Daily [animal] Doodles.

My lovely friend Andrea, from Paper Sparrow, is heading up the 'Daily Animal Doodle' project. It has been SO SO great participating so far, and getting some of my friends involved too. These are some of my doodles from the project.

this one if MY favorite, but i don't think anyone 'got it'.  such a shame! :)

Have you been participating in the project too? do you WANT to? let me know if you do, i'd LOVE to see your doodles!!! smiles to you my dear inspiring friends, Jenipher :)

Nightly Contemplations... are you an enemy?

Do you ever feel like two different people?

I do.

In general, i do feel our society dwells on the negative much more then the positive and it breaks my heart. I'm no different then anyone else.

In fact, if anything... i'm probably worse.

I'm very positive and optimistic for everyone else [most of the time]. But i'm so negative and hateful to myself, that there are days i honestly don’t even know how i get by.

It’s a constant battle, these two people inside me. One; the person i KNOW i really am, the person i want to be. The other; well, the other is the biggest “Debbie Downer” I can ever fathom. I am constantly and continually bewildered by how screwed up i am. And how my perception of myself is so skewed.

it's quite frustrating .... and more then that. it’s VERY VERY draining.

Do you ever feel this way about yourself? Are YOU, your own worst enemy at times?



My mom gave me a book to read while i was down visiting. It's helping her, which is a glorious thing. I'm reading it and find it INCREDIBLELY truthful and humorous. Maybe you will like it too. :)


Life is TOO beautiful. TOO precious. And WAY TO MUCH of a gift to consistently let it us down!! We all have to fight these negative demons away!!! It’s NOT easy, and infact VERY hard at times, but we WILL concur this.
TOGETHER.

I have faith in all of us!
I hope you do too.

Love, Smiles, Thanks, and Cookies to YOU beautiful lady!! [or gentleman!] ;)
Jenipher


PS:

Paper Bead Making!!

I was inspired by a blog post i read at "A Story Book Life". Pearl posted about an artist named Helen who made her own paper beads. The images were so gorgeous and the idea seemed so simple yet so beautiful.



So i gathered some of my fun artsy friends, and let the bead making start!



The ink in the newspaper actually stains your nails, so beware! :D



Step #1 – Rip up newspaper into small pieces

Step #2 – Put the pieces of newspaper in a large stock pot

Step #3 – Pour enough boiling water over the paper to cover

Step #4 – Allow to sit for an hour or so

Step #5 – Stir the paper to help break it down a bit

Step #6 – Drain as much water out of the paper as you can

Step #7 – Add enough glue to the paper to help it hold together in a ball shape (any glue that is clear when dry – such as Elmer’s, or PVA)



Step #8 – Roll the paper into round balls being sure to squeeze out as much moisture as you can while rolling (you can make any size you would like)

Step #9 – Let them dry for a few days – rolling them every several hours – until they are completely dry



Georgia and Carissa are stellar-ly talented ladies!! They are inspirations to me and i know they will inspire you too! Check out their crafty blogs.



This project was super cheap and super fun!! I highly recomend it!! I can't wait to make more myself.

Smiles and Blessings Ya'll!
Jenipher

PS: TBC....PAINTING THE BEADS!

Nightly Doodles.

To keep the creative juices flowing fluidly, i've been making sure i draw at least twice a day. During work during the days and one "nightly doodle" before bedtime. Usually, the nightly doodles and quick and silly and honestly, stellar! :D

Here are the ones from this week.











I enjoy them. My friends seem to be enjoying my nightly randomness too...so all is well in doodle-world.

I hope you are all having creative week[ends] too!!

Thanks for reading!

Smiles,

JENipher :)

Jewelry; My creative declaration!

It's kind of scary...

It's almost November...i literally have just over a month to make dozens of pieces of jewelry, in hopes to make back what I've put into Cherry Runway this year. I'm trying not to think about it like this. Especially since i kind of took a CR hiatus to let life take a more adamant role in my well..life.

It's been a crazy year to say the least. But enough babble! ON TO THE JEWELRY! What do you think?
(ahem...Dan...comment!!) ;) (other people too may comment as well) :)






So simple, and yet, i love them so much!! I introduced a whole line of "Jenipher Lyn Jewelry" filled with copper goodness and fall inspired colors at Timothy's Gallery. I hope the jewelry does well! I made the price point more affordable as well.



These little darlings have been on my mind for over a year, and i just never made them. I LOVE how they turned out! Yay for liking CR jewelry! s'bout time! :)





I was really excited to just sit down on my "crafting floor" last night and just make this. A year ago, this would have been the most difficult task, and yet it [seems] so easy. The thought of making jewelry a year ago was terrifying...and yet I've been doing it for over a decade. Oh, what a year can do for a soul and spirit.

Such a year of blessing!!

New Pretties! New Bloggin'!

Okay folks! It's time...i am going to be a better blogger, for realz! I know I've said this over and over, but now i should have more time since they aren't giving me enough hours at work. :) At least the bright side to THAT is that i have no excuse now!

To be honest, I've been so inspired by all of your lovely blogs, that i didn't want to post if i didn't have something uniquely splendid, but i think I'm just going to go with the flow and hopefully inspire you the same way you inspire me!!

