Sherry Ball Schoenfeldt

We moved out of our house last week and we're staying at my parents house until we close on our new house next week. I am soooooooooooo tired and we're not done yet. And I can't find anything I thought I set aside for this time in limbo.

For instance, today I start a two-part collage workshop with some high school students. This is my first time to ever hold a workshop or class (the closest I've come is the beeswax demos at OCS with the younger kids). Knowing how chaotic things would be, I took everything I'd need for the workshop to Roz's house. WRONG!! When I went to organize things yesterday the rice papers and tissue papers weren't there. OOPS!! So off to Hobby Lobby to get new tissue paper. But I couldn't find any rice paper there. Hmmmm. Wonder if I have time to go to Triangle and if they have any?

I was already nervous about this workshop. Those of you who know me, know how much I love to talk and will probably be surprised that I shake in my boots when I'm speaking in front of an audience. And now, without stuff for them to layer, I'm wondering what to do!!!

I'll let you know how it goes~ Sherry

We put our gorgeous house on the market on September 26th (click here to see my earlier post). And we had a contract on it on October 14th.

18 DAYS!!!

Based on what's been happening in our neighborhood sales-wise, we were expecting it to take at least two months so this was quite the surprise.

The good news is that I can quit making the bed. The bad news is that I can't start making art, I have to start packing BUT WE DON'T KNOW WHERE WE'RE GOING.

Not only was the sale fast, the closing is fast - November 5th. So we're looking for houses. If we find one that's move-in ready and we can miraculously close that on the 5th, then it's one move and the packing is a pain, but normal. But if it takes longer to close, then everything goes into a pod except what we need to live for a few weeks. And if we don't find one or if the one we find needs lots of work, we have to pack some stuff to go to storage, some to an apartment.

YIKES!!! What does this mean for my art? Or my studio and my supplies (click here to see some pics)? Guess I'll let you know as soon as I know! Or if everything continues to move this fast, guess I'll let you know after I get where I'm going! ~ Sherry

As I may have mentioned before, in addition to being a mix-media artist, I'm an accountant - it's the way I pay for art supplies. As you may not know if you're not into accounting, this Thursday is another IRS deadline: 401(k) reports are due. That's what I'm doing these days.

And I'm exasperated and worn out. There are clients who didn't send in their "stuff" until last week and it was so wrong that I have to spend days correcting it. I know they're well-meaning clients and probably perfectly nice people but . . .

So in an effort to recover from last week and build up strength for the next week, I'm going to spend today doing things I love. First, there was a fattening breakfast. Then we bought flowers for the garden. Then I went shopping for boots (OMG, they are SO awesome), jewelry, a jacket and a couple sweater dresses. It is amazing (and kinda sad?) how great a new pair of shoes can make me feel. Bring it on clients: I have new, incredible high-heeled black boots and I know how to use them!!!!

But after I finish writing this, I'm going to do what soothes my soul the most: spend time in my studio. Even if all I do is reorganize art supplies, time in the studio both calms and invigorates me. There's just something about touching all the fun goodies that soothes and inspires me. (The only problem with reorganizing is that then I can't find anything!)

Today I won't be reorganizing or even just playing around. I'm going to "finish" the book I started with a group of friends on 9/24 (you can read more in the previous post). It's titled ART INSPIRATION: ENCOURAGING WORDS FOR THE CREATIVE SOUL. I put the word finish in quotes becuz this book has so many pockets that I can keep adding quotes and sayings indefinitely.

Life and work can be exhausting. So, restore yourself this weekend - whether that means time in your studio or a hot bath (I plan to do that later today too) or reading a book (hmmm, can I fit that in too?) or a walk or shoe shopping or prayer and meditation. ~ Sherry

a stamp from Mrs. O'Leary's

I'm DONE with two ongoing projects that have been kicking my patootie - getting the house on the market and getting the website done.

