surprises

Today has been somewhat rainy and windy. Fall is now here and as usual I am happy to see it. However, I was not happy to have such early fall-like weather last weekend when the mister and I went to the coast. I was hoping for a little blast of last minute summer. I had visions of laying on the warm sand during the day and staring at the stars at night. Instead I got a grey sky that almost exactly matched the grey ocean and rain all weekend long.  You couldn't even sit on the porch without getting wet.

It was still a nice weekend, though. There was lots of relaxing and one day we went into town, walked around in the rain and had some ice cream.

We also stopped by the smoked fish shop. I've driven by a few times and never could stop. We got the most amazingly good and still warm smoked tuna, salmon and black cod. I will stop there now everytime.

Karla's Smokehouse

We stayed in a kooky old run down house that hadn't been redone since the early 80's and is still filled with the owners things. The owners still come and stay there part of the year.

Down in their dark garage there's a little hallway to get to the washer and dryer area (everything else is behind plywood walls and covered in tarps). In this hallway I found a wall covered with clippings and old calendars and posters. I love finding walls like this. This one was especially exciting because the owner had a pin-up calendar from 1981 on Duane Bryers' chubby pin-up creation, Hilda. I have only ever seen these images on the internet. It was cool to see some in real life. 

Everyone seems to be pretty excited about fall being here. I am already looking forward to some things. But, I'm gonna try and keep my preconceived ideas to a minimum about my plans. You never know what you'll really get.

Oilcloth Tote Bags and Mom

I've been meaning to post this for about a month. And now, with the symbolic last day of summer I finally get to it. In my defense this summer, especially the last month and a half has been pretty crazy. Between visits from family, making the zine, doing the zine symposium and then for the last month dealing with a really bad back injury - I've had little time to catch up. I'm looking forward to some cooler weather and stronger days ahead.

I've posted before about my mother and her amazing talents. She has been cranking out amazing quilts for the last couple of years. She never sells her work and it drives me crazy, because her stuff is so beautiful and well done. But, it takes a lot of work to do that and I can understand her not wanting to spend time on that. She'd rather sew!

I spent a couple of weeks at the beginning of summer looking for a good lunch bag for work. I wanted Mexican oilcloth because it's easy to clean and so bright and cheery. I looked and looked on Etsy and there was nothing like what I wanted on there. I finally settled on something that wasn't what I wanted. Then I thought about my mom and how she could probably make one with her mad skills.  So, I bought some oilcloth online with contrasting gingham colors. So cute! I took it to her house with a placemat I liked, too. Hoping she could make me some customer round placemats as well (I forgot to take pics of those, but trust me they're awesome).

She was pretty unsure of working with oilcloth, especially since I wanted the liner to be oil cloth, too. I knew she would be able to do it and in fact she did quickly crank out some awesome lunch bags. She made them to my specifications, which were a little bigger than I probably needed. So, I use them more for picnics. And truthfully, they are so beautiful, I've been cautious about using them at all.

In her usual fashion she added lots of sweet little features, including pockets inside and matching placemats and coasters for the bags! She used this stitch for everything and it worked great. The cool, thing about oilcloth is that you can just leave the edges cut. It won't unravel.

She took some cardboard and covered it to make the bottom more sturdy and flat. You can also remove it if you want.

I can't offer you the directions for these bags, but something even better recently came out if you like the look of these totes. A new book called Sewing with Oilcloth is now out. And you can get free patterns for the tote bag and the table runner.  This book almost makes me want to sew!

kid's drawings

One of my favorite things to buy at zine symposiums or comic shows is drawings that little kids are selling. There's usually at least one kid who's with someone selling and they have a pile of drawings or comics of their own to sell. 

Last month at the Portland Zine Sympoisum there was an organization raising money for kids art classes by selling some drawings. I bought this for 2 or 3 dollars.

 

Here are some other drawings I got in the past, most likely from either the zine symposium or Stumptown Comicsfest. I've been meaning to post some of these for years.

This one above was a full comic series. I bought three issues, all full length and stapled in the corner. This was from at least 5 years ago at PZS.

 

This one above is my favorite. It looks like this on the page. The drawing takes up about 1/6 of the blank page. Here is a close up below:

Not only is this just a great picture of some kid that I am guessing has some serious braces. But, it always makes me hear a song in my head from a long ago Oakland band called Eskimo that I saw a lot in the late 80's.. They ended a song called Clark's Monkey calling out the name Clark, Clark?

These last two I think I got at Stumptown.

