what I got from the "pattern exploring"-story I've posted on sunday – a number of sort of "textile sketches" or mini-quilts. The result of all the influences of what has been done or seen lately : my greeny hand painted fabric scraps, patterns, colours, a couple of new finnish fabrics. This sunday I’ve made four new designs (here are two of them) that I’m exploring right now varying texture, colour and another elements. I'll use them to make new pouches and mug rugs.

I’m certainly in love with that dahlia motif and I’m gonna use it for my smaller pouches/ iPhone cases later.

Stay tuned!

Monday, July 30, 2012

Bell flowers - NEW drawings

Here are the bell flowers, that I’ve brought last week from grocery store, they were on sale: with broken stalks and yellowish dry leaves here and there. But they were still beautiful – another eye-catcher in my garden, and I like this reduced colour amplitude, being kind of calm and appeasing, with sun shining through the foliage and sparkling in various shades of green.

Sunday, July 29, 2012

Exploring pattern - surface design sketches

This time I’ve started first with pencil drawings outside and made a whole serie of sketches of wild flowers at the seaside, which I’ll post later. I worked with plants with as much different structures and shapes as I could find, and Finland is just amazing country for variety of wild and BEAUTIFUL different flora species on a couple of square feet – I could have spent my whole day at one spot and would haven’t had them all on paper – greedy eyes, I know.

Back at home while my family has been napping Saturday afternoon I’ve been watching the sketches and it suddenly gave me an idea to make a collage with leaves and plants what I had growing around our house and explore pattern. I’ve picked up just several items and made some arrangements, then I’ve let my little girl play with them as well, and it was fun. Afterwards I’ve just drawn them loosely with my sharpey. I’m thinking about using it all in my projects where I need that kind of surface design drafts – pouches, cards, it may become a pillow case, etc. Stay tuned, I hope to come with the results the next week.

Saturday, July 28, 2012

Affirmation #5 - embrace change

Lately I’ve been going though many things I haven’t planned or at least not imagined that way. After I got started posting regularly on my blog and working for the Etsy-shop, and after all the time I’ve spent on figuring out which way to go, I have planned to fully concentrate on "Raumalainen" during the summer. And since the beginning of July I’m actually busy with anything except the creative projects that I’ve considered important for me. 

During my being-far-from-the-studio I’ve reflected a lot about my business, but I also kept telling to myself that all the events, movements etc. were not without purpose, even if it’s yet not evident to me. That’s how I came to another affirmation about embracing changes.

I quit my job after three years of maternity leave, in which the perspectives had kept already shrinking over the last years. I’m now going freelance and sometimes it’s sort of scaring. Even if I do not freak out obviously, I cannot help but feeling sometimes like a rug being pulled out under my feet. 

But anyway, recently I’ve seen a quote on my friend’s blog about being later more disappointed by the things we’ve not dared to do, not by the things we’ve done. And that coincides with the motivation I have to continue. I love what I do and the project "Raumalainen" brings into my life, besides of having a family, of course, that feeling of fulfillment, I’ve rarely had before, while having a regular job.

Just like this I’d like to highlight that positive attitude towards any change, because that’s how we can keep the eyes open to see the opportunities. So embrace change.

Friday, July 27, 2012

Zooming in on process - watercolour drawings

This time it’s a focus change – I have been drawing the bell flowers this afternoon and suddenly found it interesting to zoom in on the process and change the point of view. Here we are with a peek into my patio corner where I paint and draw on sunny sommer days. The actual drawings will be posted on weekend.

Thursday, July 26, 2012

New drawings - ANEMONES

Here are the drawings of anemones, the last three of them, because I got started already yesterday with them, the weather was changing all the time and I just detailed them too much, and it was not good. And I failed at the beginning. Many times. Today it has been easier despite the disappointment and I’ve managed not to overload my sheets. I love the anemones, and I’m almost quite pleased with the results, though it’s not that much, and it has been one of the trickiest flower to draw so far. I’ve actually expected them to come in red and white as well, but these three shades of magenta-violet-ultramarin blue is all I have right now.

Next would come maybe red carnations, of violet bell-flowers. I’ve also some white flowers, and a gorgeous red dahlia, that might come the next.  And I have to fill a little bit my shop with another products - so far for weekend planning.

Have a nice day !