A year ago I said the website was done but I now know that wasn't true - it was up but it wasn't done. And in some ways, websites aren't ever done. I still have PayPal to do on one page and I need to photograph a lot of jewelry for the jewelry gallery. Oh, and put up some journal pages. But the layout is perfected (thank you Hope) and the home page has a beautiful movie showing my "stuff" (thak you Victor).

The house is another story. Our house is beautiful. Patrick designed it and it has everything we need and want. We love it and our neighborhood. But we have no kids living upstairs anymore. We want a smaller carbon footprint. We want to have less debt. We want me to have more time for art. So we started talking about selling it over 18 months ago. But there was a wedding. Then we were just pokie. Then there was an economic crash. Then we were still just pokie. Now it's listed and we get to try to keep it ready to show for who knows how long.

It's such a relief to have these two major projects behind us. Then, in three weeks, tax season will be over and I won't know what to do with myself. Oh yeah: All the art projects sitting in baskets and tubs in the studio, the garage and the storage unit.

At least that should give me something pretty to post!

~ Sherry

I have to confess that I have no self-portrait this week! Early in the week, I tried a profile only to have my media NOT mix! I set it aside for a few days but have been unable to come up with a fix - in part becuz this week completely and totally got away from me.

So no self-portrait from Sherry - tho there is one from Ellen (click here). I will post another journal page a little later and I will eventually add a slideshow of the work we did (including yours if you let me know).

I learned a couple of things from this challenge:

• I don't draw enough anymore and I'm pretty good at it so I should do it more and get even better.
• we are too self-critical - far harder on ourselves than on others. Case in point, one woman's drawings look just like her subject matter yet she feels the need to tell us what they're supposed to be and what's wrong with them. She needn't explain - it's perfectly clear to me what she's drawing. And even if it wasn't perfectly clear, it's ART and she owes no one an explanation let alone an apology.
• we don't celebrate each others' artistic endeavors enough

What's next? Ellen is supposed to come up with a challenge for us to post at the end of October. Wonder if she knows?

Thanks for joining us in this challenge ~ Sherry

In my last art journal post, I forgot to give you the links to the other two SELF-PORTRAIT ART JOURNAL CHALLENGE participants who have shared their results with me.

Click here to see Ellen's most recent entry.

Click here to see Sharon's most recent entry.

If anyone else is participating, please share your results with me.

This Friday is the last day of doing this weekly. I think I want to switch to monthly after that - I'm not getting any other posts OR art journal pages done. And I'm starting to feel a little vain what with focusing on my own face so much!!

Thanks ~ Sherry

This is week 3 of the self-portrait art journaling challenge. Today I got a little carried away with drawing the picture of me and then didn't know what to say about it - it was really more of a portrait than a journal page - so I put it aside when my friend Roz came over.

After the third time she told me I was more weird than the rest of us, I pulled out one of the rubber stamps I had stolen from her and tatooed the middle of my forhead with the words

CONFORM
and be
DULL.

I have always been a little "different". And except for junior high, I've always felt pretty good about it. I know that's what Roz meant by "weird":
unique, different, one-in-a-million, special.

A few years ago, for a project, I asked my friends and non-friends to describe me. The constant themes of the answers were independent and open, accepting and non-judgmental. Of course, since only my friends answered the email, the results were nice!

Be yourself.
Accept others for being themselves.
And life will never be dull ~ Sherry

Week #2 (tho Ellen's blog says week #3 - she's ahead of me!!) and I elected to do a full body line drawing.

I used a fine point sharpie for the sketch & writing. Then I went around it with a black glitter gel pen and wet brush to get the shadows.

This is not quite the face or body I have now (the real ones really are more "poofy" and definitely look like they're "50+") but they're not exactly what I had before either. Guess this is closer to the me in my head. And since I change my hairstyle all the time, I'm willing to bet I had this one at one time.

It is so good to be in a place in my life where I can be/do what I always wanted. Yes, there's still a "day job" or two to pay the bills but I see myself as an artist now. Life is good. God is good.

