A home from home.

All done! I finished the last few bits and bobs down in the space and generally enjoyed it all day. Here are pictures for your perusal.

On the home stretch

It's been quite a day. We made great progress in the space today though there are still a couple of little bits and pieces to do before the clamouring hoards arrive tomorrow evening. It feels nice and cosy though.

BUT this morning I moved a ladder, forgetting that there was a hammer on top if it and it fell, pointy end down onto my head. And THEN I closed my finger in a car door and I now have a half blue nail. I'd show you photographic evidence but I'm concerned you may be eating at the moment.

One has to suffer for one's Art, doesn't one?

Name in lights

I mentioned in a post yesterday about the uber-cool writing made from fairy lights that I came across so today I had a go at doing it. It's still held in place with electrical tape and any normal person would wait until it was finished before posting pictures of it but oh no, not me. I know patience is a virtue but it's a virtue which I've always lacked.

The writing is a little wonky and I'll have to find a more attractive way of holding the lights in place but I rather like it! I'm already planning what I want to write on the walls of my living room. Here are a couple more pictures of the space as it is evolving:

Also, on a completely unrelated note, WHAT is the deal with the weather?! I got burnt sunbathing last week and today it snowed! Madness.

I mean business.

This lost and found show has finally forced me to pull my finger out and get some new business cards printed as the only ones I have are from my degree show back in 2003 complete with an old phone number. Not very professional.

So I excitedly collected these cute cards from the post office this morning which I organised online through Moo Cards. They may be a little more expensive than vista or some other companies but there are loads of design choices and you can have as many different pictures as you want.

Yay!

Stencilling

Here's yet another update on the exhibition progress. I wanted to make the space feel homely but wallpapering seemed a tall order in the time I have so I decided to stencil a design on the walls instead.

I found a free downloadable design online, printed it out, enlarged it to A3 with a photocopier, and traced it onto card. In the end I had to simplify the design in places and change it so that it would be a little sturdier. Here is the finished article:

I probably should have used slightly thicker card as the stencil was falling to pieces by the time I finished but it just about held it together for the last stencil. The end results are a little fuzzy round the edges but the overall effect will look fine I think once all my pictures are hung on top of them.

I found a perfectly lovely table outside a derelict house on my street the other day and I brought it down to the space and painted it the same colour blue as the stencil. (not pictured) I love finding abandoned furniture and this one really fits in with the 'lost and found' theme of the exhibition. There will be many, many more pictures of the table and all other parts of the show to come. Lucky you.

Exhibition progress

Things are moving along down at PS2. I arrived down there on Friday to find my name and the exhibition details on the window - famous at last!

Danny and I set about masking off the walls and painting them, clothed in fetching overalls.

On Sunday I led a paper party deco class at the Crescent Arts Centre and then loaded up lots of furniture into a hire van to bring down to the space. It's all happening!

 

A good idea!

I just came across this amazing idea on http://www.offbeathome.com/

It went straight into my 'ideas to copy' inspiration folder.

I'm thinking I might even attempt to write 'lost & found' in lights on the wall of the exhibition. watch this space. Also very cool:

Painting PS2

Here's Dan painting the project space for the Lost & Found show, and we managed to get it done in one go. Go us!

 And I have a new rug. As the dude says, it really ties the room together.

Lost & Found - the exhibition!

There's some very exciting news here at Lost & Found. I'm having an exhibition next week! It all happened very quickly. A few months back a man called Peter who runs the fantastic PS2 project space on Donegall Street in Belfast emailed me after coming across this very blog. He asked if I'd like to have a lost and found exhibition all about collecting, recycling and how we all have different ideas about the beauty and value of the objects we have around us.

Skip forward to last week when I was told that there was a spot open for my show in April - two weeks later! Luckily I work at the University so I have two weeks holidays for Easter. Isn't life wonderful. So it's all go and very busy and exciting but I wouldn't have it any other way. The next few days will be spent packing up most of the contents of my home to bring down to the space, then I'll spend a few days putting the collections all together.

I'd love people to add items to the project (you can have them back afterwards) - they might be old photographs you find in a second-hand book, a shopping list found on the street or your favourite vintage find or beach combing treasure.

