Holy crap, I have stuff for sale! At the moment all I have are these four pairs of earrings, but I should have more up there soon!

- lindsey

A few pairs of earrings I made recently.

I’ve been playing around with a lot of different internet services lately. I’ve started using Meebo and now have a Meebo widget occupying some sidebar space on angrygato.com.  It shows when I’m online and allows visitors to my site to talk to me via instant message.  No one has used it yet, but I thought it was a neat little gadget that I wanted to try out.

Yesterday, I got a Tumblr.   At first, I didn’t really know what I wanted to do with it but I was intrigued by the concept, since I do enjoy micro-blogging (much more so than “real” blogging, actually).   After playing around with it a bit, I decided to insert my Tumblr’s feed to the angrygato.com main page, so any visitors could see content that was more or less constantly changing, along with being a bit more interesting than a few sentences about what kind of stuff I’m working on.

In theory, that might mean that this “proper” blog will be used less often, but I update infrequently enough as it is.  Instead, this might actually provide me with a neat way to display and document everyday adventures in crafting, and maybe drive me to write MORE real posts!  Maybe I’ll even actually DO more!

One can only hope..

But stay tuned to the Tumblr for a view of what’s really going on in my crafting universe.  You can find it either on www.angrygato.com or angrygato.tumblr.com.

- lindsey

My craft supplies are hogging my couch. I'm sitting on the floor now.

It’s a rainy day.  The skies are feeding my garden, and I’m in my pajamas, having a relaxed, messy, crafty day. 

Since I last posted, I graduated from community college.  Now I’ve got the entire summer to have fun, make stuff and save up for my university expenses in the fall.  I’ve been pretty busy during the past week or so, and I’ve made a few fun little things.  

I recently discovered the joys of needle felting and basically felt in general, so I have had a lot of fun with that lately.  These pictures show a few felt beads (so fun!) and a couple felt pendants that are in-progress.

Made with a scrap of a felted sweater, wool fibers, embroidery floss and glass beads.

Felt beads and a couple unfinished pendants.

 I’ve also been making a few journals every now and then, but I was getting tired of my selection of yarn for weaving the spine with.  So,  I decided to get some yarn and dye it myself!  Of course, I’ve never done any dyeing before and I conveniently forgot that cotton is very difficult to dye, but eventually I got some Kool Aid and white wool yarn.  

The results of my Kool Aid dyeing experiment!

It was a fun and entertaining experience, although the results are certainly not perfect.  There was some color contamination, and I ended up with blue dye all over my counter because some of the yarn siphoned the dye out of the bath.  But I’ve learned my lessons, and can’t wait to try it again!

This is a journal I made using some of the Kool-Aid dyed yarn.  I used the skein on the bottom of the above picture.

Journal made with Kool-Aid dyed yarn

It would be really fun to be able to do some felting on the spine since it’s made with wool yarn, although I don’t really know how I would make that work.  

Here is a picture of one of the inside pages of the journal.

Speaking of yarn, I’ve been making yarn out of old T-shirts lately too.  It is a little time consuming and tough depending on how sharp my scissors are, but I’ve got a TON of T-shirts in all sorts of fun colors that are begging to be cut up.

Finally, I also got a new toy to play with that I’m using at this very moment to make this blog business happen!  I bought myself a new netbook for a graduation present, and I got a sweet little neoprene case custom-printed for it.  

My shiny new netbook and case!

Back to crafting! Hopefully today will give me more stuff to show off!

- lindsey

Learn how to make this lovely journal

I have finally posted my first craft tutorial!  The tutorial covers how to make a simple journal out of repurposed materials.  It’s a neat technique because you can even print the inside pages to create your own book of whatever!  A few years ago I used this technique to make cookbooks for my family by collecting recipes, designing the pages and photocopying everything, then binding the pages into an old book cover.  They came out fantastic!

If you’d like to learn how to make these journals, you can find the tutorial here.  

Hopefully there will be more to come as school finally ends and summer begins!

It’s that time of year.  Homework awaits and piles up, but the snow is just starting to melt for good and signs of life are just beginning to appear.  Everything is starting over, and all I want to do is play.  

