oh. my. flippin. stars.

I am so annoyed right now! This is my third time trying to write this post today. Each time, I get halfway through and it gets lost. Plus I spent an hour correcting some photos in picasa, and now all the edits are lost. And my whole picasa database is somehow, suddenly, all jacked up. Oh and my Outlook isn't working either. I am running a bunch of  things to try and clear it all up, but that doesn't give me back the hours I lost today dealing with it all! Damn technical difficulties!

ok.

deep breath....

one more.....

ok.

I have been wanting to post tons of pictures so the freaky head vase will no longer be on my front page!  

I was flipping through some of my sketchbooks from the last couple of years and took some photos to show you. They aren't anything particularly special, just pages I like for whatever reason.

I love the  colors in this one above. The dots are stamped with a pencil eraser.

Some doodles:

The lettering says, "geeks, dorks, and other dreamboats." 

And I don't have any memory of what this is about, but it made me chuckle when I saw it:

Tee hee.

Sometimes I feel lumpy.  I am working out again, so that helps.

Some more  doodles:

I was working with a customer at my day job the other day and this guy would not smile. I was killing him with kindness and he would just not crack a smile! It was driving me crazy!
He saw some post-it notes I had stuck to his paperwork, and of course there were doodles. He still wouldn't break from his intense stare, but he did say, "I like your doo-dads." I had never heard doodles referred to as doo-dads. Have you?

Some  illustrate-y doodle-y paint-y experiments from last winter:

mmmm, cake.

And now some odd faces that I love:

I know.
I do some weird stuff.
Oh well.
I like it.

Here's one of my honey:

He is really cute.

Listening to the Juno Soundtrack and Yael Naim.

Oh, hey.
I went to the fabric store today and am putting together some little bits for a giveaway for you. Not sure if you're into that kind of thing.

Thank you for all of your  thoughtful responses to yesterday's post.
You guys are so awesome.  

This is the cover of one of my journals from 2000.

Fitting for what I've been talking about.
Being vulnerable  and forthcoming can feel scary!
But  in a good way.  

I am touched by the honesty you reflected back to me, the common feelings that we share.
Thank you for not just being like, "Shut up, show us something pretty! Where are the rotten tomatoes so we can chuck them at her!" Or with this crowd, would it be tomato pincushions?
(Have you ever had the misfortune of having to handle a rotten tomato? Oh my God, yuck. But I digress.)

And another journal cover from 2000.
Open Carefully. 

I am a collector of all sorts of wacky stuff, one of those things being the 'opening instructions' on product packaging. I can't exactly say why, but I always find it so cute and poignant. I imagine them as instructions for people on how to open up, and it just takes on this tenderness.

The one above is from microwave popcorn.

Here's another.

The small one on top reads : Tear along perforation. Use thumb notch to snap out contents.

Do not open with sharp object.

Somewhere I have a plastic ziploc bag with tons of different ones. Someday I should start cataloguing my collections. I told you I was odd.

Thank you for reassuring me that this is a safe place to open my heart.

(do not open with sharp object) 

xo, m 

 I don't want you to get bored with all my past fabric designs, so tonight  I thought I'd show you some drawings instead.

This one is from one of my visual journals. Maybe from 5 years ago, or so.  A self portrait. 

I had hair then.

It never ever looked as cute as it does in this drawing, which is why I keep my hair at an eighth to a quarter of an inch long.

Yes, really.

Yes, I do it myself.

I usually keep my antennas tucked in.

Here  are a couple of drawings from last winter. I was experimenting with new styles.

Gouache and ink on Bristol paper. 

I love that purple lady.  I love her dress and her hair.

I'd like to wear a dress like that.

Wow! One hundred posts!

That many?
And,
That's all?
Funny how it seems like so many and so few at the same time. 

I have finally met the milestone of Ye Olde 1ooth Poste Giveaway!

I am going to put the important parts in bold, for the skimmers.

I was just up in my workroom trying to figure out what I could put together for you. I was overwhelmed! I have so much stuff- I didn't know where to begin. I know I want to give you supplies rather than something I have made. Half of the fun of all of this is getting to see what you will make! I was going through my fabric, paper and jewelry supplies and just sat literally sat and stared for a while. I just can't make up my mind!
So, how about this: you decide!

You all know how this works, right? Go ahead and leave me a comment on this post and I will randomly choose one person to receive a yummy bundle of goodness.

*In your comment, please specify whether you would like a sampling from my sewing stash, paper piles or jewelry junk!

*Also, would it be too much to ask for you to leave me a little tidbit about why you visit yummygoods?

*Or let me know something you would like to see more of. Pretty please?

*I encourage you to  to leave your link so we can all get to know each other!

(The cutoff for the giveaway  will be Sunday, December 30th  at midnight.)

I have to admit that doing this giveaway makes me feel a bit awkward,  like I am inviting a bunch of people to a party, not sure if anyone is going to show up!

I know I promised you a little background on what I've been hinting at all these months, but that will be happening in the next few days.
I wanted to get the 100th post hoopla taken care of, ( as if there will be hoopla! ha!) then I can really relax and look back at the year and tell you all about it.
Ok?
The big reveal is imminent, please bear with me!

I don't usually use bold (I am usually much more of an italics kind of girl)  but it's kind of fun.  I won't make it a habit though, it could probably get pretty annoying, drawing attention to all these words just to make you pronounce them in your head with more emphasis. Oh dear. Must cease.

