love is even better than art...

i can't keep it a secret anymore!!!!!!
(*at the risk of being "that girl", i am mentioning this here, on this blog, just this once... henceforth, all girly, mushy, lovey-dovey stuff will happen over here)

get pinned!...

blue knitimal

love knitimals?
wish you could take yours everywhere and spruce up your outfit at the same time?

guess what?!
YOU CAN!!!... with this fancy schmancy knitimal brooch.

each knitimal pin is one of a kind--- drawn by hand, painted and completed with colored pencil, baked to a hard finish, then sealed with clear varnish. the back of each pin is signed and dated... like i said, they're one of a kind!


orange knitimal


grey knitimal

how sad is this?...

mason has a little eye "issue" (some sort of irritant... scratch? allergy? psychological?) and i put his winter parka on to make sure it fit... and in so doing, i officially won the "worst doggie mother ever" award (as nominated by my dog, who most assuredly thinks i am not only not taking his jacket off, but also laughing at his injury). sorry, mace. i love you. but you're extra cute when you're pathetic.

all in a day's work...

tree!
today was tree day.
i managed to get quite a bit done (tree-wise), which might not look like much, but its the tippity top of the building, so that alone is impressive and the pictures don't really do the color shifts justice. (my own horn: toot toot).

if you're a process type person...

i've gotten a lot of emails, in the last week, asking about the process of painting a mural; where do you start? how do you make something so small into something so big? what kind of paint do you use? where do you pee?

all valid questions.
1.) you start with priming
2.) photoshop helps for scaling the image; bricks help for figuring our placement; and experience tells me the middle is usually the safest place to start a sketch-- you can adjust as you go along.
3.) i use Benjamin Moore, all weather-exterior latex paint
4.) i try not to drink anything until i'm super thirsty, then i just take baby sips and mid-day, i'll hop in the car and go to the supermarket nearby, so i don't have to go back home and get Mason stirred up again when i leave.

Some of you have been more interested in the physical changes one can watch as a mural unfolds, so for those of you, here is a visual journal of the process:


wall as i found it.


end of day 1 (priming)


end of day 2 (priming)


end of day 3 (base color)


end of day 4 (blocking in color)



sometime in the future (this is a handy photoshop projection of what we can expect)

and still others of you prefer a more anecdotal approach to the process--- you want to know feeling, see images that provide a sense of being there and such. ok, here you go:

here's my feet the first day i climbed up to the top of the 3 story scaffolding. what you can't see in the picture is how terribly my hands were trembling. they were. bad. very bad.


when i look around, i see this. and i am scared.


when i am sitting, i see this. SITTING. i see the top of a house. when i'm sitting. do you get that? sitting.


here's what the top of the building looked like after i lamaze-d my way through painting it. now that i see it, i kinda really hate that color, which means my desire to be perfect is going to override the mantra i chanted that day ("i'm not coming back up here. i'm not coming back up here")


aack!


but, i am fine. and i feel stronger for it. look at me go! i conquered! i win! i am the best! and i have to go back up there!


on that note, i have a lot of brushes to clean, and a lot of advil to take; my right hand is very, very sore. i am feeling, er...is it considered laziness if you've been quite busy otherwise? i don't feel like doing anything right now, but am guessing that that is ok, since i've been essentially LIVING on a scaffold for a week (when i haven't been teaching people to draw or reminding 10 years to put their cell phones away). so, i'm going to go do those things--- bright and early tomorrow i'll be back on the scaffold and at some point this week, i'll muster up the energy to share some exciting personal news (but for now... advil. lots and lots of advil).
xoxo, danamarie

Accidental art...

The history of one part of the wall and the present of another part of the wall, make nice in the paint tray.

These are AJ's favorite colors (in combination), so the accident makes me extra happy.

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Morning fuel...

In our house growing up, my dad was synonimous with dunkin donuts. The coffee cup logo was part of his trademarked image. The biggest priviledge you could have was being asked to go on a donut run-- and if you were extra lucky, YOU got to participate in the curating of the box of a dozen.

Toasted coconut. That was my contribution. Always.

It was the coffee part I didn't get. He didn't even put sugar in it. (and in Miami, you get at least a dozen packets of sugar thrown in your bag even when you say "no sugar").

Well, I was up at 6:30 this morning. Every single part of me aches. I am on my way to home depot, praying there is a such thing as a padded handled roller.

And, yeah, I totally "get" coffee today.
(I also "got" a donut-- double chocolate, for my dad)

Xo, danamarie
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Hello from here...

Blisters & backaches & bruises, oh my!

Just checking in... I have class til late tonight, so the big reveal will have to wait. Its coming along though!

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today in the studio...

why not be a knitimal today, too?

A good night's sleep...

You know how you can just be cruisin' along, feeling good, everything's making sense and then one morning you wake up to a big ol tangle-y ball of mess? Its nothing big; nothing painful or deadly, just way too much grown up junk for one day.
That's pretty much how I've woken up everyday this past week.
The mural wall is sucking up primer like crazy* the car has a rail road spike in the tire* 2 trips to the dealership* crappy health insurance* crappy management company suddenly dumping a "you need to sign a year lease" letter on us, even though we've been month-to-month for 8 years under the management of the actual building owner, meanwhile, said management company has been thoroughly useless in helping with Smokey McHacking-Cough (our few months new downstairs neighbor. Also known as the reason our house smells like a casino. Also known as the reason I can't breathe in my own apartment.). *oh yeah, and they're raising the rent too* I was "going" to write them a letter to point out how they were in breach of contract, second hand smoke laws, Dr's notes etc... They beat me to it with this; I complain and have to leave, it seems* so? Do we move? I don't really want to pack. Rent is cheap. Is it worth the annoyance of the smoke and letting them "win"? Can I get a day off to decide!?!*

Nope.
It doesn't work that way, right?
So, I'm putting on my beamiest, Henson-iest face, and taking this one problem at a time.

Starting with sleep.

Here's to a better week for all!
Xoxo, danamarie
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