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5 Things Thursday July 2, 2009 I'm trying to write here more. To actually post more than photos or just of trips. To post more thoughts and actually write more substance. So, here goes 5 Things Thursday. Let's see if I can actually keep up!
Summer Interview Series 05: Robin at Anything but Ordinary July 1, 2009  I've 'known' Robin for about 9 years. The internet is a funny thing, you can know a person, but not know them in person! What brought us together was this red-headed girl from Green Gables. In 2000 Kevin Sullivan released Anne of Green Gables: The Continuing Story, complete with a website that hosted a forum. The forum was a mecca for L.M. Montgomery fans and many people became fast friends. That forum branched into the Avonlea forum which branched into another forum, but in general over the past 9 years many people have become friends in real life. The 'net still felt young 9 years ago, and here it is now with bloggers and other groups meeting in person all of the time, but back then, meeting in person was not as common. Over the years I've been able to meet a few people from the Anne forums, but I have never had the chance to meet Robin, but maybe one day I will make it to Michigan! You have the cutest little house! You and your sister have spent time decorating it over the years. What is your favorite room in the house? Your favorite item? And describe some design inspiration. Thank you so much for the lovely compliment! A lot of hard work has been put into our little bungalow. It's always a work in progress, even after five years of being here! I'd say out of all the areas in the house, the living room is my favorite. It has a lot of old things and new things mixed together which makes it one of a kind. I'd say my most favorite item is a side table that my Dad inherited from his Aunt. It's almost a hundred years old [if it's not already] and so beautiful. Most of the design inspiration for our house started way back with Trading Spaces on TLC. It was really motivating to see the designers use a small budget and turn a drab space into something totally different and fantastic. I also happen to have a sibling who is majorly obsessed with HGTV, and has incorporated many ideas from a variety of shows into our house.  You've been blogging about as long as I have. What keeps you going and how do you stay motivated? And how the heck can you blog day after day for NaBloPoMo???! That's excellent discipline! What's kept me going for this long is really very simple. I always seem to have a story to tell! Just living life and being out in the world is great motivation. As for NaBloPoMo [National Blog Posting Month], the first couple of years were really difficult, I won't lie! Thirty days of blogging seemed like torture, and at times, it was! Last year I finally came up with a rough draft system. I started to think about what would make a good topic several days in advance; that helped a lot. It's an annual tradition now that I look forward to! The past year has been tough with you on the job front. How have you been able to cope and if you could pick the perfect job, what would it be? Being laid off from my job after seven years was definitely very difficult. As much as I tried to prepare myself for it, it was still a shock when it happened. I miss my job [and even my crazy coworkers] more than I thought I would. The best way I cope with all of it is by keeping myself busy. I started babysitting for my cousin's daughter a couple of months ago. That's five days a week, so it's like I'm working again. I'm actually busier now more than ever! My absolute dream job would be having my own bakery. I love the fancy cakes that have the fondant and gum paste; they're amazing! My cat Leo and your cat Mango are bff's via the 'net. Ok, we're just two crazy cat people, but have you ever thought about getting a dog? They are indeed internet bff's! Crazy cat people unite!! ;-) I have thought about getting a dog, definitely. With three cats in the house right now, it's not something I'm thinking about anytime soon. Maybe one day though... What has been your favorite story to tell over the years? There have been some great, laugh out loud ones! Which one would you recommend to people new to your blog? Again, thank you for the compliment, Misti! I'm not even sure what a favorite story of mine is. I definitely had a lot of crazy work stories! One of my favorite posts to recommend is not a story, but a variety of excerpts from my childhood diary aptly named: "Dear Diary" Do you excercise a lot of self censorship on your blog, or is most any story up for the telling? (Do you have any feelings about blogging and self censorship? e.g: judgement from people you know?) Pretty much everything is up for telling. But at the same time, I sometimes feel like I water down my posts a bit too much. It's always in the back of my mind that I have to watch myself because "so and so" may get upset. It's a bit of a double edged sword that way. What are some of your favorite blogs that you think we all should know about? Two that I check out most often are: Dooce & Bitchypoo Dooce is a hilariously, brilliant writer! Her pictures are fabulous as well. Definitely worth checking out! Bitchypoo is a blog I've been reading for about six years now. When I first started reading, she lived in the suburbs with her husband, daughter and their six cats. They now live on a farm with over a hundred chickens, two pigs, two dogs and ten cats. She tells great stories, and shares a lot of wonderful photos of all the animals. You've started a photography blog in addition to your regular blog. Have you been taking a lot of photos lately and what inspires you?  My poor photo-blog has sadly been very neglected. Even though I don't post much on there, I do enjoy photography quite a bit! I carry my camera with me almost everywhere. Sometimes I take a lot of photos, and other times not so much. I think I'm most inspired by architecture. Last month I went all around the city of Detroit taking pictures of old buildings. I had so much fun with it. I only wish I had more time!  All images courtesy of and copyright of Robin at Anything but Ordinary. Read her stuff, I promise it's good! Excuses June 29, 2009 What's your excuse? I used the 'I'm too tired' one this morning. Though, my eyes were quite heavy the entire day. I wish, when you decide to change or do something, it was just simple and it happened. I wish that if I said, tomorrow I am going to be peaceful and not angry, I'd be that way. I wish tomorrow that I would have more patience. Instead of slipping into the same way circumstances of every day, that I'd take a step do be different, to improve. Such a hard thing, to work on being something better. Someone better. How easy it is to get into fall back into a circle. Or oval. Instead of stepping outside of the box.  