reflections in watercolor

I am what I am, and I'd probably prefer not to think of myself as what I'm not.
That being said, sometimes I do think about the things that I don't do versus the things that I do happen to do. For instance, I'm not a "painting a day" adherent. I paint when I want to paint, and I don't when I don't. And generally, when I do paint, I tend to make like multiple paintings in a sitting. There's something about making art that needs to be inherent to me, not routine. It's not a this versus that kind of thing, it's just a who I am as a person kind of thing.

So, the thing I like about watercolors isn't so much painting "things" as it is playing with color and being pleasantly surprised. Watercolor (not unlike certain glazing techniques in ceramics) can be a semi-random process. Now, when I get out the paint and the brushes and the water and the salt and sit down, I usually sort of have an idea of what I was maybe thinking about doing, but then it depends on the colors that are already on the palette and then, well, I just sit there and paint and add more color or change colors or get into a mood or a movement and just go with it until there's no more paper or spots on the floor to put paintings to dry...

And it kind of happens like that last sentence - it just goes on until it stops.

I have a good gauge of color, and a reasonable idea of how the colors I have combined are going to look together, and yet, with my watercolor paintings there is always an element of surprise. And that's kind of the kismet of the thing: making something and being certain in knowing that the outcome isn't exact and yet it will probably be fantastically interesting.

With every batch of paintings I do, I always have favorites, this is one of them:

raspberry misty morning rain

Now, for the person who asked on the comments of my last entry:

"...wonder if you would tell me what you use salt for and what it does?"

When you apply salt to wet watercolor pigment it creates the 'fractal' effect you can see in the bottom half of that painting. See this detail. Basically, the salt crystals play with the pigment and the water and leave little 'star' patterns. For a matter of amusement, you may also notice that rock salt when dried on a sidewalk will also leave a similar pattern.

Now, if you look this up on watercolor painting tutorials it will tell you about creating stars or snowflakes or lichen or something. Let's just say I have a heavy hand with the salt and a heavy hand with the pigment — because I scrape my salt off with an old gift card, and always either wear sunglasses or avert my eyes when I do it. Safety first; that and my eyes are important.

There's a semi-amusing thing about this series of paintings (at least, to me there is) because when I had started painting I had the fleeting thought that I wasn't going to end up going full bore with the salt and that I was going to try to do something more oriented with droplets of pigment.... that didn't happen. I mean, the next painting I did was mostly based in white pigment, but by the time I had finished the rest of the paintings the next morning - everything was salted. This is probably why I don't "plan" things.

I suppose not planning in some respects can be construed as lowering the bar; so as to not have to suffer the indignity of not meeting expectations... but, I mean, as conceited as maybe this sounds, when I sit down to make something I do always expect it to be damned awesome. You know, it's not like I'm thinking "oh, this is going to suck." But really, when I sit down to do watercolors, I did kind of already know what I was going to do, I just like to let things take their course. As it turns out, I made 15 paintings that got progressively more salty as I went along. And I'm pretty happy with how all of them turned out.

Slowly, but surely, my new paintings will pop up here... (except for a couple of my favorites, which I just can't part with)

weekend watercolors

I came home from work this weekend, and maybe in my mind I had constructed elaborate plans (well, I "planned" to work on a project). But then, I started vacuuming instead. I even went so far as to clean the bathroom. So, apparently, there was a part of my brain that decided against working on the project — because the project was certainly not house work...

So, I watched some tv and did some painting instead - watercolors. Now, I have this project floating around in my imagination that involves combing watercolors with prints, and I have a mental fascination with a certain technique with gouache... but neither of those were on the itinerary. Nope, this was straight up salt on watercolor.

I had watercolor sets when I was a kid - the kind with the little circles filled with paint in a neat little container. But I remember using markers more. To fulfill some sort of "painting" requirement for my BFA - I took "Aqueous Media" (2 semesters, no less). So, somewhere in my portfolio there are watercolors of pumpkins and nude people (although, oddly, no pumpkins with nude people, heh). And while I could do minimal color combinations just fine (only orange & blue, or purple & yellow, or red & green) well, I don't see the world in terms of "complimentary colors" and I never have. I see the idea of complimentary colors as being arbitrary. So, yeah, it was an exercise in aqueous media (which, btw, could have just been called "watercolors", it wasn't exactly like we did anything with gouache).