I’ve got lots of ideas for new projects, and there’s a good chance that I’ll actually be able to produce actual creations from these ideas this time!  At present, my biggest project is making bottle stoppers that can be used not only on bottles of wine, but on any neat-looking glass bottle with a similar size mouth.  

The story behind this latest project is kind of a funny one.  My last big project was trying to make my own vanilla extract from vodka and vanilla beans.  I’m intending the fruits of my labor to be gifts, and a couple weeks ago I went on a mission to find all the necessary materials.  Surprisingly, I found vanilla beans right down the street from me and of course vodka wasn’t too hard to find either.  The most elusive part of the whole equation was finding some suitable container to store it all in.

I went to thrift shops in search of (preferably amber) glass bottles with caps, and I ended up trekking over to a local kitchen supply store and buying brand-new 8oz bottles with swing-tops.  Clear glass, and they cost a bit more than I had wanted to pay.  

My adventure finally over, I drove home only to realize as I was hauling in my supplies that I have an abundance of glass bottles stashed in my closet, and plenty of them were amber or otherwise dark colored glass.  The only thing most of them were missing were lids or stoppers to seal the contents.  I felt like an idiot, but figured that I could buy decorative stoppers for the bottles if I were ever to need them again, and of course when I did some research and found out how expensive they are, it naturally evolved into the notion of making decorative stoppers myself.

This is the very first stopper I made–very plain, but I kind of like it.  

Check my mad product photography skillz! :P

I’ve had some difficulty with determining an inexpensive yet stylish way to construct the tops.  I bought some polymer clay, hoping that I could sculpt some figures and glue them on top of the corks but that didn’t work out as planned.  (Need more practice with sculpting and not muddling my colors.)  But, a fortuitous stop to my favorite thrift shop yielded a giant bag of wooden beads that have approximately the same size holes as my pre-drilled corks do!  

I briefly entertained the idea of painting the beads, but for some reason I’m just terrible at painting anything simple.  I think I have another idea to jazz them up a bit but I’ll do a bit of experimentation and see if it works….

- lindsey

Oh wow, a new post!  I haven’t updated in a while, mostly because I haven’t actually done anything in a while.  The winter doldrums hit with full force, and it wasn’t improved by my not-quite-impossible workload of full-time school and part-time work.  

Not that the school or work situations have changed, mind you.  I’ve gotten back into the swing of things because spring is coming, I’m gearing up for summer and I’ve got a lot of homework that I quite frankly don’t want to do at the moment.

I have also developed an.. EVIL PLAN (of sorts) for this summer.  It’s really not evil, but it’s fun to have diabolical plans and chuckle maliciously when the pieces fall into place.  The plan itself is actually really good, and it involves me making MORE STUFF!  and perhaps even selling it.

I’m not going to get into too many details here because said EVIL PLAN has about five different possible ways of happening, and I’d like to work out the details more before putting everything out there.  But I’m excited.. and scared.. but mostly excited!  I got a Twitter to document my progress on this diabolical scheme, so if you’re interested in getting up-to-the-minute info on what this plan is and how it’s going, find me on Twitter! 

twitter.com/angrygato

Allright, back to work!

- lindsey

First things first, I’ve been getting a ridiculous amount of spam comments so anyone that wants to comment needs to register and login.  Yeah, I know.  Another username, another password.. it gets annoying.  But my inbox filling up with hundreds of nonsense comments is even more annoying, at least to me.

Not that I’ve gotten any REAL comments in quite a while…

Now, onto the fun stuff.

I quit my job a couple weeks ago because now I’m going to school full-time and therefore I won’t be able to do my job.  Commence part-time job hunt!  It’s going pretty well actually..

I also redesigned angrygato!  I’m not done with it and probably won’t be for a little while, but it’s nice to have something fresh and new up there.  

I’ve also started making monsters for ellO gallery’s upcoming show, Monsters!  I’ll post pictures a little later, but it’s 6:30am and although for some reason I’m sort-of awake, I’m still lazy.  Food related adventures include mango marmalade (i’m crossing my fingers in hopes that it set properly last night..) and hopefully multigrain bread soon.. 

Back to bed!

- Lindsey

New business card design!  

I’m redesigning ANGRYGATO! as well and this somewhat goes along with my new developing theme.

