Browsing Category

Rambling

Posted on April 20, 2013

The Little Mermaid Obsession

Rambling/ www

ariel-flower-lamp

Anyone who knows me personally knows about my “Ariel obsession”. It started before I was even a teenager and I was “moving out” of sharing a room with my little brother and getting my own room. Even then I was pretty crafty and creative. People see while walls – I SEE BIG CANVASES for decorating 🙂 So I thought and about it and I wanted to make my room a THEME. I had some of my old toys left, including an Ariel doll and a case. I decided to make my room into an “under the ocean” / “Little Mermaid” theme. I was 12 then, and I still have those toys to this day!

That’s how it all started… and it never ended. The Little Mermaid Obsession. I went through high school and everyone knew it. Even my teachers. I knew people laughed behind my back, but I didn’t care. It was me – my character. I wasn’t obsessing over N*SYNC or Dawson’s Creek like everyone else, I was doing my own thing. When I turned 16 and I entered my high school’s art program and began learning more about painting and drawing. I decided I wanted to paint scenes from The Little Mermaid movie on my walls. The biggest problem was convincing my mom to let me. It took me a few years but I made it happen… And 10 years (almost 11) years later it still sits in my old room at my mother’s house.

ariel-freaks-room

Back then it felt like “oh this will fade, the movie came out in 1989, the 90s will take over and it will be forgotten”. Because in the beginning it was hard to find Ariel-related things. I had to check certain stores every-so-often, and most of all The Disney Store. But today that isn’t the case. It has blown up and now all these kids who weren’t even alive when those movies came out (Sleeping beauty, Cinderella, The Little Mermaid, etc) are loving them as if they came out last week. I think it’s awesome.

Originally I was going to make a photo-blog of my “Ariel stuff” and in a way I have. I started an instagram, which also updates the tumblr I created: arielfreak.com. It’s pretty simple, because I can update it with my phone. 🙂 You can also follow my account @arielfreaks on instagram. If you are a big fan yourself please send me any photos of “Ariel stuff” you have or mind come across. I’m always interested to see what others have!

Posted on March 17, 2013

The laundry bag saga

Home/ Rambling

Ahh apartment living. Something you learn as you go. We moved into our apartment 3 years ago, since then I’ve had to get used to sharing a laundry room with my hallway neighbors. I’m one to put my laundry in and quickly take it out because I don’t want ANYONE and I mean -anyone- touching my stuff. I could cringe at the thought of someone putting my wet clean clothes on top of the laundry machines. The thing that took me the longest was sorting my clothes between two dryers – ‘high’ and ‘low’. It drove me nuts, for months. I wanted to be able to sort them but I REALLY did not want to buy two hampers. That would just take up too much space.  I just wanted a bag I could carry down to the laundry room.

One day I noticed my neighbor was using this bag for his laundry – a good sturdy bag that can stand alone but it wasn’t a hamper. ANNND it had 2 compartments which read “light” and “dark”. Even though that wasn’t exactly how I sorted my laundry I knew this bag was THE ONE. I had to have it. Over the next 12+ months I search time and again for this bag. It was originally distributed by Crate and Barrel. That link is a huge tease because it shows you the product and its reviews BUT they don’t sell it anymore. I even took the time to email them to see if they had any available anywhere but they said no it was discontinued. Why they have the link still up is beyond me… but anyway.

laundry-bag-crate-barrel

After months of checking the internet, even putting alerts up on ebay I decided to craigslist it. I went to the “wanted” section under “for sale” (oh yes for those of you with dirty minds I know what you are thinking). I posted a photo of the bag and said if anyone had it collecting dust in their broom closet that I would gladly buy it from them. Within a few minutes someone emailed me letting me know they recently bought it at Home Goods!! I right away made plans to head over to the store and I even dragged Bryan along with me…

I looked up and down the aisles and nothing. I searched for a good 30 minutes. No sign of it. We were about to leave when Bryan noticed this big bag underneath a pile of stuff (this happens a lot in home goods, doesn’t it?) It ended up being exactly what I was looking for!!!! There were two left… so I bought both. In the 20 minutes between waiting online and checking out I had two people ask me about this particular laundry bag. “Oh where did you find that? How much is it?”.

OMG. Hands off house-wife! THIS IS MINE. I’m an apartment-girlfriend and I need it! =]

 

[edit] I realized afterward on the tag that the company that made this particular bag is TaylorMadisonDesigns.com.  [/edit]

Laundry Bag Sorter

Posted on December 27, 2011

Thank You Internet

Design/ Rambling

What a busy busy holiday season it has been! It’s been crazy but I am glad January is almost here and we can hibernate for a while. A few weeks ago I received a comment on this blog post – one a I had discussed a book I found at a second hand shop. The owner of the shop had told me it was part of the estate from Murray Stein but the book itself had “Lou Kashins” written on it.