What I do distinctly remember was being told that we should avoid using the color black. when rendering shadows, and to just kind of avoid using black in general. I also remember thinking that "don't use black" thing was both stupid and absurd. I took "Aqueous Media" to fulfill a painting requirement in college, specifically because I didn't want to take "Painting" which, if I recall correctly, was mostly oil painting, which is something that has never held any charm for me. I really do think that portraiture in museums, particularly anything meant to be realistically representational is duller than absolute boredom. I didn't take Aqueous Media because I wanted to learn how to make watercolor paintings that looked like I had mastered "watercolor techniques" — I took it to avoid taking another class & to fulfill a requirement. Plus, watercolor paint & supplies were cheaper than oil painting supplies...

I've been drawing since I was 2 (or so says my Mother). Art is something that came inherently (unlike playing the piano or poker). So, my approach has always been to do it like a savant, not to grab a book and read a tutorial. Although I went to college where my actual skills were refined (which doesn't mean that I refused to learn anything or anything new there) - I didn't take Aqueous Media to learn how to make watercolors that are supposed to look like "watercolors." So, when I read things like this on wikipedia, I laugh; particularly the last paragraph.

While I did the exercises in Aqueous Media, they were just that: exercises.

Anyway, every time I pull out the watercolors and inevitably squeeze some black pigment out of the tube - I think of being told that I shouldn't and just inwardly chuckle. Rules, schmules.

So, I got out the tray (purchased on the basis of the supply list for Aqueous Media) which is always covered with dried paint. I filled up a faux tupperware bowl with some tap water (because it's not like I see the act of painting in ceremonial terms - any bowl that holds enough water will do). Got out the kleenex box full out paintbrushes which hangs around in various places. Put a fresh sheet of newsprint down on the paper cutter. Got the elaborate bowl I made in one of many semesters of ceramics which holds my salt (regular table salt mixed with sea salt mixed with used salt scraped off of previous paintings). And, of course, got out the paints, and sat down on the floor and commenced with the painting while watching the Simpsons on hulu & CSI reruns from onDemand.

The paintings sit on the floor to dry. And then I wait impatiently for paint to dry, and chuckle inwardly at the idea of waiting for paint to dry... And when they are finally dry, then I take an old gift card and scrape the salt off them (and then collect the salt debris and add it back to the bowl; the bowl sits on a shelf in front of a pile of art theory books along with a decorative resin turtle).

Watercolors - particularly the abstract nature of salt on watercolor - are always an interesting surprise, which is part of the appeal. There is a difference between the way the piece looks when the paint is still wet and how it appear when it's dry (particularly because I use a lot of color and I always use the "white" watercolor, which alters the opacity of the colors). As a general rule (and this isn't like the don't use black) - watercolors will dry darker and duller.

I suppose the paintings I make are perhaps an acquired taste or a specific taste, because, in all likelihood, I am never going to be one of those people who is compelled to make intricate photo realistic paintings with watercolor. And yet, through medium and technique, my paintings are intricate and meticulous even with all the factors of chance and happenstance. There is the combination of what is inherent and entropy.

There is no other painting medium (or pastels or colored pencils) that is going to produce this visual. In the end the painting is a painting, it is a visual thing.

You can check out some of my watercolors on my "sarahknight" shop on etsy.

yes, it's a bird feeder

It's February in Michigan. And while the weather has temporarily calmed down — you know, it was a balmy 39˚F out yesterday — the scenery is still maybe a little bleak, or maybe I'm a little short on time to go wander around and take better photos.

There is a project that I started on 10 years ago that I never finished, and I'm engrossed in it at the moment. Every couple of years I return to this project, so time will tell if this is the time I actually just do it — finish it.