Wednesday, July 25, 2012

Work in progress - colouring book

Some work in progress – this early morning and while my little girl was having her breakfast I’ve finished the sketches for the colouring book, I’ve introduced lately. Now it’s about writing a couple of words to explain the story and putting – I don’t know – ink, or maybe something else. I like ink for my affirmation drawings, but it’s too smooth and dense, and elaborated for this kind of work – I’d like it to be more bristle-like, maybe more charcoal, more nervous – have to figure it out in the next days.

It’s sometimes sunny outside today, thanks God, so I have to take advantage of this and sketch the anemones, that are finally flourishing in my garden – I’ll keep you posted.

Tuesday, July 24, 2012

A blue-bellflower teddy

Here we are with another one teddy bear – in beige and blue. Its characteristics are  similar to the teddy, that was described in the previous post (size, jointing, filling etc.). Different is its character – that’s it that comes out differently each time I make a new teddy. 

As for the rest, I'm getting focused after the week spent far away from my studio: it usually takes a couple of days, sometimes a week, to get going all the projects that I’ve left behind before departure. At this time I may start asking myself about what is actually more or less important in what I do, and what if I’d change here and there a little bit. I’m okay with that, and it comes sometimes to a couple of new projects, or just developping of some new ideas. 

Otherwise I try to get going projects that have come to a standstill recently. Yes, I have a couple of them in my basket. These are non-finished projects, which realisation is beyond my time limits  - spending time on reconnecting with inspiration each time after an interruption on a long-term project is something I cannot afford right now. I prefer quick and short projects, or projects which realization can be fragmented, so that my little girl can wait a couple of minutes till I'm done with the fragment and have my spirit free to switch to playing/reading/etc.

Back to non-finishing, the post-travel slow-downs shake me up to re-think a project, that is spooking in my head and to find another way to get it done. Hope to be able to show more of that by the end of the week.

Here the teddy blue-bellflower. It will soon be available for sale. Stay tuned.

Monday, July 23, 2012

Teddy bear - green sapphire

As I’ve recently told, I was busy knitting teddy bears being abroad. Here the first one of the three(!), I’ve managed to almost finish during my journey. This one is knitted of variety of yarn, as usual. It is fully jointed and filled with polyester filling, it has glass eyes.  Its nose is needle-felted. It can sit alone, and stand with some support in the background. The height is about 30 cm (11,8")  standing, 23 cm (9,1") sitting.

It will be for sale soon - stay tuned.

I'll be back tomorrow with another one - blue bellflower.

Friday, July 20, 2012

Home searching - new colouring book in progress

Hello, I'm back and blogging again.
A couple of days before I saw a film about a russian painter.

He talked a little, and showed not that much either. There was beautiful music in the background, short films showing riverside scapes in winter, with a couple of views of his simple old wooden village house at River Kolyma. His household was sparse and simple. I liked his voice - calm and sort of "sotto voce", and his thoughts and observations about human nature and nature at all were sharp and deep. 

He had that inner balance, that awareness of what he can and knows, of what he understands, of what he will never understand, but can feel and immerse into that sensation and it will be enough, and he had that profound sense of awe towards the nature’s splendor and power. 

He said that it was that country that shaped him, the tragic destiny of his father, denounced as a national enemy in the middle fifties, expulsed over night to labour camps at River Kolyma, and that was the painter’s mother who has never abandoned to search her husband and finally moved to that region, where the little painter grew up and fall in love with, found his vocation and never left. That he learned to love that severe country and to see its beauties - he's proud now to call it home.
It got me thinking about home. About what is so important about it. 

About home as sort of composition of people you love, your family, people you appreciate talking to, not necessarily family, culture and history of the country, and very many other pieces that put together that puzzle which we call home. And that it may also not be bound to a certain place or country, like in my case, because of people I meet, countries I traverse, and cultures I assimilate, and many other pieces along the way, that I adopt, appreciate and keep and just like this they partake in what I call home.

I feel like home when I have the sensation of integrity, of wholeness, of inner balance, of deep joy and delight, and it all may originate from many different places and people, but also from a beautiful seaside, or a flower, or music, or foliage noise during the rain, or smell of growing tomato vine, and I put them all together  and just like this I feel myself at home.

With all this in my head I've started another colouring book for my little girl. I haven't planned any story here, but while drawing I've realised that the drawings shaped a story about a little dog, searching for something it has lost, and not knowing what it had been, maybe home, maybe not. It finds friendship at the end and this is what makes him happy. Here a peek preview.