I'm betting I have more around. If I find them I'll post them. When you go to shows like this look for the little kids who has a mess of drawings on a small part of the table. You'll get some cool stuff.

august bounty

This year I planted only cucumbers in my 4x4 garden box. I planted 2 little plants around the beginning of July and they have really taken off.

I have harvested about 6 cucumbers so far and there are going to be tons more. The plants are so pretty with the little yellow flowers.







Tonight I cut up two and put in a bowl with rice vinegar. They are great on salads, cold pasta and alone.

Here's some more pretty pics of the "garden" tonight. Including a portrait of a very busy bee.









There are a few more on my flicker account. What are you harvesting?

Scenes from a Zine Fest

Last weekend was the annual Portland Zine Symposium. I have attended every one and tabled at all but the first. It's a fun, tiring and inspiring weekend. It's great to see zine friends from all over the country that you see every year. Some I've known for about ten years now.

Last weekend was pretty much as described. I came away feeling more inspired about zines, even though I walked away with less in quantity than before. What I did get made a strong impression. It was very hot in the room and that made it even more exhausting. I came away from the zine symposium with some great zines which I might blog about later, a renewed love of zines and zinesters, a summer cold, a completely wrecked house and a new zine of my own.

My new zine is Paper Crush #4 and it's about collecting vintage postcards and photographs.

100 years from now there will be much less paper correspondence for people to see and learn from. Through vintage postcards and photographs you get to read words from people's every day lives from over 100 years ago. You can see images of places that may or may not still be standing.

Each Paper Crush #4 zine comes with a free vintage postcard! You can find the new zine on my Etsy shop.

If you wonder what a zine symposium is like, this video is almost as good as being there. It's kind of long, but gives you the idea. They seem to have captured almost every table there but mine, but that's okay. I got some pictures to share.

One of the things I really love about the zine symposium is the creative things that people do at their table. Sometimes it's decorations, sometimes it's free stuff they offer. This video captures a good amount of that.

This year I made little postcards and gave them away so that people could leave notes on each other's table. it was pretty fun. I should have made more.

Here are some pics that I captured from my table.

This is before the doors opened

July 31st

It's the last day of July. That means the last day of International Zine Month. This would be a good time to check out Broken Pencil's site. Broken Pencil is out of Canada and is a great magazine filled with zine culture and independent arts. For the month of July they profiled a number of zinesters, myself included. You can see my profile and find out my answer to why I make zines.

It's the last day of July and that means only 5 more days till the Portland Zine Sympoisum! I am not nearly ready. The last few days have been spent on outings around the area since my sister is visiting. Now it's time to get this thing done. Hopefully in the next two days I can get it dialed in and copied. So, why am I blogging! Argh. I am hopeless. Well, here's some pics from the last few days around the Portland area. There were museum trips, lunches, lake picnics, kayaking and a trip out to Sauvie Island.

raspberry jam

Today is a rainy day in Portland. Even though it's the middle of July, I don't mind. I like having some sun and then some cooler days.

Last weekend was a perfect summer weekend. On Saturday I went out to Sauvie Island and got a flat of raspberries. Kruger Farms had just posted the day before that the raspberries were in and showed a picture of buckets of raspberries. That was enough to get me there. I love any reason to go out to Sauvie Island. Below is a phone picture from inside Krugers looking out over their fields.

There were lots of people there, but plenty of raspberries and other great produce. I got a flat and some other items and then went out to the Blue Heron Herbary - one of my favorite places on the island.

The next day I went to my Mom's and we made Raspderry Jam with some of the berries. I've always been intimidated to make jam. Something about the special jars, sterilizing and pectin just seemed like a lot of work, especially when I can get super great and local jam pretty much anywhere. But, I found a recipe for Raspberry Jam that required no pectin and no special jar sterilizing and I wanted to try it.

Raspberries have natural pectin in them, so it isn't really needed when you are making raspberry jam. I learned this from the cookbook Foods to Live By, which is written by the folks who run Earthbound Farms.

I really like this cookbook and so did my mom, so I left it with her so she could try some things. Because of this, I don't have the exact recipe with me, but it was really easy and I read it over many times, so I'm pretty sure I have it committed to memory.

Basically it was this:

16 cups raspberries
8 cups sugar

Put in heavy bottom pot, bring to boil, then simmer for about 50 minutes. Spoon into any sterilized jars right away or wait to cool and put into jars.

We simmered for longer than 50 minutes because it didn't look like it was thickening. It looked more like a sauce. But, after it cooled down it did thicken up quite good, especially the ones with the seeds left in. We did some seedless and some with seeds. For seedless we put the jam through a sieve and then a strainer.

Let me tell you, it's delicious. Not too sweet and so fresh tasting.