In the mean time, because I am a professional procrastinator, I finally put out some bird food. Well, that and as I said: t was a balmy 39˚F outside. Sorry birds, but when it's freezing it's just too damned cold for me to feed you — fly South.

Anyway, the crop of regulars showed up. There is a lone black-capped chickadee, the house finches, the gold finches, assorted sparrows, and the juncos.

Juncos are amusing birds. I've heard that they don't eat off of feeders - but that they scrounge around on the ground under the feeder. That was exactly what I saw when a small flock of them showed up yesterday. But they're making progress, at least one of them is. If the goldfinches and house finches can do it, then the juncos can learn it too (as evidenced by the last photo).

I like stuff

Wikipedia could probably tell you all about the history of Valentines Day... and Google probably could point you in the direction. Admittedly, I'm not really a history buff. That doesn't mean that I hate facts, I'm just indifferent to some things.

Valentine's Day is about that heart shaped box of chocolates, and seeing pink and red and white and hearts everywhere. It's trying to remember expressions of love... it's not quite as much of an "invented" holiday as "Sweetest Day," but it's about consumerism nonetheless.

I'm a participating consumer; otherwise I'm indifferent to the concept of consumerism, because it's just not something I spend a lot of time thinking about. I buy groceries, I buy stuff, hell, I even like stuff. I distinctly remember my seventh grade English teacher telling us that "stuff" is a dead word. But well, *eyeroll,* that hasn't ever stopped me from using it.

I like stuff. Yes, I said it: I like stuff. I mean, you know, if you've looked at any of my previous entries then you may have noticed that I happen to make stuff. So, it's not out of the question that I like stuff. Plus this is a blog, so I need to write about stuff or post some pictures or something... and it's Valentine's Day time, so I guess it's time to talk about love or stuff like it.

I'm not terribly obsessed with Valentine's Day. I buy a heart-shaped box of chocolates, I get a box of heart-shaped chocolates, and if I'm feeling frisky, then maybe I remember to make a couple of greeting cards. BTW, I like eating chocolate.

So, this is a post about stuff I like. Particularly some stuff that I like that happens to be in my "office."

I enjoy knick knacks, or inappropriately appropriating objects as knick knacks. Many of my knick knacks are toys or things that are apparently supposed to be left out in your garden (where presumably the birds would do their business on them and the insects would crawl all over them). I have an infinite collection of lizards, turtles, and frogs (and the occasional bird). A few of them are legitimate knick knacks, the rest were apparently intended for the garden. The more realistic the replica animal - the better. So, these are some shots of my menagerie.

I like books by Hunter S. Thompson.
I like the music of Warren Zevon, Pink Floyd, Cat Stevens, Joni Mitchell, Everclear, John Denver, Rush, Jethro Tull, Bob Dylan...
I like listening to music I like.
I like watching tv.
I like doing nothing and imagining stories (which I believe they call day dreaming).
I like the color violet, and buying violet-colored things.
I like irises.
I like Coca Cola; regular Coke & Cherry Coke.
I like Mary Janes and striped socks.
I like those ridiculous and often gaudy patterned sheets from the seventies.
I like chocolate, particularly those Lindor bars.
I like coconut.
I like pleasantly warm weather.

I like a lot of things, as I imagine we all do, so listing them might get a little frivolous, but this was my "Valentines" theme post, so, I hope you take a moment to think about the stuff you like, and maybe remember why.

sale at sarahkdesigns

8X10 Print Sale!
2-11-2011 to 2-13-2011

All 8X10 prints (regularly $15.00) are just $10.00 each this weekend only!

All orders placed during the sale will be shipped on Monday 2-14-2011.
come to SARAHKDESIGNS to view the inventory

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Yes, I'm having a sale. It's been one of those weeks. I blame the weather. It's been miserably cold here. So basically, every day was: get up just in time to eat dinner, eat dinner, feed the fish, get dressed, drive to work, work 8 hours, drive home, feed the fish, somehow spend 4 hours in front of the computer whilst 'watching' CSI reruns, feed the fish (they're well fed), get to bed an hour late in spite of not really doing anything... and get up to do it all over again... Lather, rinse, repeat.