~ Sherry

ps - my legs DID look like that about half a life ago - deep sigh - and I notice that while I accept myself as an artist, I still can't accept my age - lol

So this is week one of the challenge. And boy, was it a crazy week. Clients (not art clients). PayPal. Life in general.

In light of that, I tried to give myself a crazy look with extra wide eyes and kooky hair.

I used several different media on this journal page - watercolor background, collaged image of me, acrylic paints, gel pens, permanent markers, graphite & color pencils. I also used the new (at least to me) Golden Digital Grounds so I could print on top of the collage. There are actually lots of iridescent paints too, but those don't seem to scan well!

Ellen went a completely different direction with her page - reflecting on her native american heritage and adding images to her face. Click here to see it & read about it.

I'm going back to work on the PayPal issues on my website so wish me luck - I wouldn't want next week's journal page to reflect the same feelings as this one (might have to put tape over the mouth so bad words don't come out!!)

~ Sherry

Ellen came over Friday and we had a lot of fun sharing techniques and sketching. She showed me photos for Mombasa and the travel art journal she kept while there. I shared a few tips on drawing facial features. And we decided to post our journal pages every Friday for four or five weeks then get together to see what's next. She used a photo of herself and almost finished a journal page.

And I remembered something very important: While I can draw great eyes & lips and decent noses & ears, THE PEOPLE I DRAW DON'T LOOK LIKE THE PEOPLE I'M DRAWING!!!! This is a major drawback to the journal plan. So I traced a picture of myself: I don't have any hair becuz I'm going to add that when I do the actual journal pages (I did draw my head shape but it didn't show up on the scan).

Check out Sharon's self portrait. When she commented on my previous post, I wasn't sure which Sharon was writing. But as soon as I clicked on her post I knew becuz her drawing looks just like her. Great work!!

So come back next Friday to see our first journal pages. Anyone else want to join the fun?
~Sherry

Back in mid-July, my friend Ellen and I set ourselves an art journal challenge. Hmmm. Maybe I should back up a little more so I can try to show the paths that led us to the lightbulb moment.

Ellen's path: Ellen has been learning to draw and paint by taking some local and online classes. Her skills have improved remarkably. She also keeps art journals chronicling her life as well as what she's learning. When our local art group, The Ephemerites, met in July she showed me that she was starting sketching faces. Ahhhh. The nose. The bane of many an artist. And Ellen was struggling with it like the rest of us.

My path: I've been watching Ellen develop her abilities and thinking that I really need to start drawing again. And I really need to take a watercolor class sometime (I love watercolor but my abilities with it seem to be limited to backgrounds!). Sometime early in July I read an old CLOTH PAPER SCISSORS about an artist who drew a basic picture of herself then copied it and used it over and over in her art journal.

The lightbulb: Our paths crossed at the art meeting and we decided to get together and draw our faces then copy them and cut them out to use in our art journals. The drawings will be basic so we can add to them in the journal. I envision putting myself on a background and adding hair and eye makeup and jewelry all based upon where I am that day.

We start Friday. So why did we wait so long? Ellen went on a mission trip to Kenya for two weeks then spent a week in very unpleasant airports trying to get home. I'm thinking her journal pages might be a little more interesting than mine (hehe).

It's been awhile since we talked about it but I believe we decided we had to do one journal page this way a week. Which is one more journal page a week than I'm doing now (why are summers still so busy when you don't have kids at home?).

I'll post mine here and see if Ellen will let me put hers here too.

So - would you like to join us in the challenge? I'd love to see a bunch of your sketches and journal pages too.

~ Sherry

Last nite I wrote about the fun day I had experimenting with my new glass kiln. Now let me tell you what happened AFTER I wrote.

Well, first I went to bed. But being "of a certain age" (ie, middle) I was having a restless night. The fact that all three stooges were snoring in my bed added to my sleeplessness. So I got up. Checked blogger. Checked facebook. Checked my email. Checked messenger even. Hmmmm. Now what? Oh, I know, that one piece of glass was just about perfect but not quite shiny enough. Now here's where I made my mistakes.
.....(1) Check the internet for instructions on shining up the fused glass BEFORE trying to fix it.
.....(2) No matter how wide awake I think I may be, I am NOT functioning at optimum performance levels at 3 am.