With the new ambition to blog, i have been creating up a storm which has been brilliant!

BEHOLD! :)



i heart snacks.

$32.00




Love Lily.

25.00





Asian Tensha set.




Chains of Garnet.

32.00



I hope you are having a stellar Sunday!!

Smiles and Thanks!!

Jenipher :)

The only time it's okay to be Bossy!

I glaceed upon an adorable little felt piggy from Bossy Felt Works around the Holiday time and have finally wrote to the ladies to tell them how much i love their crafts! Bossy's is a three lady cooperative who's crafting lives make me envious. It seems that not only are all of these women incredible talented, but have such a wonderful friendship, and a great supportive family. It's a crafters dream come true!



"On a good day at Bossy's, you'll find Amy, Kari and Mandy all gathered around the kitchen table, accompanied by piles of wool and cups of tea. Their four girls are playing upstairs, or maybe out in the play yard with the two puppies, while the two elder dogs snore under the table."

How long have you been crafting?

There's three of us in Bossy's Feltworks. Mandy and I have been crafting for as long as we can remember, and were both looking for a home based craft business. Amy has been crafting since we tried out making felt balls three years ago.

Did you always craft in this genre?

Amy is a specialist, having come into crafting via needle felting. Mandy and I have tried most craft genres between us. We both went to art school, but stayed more on the crafty side of things. I would say that we three are basically fearless in the face of craft materials. Between us we can figure out how to make what we're thinking of, whether it's for the business, for our girls, or gifts for family.



Who or what inspires you?

First off, we inspire each other. We have bounced thousands of ideas off of each other in the last three years. We work together on Tuesdays and try to surprise each other regularly with a new product. Etsy inspires us immensely. We love seeing what other crafters are creating and reading about sellers in the Storque. Our girls (we have five girls between us) inspire us with their handmade requests. We must also say that a good cup of tea and some chocolate have done as much for our business as anything else!

What challenges have you found while taking your craft into the business world?

We came up with our craft specifically to start a business. Instead of morphing a hobby into a business, we were looking specifically to use wool from Amy's farm to make a product that could be sold at the local farmer's market and on the Internet. With three of us, we were able to not only divide the tasks of starting a business, but also to thoroughly discuss our decisions.

Our greatest challenge is time. We are mothers of small children, and many things in our lives come before crafting.


Other info
We started Bossy's Feltworks in March 2006. We are just about to have our third season as weekly vendors at the Orcas Island Farmer's Market. We joined Etsy in December 2007.

So head over to Bossy's, and check out their gorgeous felt pieces! Say Hello to Kari on Etsy, she's a doll!

Crazy Weeks and Photograph Saturdays

I work at a brilliant store called Antropologie in the Visual Sales department. Which, in a sense, is just a fancy title to mean i help create all of the stellar displays at our shoppe. [And boyyyy are there ALOT of displays!].



During my 1st week, i helped make this tent from pipes, flange, fabric, and twine. I wrapped all the polls with twine for at least 5 hours before we decided to cover part of it up with canvas. It was my 1st project i ever had with Visual and the most joyous week at Antro. I'm so blessed to be part of VS. :)



Every morning, I water these (and a couple dozen more) Hydrangas. And boy do they need watering. NOTE: If you have or like Hydrangeas; make sure to drench the roots of the flowers, if your flowers are on a delicate surface, remove them, because you should also use a spray bottle and spray the leaves and flowers as well. This will help keep the blooms intact. When you cut the flowers out of the root, you have about 10 hours before they will die, even if they are in water the whole time.

This week we were preparing for a HUGH move in my particular store and had people come in from other stores to help us. I'm new to this gig, so while everyone else was split up to completely redecorate the rooms i did the tedious little details. Written down, it looks like i did NOTHING, but honestly, it was a still a long day of work. Wednesday was BY FAR my favorite though. [Serious!] :)

Monday: Moved funiture and started to paint shelves and moldings green.

Tuesday: Painted shelves and moldings green [8 hours]

Wednesday: Twisted twine around our hardware fixtures. [Basically, we have there fixtures shaped like cylinders where each level spins around so you can look at all of the hardware. I wrapped about 11 rotations of twine around each shelf] [8 hours]

Thursday: Twisty Fabric. [Okay, this day suckkked...i took fabric and cut it in strips. Tied one size around a door handle and stuck the other strand inside a drill without a bit, then turned the drill on and TA DA! Twisty Fabric. The fabric kept coming undone from the handle or falling out of the drill when i turned it on. The fabric shrinks from being twisted and sometimes breaks. Man it was frustrating.] [8 hours and barely any success]

Friday: Cut Leaves. [We painted thin paper bright blue, folding the paper in 1/2 foot strips so you have about the same on each side. Then cut vines on the folded side, so when you unfolded the paper, you magically have a vine with leaves on each side. We're still not finished with this project yet] [8 hours]

It was a really really great week!! Everyone was so brilliant and i learned so many amazing techniques. I'm very thankful i got to help with the process.



Last week, for two or three days i made 30 camels from scratch. I used a wire to make a armature, filled that with paper and tape and then covered them with clay.

I love my job. :)