Fran Meneley

Here Today, Gone Tomorrow

 

Dreaming of this...

...while looking at this...

...have escaped into my new watercolor box working in my "In Ten Minutes" journal for the Sketchbook Project. I have procrastinated like a freakin' banshee on this one...4 pages done and it's got to be mailed a week from today : (

My saving grace is that tomorrow I head out for the PLAY journaling retreat where I'll have four glorious days to journal! This weekend I laid out some collage for a new journal cover...sewed it up, added some brand spanking new blank pages and will tuck it into my traveling bag. Hope you are finding some escape in your late January days!

A Passion for Pinning - In the Studio and On-line

I have always been a pinner. The humble bulletin board. That’s right. Somewhere to pin up my favorite finds. Photos, studio dreams, favorite postcards, artwork, heroes and heroines, hearts and hands - some of my favorite visual things. I talk about this in my classes as a way to develop a visual dialogue and to really discover what it is we really like and love - a way to develop our voices as artists. We are bombarded by images in this media age and by selecting and choosing things to pin up, we are forming a personal aesthetic. A bulletin board, whether it's a big one like the one I have in my studio or an area on a blank wall marked off with tape, begins to inform us about who you are and what’s important to us. I don't see this as some kind of art “thing”; it’s a living dialogue and needs to be changed and refreshed from time to time. Just like my studio has evolved and changed over time, I evolve and so does my bulletin board.

And then I found... 

Oh my god...it's like my bulletin board, only on mega steroids. Really. 

Pinterest is an on-line pin board - "a virtual pinboard — a place where you can create collections of things you love and "follow" collections created by people with great taste. People use Pinterest to collect and share all sorts of things -- wedding inspiration, favorite T-shirts, DJ equipment. You name it, people are pinning it."

You can create different boards for different areas of interest - the graphic above is a screen shot of 6 of my boards - Color Palettes I Love, Frannie Likes, Hidden View, Dining, My Idea of Camping and Inspiration. You create your own board topics. When I'm online and see an image that I like I can easliy "pin it" to one of my boards with a "Pin It" button I've installed on my Bookmarks Bar - super easy - they tell you step-by-step how to do it. I can access lots of other people's pin boards or just search by topic. It's really easy and really addictive. A totally wonderful time suck. I found a really great tutorial on how to get started on Pinterest - it's free - here. Pinterest is really simple and if you'd like an "Invitation" leave me a comment and I'll send you one. I don't understand why, but you have to be "invited", you can't just sign up. You can also request and invite from the Pinterest website. Once you get your invite, just set up an account - super easy and they don't ask for more than basic information. And start pinning. It's like the bulletin board in my studio, which I will of course keep pinning to, but with Pinterest I have the entire internet of images to choose from. I love seeing what really catches my eye, that wow moment when I'm really caught by a bit of beauty. Pin it. Keep it. Return to it. 

Pretty soon you'll have this tattoed on your forehead. I kid you not. 

p.s. To see my Pinterest boards go here, or click on the Pinterest button on my sidebar.

I Have A Dream...

I refuse to accept the view that mankind is so tragically bound to the starless midnight of racism and war that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become a reality... I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word.

Martin Luther King, Jr.

Fire and Ice and an Interview

 

This sunrise last week had me stepping out onto the back patio in my slippers and just gawking, slack-jawed as the sky caught fire. Truly awe inspiring. I felt very small in a very signifcant way, humbled to witness this fire in the winter landscape. When I move to town in March I will miss my view of the wide open prairie and the sunrises. New sunrises on my horizon in town, just through the trees.  

 

A counter point to that firey sky is this lovely little video of a true photography pioneering genius, Wilson Bentley. Brought to you by Miss Jaihn over at Truly Spacious. His ingenuity, passion and perseverance inspires us all.

If you'd like to read an interview with me discussing my thoughts on creativity and intuition, skip on over to Meri Arnett-Kremian's blog, Finally Me - a blog whose target audience is women of substance,intelligence, wisdom and experience who are continually growing and responding with grace. Posting articles on relationships (marriages, live-ins, friendships, family); transitions (empty nest, menopause, deaths, divorce, caring for parents, having kids come back home, mid-life dating and mind-body-spirit issues with a concentration on women's passions including art, travel, books, films and photography. Lots of great articles and interviews with other women of sustance. And thanks Meri, I am very honored to be included here.

Some Inspiration

As the first days of 2012 roll by, I thought I'd share a bit of inpsiration that has come my way.

I was really delighted to find a new magazine! As a lifelong magazine-a-holic, and former magazine adveriting director, I am always thrilled to find a new magazine to tuck into. And it is a sad state of affairs these day, at the newsstand. We used to have a really good shop in town that carried dozens of great titles and many, many foreign publications. Inspiration abounded and the gratification was immediate. Now, not so much. It's slim pickings and I think the expense for shops to carry a breadth of national and foreign titles has just gotten beyond the reach of most indie shop owners. So when I saw that there was a new magazine of "style and substance" available, I instantly subscribed.

I'm a paper girl, through and through, so I will eagerly await it's arrival in my post box. If however, you  just can't wait...they have a digital version! Anthology is both a blog and a magazine - how great is that!! The brainchild of two very acoomplished publishing mavens, Anh-Minh Le and Meg Mateo Ilasco (read their bios here) had a vision to create a publication that was a "shelter and lifestyle magazine that takes a narrative approach to its coverage of home decor, travel, design, entertaining, and culture." I think they have succeeded beautifully. Check them out and be inspired.

 

For the design geeks in all of us, watch this trailer for a film I caught on PBS about a week ago.  This documentary delves into the private world that Charles and Ray Eames created in their Renaissance-style, Venice Beach, California studio, where design history was born.Very inspirational and you get to see inside both their design studio and their home! Eames: The Architect and The Painter is available through Netflix here or check your local PBS listings.

If you're like me and like to peek into other people's studios, you'll love Where They Create - a blog and a book! No shiny coffee table tome, this one gets in before the creatives have time to clean up for company. A fun and voyeuristic skip into the spaces of our tribe. Find the blog here and you can order the book from here.

Hope this jump starts some homegrown inspiration in your creative workspaces!!

Dream Good! Breathing in 2012!

I'm adopting Woody Gutherie's 1942 "New Year's Rulin's" as my own this year. I will endeavor to work more and better, take bath, read lots good books, listen to radio a lot, learn people better, don't get lonesome (followed closely by, have company but don't waste time), dance better and (try to) love everybody. A heady list for sure...but words to live by. Oh and dream good and stay glad!

Wishing you the best of dreams in 2012.

Woody's New Year's Rulins from Brain Pickings

Merry Christmas!

 

L.O.V.E.

Murmuration

 

Love THIS! We get huge "murmurations" of starlings in the fall, eating up the left over corn fields. I'm so fascinated by their mysterious elegance - I just had to share.

Brougth to you by Islands and Rivers

Vegetable Love

The farmer's markets here in Colorado are covered with snow. The CSA farm just down the road from me is frozen. Ah, but a girl can still dream and make a fresh carrot salad to remember the days of summer splendor. I love this recipe, winter and summer - it's fresh and light and goes with everything. Another page for the PLAy recipe book that we'll be making in January.

With the Tarragon Corn recipe, I think it makes a pretty spread in my journal. Lovely to play with summery watercolors on a December afternoon.

Winter Dreaming...

 

Views out my dining room window this morning...3 degrees...dreaming of summer corn fields and this delicious dish...

...to be copied for a recipe book we are making for the PLAY Journaling retreat at the end of January. Happy Winter Dreaming!

p.s. thank you, thank you, thank you Lisa for this fabulous recipe!