Jes Lee

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….and that is why I love where I live….

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After a semi-regular-morning-session of Wii Fit, I watched a pretty epic storm roll through. I watched for a while, and recorded a bit of it.

I moved on to an intense session of photo editing and negative scanning. It wasn’t long before the sun was beaming and I started getting a little stir crazy. I decided it was time to go test out one of the other Kodak Brownie cameras I have. I loaded up a bag with that camera plus a couple other with mystery rolls of film in them and headed out to the nature preserve behind our condo building. I found out that the nature area is larger than I thought! There are more trails back there than I realized! I finished off two partial rolls of film and one test roll in the Brownie, as well as a few instant shots and a few cell phone photos. I’m taking my sweetie back out with me on Saturday. He didn’t realize that area was that big either. I know I only scratched the surface.

I received an email from the wonderful people who own the house/gallery I have been invited to have work at during Art-a-Whirl. It was full of information like postcard pick up dates, artwork drop off dates, and that they have room for more artwork than I imagined they would and I need to get going on making more……..

I’m still looking forward to it. There will be more info about that here soon.

My sweetie and I headed off after dinner to the Rogue Buddha gallery in NE Minneapolis for the last of the Pocket Lab Reading Series hosted by two good friends of mine. We had a wonderful night listening to four poets we had not heard before (we even bought a book from one) and talking to artist friends and poet friends. We walked to the 331 Club and chatted more over drinks. It amazes and inspires me seeing the people I have the chance of working along side in this city.

On the way back to the car we walked past a shop called iWare that has me thinking about how I need to schedule an appointment with the eye doctor, and debating again if I should ask about contact lenses, or stick with frames.

I came home to see sitting on the table where I left it, my book for The Sketchbook Project. A daunting task….there is something about blank journal pages….but one I am excited about trying! I have until January to fill this up with new work. Then it will be photographed and added to their digital collection so anyone in the world can check it out and look at it on their computers, and it will be part of a traveling exhibit that will be going around the US. No pressure!

I loved today, was overwhelmed by today, had a couple of scary OMG moments today, but days like these, days that are filled with community and friends and art, are awesome.

On to tomorrow.

The view from here

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A few things I have learned recently:

1. Not all Real Estate agents care. Yeah, I really did know this before, but it was proven again. No, not ALL Real Estate agents are this way! Especially not the two I am related to ;) (That said, it has been a long week already. Tonight, my sweetie and I had our typical comfort meal: curry and beer. That seems to be our go-to comfort meal no matter where we are. This also came after a nice walk. It is amazing how a couple of things can change your outlook.

2. Fort Snelling has a lot of walking trails and many more things to see than just the historical re-enactment part! I remember going there where I was quite young to see the historical part, but I honestly haven’t been back since. I honestly didn’t realize there was so much more to it! Anyone want to go on a photo adventure?

3. I finally found a book that I’m really focused on reading, but I really don’t know what it is all about yet…(other than what the description on Goodreads says)

4. Flickr has a new photo uploader design! It is actually really nice, and is encouraging me to post more photos there again! So yes, there are many new photos in my photostream if you are bored and would like to look.

I have a lot of ideas. No, really, I do this time. My show that is coming up at MCBA in February will be quite different. At least I hope it will. There is this small thing of there being another show in October that I am excited for, but didn’t really plan on. That will take some time. But the MCBA show will be different. Still photo and book based, but in different ways than I have worked before. A wise friend recently told me that she doesn’t believe that artwork supplies have to come from the art supply stores. They can come from the hardware store if you want. She is right really. I keep thinking of this. Photos and books don’t always have to look the way you expect them to.

I am going to try screen printing! One of the benefits of being a Co-op member at MCBA is that when they decided to start promoting that we had a decent screen printing studio, the Co-op members were allowed to come for a free screen printing workshop. I kept thinking that I had forgotten most of what I needed to do to screen print since then, but I realized a few days ago that I took copious notes during that work shop, and you know what? I really do know what I’m doing. Screen printing is something that I want to work into my artwork. I’m not exactly sure how yet, but I am going to experiment a bit and see how it goes.

Getting back to the list:

5. One of the Brownie cameras I found in my stash that I am going to try shoots images that are not square! They are actually 2 1/4″ x 3 1/4″! As soon as I have a day where it is sunny and I don’t have to work all day, I’m going to try it out. I’m excited! Though I also realized I don’t have a negative carrier for my enlarger that will fit that negative. In fact, 2 of my 4 enlargers won’t fit that negative at all…(yes I have 4 enlargers in my tiny darkroom).

6. I am going to print a run of “back-up” business cards on my own for when I run out of mini-Moo cards at Craftstravaganza in a couple of weeks. Really, they aren’t that hard to print. And I already have a polymer plate made up with my website address on it! Just don’t mention this to my husband. He thinks I’m crazy for not just ordering them.

Tomorrow I have a lot of digital photo processing to work on. I’m kind of dreading it. I really want to be out taking photos and working on new artwork! But, this job pays, and pays well and needs to be finished. Hopefully this weekend will lead to more creative time and energy.

Until next time,

~Peace~

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