Inspiration: Plant Starts

A great use for my Handmade Glass Lolipop Vase - a little sprig of your favorite plant!

Put in water or sand, give love, water and sunshine... watch it grow!

Kiln Glass Resource Centers

Let the glass flow...

Last night I had the awesome opportunity to join a group of artists at the Bullseye Glass Company to discuss KGRC. That would stand for Kiln Glass Resource Centers. Everyone is in town for BeCon and Bullseye generously hosted a meet n' greet round table event for the owners of Kiln Glass Resource Centers. We had a great discussion - I have so many new ideas now! And it was great to meet so many incredible people. Nathan Sandberg gave us a great presentation about achieving movement in fused glass. It was called "Going with the flow" and featured the work Bullseye did with artist Jun Kaneko. Really inspiring. I am drawn to movement in artwork and this presentation was all about causing motion in the glass with your kiln forming process. Very interesting.

Bullseye has a class that Nathan teaches for this technique

Pendleton Woolen Mill Party

Friday was the big international Craft Party - Erin and I went to the Pendleton Woolen Mill to check out their festivities - what fun! Awesome party favors, lots of woolen needle felting - I made a bookmark, there were also stations to make felted soap, felted wrist cuffs, and felted banners.

Also it was a great opportunity to shop! For one thing, in the picture above, the gallery space we were crafting in is use to showcase Pendleton blankets and tapestries. There are a number of tapestries that were designed by famous artists and a portion of the proceeds from sales from these tapestries goes to the Pendleton Native American Scholarship Fund. AND these tapestries are on sale now! It seems they are converting the space into a gallery for their blanket inventory. The sale is huge. Some are only $99! I may not have the details entirely correct, but seriously, there are some amazing deals going on!

I meanwhile shopped for wool. Visions of a set of woolen blankets sewn into a sleeping bag of sorts guided me through the aisles at the mill. The night before I went camping with Tim and we froze our butts off with three blankets on an air-mattress. All night I had wakeful dreams of wool blankets to keep us warm. Even better - a woolen sleeping bag the size of a queen airmattress! Oh yeah baby. So there I was at Pendleton, shopping for wool for this project. I don't want to spend an arm and a leg, and I don't mind getting crafty. There are remnants that they sell at $5/lbs, which I thought I'd felt (so they are thick and soft) and then sew together like a patchwork quilt. Then I saw there were entire bolts of a few old patterns that were 80%OFF. That made some of them only $12/yard. Holy crap! So I bought 4 yards of 60" wide Pendleton Wool for only $12/yard. Shocking.

This Friday is THE Craft Party!

Hey Portland friends - you are invited to the Craft Party!!

There are events at the Museum of Contemporary Craft as well as the Pendleton Woolen Mill

Heres a schedule to get you pumped!

Friday, June 10

Open Craft Activities: 11 am–6 pm
Regular Museum admission ($3 adults)

Craft Party at the Pendleton Woolen Mill: 2 pm–5:30 pm
Etsy sellers bring your business cards!

Craft Party: 7 pm–10 pm
Sliding Scale Donation ($5–$25; Age 21+ only)

Museum of Contemporary Craft
724 NW Davis Street
Portland, OR 97209

Benefitting Quilts for Quake Survivors and Mercy Corps' Japan Relief Fund

Etsy's at it again! I Heart Art: Portland and Museum of Contemporary Craft host an all-day celebration and an evening party in Portland as part of Etsy's Worldwide Craft Party. We've teamed up with the Quilts for Quake Survivors project and Mercy Corps' Japan Relief Fund to reach out beyond our community and raise money to help those in dire need through our own crafty ways.

Daytime

Drop by the Museum during regular hours, 11 am to 6 pm, and craft in the Lab all day long (regular admission applies). Help sew quilts for the Quilts for Quake Survivors project or choose from three different crafting stations: embroidery, Japanese-style papercutting or a Mighty Ugly project.

See the I Heart Art: Portland blog post for details on the daytime schedule.

If you'd like to participate during the day, please RSVP on the Meetup.com page. The tickets available for purchase through this page are for the evening party only.

Visit the Pendleton Woolen Mill from 2-5:30pm and get a tour, play with the woolen craft products, view some pieces from the archives and network with other craft artists.