I guess I better get back to working on my zine now. Zine Sympoisum is in a few weeks.....well, maybe I'll have a snack of toast and jam first.

Hope your all enjoying the summer!

for your friday night consideration

In case you are home tonight and looking for some sort of something on the internet to entertain and maybe even move you. I give you some of my favorite choices.

This entry is inspired by the song Blue Spotted Tail by The Fleet Foxes. It came on a few minutes ago and I stopped all I was doing and started out at the twilight sky through the open window and thought about stars and summer nights.

I looked on Etsy for an illustration to match what I had in my head while I listened to the song. I didn't find one like what I imagined, but I did find this pretty awesome fabric illustration by seeinginfabric It's called "For All the Stars We Don't See"

Now, if you would like some more music and some humor, I highly recommend this Paul Simon special from 1977. It's only available on youtube. But, it's so very good. I hope they remaster it and release it soon. It's funny and the music is great. I miss the days of specials. Everyone had them for a while in the 1970's. This one's a real gem.

If you're in a more documentary mood. The BBC documentary about Easy Listening Music is pretty great. It gets a little slow at the end, but how awesome to find a documentary about real easy listening music. Someday I will start my Easy Listening interent station. Anyway, you'll hear about Bert Kampfert, Ray Conniff, Herb Alpert and Richard Carpenter, among many others. Also, only on youtube, unfortunately.

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend!

zine season has begun

July is International Zine Month. In Portland it's also usually the month before the zine symposium and for me that means time to get in gear on the newest zine.

I'm pretty behind this year and just started today. I'm working on a new issue of Paper Crush and without giving too much away, the zine will be a nice compliment to the theme of "Postmarked 2011" for this 11th annual Portland Zine Symposium.

As a fund raiser the PDX Zine Symposium is selling postcards. For $5.00 they will send you a stamped postcard that you can decorate and send back. They'll all be on display at the symposium. It's a fun way to help out with the symposium and a great way to be there even if you can't be there.

I sent mine in last week. Here it is:

I have worked on the zine today in between cleaning out the closet in my craft den/office/record library. It feels so good to get rid of a lot of stuff. It's hard for me, though, feeling like, well, I could *do something* with this. But, if I haven't in the last five years I'm betting I won't.

So, I have the next couple of days off to work on the zine and the space clearing. It's become a ritual of mine to take a couple days off in July or August for the purpose of working on a zine.

Even in the midst of it, I am surprised that it is that time again.

I have a problem with comprehending the basic fundamentals of time.

Happy Zine Month!

little wooden plate

Sometimes you never know how much you love something until quite a while later.

Many years ago I gave my Dad these handless lights. They were like glasses that you put on, but without anything where the lenses would be and on the sides were little lights. I thought he might want to use them to get better light when he was working on his model airplanes.

When he opened the package it was clear he thought it was a pretty nutty gift. He thanked me in the way he might of when I was a kid and had given him a macaroni tie clip.

Months later he told me how much he loved the flashlight glasses. He used them every night to go out and get wood. He lived in the mountains in Northern California and it was pretty dark when he would go out to get wood. Apparently the gift I had given him was the best thing he'd ever used for this task and was much handier than having to carry a flashlight while holding wood.

When I was about 20 I was living in Sacramento with my best friend. Her mother was also in town and once when she came back from a trip from Nicaragua she handed me a gift she had brought home for me. It was a wood plate, about 8" wide.

Now, this was 1985. Wood anything was really not a popular aesthetic. I mean this wasn't the Seventies. But, I still kind of liked it when I got it, even though it was quite crude and simple - not even varnished or anything. I really had no idea when I would use it.

And I don't think I did use it for quite a while. I remember using it quite a bit maybe ten years later. Since then I used it every week, at least once, usually much more. Turns out this little wooden plate was perfect for everything!

It was great for small pizzas, for cheese, fruit and bread. Since it was wood you could cut and serve on the same dish. It was what I used for late night snacks of toast and jam or for any kind of appetizers. I loved this little wood plate and actually started looking for more of them several years ago when I would remember to. Turns out they're kinda hard to find here. At least one

that's simple and not expensive. I found a couple a few years ago at Cost Plus, but haven't seen them since. I like the Cost Plus ones a lot, but they aren't the same.

I was looking for a replacement, because I could tell the end was coming for my little wood plate. This simple wood plate that my friend's mom bought for probably far less than a dollar had lasted me over 25 years. It finally cracked in half a while ago and I had to take some pics before I threw it away.

You just never know when something shows up if it's going to be just what you needed or wanted. Even when it looks like nothing you've ever wanted. You just have to wait and give it a try.