I quit Facebook a little over a week ago. It was an impulse/slight internal desire. And, other than wondering what some people are up to, I feel ok with that. I joined Twitter for about two weeks, didn't Tweet, just to see what a few people I knew were doing, but deleted it too. I never really got the Twitter thing. The other annoying thing was that I started getting spam friend requests and so I deleted Twitter very quickly. Although, Thursday evening I did have the urge to get on Facebook to talk about Michael Jackson. Instead I refreshed Cnn.com about a zillion times until they finally said he was dead and not just in the hospital. Anyway, so Facebook went away because I was on it too much, aka: time suck. 29 is only 12 days away. I've spent 28 thinking about how fast my 20's went, how much I didn't do (I did a lot, just not what I expected to do), and worrying about where I should be in life or where I should be going. I want 29 to be about being happy with choices and paths we are taking. To just not worry about a stupid number. In talking with many people about this precarious age, I am certainly not alone. But, again, I want to step outside the box, and just be happy with it. And maybe finally do something about a dream or two. On Pandora, you should really create a station for Edie Brickell or Neko Case. Mazzy Star is on both of the stations in regular rotation, and though I didn't really listen to them when they were in their prime, other than Fade Into You (cue 90's grunge, jeans and flannel), I am really glad to be hearing their music now. And as slightly embarassing, but not too much, I love Miley Cyrus' The Climb. Youtube it. Or just watch it, ignore some of the teen angst looking stuff in the video and focus on the lyrics. While you're at it watching the Half Blood Prince trailer. I'm tempted to re-read the book this week. I was angry at Twilight for pushing this movie back, until of course I watched Twilight, but I am really ready for this movie. It's been too long for Harry Potter! On the Range June 27, 2009 Phew! The last of the Montana pictures are uploaded! Wow, what a time consuming process! So, on the last day of my trip, my flight out of Missoula wasn't until 1pm. I could have slept until 9ish and just cruised back to deliver the car at 11am, but I got up at 6am. The sun was rising over the Mission Mountains when I got out of bed. After checking out I stopped at this great little coffee shop across the street. The shop is actually a shack/shed, which is reminiscent of snow cone stands in Texas. I didn't see any mainstream coffee shops, just these great little places that really served the best lattes for a cheaper price! I wish I could have brought them back to Florida. So, my reason for getting up early was to have enough time to drive through the National Bison Range. I actually got there before they were even open to pay, so I drove on through and paid on the way out. I highly recommend going if you are in the Polson area. The bison are cool, but there is just a lot of other wildlife that you might miss if you didn't go through.        Antelope...I was excited to see these. I'm probably crazy, but I want to pet their butts! That fur looks so soft!  I was nearing the end of the drive, speeding up a bit, when I noticed a piece of dead wood. I thought it over for a few seconds, put the car into reverse, looked in the 300mm and said, nope, that was an elk!   It was definitely a cool place. You have to stay in your car the majority of the time, but there were a few trails that were identified to go on, but I was in a bit of a rush. The drive takes about 2 hours. Sipping some wine tonight, listening to Pandora and about to finish piecing together the t-shirt quilt. I decided, or rather Chris helped me decide that I needed Aggie fabric to back it. That's only available in Texas, so I will be putting in a call to mom about tracking some down. I had a fun little snooze with Leo earlier. He was being such a baby, curling up on me and cuddling. Goofy cat. My animals are pathetically adorable. Yes, crazy cat lady talkin'. ;) I think I have some painting on the agenda for tomorrow. Or playing in paint at least. It was all over my hands last night! Good and Bad June 26, 2009 The Good
I'm thinking of adding some photos to my Etsy shop this weekend. Does anyone have an opinion on that? I'm actually afraid a bit. Not that I have anything to lose by doing it, but really the fear of not selling anything, which is an entire possibility because Etsy is now so large. I am going to sort through some photos and come up with 10 that are worthy of putting up. I think they will be unmatted and just signed on the photo somewhere. Probably 8x10's and 11x14's for now. We've had people tell us we should sell, but it isn't that easy. Just thinking...  Chris says hi! Do you know how hard it was to get this shot? I had to shoot quick, forgot to expose it right, it came out super over exposed, so I had to convert to b/w. He really should pose for shots more often. Summer Interview Series 04: The Whitlocks June 24, 2009 When I decided to do the interview series in May, my brother was one of the people I wanted to interview. He started blogging again earlier this year. Probably five or six years ago he had another journal but it soon dissappeared. I'm glad he is back! My sister in law, Stephanie, posts sometimes, though certainly not enough! The up side is I get to see snippets of my niece Zoe growing up. It was a bit difficult for me to come up with questions. I mean, this is my little brother, the one who enjoyed punching my arm in highschool, the one that let me put makeup on him 'cause I didn't have a sister to do that (thanks bro!), and the brother who played a mean game of backyard baseball. You two embarked on a new journey this year. What has been the best thing about becoming a parent? The worst?? Besides the poopy diapers! Curtis: The worst thing for me is that at night time after Zoe has been put down to sleep and wakes up in the wee hours, she doesn't want me. She want's her mommy. During the day I can give her a bottle and feed her food and do all the parent things, but when it comes to night time she doesn't want anything to do with me. The best thing are the smiles. I'm proud to say that I was the one that got her to laugh first. Blowing on her belly and nipping at her knees seems to do the trick every time. When Stephanie is feeding her dinner I will always crack a grin over at her and she just gives me the biggest smile back. Stephanie: I would have to say that even though I might complain or act frustrated sometimes, I don't believe that there is a worst to being a parent. It is amazing to watch Zoe grow and learn something new every day. I wish sometimes there was a course or a class or something that helps teach you all there is to know. But then having a child would be boring! Every day is a learning experience for Curtis and I also. Sometimes we just look at each other and can do nothing but laugh. This has been the most AMAZING adventure. Being a mommy is definitely the BEST, most rewarding "job" there is!!  The garden seems to be a second home to you, Curt, and I feel the same sometimes. How do describe how you feel about being in the yard, the dirt in your nails? What do you like about watching the garden grow? Curtis: It feels good. Especially after working all day. I'm like a kid just getting home from school throwing off my good clothes and putting on some play clothes and running back out the door in less than five minutes. It gets my mind off things. The dirt doesn't bother me. I love the feel of the grass blades between my toes. Stephanie: I love watching the garden grow. Well actually I love watching Curtis in the garden. He is just like a kid in the candy store and it warms my heart to know that something so silly to some is so special to him. The way he takes care of the plants and talks to them it is almost like we have lots of little children! I have to wait until it gets dark outside to ask for help inside most days. He gets up on his days off and goes straight to the garden and tries to discover what grew overnight. I bet he can probably tell you how many inches something grew in the past couple of days. I am glad that we have a house and a yard so that he can have something to do that he is passionate about. It's funny to see him pose his fruit for a close snapshot so that he can have a memory of the items he grew. Also, I just LOVE eating the fresh fruits and veggies that we get to have.  