Yes, it was one of those weeks.
This is my fish Ozzy essentially expressing the word "Meh." He's ready for the warm weather to commence as well...

Hopefully you had a busy (and yet well rested) & accomplishment-filled week.

snow pictorial

So, yeah, it snowed... again.

I tried to have a sense of humor about it, I suppose. But really, now I hate snow. I've had enough. I don't want to spend any more time shoveling the driveway or that part in front of the mail box... or an extra half an hour driving to work, and another extra half an hour driving home. I really just want it to stop.

In the mean time, I suppose, I have hot chocolate and animal crackers. But really, I'm just ready for spring. (as recent additions to my "sarahknight" etsy shop can attest)

••∞•∞•∞••

Oh, but on a non-snow related note: I now have a Tumblr
You can find me at: http://sunshinesight.tumblr.com/

I'm still a technophobe, so honestly, I'm not quite sure what exactly the point of tumblr is. It seems like a middle point between twitter and a blog. Still, don't expect to find any nude photos there or anything.

••∞•∞•∞••

On an optimistic note:

• new episode of "Supernatural" this week (a + that it wasn't pre-empted)
• FX reruns "Archer" at 11pm on Saturdays - so I can actually watch it
• my socks are all folded (so now I don't have to pick through the pile to find 2 that match)
• Brett Dennen has a catchy new song which I keep getting stuck in my head.
• Found Zachary mellowcreme "valentine mix" when I was browsing the Holiday candy aisle - yum

Picture Story: violet night

It occurred to me when I was scanning my 11X14 acrylic paintings that I was inevitably going to be making new scans of paintings that I have used as backgrounds for my illustrations. Yes, that's part of the magic of photoshop — the painting I used as the background of an illustration is actually completely separate from the illustration. Mostly because while I render the vast majority of the 'parts' of my illustrations by hand - ultimately they are digital collages and assembled on the computer.

So, it took me a ponderous moment of searching, but I found the "violet night" background.

It is via the magic of photoshop that this painting became part of the background of this illustration:

"violet night"

"violet night" was created mostly out of the parts of other illustrations. It's just one of those compositions I assembled for the fun of it.

The irises are something I created for "purple martins & purple irises" which is an image I originally made for one of my calendars (it was for June, since that's when my irises bloom). Anyhow, the irises were originally a pen & ink drawing, which I 'filled' in photoshop — the petals were created from parts of a scan of a salt on watercolor painting and the leaves were created from a scan of an acrylic painting.

The luna moths came from a graphite pencil drawing that I had done as a teenager for the county fair. I scanned them into the computer, colorized them, printed that file, and then colored over it with prismacolors, and scanned that back into the computer. The luna moths are kind of the only part I formatted specifically for this illustration, even though they originated with another composition.

The starry sky came from the background I made for "deer in the winter woods." This illustration was the January picture for one of my calendars. I'm pretty sure the star is a vector graphic, which I spent many hours rotating and layering in a file. For violet night - I used the graphic as a layer over the scan of the painting, and then literally faded out half the graphic with the eraser tool.

Obviously, I color adjusted the scan of the painting that I inevitably used as a background, because, well, I wanted it to be a cooler and bluer shade of violet.

I admit, there are some illustrations that I like just a little bit more, and "violet night" is one of them. Probably mostly because that's my favorite shade of violet — that sort of milky bluish violet color.

pining for spring

I'm ready for spring. The only kind of "snow" I want to see is flowering tree petals on the ground.

I did a bit of work a couple weeks ago on some "spring" photos and got a number of them up on Artfire. You can find the images here. Of course, right now when I look out my window - the Bradford pear tree is covered with snow...