But early this morning, those things didn't occur to me. So I put the piece in the kiln with some clear glass balancing on top and set the microwave for way too long. When I opened the kiln, the clear glass had slipped off the fused glass and both pieces had become a big glumpy puddle - some of which was stuck to the kiln wall.

I have these magic heat proof gloves for taking the kiln out of the microwave (you should all totally buy them and keep them instead of those bulky kitchen mitts). But apparently there are limits to how heat proof they are. So when I saw the molten glass on the inside of the kiln wall, I tried to pull it off with the magic gloves.

Dumb!!! The gloves sizzled and turned brown and my fingers felt burned. I set down the kiln (amazing that I didn't drop it), took off the gloves and immediately iced my fingers.

Apparently the gloves were magic enough to keep my fingertips from blistering. But when I got up at a NORMAL time today, I noticed they had little brown marks on them that matched the weave of the gloves where they turned brown.

So buy the cool mesh magic heat proof gloves for your kitchen or kiln. But, for goodness sake, don't put them to the test in the middle of the nite unless you're pouring yourself some warm milk.

lol ~ Sherry

As I may have mentioned, Patrick and I are getting our house prepped to put on the market. A big part of that prep has been containing the art supplies.

You see, and forgive me if I've already said this here, one of the drawbacks, maybe the only one, to being a mixed-media artist is that I have to have all the supplies for all the different media. Oil paints. Oil paint sticks. Water soluable oil pastels. Rubber stamps. Ink. Encaustic. Acrylics (fluid and heavy body). Gels. Polymers. Resins. And, my gosh, the PAPER! It's everywhere! And as an assemblage artist, I can't see one piece of refuse without thinking, "hmmmmm, if I did . . . I could make . . . with that. So not only do I have tons of art supplies, I have tons of junk.

So I've kind of been bemoaning my non-choice of a particular medium as I filled up the storage unit with art supplies and junk. But what did I do with my birthday gift cards? I went to Hobby Lobby and bought a jewelry glass kiln that works in the microwave. Then I bought a new soldering iron. And more glass. And solder. I'm just a sucker for almost everything artsy-fartsy related. Unless it involves meticulous cutting. Yuck.

I had a fun day experimenting with the kiln and glass today with my BFF Roz. Hopefully I'll melt something that's worth photographing soon. And, yes, believe it or not, a microwave kiln WORKS!!! I wonder if metal clay would work in there or . . . Wait, Sherry, you have to draw the line somewhere.

Or do I?

~ Sherry

I became a fan of WHERE WOMEN CREATE on Facebook (I was already a fan of the magazine). They have a discussion thread going: "Where do you find inspiration for your art?"

As I thought about it, I realized that I don't seek out inspiration - it's kind of just a byproduct of going thru life. Right now, I have a lot more ideas than I have time so I WRITE THEM DOWN. My thought in doing this is that some day I may have time but no ideas and, voila, there's a well to draw them from! I have a secondary reason as well - sometimes, the ideas come to me at night and I'm unable able to sleep again until I've done it or at least written it down. (I hate to admit I'm the same way about accounting and groceries and everything else too - once it's in my head, I have to deal with it!)

As to the inspiration for a particular piece, I'm a "go with the flow" person. Sometimes, I'll just start painting a bunch of journal page backgrounds. Maybe I'll pull out a piece of glass or an image. Or I might pick up a piece of fabric or paper that I like and start pulling things that go with it.

Pretty soon what I'm working on tells me what to do. Or it tells me to backup and try again. Or it shouts at me to STOP! Enough! NO - not THAT paper! (BTW, art talking to you is NOT the same as the other voices some people hear - LOL.)

Let me know what your "process" is - after all,the number one thing that gets my creative juices flowing is interacting with other creative people (See Inspiration: The Company of Other Creative People )
~ Sherry