What plant has been the most challenging to grow? Curtis: Depends. Last year it was squash. This year it was the beets and more recently, tomatoes. The tomatoes this year are failing. I'm not sure if its because I tried you're method of growing them (in pots) or I didn't do it right. I just finished transplanting two of the tomato plants from 5 gallon buckets and put them in the ground where the lettuce was once growing. We'll see what happens. Other than that, nothing really. I just put some seeds in the ground and it grows. What other hobbies do you two enjoy other than raising a rugrat and digging in the dirt? Curtis: Backpacking. I'm in the middle of writing on my experiences from Philmont on my blog currently. It once was the thing always on my mind, backpacking, but has more recently been put on the back burner for those occasional trips. I've been wanting to start the crochet thing back up. Feminine, I know, but you and I both grew up around it. I have only really made one thing and it really didn't fit my head.  Stephanie: Right now all of my hobbies have been on a long hiatus because of Zoe. I love to scrapbook and create different things. I also love to quilt and I am wanting to finish a quilt I have been working on for something like 5 years. Do you feel it is possible to live a life entirely off the grid, especially in the city? I know that you are interested in the Path to Freedom garden in California. Curtis: I've been thinking on this idea for a while now, probably since we moved in to the house. Everything is possible if you have the pocket book for it. Solar panels or a wind turbine can cost a pretty penny. Wind turbines wouldn't be good in the neighborhood setting so you are left with the photovoltaic route. Stephanie, for the most part is always getting onto me for leaving the lights on. Its all about be self conscious about what your doing. We have thought about cutting the tv/internet service for sometime. We only watch tv at night time, just before putting Zoe to bed and the internet thing is the same way. Getting rid of it wouldn't be hard. Having a baby and being off the grid could be difficult, but just think back. There were still some people in the 30's that didn't have electricty and they made it just fine. Of course, they had a root cellar that kept things cool never grew up knowing any different. I've got cabinet above the dryer to store my 50 pounds of onions, kept cool by the compressor outside. Growing up we both played in our grandmother's and great-grandmothers garden, as well as watching Dad mow the lawn every week. Do you think that has had any influence on your interest in gardening? Or was it something you fell into because you'd just bought a house? Curtis: Stephanie and I got married and moved from the apartment to a house. I had responsibilities now. No more summers of hiking in the great wide open. Good song by Tom Petty also. So I started to look for some way to spend more time outside. I never really thought of growing food. I planted some flowers in the front yard and just kept mowing the grass. But mowing was just about once a week. So, that first winter I got thinking about growing food. Having never grown vegetables, I did some research on the 'net on when to plant certain veggies and started last February tilling a small plot (10ft by 10ft aprx) and planted some 'maters and peppers. Later last summer I planted watermelon that took off. I started reading up on Mel's "Sqaure Foot Gardening" method on growing more in less space and from there it just snowballed. I built the first raised bed and planted green beans and radishes. A month or so later, I made the second one and planted lettuce. Lettuce? I never would have thunk it. By August, I had come across the urban homesteading movement and Path to Freedom. There were tomatoes and peppers being harvested weekly and the green beans wouldn't stop growing. I learned how to can, and started preserving the bounty of beans. This last winter and proceeded in taking down the picket fence around the small plot and added the greenhouse and added eight more raised beds. 50 pounds of onions and 25 gallon sized plastic baggies of lettuce later, I'm glad that I spent those few moments playing in Granny's chicken coop & garden and Nan's garden, so that I would have that spark of, "Hey, they used to do it, why can't I?"  What creative outlets do you both enjoy, or wish to enjoy again someday? Curtis: I used to sketch when I was in middle school. Mom found my old books that I left we I move out. I've thought about it. But, can you give me a 25th hour? Stephanie: Someday I would like to enjoy music again. I used to play/peck the piano, self taught, and I would also sing. I would love to take piano lessons and someday buy some kind of piano for the house. I also love to design things. Graphic design in high school was the best thing that I stumbled upon. I love researching and getting new ideas for a project I am working on. Someday I would love the opportunity to plan parties and get the creative juices really flowing. Name the best thing about the moment that you are writing your response. (as in, the simplest thing that makes you happy right at that moment.) Curtis: Zoe is asleep, and I'm listening to 'The Weight" by The Band. Stephanie: Having the most wonderful family in the whole world!  All photos courtesy and copyright Curtis & Stephanie Whitlock. They can be found at The Whitlock Family where the garden and Zoe antics are plentiful! Butterflies June 22, 2009  The weekend after my trip to Montana we drove over to Sarasota for our anniversary. We first stopped at Corkscrew Sanctuary before making our way to Myakka River State Park to photograph the butterfly orchids, Encyclia tampensis, in bloom. We missed them by about a month last year, but they have clumps all over the park. We found a spot with enough low hanging orchids that we stopped to take photos. I had my work camera still so I was able to get some good shots. Chris was playing with his new ring flash and it was a grand old time, except for the mosquitoes at sunset.  Since Chris was working with the flash, I found a lower clump that had a few flowers with a red tinge to them. The sunlight coming through was amazing and I think I came up with some good shots.   The light started getting too low and I was having trouble with my photos blurring when I realized...hello, flash! I'm not a flash person, or I didn't used to be, but I set the flash on -2 and began shooting.    Chris had the macro lens and took this photo.  Hey, it's me! ;) Chris too more photos but hasn't processed them all yet. He got a lot of stunners. I have more photos from the trip to share, but like always, it will take some time. I have one more round of Montana photos to get around to, the summer interview series and the rest of Myakka and Selby Botanic Gardens to get to this week! The Furnace June 22, 2009 It is hot. As in, mix the humidity of Florida with the blatant heat of Arizona in the summer and what a mix. Wow. I also just went in my backyard and I couldn't find it. I think it was underneath the St. Augustine and other weeds that are a foot high. I did find my cowpeas growing well. A little each day and maybe I will see the garden again later this week. I thought it would help going out later in the evening, but no, not with the mosquitoes. Ick. Aside from being on a Friends kick, not much is going on. I managed to cut some t-shirts, finally, for a t-shirt quilt. Perhaps I will get around to sewing it together this week. Still messing around with a painting and I think I just messed it up even more. Argh. I'm liking summer right about now, at 8pm, but that's about it. I hate the mosquitoes and I hate dripping in sweat while walking to my car. I admit, I get blogger envy when I see photos of those in cooler climates. I can pretend it was two weeks ago when I was in Montana (and where did the time go?) by showing you some photos of the rest of the trip.  