Eric Carle style cards

I'm a bit late in posting our little Mother's Day project for the grandmothers, but it's something you could fit to any occasion or just a fun art project.

Everyone loves Eric Carle books. He does his illustrations by making collages of paper painted in different colors and textures.

So first we did some painting. (Actually the Mr. did this with Hendrix while he let me sleep in, his own idea. Yeah, he's pretty good.)

Then I cut out circles and various flower shapes from his paintings. The textures look so cool on these. 

Then he picked the flowers he wanted to put on each card and painted glue on the back with a paint brush.

I drew the stems and added the ribbon and a cute picture. I think they were a hit!

Has anyone ever been to the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art? I would looooooove to go. We are going to Boston in July, but I don't know if I could convince the rest of my family to make the 2 hour drive. If you've been, would it be worth it?

On the Interwebs

I really love these dripping wall murals by Ben Slow.

This cereal box scenery (with downloads) is just about the funnest.

This might be my new front-runner in the search for a nursery print.

2 guilty pleasure songs, powers combined, making your life better.




I've been thinking about making new curtains using this genius technique.

Do you love horseradish like me? Here's only about 90 things we can try.




Let's be honest, fashion week in China always looks way more fun than it's NY counterpart.

And one of the million reasons little girls are awesome:

(via.)




Happy weekend. Have a foolish day :)

A Small Makeover

I'm 32 weeks and I have a small case of frantic nesting. Suddenly, every little plan and project I've put off must get done. Now. I think most of you can also relate to feeling like you are never satisfied with all the decor in your house. But that's the fun of it- you don't have to be satisfied, you can just keep making small changes to satisfy the decor ADD.

I didn't take a before picture of this little vignette on top of the dining room book shelf. Just imagine a pile of junk. It used to have some pretty thrifted pitchers up there that I got sick of a couple months ago and took back to the thrift store with the intent of getting new pretties to put up. But that didn't happen until yesterday. I actually went the antique market for that purpose, but of course came home with everything but objects for this space. So I just "thrifted" from other spots in my home, which turns out is just as fun to do.

I finally put up Olivia's beautiful print in a frame we already had. I love it in this spot. The buddha statue thing has an interesting story. About a year after Hurricane Katrina, Nick and I went on a group work trip to New Orleans to gut houses that had still been untouched since the flood. He found this in one of the houses, and it was one of the only things that wasn't totally molded and destroyed. The owners had left it all, so the guy in charge of our work group said it was ok for him to take. It's kind of a really sad story actually, but it's a good reminder of that trip. And the statue itself just makes me smile. 

Someone has become a little obsessed with knives, and with turning any long objects into knives. Where do boys learn this stuff?

This is blowing my mind.

These are blowing my mind so hardcore right now. Wide open. Staring and drooling. Punched in the cerebellum. Ridonkulous. 

They are works of art by Brian Dettmer. He takes old books like encyclopedias and medical journals and just carves away at them to make them look like this. From what I understand, he doesn't add anything to them, just carves away to reveal the illustrations already inside. 

Unbelievable genius. See more here. 

Virtual Field Trip

Let's go to the MoMA. It will only take two minutes.





Happy weekend! (found here.)