Wall Ball and Badly Drawn Buildings...

 

A few weekends ago, I went on a daddy-daughter date to Wall Ball, which is an art event featuring over 50 artists where you can actually watch them go through their process of making art.  I was quite giddy as I walked around and got to talk to different artists.  I loved seeing the different techniques that they used, was in awe of the ability of many, and had a few "dude, I can totally do that... why am I not doing that!" moments that has encouraged me to do more.  And, of course, I had the best date ever to share this experience with! My dad and I brainstormed on different art pieces I could make...

 Here's a guy working with glass... A friend and I will be taking a glass class soon (*squeal!*... similar to one heard from jr. high girls when they see Justin Bieber...)

 

 I liked this guy. He adds robots to all of his paintings, made me smile...

 And this guy was doing all this beautiful engrave work.  Quite jealous of his mad skills!

I'm all about supporting local artists, and I bought this sketch/watercolor piece from Jenn Carter.  I thought it was quite cute :)

But my favorite artist in the St. Louis area will always be my brother.  This is a charcoal sketch he had done for me as a gift.  He's so talented :)

After checking out all the art, I decided to make a painting for my dad.  I'm not going to go through the whole process of how I made it, cuz a lot went into it, but here's brief overview. 

My dad had a blue print of the Beaux Arts Building that he had worked on.  I made a quick sketch of the building from their website:

Then I pasted the blue print of the building onto a canvas,

Then painted...

The red is overlay of letters is the first initials of everybody in my fam.  This isn't my usual style, but it was fun to try something new! 

And I shall end with some Sultans of Swing... this song reminds me of riding around in the car with my dad as a kid... always makes me smile when I hear it :)

I'm pissed off... I mean 'on'... :)

In clinical, I was making my rounds, hopping from room to room to see what my students are up to. As I was about to exit one patient's room, there was a person in front of me trying to get into the bathroom to empty a container of urine and put dirty laundry in the hamper. As she struggles to open the bathroom door, amber waves of urine crash against the sides of the container, and I had a quick thought that this isn’t gonna be good. The urine splashes out of the container, and right onto my jacket… onto my face… and into my left eye! Bagaughspshhfa! Luckily, I maintained my composure and dignity (which was quite an accomplishment with pee on my face, I must say, so here is me patting myself on the back! *pat-pat*... good job, Erin...), and rinsed my eye out quickly and talked to the appropriate people at the hospital and the university to follow appropriate policy. Found out that I now have to rinse my eye out for about fifteen minutes cuz a quick rinse isn't good enough… yeah…

The eye rinse at our work is pretty much a HUGE bottle of sterile normal saline, aaaaaaaaand it had a ton of dust that had collected on it, which normally I would find that rather gross, but considering I just got pee in my eye which is even grosser, I just found it disheartening.
“This is what I’m suppose to use?!”
“Well, at least it’s not expired!” said one of our fabulous nurse managers who was helping me out; she poured while I held my eye open over a sink (we're all about teamwork at my job! :).  But we could only pour a little bit at a time cuz every time she poured the solution on my eye/face, I couldn’t breathe! I have no idea why! I felt like I was underwater! It was very traumatic! And I have this sneakin’ suspicion that she rather enjoyed it (just kidding, she’s wonderful! :). I laughed and said, “I feel like I’m getting water-boarded! I tell you whatever you want! Mother’s maiden name?! Social security number?! It’s yours!” We finally got a good system down where I was able to get an adequate amount of oxygen while having my eye cleansed. By the end of it, I was more composed and am a stronger person for it… tried to convince her I could try to become a marine due to my ability to tolerate water-boarding… She told me that they would break me into two… probably… but a girl can dream, can’t she?


Along with the comforting act of getting my eye flushed, I got to go the emergency room… due to policy… double yeah… and got to sit there for a couple of hours for them to tell me that I did what I needed to and I can go home, and I need to keep an ‘eye’ on it (bahahaha! I crack myself up!). Oh how my life is so exciting!

Shop Stop: Willow Lake, T.F.A., and Roots

On Friday, my dear friend, Jen, and I went to some of our favorite antique/vintage home decor shops all around the St. Louis/O'Fallon area.  And all of these spots are definitely worth checking out!