On Tuesday I drove to Big Fork, which is about thirty minutes or so on the northeast side of Flathead Lake. It wasn't quite hopping yet with tourists, but I managed to get into a few gift shops, purchase some huckleberry flavored foods and eat dinner at a trendy/cute American restaurant.  Their main street had lots of spring plantings and I snapped botanicals. Like always. It wouldn't be me without flower photos.  That evening there was still a lot of clouds and rain around so the sunset that evening was really remarkable.   On Wednesday it was sunny and I attempted to try to find a hiking trail that one of the local people in my group had mentioned. I failed to find it, so I ended up at Finley Point State Park, which is a really tiny state park at the end of Finley Point. I walked around some the small 'trails'.  This bug fell out of a tree and at first I thought it was a bee, but it also looks like a horse fly. I couldn't decide and I'm too lazy to go looking it up. I was intrigued enough to get a photo, but creeped out enough I didn't stick around too long.  After dinner at the Smoke House, I was about to head to my hotel when I decided to keep on driving and see the back side of town. I ended up finding a dog park and then following the signs to Kerr Dam. They also had some trails there so I walked around a bit in the late setting sun.  On my way out I ran into a doe with two fawns. They were a bit frustrating because they didn't just bail off the side of the road. No, the kept walking forward. I just wanted to get by them! Then one of the fawns got separated and of course, climbed the south side of the mountain only to come back out on the road above me where I was going to eventually end up from a switchback. Gah! Finally, cute little fawn friend decided to hop back down to mom and sibling, but I was a little frustrated and worried for a minute. On Thursday I decided to drive over the Mission Mountain range, past Big Fork and into Swan River National Wildlife Refuge. There are several national forests right around that so I just turned down a forest road and went for it. I had been told the area was thick with grizzlys so I didn't go hiking, mostly stayed around the car, but that doesn't mean I didn't scare myself when I heard noises in the woods.    Bear Grass  At the refuge...  Aside from some birds I only saw two snakes. This one was very nice and didn't move when I walked on the boardwalk. There was a road to go down but it was flooded and I didn't have my boots so I didn't venture farther than the boardwalk.  My other snake friend!  On the way back to the hotel, I stopped to enjoy this sunset. That lake offers some great sunset opportunities! I happened to catch sunrise on Friday morning but didn't take any photos. Sunsets are much better in my opinion! I Thought I Wanted To Do That... June 20, 2009 I really thought I wanted to install Wordpress. I really did. I tried a couple of months ago and had a hard time. So harda time that I gave up. Then I finally read around more and found out I had to change server types or something on my host service and so I did that. The problem with all of this is that none of this is outlined on Wordpress' site. I had to dig around in forums and Google searches. A huge pain. But, once the server thing changed it was simple, simple to install. I threw my hands in the air last night at midnight when I saw the login page for wordpress come up. WOOHOO! And it was downhill from there. Editing themes and CSS...gahhhh! I am a simple html text editor and now I am having to read about migrating all of that and well, frankly, I don't know if I am interested anymore. I wanted to have a better commenting system and sorting system for my files, but I think I will just have to go break them down more and work it that way. I will have to settle for not being the cool kid on the block. Unless, of course, some techno-savvy person reading this blog knows a super simple and easy solution to my problem and can help me out. I don't want to use any of the themes on WP. I want my own stuff! A long time ago I took a course from the Budding HTML Guru's, (not that site, it wasn't a British site then, looks like the original site is down, and it was free), six or so years ago. I do not know this world of php and I remember deciding I hated CSS. And so, I think I will stick with HTML, as cumbersome as it is to upload my own RSS all the time and also look for a new commenting system. (Ooh, just found one. Trying it out at the bottom of this post. Lemme know what you think.) I've been reading a book the past few weeks called Voyage of the Turtle. I started reading it a few months ago and finally dove into it more on my flight from SLC to Missoula two weeks ago. I really read a lot more of it last weekend on our way to Sarasota. What an awesome, awesome book! A long time ago before I got the religion of the Sea Turtle, I was a devout shrimp eater. My senior year of highschool I wrote an essay that was supposed to be about the Texas Gulf coast for a possible scholarship. I am sure I have it around in my files somewhere, but I think it had to do with shrimp boats and dolphins. Now, I was a completely ignorant dolphin hugger back then. I still love the image of a shrimp boat sailing, just as long as the nets aren't deployed. I went to college and learned about the destructive practices of shrimping and fisheries in general and decided not to eat shrimp. I've been pretty good since, I failed once by eating a shrimp in Galveston last year (it was from Casey's on the Seawall, I couldn't help myself!) and we tried doing the farmed shrimp thing, but shrimp farms from overseas are horrible, too. Anyway, this book has reaffirmed my devoutness to the Sea Turtle religion and my resolution not to eat any fish from restaurants unless I know one man with one rod and reel caught it. Or just encourage my husband to fish allll the time so I can have fresh fish. I don't think that would be a problem with him! Carl Safina discusses long lining and gill netting of the sea's fishes. Long Line description. I highly recommend this book if you are interested in science, nature and learning a lot about the marine environment. He travels all over the world, mostly in search of leatherback sea turtles, and goes to nesting grounds as well as out on boats with fisherman to get their perspective. It's much easier to change practices here, but overseas where subsistence fisherman are still trying to feed their families and live in poverty, its hard to change their practices. I have about 1/8th of the book left to finish. I saw two leatherback hatchlings three summers ago when the FMAS went to their annual turtle release with Miami-Dade county. I would love to see their cousins and/or possible momma hauled up on the beach and nesting, or better yet, out at sea swimming. carl Safina also has a blog here.  