It doesn’t feel like I have been doing a lot of art-related things lately, but there actually have been quite a few semi-major developments concerning art and all that fun stuff.  The most major of which is.. well.. concerning my intended major when I go to “real” college.  To make a long story short, I might be trading art in for science.

This isn’t to say that I’m not going to ever be an art teacher, but I’m interested in looking at all sorts of different options as well.  Just looking at majors over at da UNH, I really think I could be just as happy doing studies in environmental conservation/sustainable living.  I’m also thinking about their Eco-Gastronomy dual major.  I can still get teacher certification after I graduate.  If I still really want to teach art, I can get a master’s degree in Art Education which would give me the academic credentials to teach at basically any level.  In a nutshell, I’m kind of thinking a studio art major would be a waste for me, since a lot of my interests combine art with science.  

Aside from all that business, I’m thinking of incorporating some of my cooking (and other..?) exploits in this blog as well, to give me some more to write about.  A sampling of what I’ve created in the past couple of weeks… orange chicken, Pink Lady apple pie, banana nut bread, maple-pecan coffee cake, fruit salsa with baked cinnamon-sugar tortilla chips… 

I’d also like to try brewing my own soda.  I have fallen in love with sarsaparilla and actually made my own syrup last night to mix in with seltzer water and try, although it wasn’t just sarsaparilla.  I added cinnamon, cloves, wintergreen, spearmint, lavender, star anise, cardamom and pepper along with a generous amount of honey, so we’ll see how that goes.  But I’d like to actually get some champagne or ale yeast and make soda from scratch!  It’s an exciting prospect, and I’m trying to convince Mike that we should try and home-brew our own root beer!

Hopefully nothing will explode though… if so I’ll probably have pictures.. 

-lindsey

After what seems like ages, I’ve finally gotten back into the swing of things, artistically speaking.  I’ve been able to relax and let go of my stress a bit easier now, since school is over and all I have to deal with is work and fun summer stuff.  

I spent most of the weekend drawing small pieces that I’m planning on submitting to a show at the end of the summer, and for once the visual content has some substance to it!  Not a whole lot, but it’s something I struggle with occasionally.  

 I also experimented a bit with acrylic/photocopy image transfers.  Now, I’m no stranger to the process, although in the past it has usually consisted of me painting a canvas in random colors, slapping the image on top and slowly peeling it away to see what was there.

This time, I tried painting the photocopied drawings (on the toner side) and then gluing them to the canvas to see if that would work as well.  To my delight, it did.  Now I can have even more fun with image transfers and retain a good deal more control over the colors!! 

These aren’t 100% done yet, but I’m thrilled with how they’ve come out so far. 

See more photos from my experiment on Flickr!

Two more pictures under the cut! 

Read the rest of this entry »

I hate the fact that I’ve been neglecting this, and my art in general.  The semester is almost over, I’ve finished all of my important projects (even got a 100 on one!) and now I have to register for next term.  Summer classes, intensive study, fall classes, spring and hopefully I’ll escape with a degree.  At the same time, I’ll be looking for other schools to repeat this whole process with.

All for the sake of progress.

But at least Round 2 probably won’t involve going to school full-time in addition to working full-time.  My head keeps spinning just trying to think of how things will work, how I’ll pay for this and that, if this will get in the way.. and in the meantime there are so many other things I want to do but there aren’t enough hours in the day.

With my neglect of art, my creativity has been spilling out in other ways, chiefly through cooking.  I’ve got a bunch of herbs growing, so eventually I’ll be able to use homegrown, fresh herbs to make things even more tasty.  We don’t have much space for them, but I’ve got a windowbox on the deck and a bunch of herb pots in the kitchen by the windows.  

I’ve been making all sorts of things from scratch (or near enough) lately.  I made my first loaf of white bread last week.  The texture and crust were fantastic but the flavor left something to be desired.. oh well.  At least it was good for french toast!  

Yesterday I made blueberry muffins with streusel topping, although the streusel kind of melted or something.  I also made chicken noodle soup, which I was especially proud of.  I used pre-made chicken broth, but I used fresh vegetables (from the produce stand next door!) and did everything else myself.  I wasn’t expecting it to be complete trash but I was pleasantly surprised at how well it came out.  