How about an early spring this year? I'm tired of winter...

cold days are best spent indoors

The world's blandest chili
Ingredients:

• 1 16oz can dark red kidney beans
• 1 16oz can mild chili beans
• 1 26oz can tomato soap
• 1 tbsp chili powder
• 1/2 tbsp Hungarian paprika
• 1/2 tsp red pepper
• 1/4 tsp allspice
• 1 lb ground chuck
• 1 8oz package shredded mild cheddar cheese
• 1/2 soup can of water
  

Brown ground chuck, drain grease. Add beans, add soup, add water. Stir. Add spices. Stir. Add generous handful of cheese. Stir until it melts. Serve garnished with cheese.

I'm sure this is full of calories and "bad" for me. But it's cold, and well, it's dinner. Plus, it's delicious, especially on a cold day in January.

I am the daughter of a craft project hoarder. My mother has hundreds of unfinished craft projects... and while I don't have hundreds, I do have a few. I did a bunch of paintings a few years ago for a project and just never got around to phase 2 of the project. So, they have been sitting in a pile in a cabinet in my office. They were sitting in a pile on a shelf in my office, but I "reorganized," so, yeah, they ended up in the cabinet... Not the greatest place to keep paintings.

So, I pulled them out, separated them from themselves... spent a morning with brushes and a bottle of alcohol and the exacto knife with the curved blade cleaning 'transfer' off their fronts (they're painted on illustration board; the backs are gessoed, the weight of the pile stuck blips of gesso onto the surface of the next painting...). I spent a morning scanning them (see last entry)... And yesterday I varnished them and signed them. Well, okay, there are still like 5 paintings I haven't scanned yet, but I got most of them.

So, now the place has that faint odor of varnish... I suppose I'll choose to think of that as the scent of accomplishment. It definitely feels more purposeful than shoveling the road out in front of the house - yes, it snowed again.

I'm ready for spring, how about you?

this post is "not exciting"

I do a lot of things that I could only describe as "not exciting." And I spent the weekend doing "not exciting" things. While painting is fun, there is something ironically rewarding about the part right after the painting where I'm sitting there in my living room waiting for paint to dry while chuckling at the idea of waiting for paint to dry and trying not to act impatient about it... it's downright existential.

It'd be one thing if I was going to keep them all for myself, because, well, then I could just leave them be until I got around to framing them... but that's not how it works when you want to sell the things that you've made to other people.

So, I spent the weekend doing the "not exciting" task of burning files off my desktop onto cds in order to make more room on my desktop to scan my paintings... which in the circle of life will eventually need to be burned to disc so I can make more room for new things on the desktop. It's really quite "not exciting." But it is time consuming.

Yesterday I scanned, edited, and saved 13 watercolors (not unlike the detail pictured below), and this morning I scanned in 20 acrylic paintings. The thing about both of these endeavors is that the paintings are larger than the scanner bed so they have to be scanned in two parts and then I have to align those parts and mesh them together...

Are you bored to tears yet? ; )

(this is a little snippet from "astral indigo")

Yeah, it's not exciting (the post-painting process stuff), believe me. It's time consuming, but definitely not exciting.

Anyway, I have a project percolating in the back of my mind... something about doing watercolor painting over a print. I sat down this morning and sketched up a prototype for the "print" portion of this endeavor while finally watching the Johnny Depp version of "Alice in Wonderland." I like Johnny Depp. I can't say I'm an uber-Depp fan or anything, because I've never seen any of those Pirate movies (nor have I ever been able to convince or force myself to watch "What's eating Gilbert Grape") - but I do generally enjoy anything Johnny Depp or Tim Burton. So, yes, I know, I'm way late to the party when it comes to finally watching Alice on dvd (which I think has been hanging around the living room since at least September)... but somehow, this weekend was just right for it. Besides, my other movie choice involved homicidal clowns... apparently I was just not down with the idea of killer clowns this weekend.

Time will tell if I get on this current project - and finish it. Ironically, the acrylic paintings I scanned in this weekend were painted 4 years ago. I made them for a project that I just never quite got around to finishing... and now, I suppose, it's time to let them go. Eventually, they will appear in my "sarahknight" shop on etsy... that is, of course, after I type up the listings, calculate the shipping, and format graphics for the listings.

Yes, the painting part happens so fast... it's the post-painting activities that draw this out.