I'm anti-hiking at the moment...too hot and too many mosquitoes. I get enough of it at work, I don't want to be back out in it. So, while I was staying cool inside today Chris saw his sixth panther. And yes, that is a deer in the background. If you click the photo you can see Chris' write up about it. Basically, predator was stalking prey. Not sure if the prey got away...  He wasn't that close to the panther, these photos are cropped. See, when you have a 20 megapixel camera, you can do these cool things. And speaking of cameras I ordered the Canon T1i. Hoping it will be here this week!!! Summer Interview Series 03: Kasie & The Art of Life June 17, 2009 I found Kasie while blog hopping. I was on Kal's blog one day and was reading through her comments. I often find new blogs by clicking on the commenters instead of on blogrolls. I saw Kasie's blog and fell in love. A good mix of art and life and she is always so nice!! I think the key to forming friendships or bonds in the blog world is to keep commenting on blogs you enjoy and hopefully the other person reciprocates. Luckily, that's what happened here. I enjoy reading her blogs and they are always in the top five or ten that I hit immediately on my Google Reader when I see a new one up. Kasie is one talented artist as you will see below! How long have you been painting and drawing? Do you have any special training, ie: college degree, art classes? ~I’ve been drawing since I was a very little girl. I remember playing outside and carrying around my sketchpad; trying to draw the trees, leaves, etc. It’s always just felt like a part of me. ~The first time that art class was offered in school was Junior High. (7th grade) From that year on I always took art class and worked to finish all of my required high school courses early so that I could take 2 hours of art my senior year. Oh how I loved having 2 full hours to paint, draw and just get lost in my work! ~After graduation I went to Oklahoma City Community College and got my Associates degree in Visual Arts. While I truly enjoyed college and feel that it helped me to grow as an individual, I do think it’s important to say that I absolutely do not feel that a degree is necessary to be an artist. I’ve learned so much more about art in the time since college by studying and practicing on my own. I say that because there are people who would love to try their hand at art but are intimidated by the fact that they don’t have any formal training. My advice is to dive right in! Scour the internet or library to find artists you love and study their work. Ask yourself what it is about those pieces that you love. There are many great teaching websites like Wet Canvas and Scribble Talk where artists share works in progress along with tips and advice. There’s no wrong way to be an artist.  Gentleness Medium: Fluid Acrylic 16x20 When I first started reading your blog you were into colored pencils. You have since migrated to acrylics and have really seemed to master them. What made you want to delve into this medium more? ~Colored pencils, more specifically Prismacolor colored pencils, have always been my true love in art. I was introduced to them by my high school art teacher but it wasn’t until after college that I discovered the world of layering and “colored pencil painting.” I stumbled onto the work of Ann Kullberg and couldn’t believe the depth and beauty that colored pencils could create. ~Prismacolor pencils are translucent, meaning that when you combine them in layers the colors will shine through each other and work together. ~So I began studying and learning all I could about working in colored pencil. I got the book “Colored Pencil Portraits Step by Step” by Ann Kullberg and spent a lot of time on forums like Scribble Talk. ~Colored pencil painting was the perfect medium for me because it plays to my love of details. Also, I had a very young daughter at the time and liked the fact that I could pick up and put down my pencils at any time without worrying about her getting into anything harmful like paint. ~So…why have I switched? Well, colored pencil is an absolutely legitimate fine art medium but because it’s so new in the art world it sometimes takes a bad rap. I was getting frustrated with people saying that they loved my work and thought it was wonderful but once they found out it was pencil I would hear things like, “but I’d rather have paint.” Grrrr, lol. Plus, my own style of art, which is highly detailed, was extremely time consuming to do in pencil. Some areas of my colored pencil portraits would have up to 20 layers and one small piece would average 40 hours of work or more. Add onto that equation that I was now the busy Mom of two little girls and it felt like I could never get any artwork finished. (I do want to mention that I have colored pencil artist friends who are able to work much faster than I do and who create amazing work. Check out Nicole Caulfield. ~The changing point came for me about 1 ½ years ago when I entered some of my colored pencil pieces in the State Fair. I did well and was pleased but I remember seeing my small colored pencil piece hanging right next to the much larger Best of Show painting. What amazed me was that we both had the same sense of style. And yet because this piece was a painting the artist was able to do it in a larger scale, add a background and frame it without glass, which makes a world of difference in presentation. I decided right then that I needed to try my hand at paint. ~My first attempt at a painting was a downright failure. I didn’t even finish the piece and I was so depressed. I think the reason was that I was trying to paint in a way that was completely different than the way I worked in pencil and it just didn’t click with my personality. So I attempted the painting again only this time I decided to try layering the paint in the same way that I used pencil. I added a glazing medium to the paints in order to make them more transparent. This method worked slightly better for me but I still wasn’t happy. The finished painting didn’t have the same look or style as my colored pencil pieces. At this point I was ready to give up paints for good. ~Then, for some reason I stumbled across a watercolor canvas at the art supply store. I don’t know why but I decided to pick it up and give it a try. I also picked up some fluid acrylic paints. These two things were the missing pieces I was looking for. I was ecstatic about the way the paint glided across the canvas in thin smooth layers. I was able to layer in the same way that I had before. In fact I felt like I was doing the exact same type of work as before only I now had a brush in my hand instead of a pencil. And the plus side was that I’m now able to work larger and add backgrounds more quickly. My style of work is still slow and detailed but the overall piece is finished in much less time.  