It is for reasons like this that I love the internet! He found my blog because he was searching his uncle’s name. I think that is so awesome that you can discuss a thought and the next thing you know someone has the same thought, googles it, and then you are connected. I am always glad to learn the history behind the second hand items I come across. There is so much more depth to something that had a life before it got to you. Thank you Lee for finding my blog and sharing your story!

Posted on March 14, 2011

New Layout… Finally

Design/ Rambling

I had been wanting to make a new layout for a while, but I had a bad case of “creative block”… well not so much creative block more like “happy-with-what-I-made” block…. if there is such thing? I find it funny that I have no problem creating things for others but when it comes to making something for myself, and I am soo picky, and I get tired of staring at it so I start from scratch 400 times. I guess it is just good creative exercise in the end.

First I started out with this…

I wanted to show art and design in one but I felt it looked too… little kid-ish? So then I came up with this…



And I didn’t like that after a while either… so I headed over to my favorite artist’s site for some inspiration: www.misprintedtype.com aka Eduaro Recife (who I am secretly in love with)…

I used his free font named “Shortcut”:

Along with a few of his brushes as well and a vector from YSR1 I came up with this…


(also what you see above but this is without the pattern background)

Within the next week I will be adding content in the “goodies” section… so keep a look out for that!

Posted on January 6, 2011

Looking forward in 2011

Rambling

So it has been a while, but I will say I was SO occupied by the holiday season. Plus I had gone to Florida so I was out on an adventure in the Florida Keys. I was disappointed to find out there is no such thing as “Kokomo” (thanks to the beach boys I thought there was). But anyway, some new things I am hoping to achieve this year within girloncanvas.com

  • Looking to have an “artist of the week” every week. Any kind of artist- not just designers. I love especially finding local artists and bringing some attention to them. I saw some really great local art in Miami, which I may share here at some point. If you have any artist you would like to recommend or if you are an artist and would like to be featured please email me [email protected].
  • I really want to get more involved in Threadless.com. Most know it is a site to create t-shirt designs for and if they accept your design anyone can purchase a shirt with your art on it! Designing for clothing is something I could see myself doing forever. I am obsessed with graphic-tees!
  • Start a personal long-term project. I think to keep my creative juices flowing all year I am going to start a long-term design project. Lately anything I’ve created was for someone else, but I think I should also design for myself! I have some ideas of what I want to create, but I’m not going to make any promises yet 😉
  • Create more resources for others. I want to start a scan-site. I have a lot of vintage magazines that are calling me, and wanting to be scanned. I would also like to create more fun useful things others can download, whether they are a designer or not.
  • Well that is what we have to look forward to in the new year. I hope you all have a great 2011… remember there’s only one! 🙂

    Posted on November 1, 2010

    Jail Bird LiLo and Stickers

    Rambling


    I always try to be creative for Halloween, rather than just getting a store-bought costume. I had such a hard time thinking of something I really desired to be. My friend John had suggested I be LiLo in a jail outfit. After searching and searching for a costume/idea I figured John’s idea is after all funny and creative. I use my handy photoshop skills (which wasn’t much) to create a fake sign that they hold up for a mugshot, and had it around my neck. Printed it and laminated it, punched 2 holes and bam! I was jail bird Lindsay Lohan. I went to a party at this bar/restaurant nearby, I got a lot of laughs for this costume! Everyone was like “wow what I good idea”. I also put powder on my feet… do you remember when LiLo put powder on her feet? She really was an awesome actress to see on screen… it makes me sad to see her go down hill SERIOUSLY. It bothers me when people with talent deep down just throw it all away.. and for what? Some tabloid attention and a quick high? Lame. Well, anyway back to reality! I wanted to thank Angie for my little gifts she sent me. She was having a poetry contest over at her site and I ended up being the only one to enter. But she sent me some stickers and fun jewelry! I swear she must be psychic, not only am I a sticker freak, but I love skulls. So the hot pink bead bracelet with a skull charm was just the icing on the cake. Thank you Angie 😀 I hope she will decide to have another poetry contest again someday, because I will definitely enter it.

    Posted on September 24, 2010

    the lovely bones

    Rambling

    The Lovely Bones movie premiered in January 2010, if you haven’t seen it, its now out on DVD. Add it to your netflix queue! I suggest it, and yes it is a sad kind of movie, but the surreal images through the movie are awesome! I don’t think its been given enough credit. Definitely very creative and pleasing to look at. The website also has some AWESOME wallpapers, the one with the tree being my favorite. Even if you haven’t seen the movie, you can still rock the wallpapers! Find them at lovelybones.com.



    **If you leave a comment on my blog, get free advertising on girloncanvas.com/plug. Let me know if you’re interested 🙂

    Back to top