Homemade pizza is another adventure.. Pizza has always been considered a great challenge to me because I always manage to screw something up.  The usual result is a soggy, undercooked crust in the middle.  Then I end up getting angry because if I’m going to make pizza, I have to make it with the best toppings I can find and they’ve all been wasted on a half-edible pizza.  But my pizza adventures have been more success than failure lately and that’s an encouraging sign.  

And, of course, my blender that I ordered came in so there will be adventures of the milkshake-and-smoothie variety soon…  

I have also meant to devote an entire post to how awesome Craft-Along For A Cause was.  We had an awesome group of people with a variety of experience and abilities, and we even discovered a few new ways to make the journals work.  Laura from Families First was thrilled when I brought the books to donate them, and she wanted to extend a heartfelt thanks to everyone who participated, and to ellO who hosted the event.  

It was a great experience, and it just affirmed that I should do more things like that.   Teaching, learning, giving.  It was wonderful.   And slowly but surely, I’m getting there.

- lindsey 

So, I’ve inadvertently taken a hiatus from the worlds of the internet, blogging, and art-making.  The reason?

My first apartment. 

The lighting is a little lacking in photographic quality, but it’s nice in real life. 

I promise that I will be back soon, but there is a little bit of “real world” business to attend to.   Doing dishes, organizing art supplies, writing papers, paying bills… oh my!  And, spring is coming.   

Craft-Along for a Cause at ellO in Portsmouth is next weekend!  Click here for more info! 

 Lots of pictures today!!  I didn’t think that I was being all that productive this week but I guess I just wasn’t taking pictures of anything until today.  

I’ve been having fun with melted beads, crazy patchwork fabric stuff, making wall hangings and making a case for my wonderful valentines day gift. <3 

Here are the results of last weekend’s experiment with foil patterns and melted beads. 

 I didn’t have any problems with making the tinfoil stick to the beads, which was amazing.  I just put the pattern in the bottom of my mold, scattered beads over and threw it in the oven.  They each gave really nice results.  

7 more pictures of fun stuff under the cut!

Read the rest of this entry »

It always seems like a lot of stuff is going on, and I suppose there is.  Working full-time and going to school part-time keeps me busy but I’ve got Craft-Along and my other art on top of it as well.   

Last week wasn’t too artistically productive, but every so often I have days that a ton of ideas will hit me at once.  Usually this happens at work, and it makes me angry because I have to wait until I get home (if I’m lucky) to try them out.

 This was one of those days.  So this weekend, I’ll probably be trying a few things out..

•  Melted bead suncatchers with tinfoil designs on them
• Single napkin flowers, maybe arranged into a bouquet?
• A couple different ways to make book covers 

 A couple days ago I got to have the day off from work ::cough because I slid my car into a snowbank cough:: and I ended up finding a few random unfinished pieces.  Naturally, I played around with them a little bit and came up with some interesting things..

I’ve had that heart lying around for almost two years.  It’s been waiting to be incorporated into something interesting, and I tried this out.  I ended up making a wall hanging out of the heart, the bird and some bent wire accent things.  No pics yet, but I’ll post them soon.

 More pictures of art type stuff under the cut! Read the rest of this entry »

I’ve been doing a bunch of work on the Craft-Along project, but very little of it includes pretty pictures of things.   

Business cards have been ordered and I’m starting to gather supplies.. oh so much fun indeed.    

 All sorts of things have been spinning through my head for this.. from trying to brainstorm more possible projects to thinking up neat fundraising ideas.  Of course, when I try to brainstorm like this I end up making fifteen of the same list.  

 But anyways….I was rummaging around my assorted art-related junk bins and I found something that I did ages ago… I don’t think I liked it very much at the time but I think I like it more now.

( A few more pictures of random stuff under the cut)

Read the rest of this entry »

I met with Byrdy from ellO gallery over the weekend and we hammered out some details for the first Craft-Along For A Cause event!   I can’t guarantee that all the details will remain the same because who knows what could happen in a month, but here they are.

Date: Sunday, February 24th from 1pm to 3pm

Where: ellO Gallery - 110 State Street in Portsmouth, NH

 Project: Handmade Journals for Families First

Participants in this workshop will end up making two different journals using a very simple technique.  No prior experience with bookbinding is necessary, but some crafting/fiber arts knowledge is helpful. 

One will be a large blank journal made out of an old hardcover book.  This will be donated to Families First to help with their Family Support program.  