Courage Medium: Fluid Acrylic 16x20 You have two adorable girls! They seem to be the inspiration for many of your illustrations and paintings. Do you have any other artistic influences? ~In high school I decided that I wanted to be a children’s illustrator. Later, however, I decided that my style was much too detailed and time consuming for illustration work. So I went through a spell of doing wildlife art which is still a passion with me. I took a workshop with Luke Frazier and studied works by artists like Carl Brenders and Terry Isaac. ~When my oldest daughter was born I found it harder to truly study wildlife the way that is necessary to be a good wildlife artist. I was spending more of my time at the park or in the backyard. ~Motherhood also changed the way I viewed life. I felt so much joy in the simple little moments that I spent with my daughters and I wanted to share that feeling with others. Wildlife art has the goal of bringing awareness of the beauty of nature to others. I feel that my art has the goal of bringing awareness of the joy of everyday life and the love of family. I’m very influenced by the works of artists like Steve Hanks and Jim Daly. How much time do you devote to art during the week? I know you volunteer with your kids classes a lot and seem to be very active in their lives. I know it must be hard to find a balance between the creative and doing all of the other obligations of life. How do you do it?? Any advice for other people trying to do the same thing?? ~This is an area of life that is a constant work in progress for me. It’s one of the main reasons that I started my blog. I had been scouring the internet, trying to find other artists moms so that I could figure out how they do it. And I just couldn’t seem to find much out there. So I started my blog and called it “The Art of Life~The Creative Journey of an Artist and Mom.” That’s what it is for me; a journey and a learning experience. ~The time I spend on my art varies depending on the season of life we’re in. There are times when life is in a normal routine and I’m able to get more done. Then there are times when so much is going on that my art gets pushed to the side. It’s times like those that I have to stop and re-evaluate things because I’ve found that I’m a much better wife and mother when I make time for my art. ~My oldest daughter just finished 1st grade and my youngest has been active in things like music lessons and library. I’m very involved with their school and activities because I love it. But even this has been a learning process for me. I’ve had to learn that I can’t volunteer for every program, activity, etc or I’ll never have time for art. Once again, it’s just part of the journey. ~So I can’t really say that I have any specific advice. I do know that every person out there has something that they’re passionate about. For me it’s art. And I feel that it’s so important to keep that passion in your life no matter how busy life gets. I want to set a good example for my daughters of a woman who lives a life of passion; someone who cares for others and yet never lets her true self get lost in the shuffle. It is possible to be an Artist and a Mom!  Rain Buddies Medium: Fluid Acrylic 20x16 Your family is very important in your life...I can tell from the great posts about Dustin's bike races and the great wedding photos of your sister. How do they help you out creatively? Are they supportive of all of your ventures? ~I would be no-where without my family!! They are my anchor. Growing up my parents always encouraged me in my art. My Dad is an artist and so was my Grandma and my Mom is very creative. My sister is now a high school art teacher and my brother used to draw the coolest cartoons. My Mom helps me out by watching the girls if I need time to work on a piece and I know that I can always get opinions and thoughts on my work from my Dad. ~My husband, Dustin, is my biggest fan and greatest supporter. I could not do this without him! He believes in me more than I believe in myself. He’s such a great Dad and spends a lot of time with the girls. He knows when I’m needing art time and never hesitates to take the girls to the park or pitch in with the housework so that I can get that time. And he does all this while being very, very busy himself. Besides his full-time job he’s also a cyclist and bike racer with a demanding training schedule. We support each other in our passions and work as a team. (All four of us!) I think that’s truly what being a family is all about. You recently talked about the Eat Clean Diet and how it has changed your family's eating lifestyle. Tell me about some of the meals you make that are healthy and how you incorporate eating healthy on a daily basis. Share a recipe if you have one!! (plus, I know you bake some killer stuff.... ;) ) ~As I mentioned before, my husband is a bike racer and racing is an incredibly physically demanding sport. It takes hours and hours of training every week. Although we felt like we were eating a fairly healthy diet before we decided to look into how nutrition affects athletic performance. We’ve been reading and studying together and are now both whole-heartedly convinced that what you eat dramatically affects every part of your life. Some books and websites that I highly recommend are:
~Nutrition and learning more about it has become a new passion for both of us and we’re now working to help our daughters learn to love a clean eating lifestyle. (Basically eating whole, nutrient dense foods and staying away from processed junk.) Here’s a really yummy whole wheat bread recipe that even our girls love: Whole Wheat Bread (found at www.cleaneatingmag.com which is another great website) INGREDIENTS:
Combine remaining ingredients with dough and knead by hand or with bread maker until dough is sticky. Add additional warm water if needed. If kneading by hand, let rise for 30 minutes, knead again and let rise for 30 minutes. If using a bread maker, let rise once, then put it in standard bread loaf pan to rise for an additional 30 minutes until dough fills out loaf pan. Bake at 350°F for 40 minutes. Slice to desired width and serve. Recently you launched a website devoted to your art work. Where do you see this taking you in five years? ~My goal with my art is to continue to keep going. I’m working to build up my portfolio and hope to be selling prints in the near future. Life has also taken me in a circle and my dream of doing children’s illustrations is now more possible than I ever thought. I’m enjoying taking it one day at a time and loving the journey! What are some great websites and blogs that you visit daily? (I'm always looking for neat inspiration!) ~I find inspiration everywhere. My bloglines list is way too long and most of the time I have to skim through them quickly. I read a collection of different art, photography, nutrition, parenting, and décor blogs. I love to browse www.etsy.com and www.flickr.com and see the inspiring things other people make. Honestly though, I’ve found recently that I have to limit my computer time if I’m ever to get any painting time, lol. Thanks so much for interviewing me! It was a lot of fun. Kasie's work can be found at her website The Art of Life. All photos are courtesy and copyright Kasie Sallee. Thanks Kasie for participating! I really enjoyed reading your answers! If you have a question for Kasie, feel free to post it or you can visit her blog and drop her a line there! I have one more interview for June and I am in the process of lining up interviews for July. This has been very fun for me and I hope for you too! Feel free to share the interview series on your own blog! Glacier Country June 16, 2009 Well, I did finally make it home. I was in bed at around 4:30 am on Saturday morning...my plane landed an hour earlier. Because our new plane was configured differently they ended up switching people's seats around and after moving one place, the flight attendent eventually moved me to row 1B. That my friends is first class! WOOHOO! Too bad I was extremely tired to even enjoy a glass of wine. I promptly pulled my hoodie up, covered myself and my head with the blanket and slept the entire flight. At least I had a little wiggle room. When we landed the attendents must've forgotten to latch the wine bottles down because they came crashing to the floor. I wonder if the back of the cabin freaked out? Anyway, I basically didn't do anything at home until yesterday because we got up Saturday morning and drove to Sarasota for the weekend and for our 7th anniversary. I just got around to downloading and processing photos last night. And, it is going to take awhile to get through them all! So, I will share with you the Glacier National Park photos. Maybe tonight I will get around to some of the Flathead Lake and Polson photos.  