By Craftwhack on April 30, 2012
Hello my flatulent little friends. Did you miss me? I have been working hard, much like one of Santa’s elves, to make another web site.
I’ve been feeling awkward for a while about having a directionless personal site, and I don’t enjoy writing about the antics of my children, so I dug down deep and thought about what I love a lot and would keep me interested in blogging about. Apparently that subject is not me. It’s kids’ art and design.
I am starting a site that will be a resource and place of inspiration for parents to check out awesomely-designed kids’ products and learn more about providing more art instruction for their kids at home, or at least surrounding their kids with inspiring art materials and books so the kids can learn that way.
I’m pissed that our kids learn next to no art in school, but the world is jam-packed full of products that are designed by people and art that is made by people that needs to be seen and experienced and appreciated by kids. Art can already seem inaccessible and scary to many people, what with it being housed mostly in giant museums and small, exclusive galleries. That sucks. I want kids to be comfortable with art and design and understand it on a little bit deeper level than just, Oh! I’ve seen that Van Gogh painting in my classroom taped onto the wall!, or, This iphone of my mom’s is really fun to play on and feels great in my hand and I wish I had the enormous vocabulary to express why it is superior to other smart phones out there. (Okay, that might be a little lofty, but you get the idea.)
So what does this mean for Craftwhack? It means I will continue to blog on here sometimes, because I won’t be able to survive if I can’t swear and be snarky somewhere. I think I’m going to slow it down to posting maybe twice a week on here- one random rambly post, and one Tutorial Tuesday. And before you get all comfy with this idea, I am renaming Tutorial Tuesday, Lifewhack, as suggested by my friend Brett Kinsler way back when. Why? Because it’s a good name and then I don’t have to worry about a strict Tuesday deadline. Boom. Win.
Would you guys go look at my new site and tell me what you think? You can be honest if you have suggestions or hate something. I like critiques. I like you, too. Even if you are flatulent.
ARTCHOO!
p.s. I’m still filling in a lot of the resources and trying to figure out if I have things organized in the best manner, so there are gaping holes still.
Posted in art, personal, rambly blogging, Tutorial Tuesday |
By Craftwhack on April 24, 2012
I suppose today is a good day to talk about my blog conference experience.
I am beyond overwhelmed. I know everyone says that after a conference, because you’ve learned so much and want to do all sorts of new things, and your head explodes over and over again for about 3 days, but I had a freaking epiphany, dammit.
Let me give you the lowdown first. I was in St. Louis for 3 days, with the conference on Saturday. It’s called Bloggy Boot Camp. Click the link for more details.
I went in hoping for lots of tips and education, and I was also looking for some direction and clarification. I got both in spades- and it started at Friday night’s cocktail party, hosted by Charmin, pimping their new app. I noticed something troubling. Every time I would tell someone my blog’s name, they assumed it was a craft blog. (I wonder why?) So then I got to introducing myself and my blog followed immediately with the explanation that it’s not a craft blog. I would explain that I started it when I was teaching myself to knit, as a way to document and share my progress, but that it got boring really fast to blog about knitting, so it evolved into a personal humor blog. That’s fun to explain 400 times in a row. Fuck me.
Now honestly, I’ve been feeling itchy lately. As in blogging-personality-crisis-itchy. I feel like my blogging needs evolved but Craftwhack hasn’t evolved along with that. If that doesn’t make sense, here’s this: I sort of feel like I’m just vomiting random posts out without having any cohesion or direction for my blog.
That feeling has been simmering under the hood for a while, but I wasn’t fully ready to explain it to myself until I was all snuggly under my puffy duvet in my king sized bed in a hotel on the 23rd floor overlooking the Arch.
Now this isn’t a sad story, because my creaky brain cogs started spinning furiously and the solution to my problem popped up right alongside the acceptance of a problem. That never happens. I hatched a great idea. One that I’m super excited about and I feel is the natural progression for my blogging career. Yes, I said career. I’m taking this shit seriously.
I’m completely obsessed with my new idea and so I am announcing that I will be scattered with my posting here for a little bit until I can get this idea up and running. Once I figure everything out I will explode back on the scene and pester you all like a shaky little poodle looking for a bite of your ham sandwich. What?
Posted in personal, rambly blogging |
By Craftwhack on April 20, 2012
Well this is most likely going to be my very best post ever. Like as in EVER ever. Why? Because I’m sitting in an airport. Everyone loves to read about airport antics.
First I’ll tell you where I’m going. I’m off to the seductive city of St. Louis, for my first ever blogging conference. Those of you who are bloggers will be interested in this while those of you who aren’t are making the ‘What. Ever. Loser.’ signs all over your greasy foreheads.
Anyway, bloggers like to talk to actual people in the real world sometimes about our favorite subject, (blogging) so I’m a little excited.
I’m also a little hatey-faced at getting jostled so much on the people movers, but I got back at those people by stealing their shoes from the security bins.
TTYL BFFS! LOL! Gotta go pee before boarding! ROFL!
Posted in daily life |
By Craftwhack on April 19, 2012
I don’t mean to be a name dropper here, but: Philip Seymour Hoffman. Oops, my bad- it just slipped right out!
I know him as Phil Hoffman, of course.
I starred with him in numerous plays all throughout high school, and by ‘I’, I mean ‘my sister’. She was all up in what was then referred to as the Drama Department, which I hope has been changed to the Theater Department by now. She and all of her friends were joke fodder for the zillions of popular kids at our high school, and lovingly referred to as Drama Fags. Lovingly.
Now those kids are pumping gas and have 30 year old children, so ha ha on them. When my sister was in these plays, I would go see them and decide which actor to have a crush on from my seat in the audience. I was probably around 13-14, so this was the only way I could make it through the plays without melting into a puddle of boredom. Phil was the object of my affection during their rendition of Death of a Salesman. My sis played Mrs. Loman to his Willy (that sounded wrong). I would sit there in the front row, all doe-eyed and slack-jawed, waiting for some eye contact from the star.
Incidentally, I recently read that he is starring in Death of a Salesman on Broadway.
Look at that pathos.
My sister’s dreams of becoming an actress took years to diminish, and while she was gathering masters degrees, PSH was getting all famous and shit. I’m pretty sure, though, that his years in high school rank right up there as the best in his life. I love his work- I think he’s phenomenally talented, and I do believe his rendition of Truman Capote is my favorite of his roles.
Anyway, that’s my fascinating famous-person tidbit for you. Although, now that I think about it, I have another good one.
When I was about 13 I went to NYC with my family on a vacation. We saw Paul Shaffer sitting next to us at a restaurant. Big whoop, BUT- the very next time I went to NY- 1 year later- I saw Paul-fucking-Shaffer again. What are the odds? And why couldn’t it have been someone more interesting?
Celebrity stories from you all now, please. Entertain me. Dazzle me.
Posted in Creative Beings, rambly blogging |
