Announcing Wee Felt Worlds!

Greetings everyone!

Whew!  Time has just been flying by here in No Mail Day world.  It's already a new year -- the start of 2013 means that we're officially in The Future, and that means... well, I'm not sure what it means yet but it's exciting.

Now that it's finally here (well, almost -- the release date is February 15th!) I'm excited to announce that my work has been included in an awesome new needle felting project book from Lark Crafts and Amanda Carestio, Wee Felt Worlds: Sweet Little Scenes to Needle Felt.

Here's my copy -- the cover is so whimsical -- the purple blobby alien is one of my projects!

 Here's the official description:

"There's something magical about things made in miniature—and now you can create whole wee worlds of them, with three-dimensional critters and scenery. It's easy to do with needle felting, an oh-so-simple process that requires few tools. Choose one of ten fun felted scenes with 50 individual items, including a prehistoric landscape with dinosaurs, volcanoes, and Paleolithic plants; a camping adventure featuring an adorable bear cub; a sweet sewing room, and even a galaxy far, far away with UFOs! Along the way, readers get tons of techniques and tips from the designers—from basic felt shaping to creating joints—and lots of helpful step-by-step illustrations. "

It's been about a year since I finished these projects, and seeing them here feels a little surreal! I contributed two "scenes" to the book, a space scene and a fun science scene, for a total of 11 little projects. It's such an honor to be included alongside such super talented needle felting artists, and the great photography and adorable styling really brought everything to life in a way that completely exceeded my expectations.

And of course I couldn't resist a few fun photos: 

Alien Girl explores her bio and instructions!

Approved wholeheartedly! < 3

Anyway, you can pre-order (or order, it looks like) Wee Felt Worlds on Amazon, and hopefully find it at other bookstores after February 5th. If you've ever thought about giving needle felting a try, it looks like this will be a good place to start!

Title: Wee Felt Worlds: Sweet Little Scenes to Needle Felt

Editor/Author: Amanda Carestio

Publisher: Lark Crafts

ISBN: 978-1454703938

End of September Blues...

September's almost over already!  Where it went is anybody's guess -- the following things can only have added to it:

- New Job!  I got a new job in youth services (!), at another library.  This is very exciting to me since it's basically the next step in my professional development, but I'm still getting used to the hours.  It's an exhausting change that has left my head spinning, a little bit! Needless to say, this has been at the forefront of my mind lately, and crafting and blogging have sadly had to take a backseat for the moment.

- Fall Activity Extravaganza!  When not busy being exhausted, I have been throwing myself at autumn with everything I have.  Apple picking, hiking, pumpkin-themed foods... this year I'm determined to do it all! 

Apples!  That I picked myself!  Off of a tree!  And they were all, without exception, somehow amazing.

- Time Spent With Friends is Time Well Spent.  Enough said, but somehow it always seems like too much time passes between spending time with good friends.

In a way, this time of year leaves me feeling down -- summer's over, and that means that winter is on the way. But fall... fall is just the best.  It's my favorite season, my favorite time of year, with my favorite activities and tastes and holidays.  At the same time, it's only a matter of time before fall is over again, and winter comes. That's always in the back of my mind, and it seems to add a sense of melancholy to everything. It's important to just enjoy everything while I can!

Weekend Wrap-Up: Long Weekend Love

Happy Labor Day, and happy Monday! This long weekend was a bit of a whirlwind -- it's nice to have a chance to get my head together every once in a while. I'm starting in a new position soon and am very excited about it.  But any new position means new stresses; change itself is stressful, sometimes, even good, awesome change.

The first stop of the weekend was Barnes & Noble for a few hours, where I indulged my magazine-lovin' side with the new Vogue and Games magazine.  I love doing puzzles, it's such a good way to de-stress and take some time to myself to think.  I've also been reading Jillian Larkin's third flapper novel, Diva, which I picked up at the library late last week. This series is so much glamorous YA 1920s fun -- I hope that this one brings things to a fabulous conclusion! 

Yesterday my friends and I took a day trip to Green Lane Park to go hiking.  It was damp and a little rainy, and we found a ton of really interesting mushrooms and fungi -- really productive, and I got a lot of satisfying photos!  Going on mushrooming photo walks is such a good way to find inspiration. I'm really terrible at identifying, but love the huge diversity of shapes and colors that can be found in even just a small area of the woods. 