My dad happened to have business in Kalispell so he flew into there while I flew into Missoula two hours south. We had thought we might have time enough on our layovers in Salt Lake to chat for a minute, but my plane was a few minutes late and he had to get to his gate. So, I drove an hour to Polson, checked into my hotel and then kept on driving up to Kalispell. Once I drove through Kalispell I was kicking myself for not flying into that city because it was awesome! I am sure Missoula was nice too, but I never got around to seeing anything other than the car rental place and the airport. After a quick snack from Wendy's we were on our way to West Glacier.  Once we arrived, it was fairly quiet. The season hadn't quite started yet, though there was a fair amount of tourists milling about. The Going-to-the-Sun road wasn't cleared all of the way yet, so we only made it up a certain portion. It was beautiful everywhere!  Probably the most intresting wildlife we saw upclose was this moose. We approached an area of congestion on the road and thought it might be a bear, which I did at first, too because the moose had its head in the water, but, nope, just a moose. Very cool, though. People gawk at alligators here, I gawk at moose. (I really wanted to type meese).  Can you spot the mountain goat? This is fully zoomed on my 300mm. There was a guy with a scope, just watching and letting tourists watch, and he had a good enough lens to really see the goat. Mountain goats were all over Mount Rushmore, very close up.  The water in Lake McDonald was very blue and we dodged rain showers the entire time. I forgot my rain jacket, of course.  We stopped at Trail of the Tall Cedars to walk on a very nice .8 mile boardwalk. The one thing that struck me was how rainforest like the forest was. Very green, dense, sweet smelling and moss covered. I loved it! The only thing missing were a few ground orchids, which I am sure exist somewhere in the park.  A really neat waterfall. If we'd had more time we could have taken the Avalanche Lake trail up, but we were short on time and rushing sunset and my drive back to Polson.  Mossy goodness...  The road was closed at this point but open to bikes and hikers. We walked up the road a little ways and found a small trail leading down to the creek/river.  We would have likes to of poked around a bit more but again, time was creeping up on us, as was my stomach! Dinner! My dad has backpacked twice through Glacier and my brother once. Both times have been great and they've really seen some backcountry parts of the park. You can see the rest of the set here. Tomorrow is another interview and I hope to get more Montana pics up this week! Ghost Orchid Time Lapse June 12, 2009 So, I'm sitting here in the Salt Lake City airport and it is quickly turning into a trip I once took from Orlando to DFW, via Atlanta. It was early January and we had moved Chris to Florida for grad school. I still had to finish my last semester of college. When he dropped me off at the airport the news was showing a winter storm in Georgia but our flight was still a go. I could have waited until the next day but I chose to go on with my flight. When I arrived in Atlanta it was icy and a little snowy but we were supposed to take off on time. Until it was time to board, of course, and then the flight was delayed and then canceled. At night. And they didn't offer any hotels to anyone. So, I slept in the Atlanta airport and we didn't leave until the late afternoon the next day. It was not pleasant. Now, here I am in Salt Lake and our flight was on time until of course we were supposed to board and then they said maintenance had to fix the plane. The word maintenance is never a good word. First it was 20 minutes. Next thing it was a four hour delay and pushing my arrival from nearly midnight into Ft. Lauderdale now to 3:15 am. Which means, sleep at 4am. Woo. Hoo. Since Chris is picking me up from the airport I've been talking to him a lot since the plane was delayed. He let me know that the ghost orchid time lapse he'd been working on this past weekend was ready to go. We have a new Pentax waterproof camera that we set up in the swamp to photograph a ghost orchid opening. He put it together in a video. There is more of a description on the video on Flickr and you can click the video and it will take you there. Well, only three more hours until I take off. Hopefully. Summer Interview Series 02: Michelle & Life in East Texas June 10, 2009 When I started thinking of people to interview for this series I thought that I wanted to interview one of my best friends. I can't pinpoint when we met exactly, but we were on the Texas Clipper II in the summer of 1998, having part fun/part school/part work on this retired Navy ship that our college owned. I think we really got to know each other when we both didn't have class while the rest of our group had class and we started having our green tea on the balcony in the afternoons in the dorm. Ahh, memories! Michelle had a short lived blog about five or six years ago right after I had started mine, so I am very glad she started her new blog this past year. Here's her interview.  Doing what we do best....being goofy! In this crazy, topsy-turvy path of life, where do you see yourself heading in the next five years? What goals have you set for yourself? Five years…first of all I can’t believe it has been 11 since we met! I thought of that today – I usually think about that every year when school lets out. I left the day after my high school graduation and if I remember right, you missed yours completely didn’t you? (Yes, I did. No regrets to missing 500 names being read aloud) Wow, it really feels like yesterday. I know people say that but it is scary how true it can be sometimes. Ok, sorry, back to the question :) Five years from now I hope to have another baby here or on the way at least. Kylen will be in school (finishing kindergarten…wow) and we will be settled into our new house as much as we are settled here (we have been here almost five years which I never would have said would be my plan five years ago!) JP will be at his job and hopefully still happy – maybe a different department but hopefully with a paycheck that will allow us to travel often. We have so many friends and family we don’t get to see nearly often enough! My goals are so different now that I have achieved my biggest one. (being a stay at home mom) Now my goals consist of being a wonderful and fun mom, keeping a good house, gardening, the dogs…If for some reason we aren’t able to have another baby and Kylen is the only blessing we are given then I plan to go back to work at a bank. If we are able to have another baby then I will be starting all over again with a new boy/girl about the time Kylen starts kindergarten. I plan to be working on decorating the house, playing in the garden and hopefully be back to normal as far as how I’m feeling.  