stringsandshinythings

[stringsandshinythings]

Another finish? Possibly another finish. I'm deciding.

But. You know.

NOT overthinking.

maybe

[stringsandshinythings]

Yay a finish! I am rewarding myself with Pringles and cleaning up my workspace tonight

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The art and the location are not thematically linked

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When you want to support your child's creativity and she zeroes in on the fun fur

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Forget everything I said about "I NEED COLOR"

This one was fast and fun

Also I yelled "MUSHROOM!" a lot.

Think it's a shaggy ink cap, I just know that I saw it walking around somewhere one time and thought it looked cool and added it to my list of reference photos

[stringsandshinythings]

Yeah. Not a big change, but it makes a big difference to me.

And then I was like "maybe I should add some shadow under the fly" and then I was like "um, the fly is going to create its own shadow, remember? because dimensions?"

then when I started putting the hardware on the back of the frame my little portable interchangeable hammer that I inherited from my grandmother so this was like a plastic thing that probably dates back to the 90s, anyway, it broke, and I'm only slightly sad about it, but I wound up texting that guy I married to come down for a small and not very sad funeral, only he wound up coming by my desk before seeing the text, which he didn't see until this morning, when he asked me about the funeral, and I had to explain "no, that was last night, when we said goodbye to the hammer", and this was a little distracting when we were both just trying to get the kids out the door for their last day of school.

[stringsandshinythings]

Didn't have work today so decided to spend it wandering around a nearby botanical garden and finding good places to sit and stitch. Collected comments from people older than my mother about "I've never seen anyone do embroidery like THAT before!"

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Okay, this is now sitting in time-out in a corner of my desk until I can decide

(a) how to fix the problems

(b) whether the problems are really problems

(c) which direction is down on this one, because it's definitely not the direction that I originally thought it would be. This orientation is better, but I keep rotating it to try to decide

I do get a little kick out of the fly, though. That part was fun.

[stringsandshinythings]

Starting a new canvas and after several minutes of trying to figure out which end I had intended to be "up" realized that I also hadn't grabbed a pencil to sketch out where the mushroom is going to go so decided I would just use a finger to compare to the stem in the reference photo and then decided that I just need to put the needle through the canvas somewhere where it would stab me in the finger and fortunately I rethought this before needing to consider my own blood as a design element but wow I need the matcha this morning

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Consecrate an entire Binny's

I was joking about how the pope should move to france again just to shake things up but now I've got a better idea. this is how we put chicago back on the map

[stringsandshinythings]

Finally, a finish! I would say that this took a disproportionately long time but if I'm honest, which I strive to be, most of that disproportionately long time was spent carrying it around and not actually working on it. I think I might be craving very bold colors now.

[stringsandshinythings]

I was inspired to look up our local Art Museum fundraiser events but unfortunately they are open to "Everyone at [$2250 per year] tier and above" Friends memberships @_@

I am now quite envious that is not the case everywhere!

Wow! Yeah, around here tickets are in the $75-$200 range depending on which museum -- splurgey but doable a few times a year for me, a definitely not wealthy person. Sometimes membership discounts or presales and I think some places have a pre-gala reception for the higher tier subscribers, but ordinary people like me are still welcomed in the door. I hope your local museum starts doing some more financially accessible fundraising parties in the future because (a) they're fun and (b) getting more people involved and connected and thinking about giving even if they're not giving thousands is, like, a good thing

[stringsandshinythings]

ALSO while you may not have the Met near you, if you DO have an art museum near you, YOUR LOCAL ART MUSEUM probably does something like this as a fundraiser, and while it is not as star-studded as the Met Gala, it is also WAY more affordable and accessible to ordinary schmoes like me and, presumably, you. And all you have to do to get on the list for tickets is probably, like, ask, or become a member. And then you can go to an Art Museum Party with live music and yummy food and people who have chosen to get Very Dressed Up just because they can. And you can talk to people who like art and people who introduce themselves as "[name], the artist" and people who don't introduce themselves as anything in particular but as you talk to them you realize that these are the kinds of people who could afford to build and fill their own local art museum and, in fact, their grandparents did, you're standing in it and holding a glass of seyval blanc. And maybe these aren't people who you have a ton in common with on any level or who you would want to meet for brunch or happy hour or a grocery shopping date, but they're people you can get together with on the point that having an art museum in your community is better than having no art museum in your community, and so you should totally look into it. I am on the "this person will show up at our gala" list for I think two art museums and a theatre company so far and even when I go to these things alone I always have a blast. Also because a substantial part of the donor pool are both rich and elderly, usually I can go to a Fancy Art Party Full Of Cocktails And Hors d'Oeuvres Like An Important Grown-Up and ALSO be Home In Bed Drinking Herbal Tea And Watching An Episode Of Poirot by 10:30, which is like best of both worlds.

yearly reminder, the Met Gala is a fundraiser that serves as the primary source of funding for the Met's Costume Institute. the money that invitees pay for tickets and almost all other proceeds from the gala is charity that goes towards a museum collection which otherwise likely wouldn't exist. please support public and private funding for information institutions

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Okay NOW I feel like this is working

Finally

Apparently all it took was coffee and French knots and cafe lighting

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Me: hopefully after this weekend things will settle down and I can take a whole day to just make art and be outside and calm

Also me: except you will not, you will just tell yourself that nothing you do will ever be good enough to be art and you will sit there and not actually do any of it and then decide it's all hopeless and decide to clean the kitchen instead.

A different me: HEY NOW. STOP LYING TO MY FRIEND, ME

That third me: You KNOW she won't clean the kitchen either

[stringsandshinythings]

Okay this is a pretty amazing thing to see on Tumblr but picture this: me wandering around the Contemporary, adult beverage in hand, and reaching this room

Cue jaw drop

Staring

And then turning to find the 11 year old somewhere else in the museum, bringing them in to see it, and watching their face just kind of turn to "I'll be here a while, don't leave without me"

"Can I Please Eat In The Computer Room Tonight?" by Nicole Nikolich (2025)

[stringsandshinythings]

My favorite version of yarn chicken is the one where you have plenty more yarn, you just really want to make it to the end of the row

(Especially fun since this is my Mindless Anxiety Knitting to use up somebody's "I found this yarn and I figured you could use it so I left it in a plastic bag where you would find it" yarn. I can not take any more yarn-induced anxiety than this right now.)