In the mean time, I look forward to season 2 of "Archer" this week. It's apparently my new favorite show. I caught a little marathon of it on FX a while back and I was smitten. Plus, new episodes of "Supernatural" return this week. And "Fringe" is back from the abyss of mid-season reruns and whatever happens to tv shows when they disappear in the middle of the holidays. Yes, I have the tv likes of a geeky college student, I know. I'm just not ready to start watching "Nova" yet...

I hope you have something keeping you busy during these dreadfully cold January days.

couch potato

The head cold officially ate my week. I bought the sinus tabs, I bought the cold medicine, I drank orange juice like there was an orange juice fountain in my kitchen and I was very thirsty, I ate soup, I slept... and I still sort of have the cold. I did watch a lot of CSI reruns though, somewhere, somehow that must count as an accomplishment.

Yes, that really is my couch. I believe, technically, it's a Klobo. However, I upholstered it. Yes, I picked out that fabric. And I measured and cut out all the pieces, and I sewed the vast majority of it by hand on a muggy June evening while watching "Carolina Moon" and some other Nora Roberts movie from Lifetime on onDemand. I recall it distinctly. Mostly because the couch sat in pieces in my living room for about a month before I suddenly upholstered it that evening... oh, projects.

I'd like to thank LarimarLounge, I am totally honored that my "nest" photo was included in their collection, which then awesomely made the Artfire homepage! Very cool.

You can check out my Artfire shop here.
Hopefully, the cold passes soon... and I can get back to more productive activities than watching tv.

hibernation

I was never a child who liked to take naps. When I was too young for school and was at home with my Mother, she used to try to sneak in a daily nap. Translation, as a 3 year old I was like "Sleep during the day? What, you mean peak playing hours? What about my dolls?" So, basically, as I recall these events I would lay down and wait for the sound of my mother's door closing, and then I would get up and play 'quietly.' This sleeping in the middle of the day thing never made sense to me... it still doesn't.

And yet, it's January. January isn't so much a time for napping as it is a time for 'hibernating.' I don't mean I go into my bedroom and sleep for a month, I just mean January is the month when I'm just tired.

It snows here in Michigan. And what that actually means is that it takes me an additional 20 to 30 minutes to drive to and from work, plus 5 minutes of scraping my car, plus me driving in my car with frozen fingers waiting for the 2 mile point when the heat might finally come up. In other words, a 35 minute drive just turned into an hour... cold weather = giant time suck.

I hate being cold. It just makes me cranky and tired (not unlike napping — which never made me feel refreshed, it just made me cranky; my brain chemicals don't like to be tricked with the prospect of sleep (8 hours) only to be pranked into wakefulness after an hour). Napping never worked for me, and I just find cold weather to be unbelievably irritable.

Anyway, one morning last week while I was watching CSI reruns on Spike tv, I did manage to crank out 15 new paintings. Which, of course, meant that I spent a day waiting for them to dry, spent a good hour 'naming' them, and then spent a morning & a half scanning them into the computer and saving them in 3 file formats after color correcting the scans. And then I varnished the paintings (another morning). And then I gessoed the backs to counteract warping (another morning). And then I printed out info sheets (artist, title, media, date) for the back. And then I remembered to stop at Walmart on my way home from work because I couldn't find a freaking glue stick, and then last night I glued the backs on all the paintings...

Considering how relatively quickly I can paint them, the process-y stuff after the painting part is enormously time consuming. Anyway, painting — or moreover: playing with color — makes me happy. So, I suppose that's my counter-January measure: colorful paintings.

I like color — as can be evidenced from the photo I took for the entry. My bedroom is actually lemon yellow, and those are, in fact, my sheets (300 thread count, from Target). I actually have 2 of my larger paintings hanging on the wall, one it very magenta-y and the other is peachy toned. Most of the 15 paintings I made last week were orange (except for the 2 blue ones). Apparently I was in an 'orange' mood, whatever that means.
Anyway, "astral orange sunshine" is one of the new ones, you can see it here.