Monday, July 16, 2012

New smartphone pouches in my shop

Here I am with a post from abroad. I’ve been busy in a last couple of hours with editing photos of my new products I’ve shot before departure and writing descriptions of my brand new smartphone pouches and can happily announce that they have been successfully landed on Etsy Raumalainen and can be viewed there in a couple of hours. Go check them out.

As for the rest, I’m knitting teddy bears and actually trying to squeeze a couple of finnish lessons inbetween (was one of my resolutions as for using my time effectively, while being far from my husband and our little girl), cooking gooseberry marmalade and watching cook TV-shows/co-knitting with my mum, talking and walking a lot with my dad, eating yummy Russian home made food, and blaming myself for not having brought my Schmincke watercolour box, because of gorgeous cichorium in light ultramarine blue blooming all around here. Well I do not have that much time, and have to go back home in a couple of days, but maybe I’ll make it work somehow and bring it to paper. 

Have a nice day!

Friday, July 13, 2012

Product preview - new smartphone pouches in mixed technique

Well, I'm going out of country for a couple of days and will be back  thursday next week.

Here a peek preview of what I've been doing lately - smartphone pouches - meet the first three of them. I still have to go to pack my suitcase and move to Helsinki to catch the airplane. These pouches will be going in next days in my shop, except of one, that was commissioned.

Hope to be able to make a couple of posts from "being-far-away", but if not, see you next week!

Wednesday, July 11, 2012

Think POSITIVE - Affirmation #4

Here we go with another affirmation. I‘ve started with no sentence at all, putting just many elements together, that I‘ve recently drawn in other projects. It got clear after I‘ve sketched the sphere in the hand, and like this I had an idea about sort of energy origin or transfer, or whatever, you name it, - from an abstract concept to an emotion, than maybe to a product or another concept and so on. 

And just like that I've transformed my inerte sphere into a living bird. It all made me think about transformation of an idea (being represented by a sphere) into matter, that has energy of motion – a bird. And that it will make it own way into the world – whether as an item of matter, or movement, or light (I mean when we emotionally support someone, kind of giving someone that kind of immaterial power, that emotional energy, sort of light, that may help to overcome difficulties or problems). This way into the world means acting and interacting with other people's feelings, thoughts, inspiring, motivating and so on. 

Like this I‘ve got to emphasise the importance of doing things right, because of their impact. They are an imprint of many things such as what we do, and what we think, and how we do it and how we feel about it, and how we deal with other people, that‘s how I got the sentence about the importance of positive attitude – I may not have any influence on diminishing the world problems, but what I do, think, or whatever, well, that may actuate some small wheels that can get a bigger and more influential one/-s to move – think and act POSITIVE!  

May your ideas, emotions or products carry that positive charge out there. The rest will line up.

Enkelinkukkat - new drawings

Pleased to introduce you a different kind of flowers – Enkelinkukkat, no idea what‘s the right name in english, has to be angel flower, I guess. Well, I‘ve hesitated this time about posting them or not – this time I‘ve not painted any background, what I‘m usually doing to put all the light in the foreground. These flowers were just different. Low-key, in nice shades of lila and mauve, and old rose – I felt, that coloured background would be distracting from them instead of supporting, and just too much for these delicate and yet opulent creatures. I‘d like to have it painted on canvases, watercoloured of course, but primed with gesso to add some texture and being lightly tinted with some hints of diluted colours here and there – just to break the planeness of white paper . Well, it sounds like a next project.

Monday, July 9, 2012

Work on commission - smartphone pouch

Yesterday I had my first  commission work!

It‘s a smartphone pouch and I was pretty free as for design and fabrics, except that it had to be from corduroy and padded, and I knew, the recipient likes colour orange. Well, I‘ve picked some fabrics that are not right now in my working stash – creative initiation came from a piece of Marimekko Unikko cotton, in fact from a couple of yellow and orange poppy flowers that were printed on that fabric among the others in rose and red. And I wanted to use more shades of blue, because that pouch didn‘t have to be girly. Guess what is the main flower? Right, carnation! Well, I‘m pleased how it turned out and the recipient is pleased as well, so that now I can publish the photos.

It‘s made of brownish corduroy, with appliqué in variety of cottons (see photos), with free motion stitching. It has a zipper, is fully lined and padded to ensure stability and sturdiness. There is a little pendant with two wooden beads at one side.


It has been interesting and inspiring - I'm gonna make some more to explore another appliqué patterns and with another background fabric. I'll keep you posted!