****And now, please enjoy some randomness in the color blue****

Journal page from 2000 .Blocks stamped with an eraser, acrylic paint:

Journal page. Some funny little papercutting I do from time to time:

Journal page. Pen drawing with watercolor background:

Listening to:
Ingrid Michaelson
Amy Winehouse
April Barrows 

Nighty night.

Stack of journals from Fall/Winter 2000/2001. And Mercury. Murky-Murk.

I usually try to keep it pretty around here. I have been thinking lately about some of the blogs I love that  are pure beauty.  Inspiration and creativity and beauty and cheerfulness. And I love them for that. And I think I would probably love them even more if I saw a glimpse of the inevitable bad day, overwhelm, or self-doubt that we all feel!  It's not just me that feels that way sometimes, right? 

These pages are from my journals in 2000/2001. I was going through a very rough period! Sometimes I still feel these things, but in generally i feel much better these days.

I had long hair then. And a question mark for a face.

I love the little motion lines.

Eeeek! I feel shy showing you these.

>>>sigh<<<

I have been thinking a lot lately about blogging and Keeping It Real vs. Keeping It Pretty. 

And I don't think it needs to be one or the other.

It gets confusing when I think about what I want this blog to be. Is it a way to connect with other people? Is it another vehicle for self-expression? Is it a marketing tool? The answer is yes! It's all of those.

It's the marketing part that gets me, I think. I censor myself  when I think about potential business contacts or the other blogs that seem to only show the beauty. I think I have been subconsciously trying to fit the mold of the enchanted magazine-spread-ready blogs. 

I certainly aspire to have that life , but right now- it's just not that way. I have to keep reminding myself that it probably isn't really that way for them, either!  I had received some really good news a few months ago (which, I promise, I will be sharing soon) and I was kind of in disbelief that I could really have any of the success that I am working for. I was talking with my best friend about it, how it didn't feel like it could be true, how it couldn't really be happening for me. Playing devil's advocate,  she said "why not you?" Allowing myself to just express whatever came up, I rambled, "because, you know, I'm dog fur and crooked teeth and cat litter and I have this stupid cowlick and I didn't go to college and I'm messy..." and on and on! And she leans toward me and goes, "But that's everyone. You know that right? You do know that, right?" See why I love her so much?

If I were to succeed at making this blog only beautiful and cheery, it would simply be an illusion (and I wouldn't be able to keep it up, anyways). Of course I  want it to  be inspiring and certainly yummy to look at. But maybe the hard times can be inspiring, too. The challenges in my life have shaped me, have made art a necessity, have made me seek out the beauty. To discount that would leave the story only half-told.

So, friends. Here I am! Sometimes I am peaceful and sometimes I am crabby. Sometimes I am funny and sometimes I am utterly joyless. Sometimes I feel like I can have a successful design career and sometimes I feel like a total hack. Sometimes I look cute and other times my dark circles make me look like I have a black eye. Sometimes I feel confident and sometimes I feel like an awkward 13 year old!

Don't worry, I am not going to start documenting every nuance of my vacillating moods. I already bore myself half to death with that, I don't want to subject you to it! I just wanted to broach the topic so I can settle into this blog thing more.

So while I am sitting here in my jammies feeling vulnerable for bringing this up, I am  going to try to take my own advice and:

Thanks for listening.

xo, melissa 

I have tons  of rubber stamps. The ones I use all the time are my alphabet sets. I have a bunch.

This particular set  was a secondhand find, can you believe it?

Love those woodblock stamps.  Those I bought new.

I haven't carved any stamps in a while. I used to do that a lot in the nineties. It sounds so funny to say that, in the nineties! Back in the day, I  was approached by a rubber stamp company that wanted to use my designs in commercial stamps. Well of course I let them! I'll have to take a picture of those. Unfortunately, Eglentyne Rubber is no more.

Carving stamps sounds much cooler if you refer to it is miniature printmaking.

Which, of course, it is.

This is an old journal page from ... maybe 2000? 20001?

The image in the center is one of my little carvings printed on a blank piece of cardstock.  I was visiting Madelyn and we had lunch with her friend Sandy. Now, Sandy is just charming and beautiful and creative like crazy. The kind of girl who you just want to take in everything she is wearing, remember everything she mentions. You just know this girl is special. So as I was taking her all in, I noticed she was wearing this great ring , turns out it has a rubber stamp top! Those little circles all around the border of my page? I stamped them from Sandy's ring! I'll have to see if I can find out where she got it.

I think I just heard a Weepies song on a J.C. Penny commercial. My best friend calls it  Penney's. She says it's an upstate New York thing to call it that. Those loganberry-drinking upstaters.

journal- home, originally uploaded by yummygoods.

are my roots showing?

journal- 100%, originally uploaded by yummygoods.

" You miss 100% of the shots you don't take." by Wayne Gretzky.

I took a shot recently, and I am so glad I did. You'll be hearing the news pretty soon. I promise.

gramma jo, originally uploaded by yummygoods.

On the left is my dad sitting with his mother and father. I'm on the right in my ten dollar Salvation Army prom dress. The lace in the previous posts was made by father's father's mother. That doesn't sound right at all but it's the fourth way I've tried to write it- so I'm calling it a day.

peeking, originally uploaded by yummygoods.

i thought i would start showing you some pages from my visual journals.

It suprises me that I am a little shy about showing pictures of myself.
I like this one. It is a tiny sticker from a photobooth.

I love love love photobooths.

patient strong calm, originally uploaded by yummygoods.

I'm 33 today!
this journal page was from 2000. still fits!