The other will be a smaller journal for the participant to keep.  The smaller journal will utilize the inside pages of the original book, resulting in a unique and inspiring place for collage, drawing or other creative uses.  

I will try to provide enough supplies for everyone, but anyone who would like to bring their own materials is encouraged to do so.   

Reserving a spot prior to the event is strongly encouraged, because it gives me a good idea of how much supplies I need.  You can register here.   

AND.. I redesigned my business card!  I think this one’s a keeper… 

Maybe I’ll do some homework before bed…

- lindsey 

Yeah, that’s right.  My dad has recently taken up knitting, and he can’t seem to be able to stop!  I’m not complaining though, I’m actually impressed.  He’s done a fantastic job on his projects.  I don’t have nearly enough patience for knitting, so I generally stay away from it.  I’m a crochet gal, although I’m hopeless at doing straight edges.  

He presented me with this awesome scarf today.

It says.. “ANGRY GATO RAWR RAWR ANGRY GATO” Under the cut: more pictures of this and another neat scarf, along with one more silly angrygato-themed piece.  Read the rest of this entry »

I like posting pictures.  It makes me a little sad when I don’t have any neat pictures to go along with my entries, so I’ll usually find something to include.

 Like this.. a doodle created in my Human Growth and Development class.  First day of classes for the lose.

In other news, it looks like a Craft-Along For A Cause event might be in the works…

I’ll give more details when it’s all finalized but this beginning makes me feel really good.  Hopeful.  And a little bit of hope is just what I need.

- lindsey 

I’ve done a little more chipping away at the Craft-Along For A Cause idea.  I’ve started to make a website for it which you can see here.  I also designed a business card, but it will probably change a couple times before I actually get around to making them up. 

 Here’s a list of potential projects that I brainstormed earlier today.

•  Journals
• Cloth Napkins (and decorative sculptures like the napkin flower)
• Heating pads (different varieties.. simple neck-warmer tubes or other simple flat shapes, animal faces…)
• Pillows (patchwork, painted/dyed fabric, hand-printed, appliques..)
• Windchimes, probably made with old silverware
• Children’s toys, such as jacob’s ladders, painted wooden blocks, clothespin dolls, rag dolls, wooden spool snakes, maybe even a cardboard castle or two.
• Cloth menstrual pads for women’s shelters? (Might be a challenge to hand-sew..)
• Fabric pencil cases
• Balsam fir pillows!
• Simple hats and scarves
• Handbags (in particular handbags made of pretty scarves)
• Simple blankets
• Potholders?
• Pet beds and miscellaneous pet toys

As much as I’d like to just go full-throttle and get everything out there, I think I’m going to experiment with projects first.  Write some tutorials, make some samples… do fun stuff.   Ooh sleep.. more fun stuff. - lindsey 

I almost finished the quilt last night.  Besides the actual “quilting” part, I made it into a functional blanket/comforter type thing.  BUT.. it doesn’t seem to have enough batting in it.  :(  Oh well, another problem for another day.

Now.. fun pictures!  

A flower made of cloth napkins!

(Lots of art under the cut.. and a kitten)

Read the rest of this entry »

Today is a day for discovery, it seems.  I just discovered that comments on this journal are set as moderated (by me) so I had a couple comments that I didn’t even know existed (!).. 

And a few moments ago, I discovered this!

 This is from http://ellogallery.etsy.com, photo courtesy of ellO gallery. 

This is the piece that I submitted to the DOOM show at ellO!  It’s called “The Road to Ruin.”  It’s a mixed media wall-hanging that could find a nice place adorning a window as a suncatcher.  Made with melted beads, a few glass and bead embellishments, some shaped wire and a spoon.  

 It was really fun to make, although a bit frustrating at times.  

 Here’s a secret.. you can’t see it in the picture, but in the bowl of the spoon behind the beads, a design has been (partially) cut out.  It’s a pitchfork, nearly completed but abandoned because my jeweler’s sawblades kept breaking and I was just too infuriated at it to finish it.  

 So, to cover it up I just melted some beads in the spoon and placed a glass marble-thing in it!  Ta-da!  

 And, between you and me I think the piece is better off for it.  I wasn’t planning on melting beads in the spoon, but I like it better this way.

- lindsey