Patterns

Web shopping is just way too easy! I was anxious to get some patterned origami paper, so I bought some from here and they arrived today. Shipping was quick enough: six days from UK to Finland. The Yuzen papers feel incredibly soft in your fingers and the patterns are fantastic. So, a very good purchase indeed.

Nettishoppailu on ihan liian helppoa! Himoitsin kuviollista origamipaperia, joten tilasinpa sitten sellaista täältä ja tänään lähetys jo saapuikin. Kuusi päivää Englannista Suomeen on mielestäni ihan kiitettävän nopea toimitus. Yuzen paperit tuntuvat uskomattoman pehmeiltä kädessä ja kuviot ovat tietenkin upeita. Hyvä ostos siis.

Listamania 2: Favorite mugs

The second theme in Listamania challenge was to list your favourite mugs. What a great subject! I think that coffee or tea certainly tastes better if you drink it from your favorite mug. Here's my top5:
1. Arabia's big Taika mug, 2. Arabia's Moomin mug with Snufkin, 3. Aquarius mug (I love horoscope stuff), 4. and 5. Russian teacups (Deep blue and golden ornaments really do the trick for me)

Listamanian toisena aiheena olivat suosikkimukit. Tosi kiva aihe! Olen ilman muuta sitä mieltä, että kahvi ja tee maistuvat parhaimmalta omasta lempimukista nautittuna. Top5:
1. Arabian iso Taika-muki, 2. Arabian muumimukeista Nuuskamuikkunen, 3. Vesimies-muki (horoskooppijutut kolahtavat aina), 4. ja 5. Venäläiset teekupit (tumma sininen ja kultaiset koristelut vain jostain syystä vetoavat minuun, sitäpaisti venäläiset kupit ovat ihanan ohutreunaisia)

Award

PiaK gave me this lovely award. It feels really good, thank you! There are so many great creative blogs and most of them already have received this award, so I'm not gonna pass this on this time.

Sain PiaK:lta tämän upean tunnustuksen. Kiitoksia kovasti! Selailin kaikkia ihania blogeja, joita löytyy todella paljon, ja useat ovatkin jo saaneet tämän samaisen tunnustuksen, joten en nyt sitten laita tätä eteenpäin.

Origami madness

Origamis are my latest obsession. I started borrowing origami books from the library about a month ago, because I wanted to teach some very easy foldings in children's art school. I found out that some kids were way ahead of me; one 11-year-old boy basically teached me all the basic tricks. So now I can continue my practises alone. I also got a great origami book from my dear friend. All the designs in the above picture, except the crane, are from that book.

Origamit ovat viimeisin villitykseni. Noin kuukausi sitten aloin lainailla kirjastosta aiheeseen liittyvää kirjallisuutta, jotta osaisin opettaa muutamia ihan helppoja perustaitoksia lasten kuvataidekoulussa. Pian selvisi kuitenkin, että muutamat oppilaani olivat jo melkoisia mestareita origamin saralla. Homma menikin sitten niin, että eräs 11-vuotias poika opetti minulle kaikki niksit ja perusjutut. Nyt voin sitten itsekseni jatkaa taitteluharjoituksia. Asiaa helpottaa kovasti myös tämä mahtava kirja, jonka sain ystävältäni. Siinä on kaikkia vähän erikoisempia malleja, jotka sopivat erityisesti kortteihin ja sensemmoisiin. Kaikki muut yläkuvassa näkyvät origamit, paitsi kurki, ovat tuosta kirjasta.


Happy Valentine's day!
Hyvää Ystävänpäivää!

Icy swimming

This sport, presented in the pictures above, is something that I could propably never do. I went to watch the Finnish Championships of winter swimming. There were surprisingly many enthusiasts taking part in the competition. I think the common nominators for these swimmers are Finnish willpower and good sense of humor. Despite the freezing water, the atmosphere was very cheerful, the contestants had a sip of cognac to warm up after their performance.