Thirty Days of Lists

This September I've decided to try my hand at participating in Thirty Days of Lists, a very cool creative project run by two inspiring bloggy ladies, Amy of Lemon and Raspberry and Kam of Campfire Chic. The basic idea of the 30 Lists project is to complete a list every day during the month of September in whatever format you want -- scrapbook, digitally, in as much or as little time as you'd like!  

I'm a huge lister (fan of lists? list-maker?), and the idea of this project was so enthralling that I just had to sign up. It's so awesome to see all of these interesting, creative people joining together around the simple art of listing and I'm excited to see what everyone comes up with this September. 

I was thinking about doing the project digitally, and still might use Photoshop to play around with my physical lists. Instead, though, I've decided to challenge myself and start with blank index cards.  I have a bunch of paper crafting supplies, and hope to combine these and illustration to make each list and card fun and unique. I'm going to house them in this cute little box that I bought at Staples so that the project seems complete and has a place to live after the month is over :)

I started simple, making a cute insert for the card box out of things from my It's Paper, Dear! August box, which was filled to the brim with super cute paper bits -- I hope to post a full review soon!

If you're interested in listing along, make sure to go check out the project's website, 30 Days of Lists!
 

How do you use lists in your daily life? Are you joining in on 30 Days of Lists?

Hello Monday -- Late 2012 Goals

Hello everyone, and a late hello Monday! It's a bit late in the year to be thinking about goals, but really, is it ever a bad time to think about and re-evaluate?  Lately my life has been feeling a bit muddled and I thought it would be a good idea to take a step back and rethink what I really want to do with my time so that I have a framework for planning accordingly. 

- Write several posts each week on this blog. I really do like writing things for this blog and feel better when I am able to keep up with it. Create more, be honest.

- Take more pictures, write more, share more life. Looking back at the past few years, I really regret that I have not done enough of any of these things. Let's minimize such regret in the future! My picture-taking has gone up since getting my first DSLR, but I want to get better and capture more. As for writing, this is a "several-fold" goal -- I want to continue working on my middle grade and picture book ideas, and hope to self-publish one of them some day!

- Read more books. Always ends up being on my lists, for excellent reasons.

- Make more tutorials! Start making and sharing printables. I hope to work and improve my illustration and PS skills to make some printable materials or blog stuff some day, and one day illustrate and craft my own picture book.

- Don't base my self worth solely on my day job. This is a tough one, and is something I don't really talk about here. I have been job hunting since finishing graduate school, and as time passes it's tough to keep my spirits up. Work to realize that success might not look like what I expected. And along those lines....

- Follow and continue to develop my passions. Open myself to new experiences, and work to make my own opportunities. Work, work, work :) I'm so grateful for some of the wonderful chances I've had over the past two years, and hope to make the rest of the year as productive as possible!

- Explore more. Take more chances. Get out of the house and travel more. Being down makes me want to stay inside and mope and watch Netflix for hours on end, but for the rest of the year I hope to do just the opposite! Go to new restaurants, new places, and search out new experiences.

I hope to set small goals each week and keep things manageable, accomplish a little bit at a time. No being discouraged, just keep swimming :)

Are there any goals you're currently working toward? How often do you re-evaluate your goals?

Weekend Wrap-Up: Carnival!

Fireworks night at the carnival was this weekend! We managed to make it out, at least, for some photos and some carnival food fun times. I'm a little wary of rides because I am prone to motion sickness just standing around, but love the buzzy atmosphere, food, and lights.  It's fun to just go and walk around people watching -- it was crowded, sticky, and very much summertime. 

 

And funnel cake... well, funnel cake is one of my favorite summertime nostalgic foods!  Every time I have some I wonder if you can make it at home, and a simple google search revealed that yes, it turns out, you really can! I hope to try out at least one of those recipes sometime in the future, and will report back with (hopefully) delicious results!

Humidity does amazing things to my hair.

We didn't manage to stay on-site for the fireworks (I got tired after working at the library yesterday and we're trying to save up money and carnival fun is too spendy for me!), but are lucky enough to live close enough to have a terrific view from one of the fields near the house.  It's great to be able to go home, wait for the earth-shattering kaboom, and run outside like excited kids to see the wonderful show just over the trees. 

What's your favorite thing about summer?  Have you made funnel cake at home?
Do you have a favorite, nostalgic summertime food?