lamb enamel pins

After a long time of obsessing and putting it off and looking all over for a lamb like this, I finally produced my first enamel pin!

Soon I might post about the process of making this, but the main thing is that I drew a bunch of India ink drawings and scanned my favorite--a completely analogue process.

The backing cards are handstamped with a handcarved block of easy carve linoleum. My favorite.

The material is hard enamel (also known as cloisonne, the highest quality kind) with silver details and  the lamb just an inch and a quarter tall at its highest point.

You can check this lamb out on my new etsy. Oinkshop! We have Eve to thank for the name.

Thanks so much for looking! I am grateful to all the various sympathetic and tender people and readers who have supported this and all the other animal-based DIY projects I have pursued over the years.

internet favorites for november: favorite things from instagram

My favorite instagram users, consistently, are the illustrator/designers Leah Reena Goren, Kaye Blegvad, Amelie Mancini, Louise Lockhart, and Phoebe Wahl. I also love the Swedish mother Erica (but her photos fill me with so much longing and delight I can barely look at them),  photographer Diana Markosian, and (for art project inspiration) Maya Climbs Trees, Kirsten Rickert's homeschooling account.

 But I follow something like 700 other accounts, and so here are some screenshots of favorite things I've seen on instagram (not all these accounts are consistently amazing, but some are--you be the judge)--inspiration for writing, painting, and photography.

1. Julia Rothman

2. Danielle Kroll

3. Maria Kozak

4. Louise Lockhart

5. Monika Forsberg

6. TimeSpacePlace

7. Hyperallergic

8. Sam Is Home

9. Esther Coxs Kiosk

PS Here are all the other Internet Favorites!

PPS Here is my instagram :)

diy shadowbox gift

since i was so profoundly inspired by this shadowbox-filled house on the selby, i made this little shadowbox from a bamboo drawer organizer from bed bath and beyond, steiff animals, some felt, tissue paper, and the all-important super glue from a craft store, and these battery powered string lights!

i didn't really know what i was doing. but it came out okay. eve, for whom this was a birthday present, has some strong feelings about t-rexes and goats, so that's why they make an appearance. one huge benefit to this kind of project: it's fully customizable! i bought some junk food japanese erasers to give that t-rex a snack.  i think i might add onto the background some trees or mountains cut out of a national geographic. i will post an updated picture when i do!

that beautiful painting on the easel is by my roommate marina!

The asymmetrical face

Q: What would I look like to myself, if I saw myself for the first time ever, just walking down the street? Or, what would it look like if I had a twin who grew up someplace totally different?


A:
1. Take a Photobooth photo of yourself looking straight ahead, in a neutrally lit environment.
2. Paste this photo 4 times to your desktop
3. Using preview, flip 2 of the 4 horizontally, to get a mirror image
4. Crop two of the photos to be just the left half of the face, and two of the photos to be just the right half of the face (you have to cleave them straight down the nose)
5. Combine the two left-halves (but one will be mirror-imaged) into one face, and do the same with the two right-halves
You now have two almost-versions of you. One is made of just the left half of your face, doubled. The other is made of just the right half of your face.
Like this.


This is a disgusting thing to do and it will make you hate yourself, but I've done it three times.


I also just learned that sometimes old zits leave gray craters in your cheeks. Does living on a farm in the woods with the only available mirror the size and lucidity of a cookie sheet make you think about your body more positively? WHY WOULD IT?

It does make you feel more positive about your smells, though. Thank god for smells. It's so nice to come into your wretched little cabin and have it smell like your bedroom at home. It's nice to be struggling through crotch-deep snow in the icy and minding-its-own-business wilderness, and breathe into your scarf.