There really is treasure everywhere!

There will be an opening night on Thursday 5th April which coincides with the fabulous late Night Art when all the galleries in Belfast open late and there's free wine to be had! It's always a good night, so please call by if you're free. The exhibition will be there until the 28th april. 

Click here for more information on the PS2 website.

Beach weather

Who would credit it? I'm on my lunch break from work at Jordanstown University and here I am sitting on the beach sunbathing on the 26th March!

I even went for a paddle! On the 26th March! In Ireland! It was freezing, but still.

Hope you are all enjoying some sunshine, wherever you are.

Chez moi

Inspired by my earlier room envy post, I tidied up this corner of our living/dining room. It's not quite as elegant but I like things to be homey. I'd completely forgotten I had this amazing and really long zebra painted hanging that I bought in Zambia a few years ago. So it is now the one and only 'curtain' I have in the house. Shameful. 

The beautiful silver bonbon tray was recently passed to me after my great aunt died, and the poster is a copy of the old British Railways poster for my hometown.

Our makeshift bookcase which consists of the base of an old dressing table and the wooden pigeonhole unit, both of which we pulled out of skips. They've been awaiting a revamp for a while, but until I find a bookcase, there they stay.

And I got this toy tiger today in a charity shop because I keep seeing spray-painted toy animals on the blogosphere and I want to get in on that action!

Room Envy

I don't think I'll ever be restrained enough to have a room quite as elegant as this one. But everything is precious about it, I'm especially coveting that painting and the blue velvet studded doors!

I came across this picture on the lovely website littlegreennotebook Have a gander!

small adventures

This is the harbour in Portstewart (where I'm from) taken on Saturday when Danny and I drove round the Antrim coastline a bit. It was pretty stormy to begin with but ended up quite charming. It wasn't however quite as rainbow-coloured as the above photo may suggest. (I've got some new photo toys and apps that I'm obsessively playing with these days.)

And this AMAZING house is called Bendhu and is on the road down to Ballintoy harbour. It was built by a Cornish man called Newton Penprase and he worked on it for 40 years, starting in 1936.

It's a private house still and has duly been added onto my already long list of dream houses.

The Harbour at Ballintoy is pretty dramatic too. It reminds me of the seascape in the last scene of 'The Goonies' where one-eyed Willy's ship sails out.

Origami class at the Crescent.

Last weekend I led an origami workshop at the Crescent Arts Centre with eleven lovely ladies. I learnt a couple of new designs - a little fox that's simple enough to do with kids and a butterfly, and I was invited to do an origami class in a school in a couple of weeks, which  is nice!

There's a paper party decoration class on next month too if you may fancy learning how to make decorations for a party or wedding. Click here to book a spot through the Crescent Arts Centre. The class costs £16 and is on Sunday 1st April.

Selling our wares at St.George's market

For the last couple of months I've been working with a charity called the NOW project who work with adults with learning difficulties, helping them get into employment. We've been doing weekly craft workshops and today we had a go at selling the fruits of our labour at the Friday variety market.

Joanne and trainees Marie and Jacqueline behind our stall.

We made a reasonable profit for the charity and had a great time meeting some of the other traders at St.George's, a covered market which has been trading since 1896. The only thing I didn't enjoy was the 6 O'Clock start.

We're selling button hearts, jewellery, vinage teacup plants and cake stands. If you happen to be in Belfast we'll be there for the next couple of Fridays.

And I'll leave you with a picture of this amazing old lady I spotted at the market. Everything was pink even down to her scarf, earrings, ring and lipstick. Class.

Today's find

More religious paraphernalia to clutter up my home! But this one is unusual for being ceramic rather than plaster like most of the ones you find in Irish homes. It looks like it has a bit of age to it too. I couldn't resist.

You can just make out 'St. Joseph' written around the bottom of the statue but he's a bit of a mystery because Joseph is normally portrayed as a fairly benign father figure with a beard and brown robe while his guy is fresh-faced and carries a sword. Perhaps it's a whole other St.Joseph. Feel free to enlighten me in the comments.

As a side note, if you happen to be selling your house, and if you happen to believe in this sort of thing, a statue of St. Joseph is meant to help it sell quickly!