Ironically, I seem to have contracted a cold: sore throat, cough, runny nose, weepy left eye... So, this morning I'll be going to the drugstore to acquire some more kleenex and stand in the pharmacy aisle for 20 minutes reading cough syrup boxes... and then buying some orange juice.

So, go have a big tall glass of vitamin C for me & take a nice long nap, maybe 8 hours?
; )

Christmas cookies... part 3

Welcome to Part 3 of what I have otherwise come to characterize as the 5 hour cookie making extravaganza.
In the event that you missed out on Part 2 you can find it here.

So, yes, finally, these are the 135 cookies frosted in 16 different colors...

Yeah, that was a lot of cookies. But I only do it once a year. So, now I have 11 months until it's time to do it again :D

Christmas cookies... part 2

Welcome to Part 2 of what I have otherwise come to characterize as the 5 hour cookie making extravaganza.
In the event that you had something to do yesterday (being that it was a holiday and all or something) and missed out on Part 1 you can find it here.

So, I suppose I should have posed this in the form of a question — as no one guessed how many cookies the sour cream cookie recipe yielded this year (except for my Mother when I asked her on the phone, she was off by 3) — but the recipe suggests that it makes about 10 dozen cookies. That's a lot of cookies. Generally, every year I count the cookies based on groupings of frosting color, and then add up those totals. Yes, Virginia, there is a Christmas cookie inventory.

This year (although my graphic only shows 12) I used 16 different colors of frosting. And the grand total was 135 cookies. Yes, one hundred and thirty-five cookies. In the approximate 2 hours it took me to listen to Van Halen's 5150 (three times) while cutting and baking them, I figured that maybe I'd make about 90 cookies... yeah, 135. It was a slight under-estimate on my part. You know, I was only off by a third... ; )

Every year I buy a sizable quantity of "nonpareil sprinkles." And every year I wonder why they're called "nonpareil" sprinkles... and usually don't bother to google it. Apparently, they're peerless — Ha! Yes, I know, one of the definitions is actually that nonpareil means sprinkles... Anyway, each of the 135 cookies is decorated with these little multicolor sugar balls.

So, when I was a kid, my mother used to make the frosting. And just like when my mother made the dough — she acted like this was the most difficult thing on earth. If only she had possessed a microwave and a pastry creamer — making these cookies would have taken much less effort... of course, she was still weirdly anal about making the dough thin, like as if she had amnesia about rolling out the previous year's cookie dough or something... let's just say, with Mom, all of these steps seemed to take an unnecessary amount of time. I suppose we're lucky she didn't get out a ruler and attempt to measure whether or not the dough had been rolled out to 1/8 inch thickness...

I bought vanilla frosting in a plastic jar and added powdered sugar and milk to it. It was much less difficult than adding milk to an entire bag of powdered sugar... and no one who ate my cookies complained about the frosting. Oh, modern convenience.

So, armed with 2 multi-packs of food coloring (one regular, one neon), my giant bowl of frosting, a soup bowl, the "happy-go-lucky" knife (it's a butter knife), my container of sprinkles, and an old foil pie pan (to catch the excess sprinkles), I began the 2 hour long cookie decorating ritual.

Each cookie would be frosted and sprinkled. I suppose, if I hadn't kept pausing to document the process with photos, this might have gone quicker...

Anyway, I caught up on the season 3 2-part finale of "Leverage" while I was performing the 2 hour long cookie decorating ritual. Apparently, I almost missed the last 4 episodes of season 3 of Leverage due to the fact that I was watching Dexter on Sunday nights and totally forgot when the season would start back up when it went on hiatus in September or August... I really wish they wouldn't do that with shows — because I totally forget when they're going to start back up... but it did prevent me from listening to "5150" for a fourth and fifth time... Otherwise, every time I ate a cookie I may have had to have broken into a rendition of "Summer Nights." :D

Anyway, Damien Moreau was foiled, and I frosted 135 cookies in 16 different colors (there are 2 shades of blue & 2 shades of purple missing from that image) and then photographed them from all manner of angles, and then left them out for the requisite 1-2 hours on the kitchen table so that the frosting would dry. It's very important for the frosting to dry. Otherwise, when the cookies are stacked in the container — they will form one giant messy inseparable cookie clump, and the 5 hours it took to make them from start to finish will seem like kind of a waste...