Tässä on sellainen laji jota en kyllä varmasti uskaltautuisi ikinä harrastamaan. Kävin tänään nimittäin katsomassa avantouinnin SM-kisoja. Lajilla on yllättävän paljon harrastajia, kisassakin oli mukana yli 1000 uimaria. Vaadittavista ominaisuuksista tärkeimmät lienevät perisuomalainen sisu ja hyvä huumorintaju. Hyisestä vedestä huolimatta kisan tunnelma oli erittäin iloinen, lämmikkeeksi kisaajat nappasivat tujauksen konjakkia.

Making lists/ Listamania

I'm taking part in Listamania challenge. The first assignment was to make list about books. It could be about your favourites or most wanted ones or whatever, as long as it's book related. My list is about the books in my own bookshelf, that I read most often. I'm going to make my list pages in 15x15 cm format and bind them together with binder rings.

Osallistun Sannnikan Listamania-haasteeseen, jossa ensimmäisenä tehtävänä oli koota kirja-aiheinen lista. Perusteet listaamiselle sai päättää itse. Omien suosikkikirjojen paremmuusjärjestyksen miettiminen osoittautui ylivoimaisen vaikeaksi, joten päädyin sitten rankkaamaan omasta hyllystäni löytyvät opukset luetuimmuusjärjestykseen (voiko tuollaista sanaa käyttää?) eli että mitä tulee useimmin lueskeltua. Lista on siis aika tietokirjapainotteinen:

1. Human Anatomy for Artists; Gyorgi Feher, Andras Szunyoghy
2. Collage techniques; Gerald Brommer
3. Symbolit, piilotajunnan kieli; Carl Jung
4. Typoteeseja; Markus Itkonen
5. Haru, eräs saari; Tove Jansson ja Tuulikki Pietilä

Omat listasivuni teen 15x15 cm kokoon ja yhdistän valmiit sitten albumiksi.

Keeping it small and slow

I've been busy and tired at work, but the mini art journaling challenge keeps me inspired. It's a good stress release to dive into little art projects. Small is the key word for me right now. If I had to make big pages and large paintings I'd be overwhelmed and even more stressed out. Small is good and calming.


I have also started a long planned scrapbook project with my old photos. I mean the really old ones. There are pictures of my grandparents parents and their siblings and friends etc. A lot of mysterious group portraits from which I can't really identify anyone. It's propably going to be a very simple album with few photos and some basic information, since I have so little material. But I love doing it anyway, slowly but surely.

More mini art journaling

Here are my art journal tags for the last two weeks. I really like these kind of challenges, where someone gives you a question to ponder on. And of course it's a blessing to have these lovely persons who have time and energy to organize different challenges and that way keep the rest of us inspired and crafty.

Ice skating

Today we went ice skating to the lake Saimaa. Weather has been just right lately, so the ice was thick enough and there was only a thin layer of snow on it. The conditions were perfect for skating and it was wonderful! So much space to go to whatever direction. And it's a big lake, we really could have skated hundreds of kilometers. But we didn't have such extreme goals, just wanted to enjoy the moment, skate a little and then have a nice cup of hot cocoa.

Art journaling prompts

Keeping an art journal has been on my to-do list for a long time. For some reason, there hasn't been much progress. My Moleskine journal I bought just for this particular purpose, is almost empty and has been sitting abandoned on the shelf. I realised that I need more discipline with journaling, inspiring prompts and sharing my work with others. That's what gets me going.

I purchased L.K. Ludwig's wonderful book "True vision, Authentic art journaling", and immidiately started working with my Moleskine. It's important to start with something, anything. No matter how the pages turn out. I just have to get the process started, an then go from there.

Another great source of inspiration is a journaling challenge that I luckily came accross: "52Q, a year of mini art journaling". There's a Flickr group for the challenge and you can also read more about it from the hostess Emily Falconbridge's blog. The question for the first week was: what do I wish for this year to bring? Here is my take on the subject:


I'll be using small tags (front and back), one for every week. I'm planning to use a binding ring to attach the pages together.