Our first stop was in O'Fallon, MO: Willow Lake Home Decor!  Oh how I adore this shop! And how I adore the owner!  She integrates the old with new- takes antiques, mingles them with new products and creates beautiful, harmonious living spaces.  She has such a great eye for decorating, and she places clippings from decor magazines to help you visualize it at your home.  You have to walk around the store three times so you don't miss anything cuz she has sooo much packed in the store.  Bonus: everything is really reasonably priced- yeah! 



These goggles were rather tempting for me!  But I resisted... for now :)



Our next stop was in the Tower Grove area: T.F.A., Jen's favorite place!  T.F.A. stands for 'The Future Antiques' (aren't they clever? :), they specialize in 50s/60s decor.  Amazing vintage chandeliers, furniture, clothing, and dishware (*love the dishware*)!  Some of their stuff is a little pricey for my liking, but you can haggle with them a little.  You will also have a lot of "OMG, my mom/grandma had this!" moments :) 



I loved these letters, kind of hard to tell in the picture but they are angled, not flat... and they were not for sale... booooo! 



Our last stop was in Maplewood: Roots! Ya, we get around :).  This is another place I like to go for decor ideas, and the ladies who work here are so sweet!  Everything is fairly priced and they have some rather unique items.  This is also a media-mixing/jewelry-making/steampunk-loving dream store!  They have antique/vintage game pieces, flash cards, watch faces/gears, and other awesome randomness to make beautiful art with.  Also, if you are looking for antique sign letter (plastic or metal), this is the place for you!

And here are my finds for the day!



I got this antique typewriter at Willow Lake.  I had bought it to go on my antique desk that I use as an end table, but it was too big, so currently it's hanging out on my coffee table.  I put a page from a children's book in it to add a little somethin' somethin'...



I got this cute little red crab from TFA.  He is actually an ink well (shell pops open), and he is currently 'sunning' himself by my flowers until I find a more permanent spot for me... 



And I got a bunch of vintage flashcards at Roots.  I currently do not have time to make something with them yet, but here is a little picture word-play for you :)



Day of Art with Erin: snazzy jewelry holdin' frame

On Saturday, we were graced with snow yet again, but instead of letting it get me down, I pulled on my Uggs and headed to Home Depot to work on a project that I have been thinking about for quite some time but has been neglected due to lack of motivation and uncertainty on how I wanted to execute it.  I have been wanting to make a jewelry holding frame cuz I haven't found anything that I like and all the jewelry I wear regularly ends up hanging out on my dresser.  Embarrassing, I know...

So I found these wonderful aluminum sheets at Home Depot that are perfect for what I was looking for.  I also got a 10X20 inch floating glass frame from Gordmans, cuz they're cheap. This is a quick, easy project, took me less than a hour. Enjoy! 

The supplies you will be needing:

decorative aluminum sheet

picture frame (I prefer floating glass frames)

metal clippers

marker

1. Remove the back of the frame (while listening to Damien Rice :)

2. Remove the glass from the frame

3. Trace glass with a marker onto the aluminum

4. Then cut along the line... 

5. Place aluminum in the frame

 6. Replace the back...

7. Then hang it all the wall

8. Add some S hooks for hanging your necklaces

5. Add some jewelry and you're done! 

And to not deceive, my dresser is still a mess, but not with jewelry :)

Day of Art with Erin: Cork Board Collage

As a New Year resolution, I am attempting to do something once a week to express myself artistically*.  I had a rough start with that yesterday, but was happy with my results by the end of the day. 

My sister and I went to the mall for make-overs; she is wanting to become a make-up artist (and she is fantastic!), so we are starting to scope out other people's handy work.  My sister had hers done by a chick at MAC, and ended up 'mouth-dropping' gorgeous... I, unfortunately, got mine done at Estee Lauder.  I got the 'romantic' look done, not realizing that 'romantic' was the politically correct term for 'lady of the night'.  After receiving many 'offers', I wiped off all the eye make-up.  Nice to know that I would do fair with that back-up job...