You recently celebrated your daughter's first birthday. How has becoming a mother affected your attitude and outlook toward life? Wow! Becoming a mom was the scariest thing I have ever done. I didn’t know how we would afford her, I didn’t know how I would handle her (wasn’t around babies growing up), I have my nephews but I’ve always been able to give them back! I was worried I wouldn’t have patience (I have always had a pretty short temper), I wasn’t sure about any of it really – childbirth, staying in a hospital, if we really could afford for me to stay home, if I really could do it on my own when JP went back to work. BUT becoming a mother was the best, most joyful, most rewarding, most challenging, most wonderful thing I have ever done. Yeah, you don’t know what you are doing. You can’t even begin to prepare for what your body will go through. You just wing it and ask lots of questions to people that have been through it already. You just do what you think is right. The best advice I heard was that your baby doesn’t know you are doing it wrong, so just do it your way, and don’t be afraid of messing up. If it works then keep it up :) Kylen has brought such joy in my life. You will miss life before baby, when you actually got to sleep as long as YOU wanted and you got to do projects when YOU wanted to do them, but the rewards COMPLETELY outweigh the drawbacks. She has taught me so much. She makes me smile on a daily basis. My attitude and outlook on life completely shifted. I have unlimited patience when it comes to Kylen. I think of her needs way before my own. My life is hers now. Finding a husband and spending the rest of your life with someone is one thing. Having a child and raising them, it makes me speechless to have that honor. My point of reference – don’t take being able to have children for granted. My mom’s best friend from high school would have made an amazing mom. She wanted kids but couldn’t have them..never had any of her own. My first pregnancy ended in miscarriage and I still get sad about it. I don’t think I will ever forget it at certain times of the year. When I got pregnant again I was nervous the first few months and was able to fully appreciate the gift I was being given My outlook on life – I am a kid again, only I get to live it through Kylen’s eyes.  You went to college for a little while for photography. Do you have any particular way of seeing what you frame in the camera before you take a shot? The one tip I remember from class was not to constantly center the subject, something I always did before. It also made me more aware of the backgrounds of casual shots. I usually spot one thing that I want to take a picture of then look all around it to find the best angle. I naturally overanalyze everything in life and I’ve gotten good at doing so rather quickly so most people don’t realize I have already thought of every possible angle and found the best one for me.  If you could own any camera, what would it be? And where would your ideal studio be? I haven't done research lately to know what would be the best camera for me. I would love a digital SLR but I also love the holga for its nostalgic effect on film. I wouldn't want a studio. I would want to maybe have a few backdrops if someone wanted that option but I prefer to let nature be the background. If I were able to take photos professionally I would have a few spots around town that are my favorites and always be open to client suggestions. You were recently diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. The initial reactions you had have had time to sink in. Has it affected your outlook on life? This is kind of tricky. At this point in my diagnosis I find it more annoying and still scary but don’t really react outwardly. I was afraid we couldn’t have more children but know that isn’t a problem. The side effects are the most annoying part. Side effects of MS as well as the daily injections. They still hurt a lot and I’m hoping my body will miraculously stop reacting to the medication. To answer your question (I’m sorry, I seem to ramble for a lot of this) I have pretty much adopted the Scarlett O’Hara outlook on MS – I will worry about it tomorrow. JP did all the research; I still don’t really want to talk to anyone else that has MS because I don’t know what to say. I don’t really have any questions. JP had a ton of questions and went online and did TONS of research and told me lots of facts/statistics. I just don’t think about it for the most part. I have lots of side effects right now that don’t let me forget it and I still get sad when it is time for my shot because of what it means, but other than that specific time of day, I try not to think about it. We've known each other for 11 years now. What do you feel has been the most interesting thing that has occurred during those years? Most interesting is kind of hard to answer. My most exciting moments include the birth of my daughter, marrying my husband, buying our first house, going on a real cruise (not one where I had to work and do school at the same time, even though that will always hold a special place in my heart).  I guess the most interesting thing and what I consider to be my biggest accomplishment is becoming a stay at home mom. We went from a two income, childless household to a single income household w/a baby. I really juggled our finances but was determined to make it work. As my mom always says, when you want something bad enough you will find a way.  Now that you are about to move into your own home, do you have any inspiration from magazines or the internet that you want to take into consideration to make the house your own? I don’t know where the inspiration comes from, probably HGTV more than anything. I’m not going to jump right into decorating. I do have a few room painting projects I would like to do before we put the furniture in, but for the most part I want to get into the house and see what I feel for each room. Some of the rooms already have a ‘theme’ of sorts and I am very happy to continue with them. The kitchen is a ‘cantina’ type theme and the main bath is a Spanish style I think. The house has such a history. It isn’t one of those cookie cutter homes that is new and a blank slate. This house was bricked in 1950; they can’t even guess when it was built. THe 30s maybe? That is when the oil boom hit and most homes in the area were built. Rooms have been added and other rooms have been converted into something more useful. I have fallen in love with the house as it is and I cannot wait to be in it…I think the house itself will be my inspiration in the end. I mean, I can see stuff on TV or in magazines but I won’t know what works until after we move in! Thanks Michelle for participating! You can read Michelle's blog at Everything Kylen and a little Mom & Dad . All photos courtesy and copyright of Michelle Harvey.  Hug your best friend today. Or send them an email if you live halfway across the country. Out the Window is Flathead Lake June 9, 2009  Made it to Glacier yesterday. Coincidentally my dad had business in Kalispell for one day and though I flew into Missoula, I stopped at my hotel along the way and met up with my dad late in the afternoon and we drove over to Glacier National Park. Talk about an awesome park. Going-to-the-sun Road is pretty darn cool. The wildlife count for yesterday was: two bald eagles, three mule deer, mountain goats wayyyyy up high and seen through a scope, one large moose in a pond and a bunny. No bears, but I did read a grizzly attacked a trail runner on Sunday not far from where we were. We only saw a smidge of the park as the road is not all the way open yet as they haven't cleared all the debris and snow from winter yet. I won't have any photos up other than this as I am shooting most in RAW and this little laptop doesn't have my converting program on it yet. Until later....tell me something interesting that is going on with you. |