Evening

At 7:00 pm, the doors will open back up to the Museum and the real party will start! We're taking over the entire space with complete with food, beer and wine, a DJ, and even more crafting stations. Your door donation will get you an entry into the drawing for a whole slew of crafty prizes (books, gift certificates, handmade goods and more!), some food and beverage tickets, and a lot of crafty fun!

Throughout the evening you can rotate through hand-felting, origami, hand-weaving, and make your own crafty artist trading cards. The quilts made for the project will be on display, and Modern Domestic will have them available for sale and sell raffle tickets.

Is your head spinning yet?! This is going to be the biggest, craftiest and most awesome craft party Etsy has ever seen! Plus all proceeds will go to Mercy Corps' Japan Relief Fund, so you can get your craft on and feel good about giving back to those in dire need of help.

Learn more about the QfQ Project and Mercy Corps' Japan Relief Fund.

Im gonna Craft Party for sure. Friday is looking to be a super fun filled day! Who wants to join me!

Farmers Market Trip

This year for my birthday I want to encourage myself to cook at home more.

A trip to the farmers market = challenge to use everything we bought!

I've already washed and marinated the asparagus, put away all the greens, parsley in water, basil turned into pesto, radishes left to soak in cold water, steaks de-frosting for bbq action and cookies and baguette will be consumed before the end of the day.

Speed Dating for Artists Round II: Visual Artists and Galleries

Last night was the second IHeartArt:Portland Mixer event. I would say I was there as a volunteer, but I didn't really do much work. :) I was there as an IHeartArt representative, to enjoy the atmosphere and network with everyone.
This event is really incredible: a free opportunity for established gallery curators to interview artists - a free opportunity for these artists to introduce themselves to the curators.
Its a "speed dating" event - replace single people looking for a hot date with artists looking for exposure.
I felt this nurturing energy around the crowd; everyone wanting to encourage each other and network with one-another. The picture above is a couple of the artists waiting to get interviewed and talking with each other about their portfolios.
There was a seminar recently (also organized by IHeartArt) on how artists should approach galleries and shops. Attending artists learned about what a curator might be looking for in a presentation, and then for this event there was a set of requirements for what the artists should bring with them. It was a well organized and smooth running event. Over 40 artists interviewed with 16 curators.
The artists seemed exhausted but exhilarated by the end of the event, and had many possible avenues to follow up with. And all the curators I spoke with afterwards were very enthusiastic about wanting to work with the artists they had met.
All the curators seemed to have a common sentiment that it was outstanding to meet so many artists they had never heard of. And they each had a handful of names that stuck out of artists that really made a great first impression.
Speed dating for artists - Portland Oregon style!
I really adore this concept and I appreciate all the hard work and care that goes into these events. IHeartArt is all about advocating for artists, educating the local community and providing the networking opportunities that make our passions grow into lucrative adventures.

Thanks IHeartArt for another great event!

If you want to read about my experience at last years IHeartArt Mixer:

• http://leahglass.blogspot.com/2010/09/i-heart-art-mixer-recap.html

Watch a video about the IHeartArt Mixer:

• http://leahglass.blogspot.com/2010/10/sweet-video-about-iheartart-event.html

Find out more about IHeartArt:

• http://iheartartpdx.com/

Snaily Snail

The mini glass globe fun continues! I went to the pet store and stocked up on some knowledge, and some aquatic life to put in my tiny glass globes. Snails and plants that can live together, a nice relationship really: the plant causes algae to grow and the snail eats the algae and keeps the glass clean. The snail also eats this particular plant, so it won't starve, rest assured! So hopefully I've created a micro-ecosystem.

Actually I've created 2 micro-ecosystems so far, the one pictured above sits on table like a tiny fish bowl, the other one (in the video below) hangs and is more tear drop shaped. My little experiments. We'll see if the snails survive and make babies! Who knows, someone asked me if they will crawl out of the globes. I have no idea? So I keep checking to make sure they are still in there :)

For sure they are super cute! I find watching them move to be really fun. Go figure. Here is a video for your viewing pleasure - proof these snails are alive (as opposed to glass snails, which I could make, that would be cute as well...)