Things continued down hill as I was shopping at Hobby Lobby.  Hobby Lobby has these glass display shelves when you first walk in, where merchandise is sectioned off by themes.  I was looking at a display shelf that had a cute '@' cork board, along with some vases, glass plates, and bunches of fake grapes on it.  As I picked up the '@' sign, to my dismay everything... yes, EVERYTHING, fell off the shelf!  I felt like a little kid getting catch touching something I shouldn't as everyone in a 30 ft. radius stared at me... smooth, Erin... A guy who works there was too kind as he tried to convince me that this happens all the time and helped me clean up.  I do, though, give myself 2 points for not actually breaking anything.

Luckily, as I started working on my project, things got better.  I was wanting to put up some cork board in my office, but had been unhappy with what I have found, so I decided to make a 'cork board collage' to add a little extra 'umph' to my office.

I started out by measuring and cutting the cork board to the sizes I wanted.

 Once done cutting, I arranged them into a design I liked.

 Then I painted all the cork boards white...

 Then painted simple, repetitive designs...

 Hang them up and viola!  Cork board collage!

 All that is left to do is put it to good use...

 Here's another view of my awesome workspace... I love it... I'll give you a better tour some other day :)

*this was carefully worded so I can be rather liberal with it...  :)

Boys will be boys... except when they act like girls...

At the hospital this past week, I was working with a bunch of teenage boys.  For many people, such an experience would be described with many explicit words, but I love it. You never know what is going to come out of their mouths, and as long as you have thick skin and a good sense of humor, it's usually entertaining. Here are two conversations I had with them this week...

The boys were inquiring about my 'stalkers'.  'Stalkers' is a term that one of the patients had coined to describe my nursing students, since they follow me around all day.  School time tends to be the guys' favorite time of the year... it's not every day you get to have a cute nursing student waiting on you, hand and foot. 
Pt. 1: "Can I get a cute, younger one?! I didn't get any last semester..."
Pt. 2: "Man, don't rule out the older ones... I had an older one who gave me an awesome back massage with my bath..."
Pt. 3: "Ohhh, I want a younger one who gives good back massages!"
Way to treat my students like pieces of meat, ordering up what you want... as least it's a good bargaining tool to get the guys to do what I want ;)... boys...

Then the following day, our conversation took an interesting, unexpected turn: 
Pt. 1: "Hey Erin, let me look at your ID."  It has my picture on it, and my hair was long at the time of pic was taken. "I definitely like your hair shorter."
Pt. 2: "yeah, your hair was freakin' long, and though it was really pretty, I like it a lot better this length..."
Pt. 3: "yeah, me too!  It's really cute!  How do you get it to be sooo shiny?"
Um... that was... odd and unexpected... Shocked, I laughed and told them thanks.  I was tempted to ask them if they wanted 'manis' and 'pedis' later and we could discuss the recent celebrity break-ups (Helllooooo, Ryan Reynolds), but I didn't want to hurt their male egos.  

Here are a couple of my pendants with a boy-ish charm theme from my etsy shop, Oddly Sentimental Designs.

Freudian Pictionary...

I have never really conquered the skill of talking and writing on a board, though it is something that I do on a regular basis.  I have awful handwriting, especially when I'm writing fast and talking.  I can't write in a straight line, it always takes a detour downward at the end of my sentence or calculation.  And I always have to step back a couple of feet after writing a lot to see if it is legible or makes sense.  Unfortunately, I took my scribbling errors to a whole new level this week...

I was explaining how positive pressure works in an IV, which can be created by clamping the tubing while flushing the line or with positive pressure caps that are placed on the extension tubing (if this doesn't make sense to you, no worries... understanding this concept is really not relevant to the story).  Some of my students were struggling with getting the concept, so to help them out I drew a picture of it.

"Here is your IV catheter in the vein..." (drew a catheter sheath on the board...)
"and when you clamp your line while flushing, it gives an extra push to the fluid, creating this little 'bleb' at the end to prevent anything from backing into the line..." (drew a 'bleb' at the end of the catheter...)

I stepped back from the board to look at my picture and 'oh my goodness'...

"Yep... I definitely just drew a penis... let's go ahead and erase that!..."

I think a couple of my students peed on themselves from laughing so hard!  Thank goodness this is at the college level and I don't have to worry about letters from parents...





And now for some Salt-N-Pepa... I so could have been a back-up dancer in this era...