The next installment will actually contain photos of the 135 frosted & decorated cookies : )

Christmas cookies... part 1

Okay, while still working a 40 hour week I took a 'vacation.' Which basically means that for a week I came home from work and just vegged in front of the television with my sketchbook and took some quality time with some CSI reruns to try to figure out what projects I want to attempt in the next year...

Anyway, I've taken my week to recharge and relax, so now it's time to get back to the routine. Christmas may be over, but aside from cleaning, the last project I completed was the annual creation of the batch of Christmas cookies.

It actually only took me 5 hours to make them this year. Heh, heh. So, even though Christmas has passed, and I literally ate the last cookie yesterday morning: on with the Christmas cookies!

They're actually sour cream cookies. The recipe apparently came from my grandma, but you can find it online here. I'm not sure where that thing about the raisins comes from (it's not in Grandma's recipe, but anyway)...

The recipe is supposed to make about 10 dozen cookies.

The first hour of my 5 hour cookie making extravaganza was spent making the dough. I decided to microwave the shortening for about 30 seconds this year to soften it up. It definitely made the "creaming" process easier. I didn't even have to break out the pastry creamer. As usual, I skipped the part about sticking the batter in the fridge (my time is limited).

Every year I crank up the tunes while cutting and baking the cookies. Usually I manage to listen to some Warren Zevon and "American Pie" (the album) by Don McLean. When I was a kid we used to listen to that record when we were "helping" our Mother decorate the Christmas tree. Time has colored history, and I doubt she remembers this, but American Pie was a welcome retreat from her terrible Christmas records. Every time I hear the Little Drummer Boy — I groan. I am not a fan of Christmas songs outside of John Lennon and Emerson, Lake, and Palmer. Eartha Kit's rendition of "Santa Baby" makes me want to find every copy of that song and obliterate them from earth...

Anyway, this year, since I'm pretty sure "American Pie" is out in the car — the cookies were cut & baked to the dulcet tones of Sammy Hagar's incarnation of Van Halen, more specifically "5150." Yes, I know, Van Hagar just brightens the holidays :D Besides, the CD was sitting beside the CD player, and the only other viable option was "Dark Side of the Moon" — which is not really Christmas music.

Anyway, check back for the next installment when I reveal how many cookies this recipe yielded this year :D

Are you ready for Christmas?

In the event that this is my only blog entry before Christmas:

Have a Merry Christmas!
&
Happy Holidays for all you non-denominational folks!

I have to work every day this week, so as per the usual, all non-working / non-sleeping hours will be spent finishing whatever it is I was making for Christmas... and by the time Christmas finally arrives, I will be exhausted. At least I only have 2 graphics to finish for the traditional family calendar, the one shown in this blog entry is one of them. I'm currently waffling on whether or not there should be ornaments or lights on the tree or something... Surely, I will change my mind 5 or 6 times in the next 6 days.

I also apparently have a field of poppies to draw, which is what's holding up the other graphic, since I have all the other parts for that one complete.

Tomorrow morning I think I'm going to come home and make the traditional ridiculously large quantity of christmas cookies, so at least there'll be something to snack on while I'm wishing I had a clone who really really likes to work 10 consecutive days in a row all the way up to Christmas. That, of course, would be in addition to my other clone who also really really likes to tidy up :D Oh, imaginary clones...

These are some shots from last year's cookies.

The recipe makes at least 80 cookies. Excessive? Perhaps. But it's a tradition. Plus I usually end up frosting them in about 12 different colors (and sometimes more than 12). Yes, I am one of those people that owns not only the 4 basic colors of food dye, but also the neon pack. I just keep adding a little more color & a little more white frosting to my bowl until it's time to move onto the next color... it satisfies my inner artist, I suppose.

Anyway, have a Merry Christmas! And you only have 7 days, so get cracking and get your stuff done!